[DannyTN]

Texas Democrats have really outdone themselves this time.

Was this an open primary? I’d like to think Republican’s wouldn’t stoop this low, but did republicans influence this?

[Wallace T.]

Twenty years ago, Andrew White would have won the Democrat primary, with Lupe Valdez a distant second. The “yellow dog” Democrats in rural Texas and among working class whites are gone now. The national Democrat Party put some serious money on Wendy Davis in 2014, yet she lost by 20 points to Greg Abbott. I don't think either Valdez (a real Hispanic) or “Beto” O'Rourke (maybe a remote ancestor was shipwrecked off the Irish coast after the defeat of the Spanish Armada) will receive much funding from liberal moneybags. Both Abbott and Ted Cruz received double the vote in the Republican primary as their combined opponents did on the Democrat side. After wasting north of $1 billion on Hillary Clinton, the media, finance, and tech moguls will invest more strategically this year.

[PAR35]

Texas has a semi-open primary. If you vote in the Republican primary (and there were some hotly contested congressional and down-ballot races, although not at the top of the ticket), you can’t vote in the Democrat run-off (and vice versa). Indeed, you can’t vote in any of the opposing parties races in any special elections until the next two year cycle.

But other than that, there is no registration by party.

So, hypothetically, for example, if I voted in the contested Republican primaries for Congress and state senate (and took a potshot at Ted in the primary), I couldn’t vote in the Lupe - White runoff (or, for that matter, the democrat congressional runoff in the district). But if I had stayed at home in the March primary, I could have participated this time around.