Texas midterm elections - as it happened: Ted Cruz wins tight Senate race against Beto O'Rourke
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Your support makes all the difference.Texas voters have re-elected Republican Ted Cruz to the US Senate after a tight battle with Democrat Beto O’Rourke.
The Senate seat for the Lone Star state remains ruby red after the historic 2018 midterms, though analysts said Mr O’Rourke brought a wave of Democratic voters to the ballots and could prove a viable candidate in the 2020 presidential elections.
His candidacy may have proven beneficial for Democrats like Gina Ortiz Jones whose bid to win the House of Representatives seat of Republican Will Hurd in the state’s 23rd district was too close to call.
Mr Cruz was not the only Republican to fight back against Democrats threatening the GOP’s hold on the region, however.
Texas Governor Greg Abbott also won a second term by defeating Democrat Lupe Valdez in a race whose outcome was seldom in doubt.
Mr Cruz congratulated Mr O’Rourke during a celebratory speech on Tuesday night, saying his opponent “poured his heart” into the race.
Meanwhile, Mr O’Rourke said he was “so f****** proud” of his supporters in a viral concession speech that essentially left the door open to his running against Donald Trump in 2020.
The president played a key role in the US Senate race, throwing his support behind Mr Cruz and stumping for the Republican despite the two previously hurling exchanges towards each other in the 2016 presidential election.
To catch up on how the evening progressed follow our live blog below
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A number of conservative polling regions have reported their election data, tilting the edge towards Republican incumbent Ted Cruz. The night is still young, however.
Fox News has officially projected Democrats winning back the House in the 2018 midterm elections.
The ACLU has released this statement regarding its calls for the Justice Department to investigate alleged voter intimidation in Texas: “We’re asking the DOJ to investigate Border Patrol’s decision to hold a “crowd control” exercise on Election Day less than a mile from the polling location in a historically Latinx community.”
The civil rights group added, “Just because Border Patrol ultimately canceled the exercise after outcry, doesn’t make the decision to do it in the first place okay. Voter intimidation is illegal and has no place in our elections.”
Sylvia Garcia has been projected to win in her bid for congress, the Associated Press has reported.
Beto O'Rourke has regained his lead in the 2018 midterm elections against Republican incumbent Ted Cruz.
As polling information continues to pour in from the Lone Star state, here's why the battle for Texas in the 2018 midterm elections was so widely-watched by Americans across the country.
UPDATE: CBS has updated its report to say the race in Texas between Beto O'Rourke and Ted Cruz is still too close to call.
Ted Cruz has continued to gain a lead against Beto O'Rourke as conservative districts across Texas continue reporting their data from Election Day. However, major Democratic hubs like Houston have only reported 16 per cent of their polling thus far, leaving the fate of the election in question.
For a moment, it appeared as if Beto O'Rourke had been officially projected to win the US Senate race in Texas. A flurry of reports showed the Democrat as the winner after CBS ran a headline that called the election in his favour, before later amending their report to state the race was still in question.
The network amended their mistake live on air too.
The close race has proven historic for Texas, a reliably red state that hasn't elected a Democrat to statewide office for three decades.
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