德州参议员选情胶着，预测市场交易量破千万美元

Texas is still a Republican state, but its 2026 Senate race is still not trading like a safe Republican hold.

Traders have poured in more than $10.6 million on Kalshi’s Texas Senate market, up from roughly $7.8 million in early August, when State Rep. James Talarico first drew even with Attorney General Ken Paxton in prediction markets.

Paxton is now back in front, but only barely, at 52%. Paxton was above 60% as recently as the beginning of August.

Polymarket tells an even more precarious story for Republicans. With nearly $1 million traded, Talarico is narrowly ahead at 51%.

Neither market is calling a winner. They are showing something that would have sounded far-fetched not long ago. The race for a Senate seat in Texas is effectively a coin flip.

And increasingly, Republicans are saying the same thing out loud.

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More money, no clarity

Kalshi has added roughly $2.8 million in new trading volume since early August, but the extra liquidity has not produced a consensus around Paxton. Instead, traders are still assigning the Republican only a narrow edge, while Polymarket has flipped in Talarico’s favor.

That divergence is not unusual in a close political market. Different liquidity pools, participants and timing can create small gaps between platforms.

But the broader message is the same: neither market believes Paxton has built a durable enough lead to price the race as anything close to safe.

The polling picture helps explain why.

An August Texas Public Opinion Research survey put Talarico ahead 48% to 42%, outside its 3.3-point margin of error. A University of Texas/Texas Politics Project poll found Talarico leading 42% to 39%.

Emerson College and Nexstar had the race essentially tied at 47% for Paxton and 46% for Talarico, while earlier Texas A&M Bush School and Texas Southern polling also showed narrow Talarico advantages.

Texas has not elected a Democrat to the Senate in decades. But markets are not trading on history alone. They are trading on a race where the recent polling has repeatedly shown Talarico either ahead or within a point or two of Paxton.

Republicans are worried

Sen. Ted Cruz called the race “effectively tied,” arguing that Paxton has already absorbed roughly $200 million in attacks while Talarico came through a relatively easy primary and has not yet faced comparable Republican scrutiny. Cruz still predicted that Paxton would win, but the acknowledgment itself is notable: A sitting Texas Republican senator is publicly describing the contest as a true toss-up.

Senate Majority Leader John Thune has also urged President Donald Trump and allied groups to put resources into Texas, saying Republicans “flat have to win there.” That is a remarkable posture for a state where a Senate race ordinarily would not demand national triage.

Trump has made the stakes even more explicit. During an appearance on Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick’s podcast, he called a Talarico victory a potential “disaster” for Texas, described Talarico as a “weirdo,” and praised Paxton as potentially the best attorney general in the country. Trump also warned that the race could go “bad very fast” if Republicans do not consolidate around Paxton.

The politics behind that concern are obvious. Republicans have a Senate majority to defend, and a Democratic pickup in Texas would radically change the party’s map. A state Democrats have treated as an expensive long-shot would suddenly become one of their most plausible routes to Senate control.

Dark money enters the race

The other major shift is money, especially money voters cannot easily trace.

Talarico’s campaign filed a complaint with the Federal Election Commission this week alleging that Paxton and his campaign treasurer used a nonprofit called Preserve Texas Inc. to route undisclosed money into a Paxton-aligned super PAC, Lone Star Liberty. The complaint asks the FEC to investigate whether the arrangement violated federal contribution and disclosure rules.

The underlying facts are politically damaging even before the FEC reaches any conclusion. Preserve Texas, a Virginia-based nonprofit, sent more than $1 million to Lone Star Liberty through four checks earlier this year. The nonprofit was incorporated by John Plishka, who is also the treasurer of Paxton’s Senate campaign, according to Virginia corporate records cited by CBS News.

Talarico’s campaign argues that connection makes the outside group effectively controlled by Paxton’s operation, meaning it could not legally raise or spend money outside normal federal campaign limits and disclosure requirements. Preserve Texas denies being controlled by Paxton or any campaign agent, describing itself as an independent 501(c)(4) focused on civic engagement and issue advocacy.

Lone Star Liberty, meanwhile, has launched a $15 million television advertising campaign across 18 Texas media markets. The FEC is unlikely to act before Election Day because it lacks enough commissioners to authorize an investigation, which means the complaint may become more of a campaign issue than an immediate legal threat.

For prediction market traders, that is another reason the race remains hard to price. The next stage of the contest will be shaped not only by polling, but by whether Republican outside spending changes voters’ view of Talarico before Democrats can answer.

Paxton’s gambling split

There is another Paxton story developing alongside the Senate market itself.

The Texas attorney general has long taken a hard line against gambling. A decade ago, Paxton concluded that daily fantasy sports operators DraftKings and FanDuel were offering illegal bets in Texas, and the state remains one of fewer than a dozen that ban online sports betting.

Yet Paxton has not joined the coalition of state attorneys general pushing back on prediction markets such as Kalshi and Polymarket. That puts him at odds with other Republican officials in Texas, including Patrick, who urged the Texas Senate in March to examine loopholes allowing prediction markets to operate in the state.

It is a notable distinction because Kalshi hosts the very market pricing Paxton’s chances of winning the Senate race. Texas users can trade event contracts tied to sports, local weather, elections, and Paxton himself, while the state maintains a broad prohibition on online sports betting.

Paxton’s silence is especially conspicuous as New Jersey has asked the United States Supreme Court to resolve whether sports event contracts are federally regulated swaps or state-regulated gambling. The Ninth Circuit recently ruled that Nevada can regulate Kalshi’s sports products as gambling, directly conflicting with an earlier Third Circuit ruling favoring Kalshi in New Jersey.

Politico reported that Paxton’s decision not to sign onto the anti-prediction market briefs could reflect a position closer to Trump’s, who has said he wants prediction markets to “thrive,” than to the state attorneys general arguing that platforms should be overseen by states.

A market for Senate control

The Texas market is now about more than Paxton and Talarico.

Kalshi’s 52% price on Paxton says traders still see a Republican hold as slightly more likely. Polymarket’s 51% to 50% lean toward Talarico says that edge is thin enough to disappear with a single credible poll, fundraising disclosure, advertising barrage or campaign mistake.

More than $10.6 million has traded on Kalshi alone as the market moved from a Paxton-favored race to a near dead heat. That is not simply speculative noise. It reflects a growing belief that Texas has become a live Senate-control contest, and that neither party can confidently say which side will be holding the edge in November.

The post Texas Senate Race Continues To Trade Like a Toss-Up as Paxton Holds a Thin Kalshi Edge appeared first on DeFi Rate.