GOP primary suffers 'truly low turnout' as only MAGA voters show up to vote

When the Republican primary for Texas' 2026 U.S. Senate race was decided in a Tuesday, May 26 runoff, it wasn't even close: Incumbent Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) lost to Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton by roughly 27 percent, the New York Times reported. Bloomberg News' Steven Dennis has a major takeaway on the primary's outcome: extremely low voter turnout.

Dennis points to the turnout in Starr County, Texas, which is in the southern part of the state in the Rio Grande Valley, as a prime example.

The Bloomberg reporter, on X, noted, "There are 66000 people who live in Starr County. John Cornyn got 24 votes."

According to Daniel Nichanian, founder and editor of Bolts Magazine, Starr wasn't the only South Texas county where voter turnout was really low.

On X, Nichanian posted, "Truly low turnout in some counties in South Texas. In Starr County, Trump got roughly 9,500 votes in 2024. 90 votes counted in the GOP runoff today. In Webb County, Trump got roughly 33,300 votes in 2024. Roughly 2,300 voters today."

According to figures cited by Nichanian, the Webb County turnout in the May 26 runoff was a fraction of the Webb County turnout in the United States' 2024 presidential race.

Webb County's largest city is Laredo on the U.S./Mexico border.

Democratic strategist and insider Rachel Murphy Azzara had her own takeaway on the May 26 turnout, emphasizing that the most hardcore MAGA voters were the ones who showed up.

Azzara, on X, observed, "A couple takeaways: Cornyn's turnout operation fell short and only the most activist MAGA base bothered to vote."

Now that Paxton, who was endorsed by President Donald Trump, is officially the nominee, he enters the general election and is going up against the Democratic nominee: centrist Texas State Rep. James Talarico, a Presbyterian seminarian. And some well-known conservatives, including Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-South Dakota) and veteran Washington Post columnist George Will, believe the Senate seat is in play for Democrats.

Although Democrats perform well in Texas' large urban centers like Houston, Austin, Dallas and San Antonio, they haven't won a statewide race in the Lone Star State since 1994. But Paxton is a very controversial and divisive figure, even among conservatives — and Thune, during the Senate primary, warned fellow Republicans that Talarico would have a much harder time competing against Cornyn than he would against Paxton. Now, Paxton is officially the Republican that Talarico will be competing with in the general election, and GOP strategists are warning that their party will have to spend a lot money trying to defeat Talarico.