Revenge Of The Establishment
Progressives deferred, right on schedule.
Today, the Texas Observer published, “What Does the Allred-Johnson Runoff Tell Us About Texas Dems?” It’s riveting. They actually come to almost the same conclusion that I did in my coverage of that race last week. Neither candidate is great, and this is fundamentally a lesser-evil situation.
However, over the weekend, Colin Allred endorsed Talarico in an interview with Politico, shortly before adding that Talarico needs to show contrition. So, at least on its face, Allred is trying harder to win back favor with progressives.
TX33 is far from the only race with this kind of noise. And it got me to thinking.
What do we, as people who participate in the electorate and vote together under the Democratic tent, want?
We’ve talked a lot about ideology and policy here, at Lone Star Left, but I’m not sure that we’ve discussed outcomes too much. I wrote down my ideology on the About Page years ago.
But you would think, no matter which side of the ideological spectrum you’re on, as participants in this Democratic process, who’ve decided to be team members, isn’t there a baseline that most of us can agree on?
Don’t we want people to eat?
Don’t we want people to have access to healthcare?
Shouldn’t workers be paid fairly for their labor?
Do we want the planet to still exist in fifty years?
How about getting the government to stop treating brown and Black communities like revenue streams for the detention industrial complex?
None of that is radical. Most of it polls above 60%.
The radicalism is in how hard the establishment fights to prevent any of it from happening.
And that’s the problem. Because the Democratic Party, particularly its corporate wing, has spent the last three decades making a calculated bet that those goals can be endlessly deferred in exchange for electability.
That’s the Third Way project, born out of the Clinton era, the idea that Democrats could win by moving right on economics, softening on corporate regulation, and dressing up incrementalism as pragmatism.
In Texas, that playbook looks like Julie Johnson sitting on the Homeland Security Committee while trading Palantir stock. It looks like Henry Cuellar, who spent years as the most conservative Democrat in the House, taking energy industry money while representing one of the poorest districts on the southern border. The establishment produces these outcomes. It funds them and then asks us to be grateful we didn’t get a Republican.
Then, there is the HD41 situation.
Nowhere is the establishment’s grip in Texas more visible and more damaging than in the RGV. The RGV has some of the lowest voter turnout in the entire country, and in a region where three points is often the margin between a Republican and a Democrat who votes like one anyway. Conservative Democrats have dominated the border for decades, because low turnout is the establishment’s best friend. When working-class, majority-Hispanic communities stay home, the electorate shrinks to the people the machine can mobilize. And the machine has been very, very well funded.
The logic is circular. Establishment Democrats in the Valley tack right to avoid being painted as soft, which suppresses enthusiasm among the base, which tanks turnout, which means the only people showing up are the ones the party apparatus can move. Henry Cuellar, Vicente González, Richard Raymond, Sergio Muñoz, and Bobby Guerra (yes, him too). They help the Republicans comfortably keep their promises, all while representing some of the poorest districts in America. The establishment protected him through primary after primary, pouring money into stopping progressive challengers like Jessica Cisneros, not once but twice. Three points. And the party spent millions to make sure those three points stayed in Cuellar’s column instead of going to someone who might actually fight for the people living under the green palace’s shadow.
Progressives picking up a win in HD41 is imperative to the progressive movement in Texas.
During the three-way primary, both Eric Holguin and Julio Salinas exposed the third candidate, Seby Heddad, for allegedly participating in Republican meetings and activities.
Heddad, the candidate who received the endorsement of retiring Conservative Democrat Bobby Guerra.
Since then, copies of Heddad’s alleged voting record have been posted on the internet, which show him voting in Republican primary elections.
Holguin lost in the primary, and the runoff is between Salinas and Heddad.
Lone Star Left endorsed Salinas.
Julio Salinas is a solid progressive with experience in the Texas Legislature, and after years of living under fascism, we don’t need more of the same.
Democrats need to flip 14 seats, but they also need to make sure their current members are on their side. Many of the Conservative Democrats CAN NOT be trusted. We saw that during the last quorum break in the 89th Legislative Session. I still have the receipts. Is now the time to talk about names?
All of Texas, not just the RGV, needs Julio Salinas to win that seat.
It could mean real pressure for living wages in a region where poverty is structural and generational. It could mean fighting the detention machine instead of funding it. It could mean demanding that the water crisis down there be treated as the public emergency it is, rather than a business opportunity.
LET ME MAKE THIS PERFECTLY CLEAR. I don’t care what it’s about or who is involved, nor do I want people emailing me, tagging me, or sending me “tea.”
After Holguin lost, I called him an establishment liberal. He was unhappy about that. However, what happened next was almost like foreshadowing. I told you so.
Holguin, after coming out so hard against Heddad during the primary, warning everyone about Heddad’s GOP proclivities, hasn’t fully endorsed Salinas, along with the activists who previously supported him. Not because of a sudden lightbulb moment or policy position. Nope.
Because a bunch of activists and organizers are fighting.
Fucking, seriously.
We had Conservative Democrats from that very region last year who were willing to give Republicans a quorum to pass their racist maps.
So, again, we talk about values and wanting the same thing. What is that?
Because we have to recognize NOW why Texas is a fascist state.
While we’re busy fighting each other over group chat drama, the establishment is busy building a billion-dollar private water plant on South Padre Island that’s going to pump brine discharge into the Laguna Madre.
We’ll have water. Maybe. But we’re going to kill a lot of fish and turtles in the process.
Not a word about why the Rio Grande is dying. Not a word about water rights, agricultural policy, or the upstream diversions that have been bleeding the river for decades. The answer being handed to the Valley is a billion dollars to a private company, one with deep ties to the Israeli government, to own the infrastructure that should belong to the public. At the same time, the brine discharge quietly destroys one of the most ecologically sensitive bodies of water on the Gulf Coast.
This is what the establishment delivers. Monetized problems with a ribbon on top.
And this is exactly why HD41 matters.
Julio Salinas in that seat means someone in Austin who will ask who profits, who pays, and who drowns. The establishment has spent decades making sure the RGV stays manageable. Low turnout. Conservative proxies. Circular logic dressed up as pragmatism.
So the question isn’t whether you agree with every position Julio Salinas has ever taken. The question is whether you want the machine to win again, in a district it has run into the ground for thirty years, while activists fight each other on the internet, and a private Israeli desalination company gets a billion-dollar contract to finish off the Gulf.
Early voting in this race starts on May 18!
You can learn more about Julio Salinas on his website, Facebook, Instagram, or Twitter.
If you’re in this district, consider volunteering.
And if you have it, consider donating.
May 2, 2026: Last day to receive ballot by mail (City elections/SD04 Special Election)
May 2, 2026: Election day! (City elections/SD04 Special Election)
May 15, 2026: Last day to apply to vote by mail (Democratic primary runoff elections)
May 18, 2026: First day of early voting (Democratic primary runoff elections)
May 22, 2026: Last day of early voting (Democratic primary runoff elections)
May 26, 2026: Last day to receive ballot by mail (Democratic primary runoff elections)
May 26, 2026: Election day! (Democratic primary runoff elections)
Click here to find out what Legislative districts you’re in.
LoneStarLeft is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.
Thank you, Michelle! The timing was perfect during the 2nd intermission of the Stars game, lol. I already shared it to bsky 'cause I'm sleeping in tomorrow!
It is so appalling to see South Texas and the Gulf be poisoned and oppressed by the petrochemical industry, now also apparently by water profiteers, SpaceX, and who knows who else. The midterms will occur against the backdrop of private prison companies building a dozen private prisons, no better than cattle pens, all along the Texas border, with much more capacity than can be justified by current detention levels. I hope South Texans are looking at these prisons knowing that they are built for them, including descendants of the Tejanos who have been in TX for 400 years, long before Anglo American settlement. And after them, who? Descendants of the enslaved after they're stripped of their citizenship? Indian tribal members? Democrats? Journalists? Women of child bearing age?