Republican Sen. John Cornyn is reportedly worried Trump could lose Texas

Could President Trump become the first Republican candidate in 44 years to lose Texas?

It sounds unlikely, but some Texas GOP officials are warning the president's re-election team to take the threat of Texas turning blue seriously, The Washington Examiner reports. Among those with concerns are Texas GOP Chairman James Dickey and Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas). “We are talking to everyone,” Dickey told the Examiner. "The challenges we face in Texas are very real."

Republicans are especially worried, the report says, about the possibility of former Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Julián Castro, who served as mayor of San Antonio, or Rep. Beto O'Rourke (D-Texas) becoming the nominee. Castro has already launched his 2020 campaign, while O'Rourke has not yet said whether he will run.

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up

Every Republican presidential candidate in the past four decades has won Texas; the last Democrat to take the state was Jimmy Carter in 1976, and Trump carried 52 percent of Texas' vote in 2016. But as the Examiner explains, Democrats did particularly well there in the 2018 midterms, with O'Rourke coming within striking distance of Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) and with Democrats successfully flipping two Republican House seats.

As a result, Republicans are urging Trump to devote resources to the state that might normally seem unnecessary, especially because Cornyn warns that if Texas turns blue, "we'll never elect another Republican [president] in my lifetime." Read more at The Washington Examiner.