DALLAS — President-elect Donald Trump and Sen. Ted Cruz secured decisive victories in Texas on Election Day, with both the presidential and Senate race results in the state being called relatively early Tuesday night.
With all precincts officially reporting their counts on Wednesday morning, we can see that Trump outpaced Vice President Kamala Harris 54% to 46% in Texas, earning more than 6.36 million votes to Harris’ 4.79 million votes.
Cruz’s 2024 margin was also decisive: He beat Allred 53% to 44% across the state, earning around 5.96 million votes to Allred’s 4.98 million.
By comparison, Trump beat President Joe Biden 52.1% to 46.5% in Texas in 2020, earning 5.89 million votes to Biden’s 5.25 million votes.
Cruz also improved his performance from the 2018 election, when he beat Democratic challenger Beto O’Rourke 50.9% to 48.3%, earning 4.24 million votes to O’Rourke’s 4.02 million votes.
The bottom line here: After decisive wins by Trump and Cruz, Texas is more red today than it has been in recent election years.
While Cruz got 400,000 less votes in Texas than Trump in this election, it didn’t matter. Polls showed the Cruz-Allred race was within the margin of error, but Cruz ended up with almost a 10-point lead in the end — a threshold he hadn’t reached in his previous two races for the U.S. Senate.
So: Where did these big Trump and Cruz gains come from?
One clear answer is found in Texas’ border counties.
Trump successfully flipped most of the Rio Grande Valley from blue to red this year as traditional Democratic strongholds like Brownsville, Harlingen, McAllen, Laredo switched to the Republican column Tuesday. Among the counties won by Trump this year was Starr County, which had voted Democratic in every single presidential election since 1896, according to the San Antonio Express-News.
Cruz, for his part, also made gains in the border counties compared to how things went in his 2018 race against Democratic challenger Beto O’Rourke.
With those storylines in mind, and with immigration one of the majors themes of these campaigns, let’s take a closer look at how each of the four key candidates this year — Trump and Harris in the presidential race and Cruz and Allred in the Senate race — performed in Texas’ border counties.
We’ll also compare those results to the previous election cycle (2020 for the presidential race, 2018 for the Senate race).
The Texas Tribune has full county-by-county map data for 2018, 2020 and 2024, as a reference point for the numbers below.
Here are the results:
Cameron County
2024
- Trump: 52.5% (60,925)
- Harris: 46.7% (54,156)
- Allred: 50.9% (58,320)
- Cruz: 46.6% (53,328)
2020
- Biden: 56.1% (64,063)
- Trump: 43.0% (49,032)
2018
- O’Rourke: 62.6% (48,656)
- Cruz: 36.7% (28,508)
Hidalgo County
2024
- Trump: 51.1% (110,415)
- Harris: 48.1% (103,952)
- Allred: 52.0% (109,577)
- Cruz: 45.5% (95,891)
2020
- Biden: 58.0% (128,199)
- Trump: 41.0% (90,527)
2018
- O’Rourke: 68.8% (104,234)
- Cruz: 30.7% (46,437)
Starr County
2024
- Trump: 57.7% (9,443)
- Harris: 41.8% (6,845)
- Cruz: 49.8% (7,040)
- Allred: 47.6% (6,730)
2020
- Biden: 52.1% (9,123)
- Trump: 47.1% (8,247)
2018
- O’Rourke: 76.7% (8,246)
- Cruz: 22.7% (2,436)
Zapata County
2024
- Trump: 61.0% (2,965)
- Harris: 38.5% (1,874)
- Cruz: 51.5% (2,193)
- Allred: 45.9% (1,954)
2020
- Trump: 52.5% (2,033)
- Biden: 47.1% (1,826)
2018
- O’Rourke: 62.6% (1,389)
- Cruz: 37.0% (820)
Webb County
2024
- Trump: 50.7% (33,383)
- Harris: 48.5% (31,958)
- Allred: 53.0% (33,760)
- Cruz: 44.2% (28,124)
2020
- Biden: 61.1% (41,820)
- Trump: 37.9% (25,898)
2018
- O’Rourke: 71.2% (35,142)
- Cruz: 28.0% (13,813)
Maverick County
2024
- Trump: 59.0% (9,282)
- Harris: 40.5% (6,368)
- Cruz: 49.5% (7,285)
- Allred: 46.5% (6,853)
2020
- Biden: 54.3% (8,332)
- Trump: 44.8% (6,881)
2018
- O’Rourke: 71.7% (7.724)
- Cruz: 27.4% (2,950)
Kinney County
2024
- Trump: 74.9% (1,062)
- Harris: 24.3% (345)
- Cruz: 70.0% (969)
- Allred: 28.2% (390)
2020
- Trump: 71.4% (1,144)
- Biden: 27.8% (446)
2018
- Cruz: 69.0% (827)
- O’Rourke: 29.9% (358)
Val Verde County
2024
- Trump: 62.9% (9,130)
- Harris: 36.2% (5,244)
- Cruz: 56.6% (8,038)
- Allred: 40.4% (5,744)
2020
- Trump: 54.2% (8,284)
- Biden: 44.3% (6,771)
2018
- O’Rourke: 52.3% (5,909)
- Cruz: 46.8% (5,290)
Terrell County
2024
- Trump: 77.5% (314)
- Harris: 22.5% (91)
- Cruz: 75.3% (301)
- Allred: 23.0% (92)
2020
- Trump: 72.9% (334)
- Biden: 26.0% (119)
2018
- Cruz: 69.3% (323)
- O’Rourke: 29.6% (138)
Brewster County
2024
- Trump: 55.6% (2,537)
- Harris: 43.1% (1,967)
- Cruz: 53.3% (2,415)
- Allred: 44.0% (1,995)
2020
- Trump: 51.0% (2,461)
- Biden: 46.8% (2,258)
2018
- O’Rourke: 52.7% (2,144)
- Cruz: 45.9% (1,868)
Presidio County
2024
- Harris: 64.7% (1,288)
- Trump: 34.4% (686)
- Allred: 64.3% (1,247)
- Cruz: 33.6% (651)
2020
- Biden: 66.0% (1,463)
- Trump: 32.5% (721)
2018
- O’Rourke: 73.8% (1,172)
- Cruz: 25.6% (406)
Hudspeth County
2024
- Trump: 72.5% (747)
- Harris: 26.4% (272)
- Cruz: 69.90% (694)
- Allred: 27.8% (280)
2020
- Trump: 66.9% (779)
- Biden: 31.8% (371)
2018
- Cruz: 54.5% (506)
- O’Rourke: 43.5% (404)
El Paso County
2024
- Harris: 56.9% (142,879)
- Trump: 41.8% (104,966)
- Allred: 57.9% (141,558)
- Cruz: 38.0% (92,853)
2020
- Biden: 66.8% (178,126)
- Trump: 31.6% (84,331)
2018
- O’Rourke: 74.4% (149,457)
- Cruz: 25.0% (50,288)