Deep in the heart of Texas, they used to say the place was “heaven for men and dogs, but hell for women and oxen.” If only those bygone jokesters could’ve lived to see the Texas of 2027 – with a woman as governor, a woman as lieutenant governor, a woman comptroller (in charge of the state’s finances), a woman as chief justice of the state Supremes, and a woman as state House Speaker.

The blue tsunami decimated the white Republican power structure up and down the ballot, from the election of a Democratic senator for the first time since 1988 to the Democratic takeover of the powerful state Board of Education, which decides whether Texas schoolchildren learn real history or the sanitized versions propagated by the ruling Republicans. All told, this historic midterm election was the Texas miracle that Democrats everywhere have long pined for and feared would never happen.

And most importantly, looking ahead to the presidential race in 2028, the political transformation of Texas threatens to make the national map hell for MAGA.

Granted, nothing in politics is permanent; even though Republicans were wiped out in the 1974 midterms (thanks to fallout from the Watergate scandal), they roared back to power six years later, winning the Senate with Ronald Reagan at the helm. But at least for the foreseeable future, the seismic Democratic earthquake in Texas – until now, the GOP’s crown jewel – has reshaped the electoral map.

California and New York are impregnably blue, and if Dems can take Texas, that’s 122 electoral votes from the big three – roughly 45 percent of what’s needed for victory. And if they add their reliably blue states, plus blue-trending Georgia and North Carolina, there are multiple winning scenarios.

By contrast, the red cult has virtually no path to power without Texas. If you don’t believe me, take it from Ron DeSantis, the lame-duck Florida governor: “If the Republican party doesn’t have Texas as an anchor, then we’re not going to be viable nationally going forward.”

Texas Republicans had long employed various schemes to suppress minority turnout – from gerrymandering to the closure of polling stations – but judgment day finally arrived. And rest assured with a Democratic administration in Austin, there will be full and fair opportunities in 2028 for minorities to vote without fear of MAGA trickery. The same sunny scenario is likely elsewhere; thanks to the midterm elections, Democrats will control nine of the 10 most populous states – and the election machinery therein.

Given that reality, Republicans will need to break with Trump – while he’s still in the White House – and nominate a candidate who can reform the party, someone who can restore decency, who can appeal to educated people, someone who can connect with a racially and ethnically diverse electorate. Ask yourself what are the odds of all that happening.

Granted, nothing is certain. Democrats are always capable of screwing things up. In Austin, the new blue team will have to deal with a hostile state Senate, which, as the last redoubt of Republican power, will devote its energies to thwarting the team at every turn. Plus, the Texas business community has outsize clout; we’ll see how they feel about dealing with a Democratic railroad commissioner, who’s tasked with overseeing – and regulating – the oil and gas industries.

But those are issues for another day. There’s still time to bask in what just happened; witness, for instance, the decisive defeat of the racist MAGAt who ran for railroad commissioner. He’d ranted on social media about the need to “rid our state of third world foreigners,” including skilled south Asians who’d arrived with legal work visas. Voters decided they were fed up with that kind of crap.

Indeed the Texas midterm results can be read as the state’s final break with its ignominious roots. Texas broke with Mexico and established independent statehood in 1836 because Mexico had abolished slavery and Texas was determined to keep it. And Texas broke with the Union in 1861 because its leaders said they were determined to preserve “the servitude of the African to the white race.”

The original Texas miracle, its economic prowess, was built on the backs of people deemed to be inferior. The midterm miracle, a fervent expression of political power, feels like an historic corrective. Republicans plotting the next presidential race will spend two years grappling with the fallout.

Copyright 2026 Dick Polman, distributed exclusively by Cagle Cartoons newspaper syndicate. Dick Polman, a veteran national political columnist based in Philadelphia and a Writer in Residence at the University of Pennsylvania, writes the Subject to Change newsletter. Email him at [email protected]