Quick hits here, as I was up past my bedtime…
All 17 constitutional amendments were on the path to passing. Most of them merited a No vote, but once these things get on the ballot they usually pass. Some Democratic legislators should be asked very pointed questions about why they supported them in the first place.
Harris County results were coming in slowly – the anecdotal evidence I got from social media is that there were still lines at several polling places after 7 PM – but we can draw some conclusions from the early vote.
Christian Menefee and Amanda Edwards led the way in CD18, with Menefee at 32.5% and Edwards at 25.2%. Jolanda Jones followed with 18.9%, and way farther back was Republican Carmen Montiel at 6.5%. Republican candidates in that race totaled about 13 percent of the total vote, a considerable dropoff from 2024.
Dwight Boykins and Alejandra Salinas led the way in Houston City Council At Large #4, with Boykins at 24%, Salinas at 21%, and Jordan Thomas at 16% – he did better than I expected, given how little money he had. Remember that you have to include Fort Bend County in the totals, which boosted Boykins. Sonia Rivera was in fourth place with just under ten percent. Dems collected well over 60% of the total vote in this one. Note that the AL4 runoff will be in December and the CD18 runoff will be in January or February. I figure CD18 turnout helped Boykins and Thomas, but Boykins won’t have that in the runoff. That makes it harder to predict how this one might go.
For HISD, Maria Benzon and Michael McDonough were cruising to victory, with the latter correcting the mistake voters made in 2021 by ousting incumbent Kendall Baker. Incumbent Bridget Wade had a seven point lead over challenger Audrey Nath, which is probably enough for her to hold on but not a guarantee. For HCC, incumbent Monica Flores Richart also cruised to re-election, while Reneee Jefferson Patterson was just under fifty percent in her three-way race. That runoff, if it happens, would also be in December.
Some good news from Cypress Fairbanks ISD:
In the hotly contested Cy-Fair ISD school board election, the slate of candidates running to overthrow the board’s conservative majority is on the way to achieving their goal, early vote totals show.
The challenging slate candidates — Lelsey Guilmart, Kendra Camarena and Cleveland Lane Jr. — all have leads in early returns, with roughly 34,000 ballots from early voting. The closest race is Position 7, where Camarena took in 49% of the votes and George Edwards Jr., part of the slates endorsed by the Harris County Republican Party, received 40% of the early votes cast.
In Position Six, fears of a split vote may become be reality, with the conservative incumbent candidates getting a majority of the vote. Board vice president Natalie Blasingame received 34% of the early returns while board president Scott Henry received 20% of early returns in a bid to keep his set. Blasingame is running to unseat Henry instead of keeping her current seat. On the opposing slate, Lane Jr. received 46% of the early vote totals.
The total ballots cast during early voting are about the same as two years ago. The total turnout that year was about 62,000 ballots, or 17% of the electorate in Cypress.
The opposing slate of candidates began organizing as early as January to oust Cy-Fair ISD’s current 6-1 conservative majority, which has veered the district in a far-right direction over the past two years. That slate included Guilmart, a school district staffing consultant and president of Cypress Families for Public Schools; Lane Jr., a professor of practice at Prarie View A&M University; and Camarena, director of partner engagement for Harris County Precinct 4. All have children in Cy-Fair ISD.
Cy-Fair does not do runoffs, so assuming no massive shift on Election Day all three Dems will win those seats. That’s a big deal.
The race to fill a Texas Senate seat representing much of Tarrant County appears to be heading to a runoff, according to early voting results Tuesday night.
Fort Worth Democrat Taylor Rehmet and Southlake Republican Leigh Wambsganss are on track to face each other in a Dec. 13 runoff for the remaining term of District 9, according to the unofficial results.
Election Day’s unofficial results are expected to be released later tonight.
Rehmet, an Air Force veteran and union organizer, and Wambsganss, chief communications officer for the Patriot Mobile wireless service provider, received more early votes than Republican John Huffman, former Southlake mayor, the results showed.
Rehmet leads with 44.12% of early votes, while Wambsganss received 40.17%. If no one secures over 50%, the two will face each other in the runoff.
You can see the results here. When I woke up in the morning, he was at 47.56%, with Wambsganss at 35.95%. To put this into some context, consider these results from SD09 in other recent elections.
2025 – Taylor Rehmet, 47.6%
2024 – Kamala Harris, 40.6%, and Colin Allred, 42.8%
2022 – Beto O’Rourke, 41.0%
2020 – Joe Biden, 42.6%
2018 – Beto O’Rourke, 43.6%
While that’s not a massive overperformance like we’ve seen in other special elections, it’s still noticeable. And Rehmet had much less money than either of the two Republicans. That needs to change for the runoff. Here’s another way to look at this:
Enthusiasm gap: With almost no cash the Democrat was able to get 18 percent of former VP Harris’ vote in SD9 while millions of dollars were spent for GOP candidate Wambsganss, who got about 11 percent of President Trump’s vote in the district so far http://bit.ly/4qHqZ3V
— Scott Braddock (@scottbraddock) 9:17 PM – 4 November 2025
Braddock doesn’t think Rehment can win the runoff, and I agree he’s the underdog. But let’s let this play out. And get Taylor Rehmet some financial support.
Austin Mayor Kirk Watson said voters have rejected Proposition Q, the controversial city-backed plan to raise more than $100 million in property tax revenue to pay for homeless services and other city projects.
Early voting totals show 67% of Austinites voted down the measure, while 33% of voters supported the property tax increase, according to Travis, Williamson and Hays county election officials.
That would be why Republicans in the Lege have pushed so hard to require votes on property tax rate increases. They’re hard to do.
I’ll have more thoughts later. Let me know what you think.
MORNING UPDATE: The Menefee-Edwards totals got a little closer, 29.26% to 25.67%. Alejandra Salinas slipped ahead of Dwight Boykins in Harris County, 21.27% to 20.40%, though I think Boykins’ edge in Fort Bend would leave them roughly tied overall. Looks like 397,314 ballots were cast, for 14.92% turnout, well above the previous two non-Mayoral years. About a third of the vote was cast yesterday, so early voting was the bulk of the ballots.
Oh, and the Spurs arena referendum passed. You can judge whether that’s good or not.