Democrat Taylor Rehmet wins Texas State Senate 9 Runoff, flipping the seat from R to D

[In It to Win It]

Projected by DDHQ - https://election-night.decisiondeskhq.com/date/2026-01-31/593273

JUST IN: Democrats flip a red seat in the Texas Senate.

Taylor Rehmet wins against Leigh Wambsganss, a conservative activist who helped lead right-wing efforts to take over TX school boards.

With all early vote, and 95% of precincts, in, Dem up 57/43.

Trump won this seat by 17% in Tarrant County.

— Taniel (@taniel.bsky.social) 2026-02-01T05:05:10.086Z

[RandySF]

1. DDHQ just called it.

[yellow dahlia]

2. Interesting #'s.

[RandySF]

3. Someone on social media said.....

the killer issue was the Republican's support of splitting the Keller School District.

[dalton99a]

4. Kick

[LetMyPeopleVote]

5. This is great news

Link to tweet

[LetMyPeopleVote]

6. This is great news

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[calimary]

7. Excellent!!!

Winning helps us heal our damaged country, one election at a time!

[C Moon]

8. Hurray!!!

[BlueWaveNeverEnd]

9. yay!

[LetMyPeopleVote]

10. I have been active in Texas politics for a long time and I am still hoping that Texas will turn blue

I have been following some demographic trends for a while that would indicate that Texas should turn blue. Texas is getting older and more urban. Texas was more republican that these trends would indicate in 2024 in large part because Hispanics voted for trump and the GOP in larger numbers than what one would expect. I grew up in or near the Rio Grand Valley that went for trump. I was surprised by this result.

Last night was a great result in a state senate runoff race where a Democrat won a seat by 14 percentage points that trump won by 17 percentage points.

Link to tweet

If this swing was held up nationally, Texas would be blue as would the rest of the country

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This race was largely symbolic in that the next time the next time the Texas legis will be in session will be after the November elections and special elections are not necessarily representative of national/regular elections.

I am encouraged by the fact that Hispanic voters in SD 9 went for the Democrat.

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In Texas, there is a racist tradition called sundown towns where non-whites used to have to be out of the city limits by sundown or face lynching. Vidor Texas is one such city. The democrat in this race flipped a local sundown city in this race

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These results are encouraging to me. I still believe that Texas will turn blue. trump's alienation of Hispanic voters should continue given the current ICE operations.

[LetMyPeopleVote]

11. GOP's gerrymander bet is built on Trump's 2024 Latino surge -- but support is already slipping.

{𝗮𝙅𝙎𝘿}: GOP’s gerrymander bet is built on Trump’s 2024 Latino surge — but support is already slipping. Texas seats once thought safe are shaky, and demographic shifts blunt map-rigging. Even with SCOTUS poised to gut the VRA, Dayen notes: maps can’t save an unpopular Trump.

— 𝐚𝐧𝐝𝐲 𝐉.𝐒. 𝐃𝐞𝐜𝐞𝐩𝐢𝐝𝐚 🇨🇦 🇺🇦 ¬1É© (@ajsdecepida.bsky.social) 2025-08-30T18:10:10.123Z

[Torchlight]

12. This is delightful!

Flipping a deep-red Texas Senate seat by 14 points is no small thing in Tarrant county. Huge win for voters, public schools, and the idea that organizing actually works.