Democrats are pressing for immigration reform following their sweeping victories in the 2026 midterm elections, which flipped Texas congressional districts once thought safely Republican and produced major upsets in the state's Senate and gubernatorial races.
Newly elected Democrats view these results as a mandate to challenge President Donald Trump's immigration enforcement policies and signal to prospective 2028 presidential candidates that the issue demands attention.
Rep.-elect Bobby Pulido, a South Texas Democrat, defeated Republican Rep. Monica De La Cruz by tying Trump's workplace immigration raids to economic damage from workforce shortages. De La Cruz had won the district by 14.2 points in 2024, before it was redrawn.
At a Capitol Hill news conference on Nov. 11, Pulido told other Texas Democrats that the party's 2028 hopefuls must make immigration reform central to their platforms. "Whoever wants to get our support in '28 has to prioritize immigration reform, period," he said.
But polling data exposes a gap between Democratic messaging and what voters actually want. A Fox News Voter Poll conducted before the election found that 45 percent of Hispanic voters identified the economy as the most important issue facing the country. The state of democracy ranked second at 26 percent, and immigration came third at 15 percent.
The divide ran deeper by party: just 3 percent of Democratic voters ranked immigration as their top issue, compared with 27 percent of Republican voters.
Rep. Henry Cuellar, a Texas Democrat whose district includes the border city of Laredo, attributed Democratic gains to a different dynamic. Voters who split their tickets in 2024—backing Trump while supporting down-ballot Democrats—were reacting to both cost-of-living pressures and frustration with Trump's immigration enforcement, he said.
"President Trump made a promise that he was going to bring prices down on day one," Cuellar said. "That didn't happen, so people remembered that."
Cuellar also noted that Trump had pledged to focus enforcement on criminals but expanded it to construction workers, a move that resonated with voters in his district and beyond.
The 2026 midterms saw an estimated 14.5 million Latinos vote nationwide, according to UnidosUS. The organization reported that Democratic support among Latino voters in the midterms reached levels comparable to 2008, when Barack Obama won the presidency.
UnidosUS polling confirmed that cost of living was the primary concern for Latino voters both in Texas and nationally.
