What to watch in the CNN & Jubilee town hall with James Talarico

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James Talarico’s bid to become the first Democrat in a generation to win statewide in Texas after three decades of disappointments is in its final stretch.

The Democratic state representative is set to appear on CNN at 8 p.m. ET Wednesday for a joint town hall with Jubilee, moderated by Erin Burnett. Viewers can stream it live with an All Access subscription .

It comes just days before early voting begins in Talarico’s race against Republican Attorney General Ken Paxton in one of the most important contests on the map, as Democrats seek the net gain of four seats they’d need to win majority control of the Senate.

In a sign of how critical the Texas race is to both parties, spending on television advertisements surpassed $500 million this week, according to AdImpact.

Here’s what to watch in Talarico’s town hall:

Talarico dropped off the campaign trail for several days before making multiple public appearances this past weekend — an absence his campaign chalked up to a bad case of the flu.

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But conservative influencers spun up a much different explanation. Some pushed a hoax that Talarico had been at a mental health facility in Ohio — claims that were amplified by Paxton’s allies on social media.

That claim was debunked by the mental health center in question, which released an extraordinarily unusual statement making clear that Talarico had never been there, as well as by Talarico’s campaign, which provided time-stamped security camera images showing him at his home each day of his absence.

It was the latest in a series of fabrications Talarico has faced during his Senate run. Perhaps the most common among them: The claim that he is a vegan. (Talarico responded to that claim this spring by posting on social media a photo of himself biting into a turkey leg at the Texas State Fair.)

Republicans are spending hundreds of millions of dollars on campaign ads against Talarico. In ads, speeches by President Donald Trump and other allies of Paxton and on conservative social media channels, Texans are being introduced to a candidate that pushes what Republicans describe as transgender ideology, opposes the state’s energy industry and won’t eat Texas’ famous barbecue.

“While we may laugh at James Talarico for all of the goofy stuff that he says, the simple fact is, he is dead serious. He is crazy, and we cannot elect ‘Tala-freako’ to the US Senate,” Vice President JD Vance said while campaigning Tuesday in Texas.

The town hall will afford the state lawmaker an opportunity to counter that image — and to highlight the parts of his profile, including his studies as a seminary student, that helped him rocket to fame early this year.

It’s a format Talarico has shown he’s comfortable with. He spoke with 20 undecided voters in a Jubilee town hall last December. And his two-and-a-half hour appearance on Joe Rogan’s podcast in the summer of 2025 — the one in which Rogan told Talarico that he should be president — helped jump-start Talarico’s political aspirations.

Talarico will also look to go on offense, and he’s likely to use the town hall to cast Paxton as corrupt — a message that has been the focus of many of the ads aired by the Democrat and his allies.

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The latest damaging story about Paxton came Monday when The Wall Street Journal reported that he’d spent New Year’s Eve of 2024 partying in Dubai with a girlfriend and two fugitives who had been indicted in the United States on health care fraud charges. (A Paxton spokesperson told the Journal that Paxton had been “politically persecuted” but didn’t directly address the Dubai trip.)

But Paxton has faced a long line of ethics controversies . He was indicted on securities fraud charges in 2015. In 2023, the Texas House impeached him after Paxton requested more than $3 million in state funds to settle whistleblower complaints tied to allegations of corruption and abuse of office. (Paxton has also generally dismissed those allegations as politically motivated; he was acquitted by the state Senate.)

His estranged wife, state Sen. Angela Paxton, filed for divorce in July 2025 “on biblical grounds,” alleging adultery.

It all helps explain why many Republicans lobbied Trump not to do what he ultimately did: endorse Paxton in his successful bid to oust Republican Sen. John Cornyn in a primary runoff earlier this year.

But until a Democrat proves otherwise, Texas remains a reliably Republican state. And the question Talarico faces is whether he can convince Republicans who have deep misgivings about Paxton to break with the party — or at least stay home.

Urging those long-time GOP voters to stick with the party’s ticket — even Paxton — is Angela Paxton. In an ad funded by a super PAC linked to Senate GOP leadership, the state senator avoids using her estranged husband’s name but tells viewers that “it’s not as much about the individual players on the team. It’s about getting the whole team across the finish line.”

“Either we hold every Republican seat, or we hand the future of Texas to the other team,” she said in the ad, which began airing earlier this month.

Talarico’s effort to court moderate voters and Republicans alienated by Paxton must overcome the GOP effort to portray him — as Vance described Talarico on Tuesday — as “a threat to your way of life.”

One of the thorniest issues for Talarico could be his past comments in support of transgender people. He said during a 2021 legislative debate that “God is nonbinary,” a comment he has since said “missed the mark.”

Talarico, and Democrats across the political map, have lambasted Trump’s war with Iran, which has sent gas prices soaring. He has said he’d seek to address the nation’s cost of living struggles by banning big investors from making single-family home purchases and providing first-time homebuyers with downpayment assistance, as well as repealing Trump’s tariffs and suspending the federal taxes on gas and diesel.

It’s up to Texas voters to decide whether those arguments outweigh the GOP’s efforts to portray Talarico as too liberal for the state — particularly on issues like transgender rights, immigration and more.

卡拉汉·奥黑尔/《华盛顿邮报》/盖蒂图片社

詹姆斯·塔拉里科 (James Talarico) 竞选德克萨斯州州长，力图成为一代人以来首位赢得全州选举的民主党人，此前他已经历了三十年的挫败。目前，他的竞选已进入最后阶段。

这位民主党州代表将于美国东部时间周三晚8点在CNN与朱比利党联合举办一场市政厅会议，会议由艾琳·伯内特主持。观众可以通过订阅CNN All Access观看直播。

就在塔拉里科与共和党总检察长肯·帕克斯顿的竞选提前投票开始前几天，民主党人正寻求净增四个席位，以赢得参议院的多数席位，这是选情最为重要的竞选之一。

据 AdImpact 数据显示，本周德克萨斯州的竞选对两党都至关重要，电视广告支出超过 5 亿美元。

以下是塔拉里科市政厅会议的看点：

塔拉里科在竞选活动中消失了几天，直到上周末才多次公开露面——他的竞选团队将此次缺席归咎于他得了重感冒。

盖蒂图片社/Gary Miller

但保守派意见领袖却炮制了截然不同的解释。一些人散布谣言，称塔拉里科曾去过俄亥俄州的一家精神健康机构——帕克斯顿的盟友在社交媒体上放大了这些说法。

该说法遭到涉事精神健康中心的驳斥，该中心发表了一份极其罕见的声明，明确表示塔拉里科从未去过那里。塔拉里科的竞选团队也提供了带有时间戳的监控录像，显示在他缺席的每一天，他都在家中。

这是塔拉里科在参议员竞选期间遭遇的一系列捏造事实中的最新一起。其中最常见的或许是：有人声称他是素食主义者。（今年春天，塔拉里科在社交媒体上发布了一张自己在德克萨斯州博览会上啃火鸡腿的照片，以此回应了这一说法。）

共和党人花费数亿美元用于攻击塔拉里科的竞选广告。在广告、唐纳德·特朗普总统和帕克斯顿其他盟友的演讲以及保守派社交媒体平台上，德州民众了解到，塔拉里科宣扬共和党人所称的跨性别意识形态，反对该州的能源产业，而且不吃德州著名的烤肉。

“虽然我们可能会嘲笑詹姆斯·塔拉里科说的那些傻话，但事实是，他是认真的。他疯了，我们不能选‘塔拉怪人’进美国参议院，”副总统JD·万斯周二在德克萨斯州竞选时说道。

市政厅会议将为这位州议员提供一个机会，让他扭转这种形象，并突出他个人经历中那些帮助他在今年年初迅速成名的部分，包括他作为神学院学生的学习经历。

塔拉里科已经证明他很适应这种形式。去年12月，他在“禧年”市政厅会议上与20位尚未决定投票意向的选民进行了交流。2025年夏天，他做客乔·罗根的播客节目，进行了两个半小时的访谈——罗根在节目中告诉塔拉里科他应该竞选总统——这帮助塔拉里科开启了他的政治抱负。

塔拉里科也将寻求发起进攻，他可能会利用市政厅会议将帕克斯顿描绘成腐败分子——这一信息一直是这位民主党人及其盟友投放的许多广告的重点。

Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images

周一，《华尔街日报》报道称，帕克斯顿在2024年新年夜与女友和两名在美国因医疗保健欺诈指控而被起诉的逃犯在迪拜狂欢，这无疑是对帕克斯顿最新的不利报道。（帕克斯顿的一位发言人告诉《华尔街日报》，帕克斯顿受到了“政治迫害”，但没有直接回应迪拜之行。）

但帕克斯顿长期以来一直面临着道德争议。他于2015年因证券欺诈罪被起诉。2023年，在帕克斯顿要求动用超过300万美元的州政府资金来解决与腐败和滥用职权指控相关的举报人投诉后，德克萨斯州众议院对他发​​起了弹劾。（帕克斯顿通常否认这些指控，称其出于政治动机；他最终被州参议院宣告无罪。）

他的分居妻子、州参议员安吉拉·帕克斯顿于 2025 年 7 月以“圣经理由”提出离婚，指控他犯有通奸罪。

这一切都有助于解释为什么许多共和党人游说特朗普不要做他最终做的事情：支持帕克斯顿在今年早些时候的初选决胜轮中成功击败共和党参议员约翰·科宁。

但除非有民主党人证明德克萨斯州并非如此，否则它仍然是共和党的铁票仓。塔拉里科面临的问题是，他能否说服那些对帕克斯顿深感不满的共和党人脱离党派——或者至少待在家中不投票。

安吉拉·帕克斯顿敦促那些长期支持共和党的选民继续支持该党候选人——即使是帕克斯顿本人。在一则由与参议院共和党领导层有关联的超级政治行动委员会资助的广告中，这位州参议员避开了她分居丈夫的名字，但她告诉观众，“重要的不是团队中的个人，而是整个团队能否最终获胜。”

“要么我们保住所有共和党席位，要么我们就把德克萨斯州的未来拱手让给对方，”她在本月早些时候开始播出的广告中说道。

塔拉里科努力争取温和派选民和因帕克斯顿而疏远的共和党人，但他必须克服共和党人试图将他描绘成“对你生活方式的威胁”的努力——正如万斯周二对塔拉里科的描述那样。

对塔拉里科来说，最棘手的问题之一可能是他过去支持跨性别者的言论。他在2021年的一次立法辩论中说“上帝是非二元性别的”，但他后来又表示，这一言论“不得要领”。

塔拉里科和各党派的民主党人都猛烈抨击特朗普对伊朗发动的战争，这场战争导致汽油价格飙升。他表示，他将通过禁止大型投资者购买独栋住宅、为首次购房者提供首付援助、废除特朗普的关税以及暂停征收汽油和柴油的联邦税等措施，来解决美国的生活成本问题。

德克萨斯州的选民将决定，这些论点是否比共和党努力将塔拉里科描绘成对该州而言过于自由派的立场更有说服力——尤其是在跨性别者权利、移民等问题上。