AUSTIN, Texas — Texas Democratic Party Chair Gilberto Hinojosa announced his resignation Friday after devastating election losses where the Democratic ticket severely underperformed.
In a statement, Hinojosa acknowledged that his party, “Suffered devastating defeats up and down the ballot In Texas and across the country,” and that, “It is imperative that our Democratic leaders across the country reevaluate what is best for our party and embrace the next generation of leaders to take us through the next four years of Trump and win back seats up and down the ballot.”
Hinojosa noted that he would step down in March after the Democratic Party’s spring meeting. Under the party’s rules, the executive committee will appoint someone to finish out his term.
Hinojosa added that he would help the committee find a new Chair.
Hinojosa was reelected to a four-year term in 2022.
Controversial comments made by Hinojosa
In an interview with public radio’s The Texas Newsroom earlier this week, Hinojosa seemingly hung the election losses on how Democrats handled transgender rights.
Reporter Lauren McGaughy shared the interview with KVUE Friday, in which Hinojosa said:
“You could, for example, you can support transgender rights up and down all the categories where the issue comes up, or you can understand that there’s certain things that we just go too far on, that a big bulk of our population does not support.”
While Hinojosa apologized for the “pain and frustration” his words caused and reiterated his support for the LGBTQ+ community, it left a stain.
“Our community was somehow put in this space where it was our fault that these massive losses happened across the state of Texas,” said Equality Texas Interim CEO Brad Pritchett. “I hope that party leadership has recognized that it is not a good idea to hang losses around one community that is so extremely loyal to the party.”
Democrats fail to turn Texas blue, again
Tuesday’s red wave once again washed out hopes of Democratic gains in Texas.
For a political party that has tried and failed repeatedly to turn the state blue, Josh Black with the Texas Politics Project said it’s time for Democrats to do some “serious soul searching.”
“For many, many years, [Texas Democrats] been saying that the electorate in Texas isn’t Republican; it’s just low turnout, but we’ve had a number of high turnout elections now which Democrats have lost,” said Black.
Black pointed to the consistent effort made by Republicans to grow their coalition, especially among Hispanics, which he said didn’t happen overnight.
“While Republican efforts to increase their vote totals have been clear and obvious, it’s not clear the Democrats have had the same discipline and consistency in their efforts in the state,” said Black.
However, there were some anomalies in Tuesday’s election.
While Congressman Colin Allred lost in his attempt to unseat Republican U.S. Senator Ted Cruz, Allred outperformed Vice President Kamala Harris at the top of the Democratic ticket. Black said that could have something to do with how Allred distanced himself from the Biden administration on border issues.
“That should be a signal to Democrats that they might need to rethink what is currently orthodoxy in the party around some of these issues,” said Black.
KVUE reached out to the Texas Democratic Party on Friday, but did not receive a response at the time of publication.