James Talarico, the Democratic nominee for U.S. Senate, gathered supporters on Wednesday at a South Dallas food drive to thank them for collecting groceries and to offer some counterprogramming to President Trump’s midterm convention several miles north.
In a community center, next to a towering pile of boxed, bottled and canned foods — Cheerios, veggie sticks and refried beans — Mr. Talarico railed against the “billionaire megadonors” he said would be “clinking their champagne glasses” at the Republican event.
“While we’re here serving our neighbors,” Mr. Talarico said, “they are toasting to their own corruption.”
His Republican opponent in the race, Attorney General Ken Paxton, was set to speak on Wednesday at the convention.
The food drive was one of two events that the Talarico campaign was holding in Dallas as a counterpoint to Republicans rallying behind President Trump in a downtown arena. The Texas Democratic Party was set to have their own event later on Wednesday near the convention, featuring a slate of other statewide candidates, including those running for attorney general and lieutenant governor. And several Democratic congressional candidates also planned an event on Thursday.
The Texas Democratic Party also paid for a moving billboard attacking Mr. Paxton to drive around Dallas on Wednesday, accusing him of “protecting pedos” because of his office’s handling of a child sex case. (Mr. Paxton’s campaign has said the case was resolved with the child’s interests in mind and has accused the Talarico campaign of “retraumatizing” the victim.)
Mr. Talarico also went on Fox News and offered what appeared to be a more moderate position on transgender athletes in sports than he has taken in the past.
“I oppose trans athletes playing in girls’ sports if it endangers safety or fairness,” he said in the interview. “Every sport has to be safe and fair. As a former public school teacher, I care a lot about our student athletes.”
As polls have shown a close race, with Mr. Talarico leading by a narrow margin in some surveys, Mr. Paxton has also begun talking about lowering prices, modulating a hard right message that has helped him win with Republican voters. Mr. Paxton issued a news release on Tuesday reminding Texans that, as attorney general, he had secured a settlement in June with producers over high prices and would soon distribute more than five million eggs to food pantries across Texas.
Frederick Douglass Haynes III, a pastor and a Democratic congressional candidate in Dallas, introduced Mr. Talarico, and mocked the Republican convention.
“It’s a pep rally, and I’m tripping because what are you cheering?” Mr. Haynes said. “Are you cheering the fact that we’re losing when it comes to the economy, we’re losing when it comes to health care, we’re losing a war that is unconstitutional, unnecessary, and unwinnable?”
Mr. Talarico’s campaign said that the goods had been collected by volunteers and weighed over 20,000 pounds — a number designed to contrast with the $20,000 ticket price said to have been charged to some Republican attendees at the convention.
The groceries were intended for middle-class Texas families, the campaign said.
Among those in attendance was the former county judge for neighboring Tarrant County, Glen Whitley, a Republican who left office in 2022 and has grown disillusioned with his party’s rightward shift. He now supports Mr. Talarico.
“I truly believe that Ken Paxton is the most corrupt politician we have in Texas,” Mr. Whitley said in an interview. But, he added, Mr. Paxton “might have to take a second place, since Trump’s in Texas right now.”
