Texas’s newly redrawn 35th Congressional District has turned what used to be a safely Democratic stronghold into a razor-thin fight centered on southeast Bexar County. With incumbent Greg Casar drawn into a different seat and bowing out of TX-35, the open district has sparked a four-way Democratic primary that could decide whether the party still has a real shot in November.
As the Austin Chronicle reported, the 2025 map reoriented TX-35 so it is now anchored in southeast Bexar County and stretches into Guadalupe, Wilson and Karnes counties. Candidates quoted in that coverage say the new lines weaken the political clout of Black, brown and working-class voters. John Lira, one of the Democrats in the race, has estimated that Bexar County alone will supply roughly 70 percent of the district’s Democratic vote.
What the New Lines Mean for November
The revamped TX-35 now tilts Republican. The Cook Political Report rates the district R+4 and labels the contest as leaning Republican, while the DCCC has still placed it on its list of districts in play. The seat opened up after Rep. Greg Casar was drawn out of the new TX-35 and chose to run in the newly created TX-37 instead, according to the Austin American-Statesman.
Who’s Running and Where They Hope to Find Votes
The Democratic primary has turned into an open-seat scramble among Maureen Galindo, Johnny Garcia, John Lira and Whitney Masterson-Moyes. Their campaigns are leaning hard into local bona fides. Johnny Garcia highlights his years as a Bexar County deputy and his neighborhood ties on his Johnny Garcia campaign site, while Whitney Masterson-Moyes underscores her small-business background on Whitney Masterson-Moyes. As reported by the Austin Chronicle, the new map forces the field to court very different blocs of voters, from urban precincts in Bexar County to voters in the surrounding rural counties.
Courts, Maps and the Clock
The legal fight over the map is unfolding in the background. A three-judge federal panel in El Paso blocked the 2025 map in November, writing that plaintiffs were likely to show racial predominance in how the lines were drawn, according to The Wall Street Journal. The U.S. Supreme Court then issued an administrative stay that allows the map to remain in place while appeals continue, per The New York Times. So candidates are running hard in a district that could, at least in theory, be reshaped again down the line.
Money, Turnout and the Runoff Math
Texas’s primary is set for March 3, 2026, with a runoff scheduled for May 26, 2026 if no candidate clears 50 percent of the vote, according to the Texas Secretary of State. With four Democrats slicing up the electorate and the district’s new Republican lean, strategists say the path to the nomination runs through turnout math: the candidate who can consolidate more than half of primary voters wins outright, and if no one does, the May 26 runoff decides it.
Local organizers say this one will be won the old-fashioned way, block by block. That means door-knocking in southeast Bexar, nudging low-turnout neighborhoods to the polls and tightening up small-donor networks. National operatives are paying attention too. The DCCC’s decision to keep TX-35 on its target list, combined with the Cook rating, elevates the race from local curiosity to a test of whether Democrats can hang on in the face of aggressive mid-decade redistricting. Whoever survives the March primary will face an uphill November under the current map, with a live court fight still humming in the background that could yet shift the ground beneath their feet.
