Texas independence campaigner Daniel Miller has written an article arguing that Democratic wins across the Lone Star State on Tuesday will help Texan nationalists break away from the United States. In the article for the Texian Partisan, the official news website of the Texas Nationalist Movement (TNM), which he leads, Miller said: “I believe no organization in Texas comes out of this election in a better position to do what it exists to do than the Texas Nationalist Movement.” TNM leader Daniel Miller sent Newsweek an exclusive quote, saying, "Tuesday changed who holds power in Austin. It didn’t change who Texas belongs to.
More than 700,000 Texans have signed up with this movement, more than the winning margin in 16 of the 18 statewide races. The new governor demanded a vote of the people on vouchers and asked Abbott’s office, 'What are you afraid of?' On a vote for independence, I’m asking her the same question." Newsweek contacted the Texas Democratic Party for comment on Thursday via email. Tuesday’s midterm elections saw historic wins for Democrats across Texas, a state that backed Donald Trump by 56.1 percent of the vote against Kamala Harris’s 42.5 percent in the 2024 presidential election.
Democrat Gina Hinojosa was elected as the next and first Hispanic governor of Texas with 52.8 percent of the vote, defeating Republican incumbent Greg Abbott, who received 45.7 percent. In the battle for the Texas U.S. Senate seat up for election, Democrat James Talarico beat the GOP’s Ken Paxton, the state's attorney general, with 55.1 percent of the vote to 43 percent.
This makes Talarico the first Democrat to be elected to the Senate by Texan voters since Lloyd Bentsen in 1988. Democrats also took control of the Texas House of Representatives for the first time since 2000, ending more than two decades of Republican control. While final results are pending, they have flipped at least the 14 seats needed for a majority, and on Wednesday were projected to gain 21, according to The Texas Tribune.
Down-ballot Democrats also won elections to be Texas’s new lieutenant governor, attorney general, comptroller, railroad commissioner, land commissioner and agricultural commissioner. Writing in the Texian Partisan, TNM leader Miller said: “Some have already written to me, and many are asking the question I expected: how are we going to TEXIT with the Democrats in charge?” However, he concluded: “I believe no organization in Texas comes out of this election in a better position to do what it exists to do than the Texas Nationalist Movement.” Miller said the Republican majority in the Texas House that twice “buried” legislation calling for a Texas independence referendum, in 2021 and 2023, was now “gone.” Both pieces of legislation failed to make it past the committee stage in the state legislature. He added: “On January 12, 2027, a new majority will elect a Speaker, and that Speaker will name the chairs.
In the Senate, the lieutenant governor's power over committees and referrals comes mostly from rules the senators adopt on the first day, and with a Republican Senate and a Democratic lieutenant governor, those rules are in play.” Miller also said the nine Texas House Republicans who had signed the TNM’s Texas First Pledge, vowing to support an independence referendum and put Texas before any other “entity,” all looked on track to secure re-election. Later in his article, Miller admitted that “some of our own people will argue that a Texas trending Democratic is a reason to stop, because an independent Texas might not govern the way they want” but added: “On Tuesday, Texans changed their state government in a single night, and they can change it again at the next election.” The TNM is calling for Texan state lawmakers to introduce legislation that would allow a referendum on Texan independence to take place in November 2027. There is a history of some Texan Republicans flirting with Texan nationalism, for example, elected officials signing the TNM’s Texas First Pledge.
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