'Texas is gonna be ugly': Republicans hit Talarico with personal attacks as midterms ramp up

Added: 2026-05-30

[00:00:00]Welcome to Meet the Press Now. I'm Kristen Welker in Washington. We begin with new escalations in the fight for control of Congress. As the parties begin their pivot to the general election in what is shaping up to be a long, bitter, and divisive campaign season. Both sides are painting the outcome of these midterms in existential terms with Democrats seeking to flip both chambers of Congress and Republicans battling major headwinds due to the president's poor political standing and the war with Iran. And if you want an indication of what the next five months could look like, take a look at the battle for Texas Senate, where Attorney General Ken Paxton brings a slate of recent controversies to his race against state representative James Talico. Terarico is already trying to capitalize on those controversies, attacking Paxton as corrupt and launching a campaign ad highlighting the attorney general's 2023 impeachment.

[00:00:53]Paxton, meanwhile, appears to be going allin on hot button culture war issues, launching personal attacks on Terico's masculinity. It's a strategy that was escalated yesterday by White House Deputy Chief of Staff Steven Miller, who slammed Taller Rico with crude and false attacks on Fox News last night. Take a look. I think it is very bold, one could even say brave, courageous, that the Democratic party would choose Texas of all places to nominate their first transgender Senate candidate who's clearly transitioning into a female. You know, when when Taller Rico goes in for a blood test, when he gets a physical, blood doesn't come out. Instead, soy milk comes out. This this man has less testosterone than Jasmine Crockett. It is it is a mind-boggling choice. They would they would choose a person to run for that office who looks like he doesn't belong in the Senate but in a cabaret show.

[00:01:48]>> And of course, Telerico is not transgender. Miller made a similar comment on social media earlier this week with the Taller Rico campaign called quote tarico derangement syndrome. And the DNC responded with a profanity laced personal attack against Miller. Another race heating up is the battle for Maine Senate, which is also taking a turn for the personal as Republican incumbent Senator Susan Collins and controversial likely Democratic nominee Graham Platner spar over Platner's military service.

[00:02:15]Meanwhile, next month's primary calendar is jam-packed as we head into summer, including contests that will decide more of November's marquee races. What happens in all of those races is going to have major repercussions for the president's agenda. But the president told reporters this week he refuses to bow to the pressure of the midterms when it comes to the war against Iran.

[00:02:38]>> They thought they were going to outweight me. You know, we'll outweigh him. He's got the midterms. I don't care about the midterms. Look what happened last night. That was the prelude to the midterms. People understand that. They know that very simple. Iran cannot have a nuclear weapon. I'm doing that for the world. I'm not doing it just for us.

[00:02:56]Joining me now is NBC News chief White House correspondent Garrett Hake. And with me on set is our panel, NBC News senior national political reporter Sahil Kapoor, Taran Rosenrance, Democratic strategist and founder and CEO of New Blue Interactive, and Ashley Davis, former White House official in the George W. Bush administration. Thanks to all of you for starting us off. Garrett, let me start with you and these comments from Steven Miller. He's of course the president's deputy chief of staff. Any reaction to the back and forth we've seen over those remarks? Garrett?

[00:03:30]>> Not of the kind I think you're looking for, Kristen. Mostly what there's been is other Republicans jumping in to defend Steven Miller after the Democratic party attacked him for his original tweet on social media. The idea that there's any personal attack that's too low or too mean-spirited uh for this White House is just not something that's been evidenced over the time that the president has occupied the office or been a campaigner. This kind of thing is sort of welcomed especially on cable news where it's aimed at a base that uh cheers on, you know, personal attacks in politics really across any topic.

[00:04:05]>> Yeah, that's for sure. The president has also, of course, criticized Terico. He's accused him of being weak on crime, supporting open borders. What kind of strategy are you anticipating we might see from the president? Will it echo what we've seen from Steven Miller?

[00:04:21]Garrett?

[00:04:22]>> Oh, I think it will. I mean, the president is no stranger to personal attacks against people he's running against. He loves to deploy a nickname.

[00:04:28]I've not seen him really stick one on Terico yet, although he tried when he compared him to uh Alfred E. Newman, the Mad Magazine character, but he already used that nickname on Pete Budajedge a couple years ago. So, he's probably going to have to go back to the well here. To the degree that this is strategic, Chris, and I think there's an element of it, there is. You heard the president earlier attacking Terico suggesting he was a vegan, although he mispronounced the word and Talico has denied it. It's simply not true. there is an effort to kind of other Terico and suggest that he is not a cultural fit for Texas despite his seminarian background, despite the way that he's been able to reach out to Republican voters. They want to try to disconnect him from those moderate kind of cornin uh style Republicans by saying like whatever else you think about him, he's not a not a real Texan. That comes in sort of ham-handed ways like Steven Miller tried to do it. And I suspect we'll see it being done in more strategic ways as we get further into this general election matchup. Yeah, it's a really important context.

[00:05:24]Garrett, I I want to ask you broadly speaking, I mean, the president's been very clear. He's laser focused on Iran right now. He's been trying to negotiate an end to the war, at least a short-term agreement to halt the fighting. Do you anticipate though, and based on your conversations with your sources there inside the West Wing, Garrett, is the president going to start getting more engaged in the midterms? Are we going to see him out on the trail more, particularly as these general elections get underway? I think I think there's going to be a significant effort to force that engagement from him. And we know that Susie Wilds, his chief of staff, has urged him to be more involved. I'm old enough to remember just a few months ago when he was going to be going out and talking about affordability on a weekly basis. Those uh uh trips to battleground states have largely fallen off, although they could pick back up again. And the president has already promised Ken Paxton he'll throw rallies plural for him in Texas.

[00:06:16]So, I do think the president will get some of that election fever as it gets closer. He enjoys the rallies. He does like certain elements of getting out on the road. Uh but as you say, right now he's been very much bogged down uh in the Iran crisis which continues at this hour.

[00:06:30]>> Well, okay. So, you take me to my next question, Garrett. The Iran war looms over these midterms for a range of different reasons and in a range of different ways. We know the president today huddling with his team in the situation room trying to reach a final agreement. Are you getting any sense that he is closer to striking a deal with Iran?

[00:06:51]>> It's impossible to tell, Kristen. I mean, our reporting from our colleague Richard Angel was that there was a deal mostly agreed to in Doha on Tuesday, and here we stand on Friday with the president uh not having announced anything of substance. His truth social post this morning read to me more like a wish list of things he wants in a deal than things that have been agreed to.

[00:07:12]You know, right now the president has two more events or well, maybe one more event on his calendar today that were meant to be closed press. There's still the possibility that the pool could come in. We could hear from him on that or I think perhaps more likely we'll hear from him after the markets close, which has been the time that he's most likely to deliver what they might consider to be bad news about the war. If there's no decision yet, I suspect you'll hear it shortly after the bell rings.

[00:07:36]>> All right, Garrett Hagar, our chief White House correspondent. Garrett, thank you so much for starting us off.

[00:07:41]Really appreciate it. Let me turn to our panel now. Sahel, let's talk big picture here. Garrett really laid out the tone and tenor that we're hearing so far just in Texas. I mean, it is already so bitter and the general election matchup between Tarico and Paxton is just a few days old. What does that say about what you're anticipating as we get deeper into these midterm races?

[00:08:03]>> Yeah, Kristen, there are a lot of messy races brewing all over the country, starting with Texas. Um, among Republicans, it's quite messy. There's a lot of bad blood after President Trump did the work to take down John Cornin.

[00:08:14]Uh Trump's ally, Senator Lindsey Graham told me a few days ago that they're going to have to spend three times the money Republicans are to hold that seat now that it's Paxton uh and not Cornin who has been sailing through. There's also uh the state of Georgia, a messy runoff for Republicans where they're not thrilled with any of their candidates.

[00:08:32]Michigan, that's messy for Democrats.

[00:08:33]There are three candidates. There's no A+ candidate. They're all flawed in their own ways and Republicans potentially smell a chance there. In Maine, the general election is already underway. You mentioned uh the the clash between Susan Collins uh and Graham Platner over her vote to uh support to authorize the Iraq war and the fact that Platner went and served there. He's going after her pretty hard on that. And then you have a number of red states, Alaska, Ohio, Iowa, and Nebraska, where in a blue wave scenario, everything has to go well for Democrats. They think they might have a shot there. So depending on the elements, if Republicans can kind of fight the environment to a draw, they could maybe do well and hold the red states and pick up Michigan, uh maybe Georgia, although that's not looking good for them. Or if it does turn into a blue wave, Democrats could really make big gains where where it would be unexpected otherwise.

[00:09:17]>> Well, Ashley, pick up on that point and the initial point that Sahill makes, which is about the fact that Republicans are bracing to divert so many of their resources to Texas, which has historically been a reliably red seat.

[00:09:30]No Democrat has won a Senate seat in Texas in more than three decades.

[00:09:34]>> Well, absolutely. And also New Hampshire. I don't I'm not sure that that's not on the list somewhere. I mean, just because of Cenounu's name recognition alone, but um >> yeah, listen, Texas is going to be ugly.

[00:09:46]I am a believer that both sides are not going to need money. I mean, we there's always enough money. I think the president has already promised uh that he will support him through the MAGA Inc. money. And I think that you already see Paxton coming here next week. All the senators, Republican senators that didn't necessarily support him or wanted, you know, their colleague John Cornin are all doing events for him next week while he's in town. So I do think you'll get the establishment the establishment's already behind him. It was very fast. But in regards to Telerico criticizing him on all the different things he's done um negatively, I just don't know. Does that stick because everyone already knows it baked in?

[00:10:30]>> Is it baked in already? Yeah.

[00:10:32]>> Karen, how do how do you see it?

[00:10:33]>> Right or wrong?

[00:10:34]>> We're talking about how much money Democrats are going to Republicans are going to have to divert to Texas.

[00:10:38]Democrats are going to have to >> Yes. The map is up in the air. I mean, not just on the Senate side, but on the House side as well. You've got redistricting that played into everything. And I think, you know, if you drew out the best laid plans, they're not going to look anything like that even in November, you know, September and October. we're going to see very much different places where our emphasis is. But I do think like for Texas and this has played out a few times where you get the MAGA Republican that comes out on top and it does change the dynamics and it means kind of a rush and an excitement to maybe be able to pick up somewhere else. But I think that we also balance that out um in a lot of places and I don't think that we will have as much money as we have had in previous times because I do think that the economy is playing into it and we have a lot of grassroots peoplepowered movements and they're just going to give less when there's not more to give.

[00:11:27]>> What about President Trump's mind is elsewhere as well. He's doing some version of what a lot of second term presidents do which is focusing on legacy, focusing on foreign policy when the domestic environment is falling away from him. You know, I'm curious what you think about the messaging that we're hearing, Ashley, and the strategy that we are seeing, the fact that there's been this focus on cultural issues. Now, look, we have seen that be an effective strategy in past races. Do you think in 2026, in this moment in Texas, it could be effective against Telerico? Is that going to work? What we heard from Steven Miller? Listen, I think that Telerica is a good candidate uh and and has been and I will never take that away from him. I do think when he's explaining or when he's like, "No, I'm not or no, I don't like vegan or whatever it is." I think that that's not good. I mean, so I don't know the what what Steven Miller is doing and why he's doing this, but yeah, I think Texas is a place that stuff like that could stick. And it and it's wrong.

[00:12:25]Obviously, he's not transgender. Well, it's interesting because the Democrats already pushing back pretty forcefully.

[00:12:32]A Democrat's exac account replied writing, "Shut up, you ugly blank responding to Steven Miller. That was an exploive. I cannot say on air is so bad I can't say it. We can't even write it on the page." Um, Taran, is that the way I mean, Democrats are saying they want to see more fight the fight you're going to get, right?

[00:12:55]Like when necessary to win over cornin effective.

[00:13:00]>> I think that there's this moment where they want to be forceful because they have talked about his masculinity. So, we're playing this culture war game, right? They're going for it. I don't think that's going to be the strategy across the board. I think the real strategy here is reminding folks, which you know, we don't even have to remind folks that that gas is inching very very close to $5 and it's just affecting you in every which way, right? and that he's saying very clearly as the president, oh, I don't really care about you. I don't really care about the midterms. I don't care about that. I care about, you know, this war in Iran. And I think that that goes against even to some of his core people that will always stay with him. But it goes against to those people that we cut across the middle and that he was able to pull in.

[00:13:39]>> I want to talk about something that's gotten a lot of attention as we approach the 250th anniversary of the country. A list of artists were lined up to perform at the White House celebrations. They've now started to cancel Sahel, a number of them saying that they were caught off guard. They thought this was a nonpartisan event. Here you can see some of the featured uh artists who have now withdrawn from this. Martina McBride, let me read what she says. She says, "I asked a lot of questions and was assured this was a nonpartisan event that was meant to celebrate all 50 states.

[00:14:15]Yesterday things started changing and what we were told is in fact not what is happening. The optics of this sill how's it playing?

[00:14:25]>> This is freedom 250. It's an organization associated with President Trump. I think what some of these artists fear is that there's going to be Trump branding all over that they would inevitably be associated with. Now some of these artists probably wouldn't want to be associated with anything regarding Trump in any situation. But it really does remind me about a year and a half, two years ago when the MAGA movement was resonating, when Trump's popularity, personal popularity was quite high, when they were making inroads with young people, especially men. There might have been some artists who are on the fence about it, but now his personal popularity and his brand outside the core Republican base is at an all-time low nationally. Do these artists want to be associated with it? Do they want to be even perceived as being involved in something political? I think that plays some role here. Ashley, what are you hearing in terms of the reaction to the fact that some of these artists have started to withdraw? Is there going to be a backlash to that?

[00:15:16]>> Yes, I think so. I mean, this is what the problem is. I think they had bad staffing. I mean, the artists had bad staffing because they should have known that this was going to be his event. Um, because now you were isolating 50% of the country when you were saying yes to the event. Now you're not doing it and you're gonna isolate the other 50%. And let's remember, I mean, I remember there's been so many musicians that have picked aside and they've had horrible backlash. I mean, look what's happening to Cardi B right now. Can't believe I'm like being hip right with all these things. But, you know, >> teenager would be very proud.

[00:15:49]>> I have one. Um, but no, you know, does it now? Do we go back to the Kid Rocks of the world or Cardi B's of the world that will aren't afraid that have already isolated half their fans?

[00:15:59]>> Yeah. How's it playing with Democrats, Terry?

[00:16:01]>> I think that it's really important that people are just and I and I think this is Democrats and Republicans. There is a sick >> of I'm sick and tired of this divisiveness. I'm sick and tired of everything being a culture war of everything being this. And you're seeing that across the board in digital and social media. Like people are starting to actually not complain anymore about even one specific party as much as they are about the fighting. So something that is a c should be a celebration of our country and our history and this patriotism has been tainted and I think people are just sick of that and I think they're sick of the divisiveness and name calling as well.

[00:16:33]>> All right guys, well this is a great Friday conversation. Thank you all so much for being here. Hope you guys all have a fantastic weekend.

[00:16:40]>> We thank you for watching and remember stay updated on breaking news and top stories on the NBC News app or watch live on our YouTube channel.