Democratic Senate candidate James Talarico skipped a Bernie Sanders-Beto O'Rourke rally in El Paso and campaigned alone in North Texas as allies pushed his bid.

Sen. Bernie Sanders joined former Rep. Beto O'Rourke and Democratic Reps. Greg Casar and Veronica Escobar at the Abraham Chavez Theatre in El Paso on Monday night to promote the Texas Democrat's run for the U.S. Senate. Talarico was not there.

Fox News Digital reported that the candidate instead held his own events in North Texas, including a stop in Denton and a rally at North Crowley High School in Fort Worth on his "Clear Eyes, Full Hearts" tour, as early voting opened ahead of the Nov. 3 midterms.

The race is for the seat being vacated by Republican Sen. John Cornyn. Talarico faces Republican Attorney General Ken Paxton. Democrats are chasing their first Texas U.S. Senate win since 1988.

Sanders, on a nationwide "Fighting Oligarchy Tour," did not mention Talarico by name. He and the other speakers still framed the contest as a fight against big money while the candidate ran a parallel schedule hundreds of miles away.

O'Rourke claims $368 million spent "just against one man"

O'Rourke used the El Paso stage to hammer Republican spending and cast Talarico as the inevitable winner.

O'Rourke told the crowd:

"They have spent, so far, $368 million just against one man, the next senator from the state of Texas, James Talarico. That's how desperate, how scared and how panicked they are right now,"

Sanders kept the focus on donors rather than the candidate on the ballot.

Sanders said:

"What you are seeing in this campaign, what you are seeing right here in Texas, all over America, is multibillionaires are pouring hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars,"

Casar voiced support and told the audience that electing Talarico would help move Democrats' legislative priorities. Escobar stood with them. The progressive lineup was complete. The nominee was not.

Fox News Digital sought comment from the Talarico campaign on the separate schedule. No response appears in the reporting.

Fort Worth message targets Paxton, Musk, and "corruption"

While Sanders and O'Rourke worked El Paso, Talarico delivered his own pitch in Fort Worth. He tied household costs to donor influence and named both Paxton and billionaire Elon Musk in that frame.

Talarico said:

"We have an affordability crisis because we have a corruption crisis,"

He also tried to step above party labels even as the party's left-wing stars headlined for him in West Texas.

Talarico told supporters:

"This election shouldn't be about the Democratic Party or the Republican Party. It's bigger than that,"

That posture lands in a party already strained by public fights over loyalty, Israel, and who belongs under the tent, including recent clashes where Fetterman drew a hard line on DSA candidates and told them to run under their own banner.

Photo captions place the El Paso gathering on Oct. 19, 2026. Earlier Talarico stops included a July 13 "Frontera Tour" event in Eagle Pass and an Aug. 31 rally in Kerrville. The final weeks are now a dual-track show: progressive surrogates in one city, the candidate in another.

Progressive surrogates fill the stage Talarico left empty

Sanders headlined without saying the candidate's name. O'Rourke supplied the spending figure and the coronation language. Casar and Escobar added the House bench. Talarico kept his own tour brand and his own geography.

The split arrives as Democrats nationally wrestle with how tightly to bind themselves to the party's left flank and which Senate hopefuls leadership will fully own. That same tension has produced episodes in which Schumer would not endorse his party's likely Senate nominee in Maine and left open questions about discipline inside the caucus.

In Texas the practical result is simple. Voters in El Paso heard Sanders and O'Rourke warn about "multibillionaires" and cite $368 million in opposition spending. Voters in Fort Worth heard Talarico call the race bigger than either party while still running as the Democratic nominee against Paxton.

Party fractures over message and loyalty have already played out elsewhere, from debates over whether Democrats' tent fits 9/11 apologists better than Israel allies to open feuding inside state parties. The Texas schedule adds a concrete version of the same problem: the highest-profile progressive surrogates in one place, the candidate in another, and no on-record explanation for the distance.

Paxton remains the Republican target as early voting runs

Talarico's Fort Worth remarks put Paxton and wealthy-donor influence at the center of his closing argument. Sanders and O'Rourke used the same theme from El Paso without the candidate on stage beside them.

The seat is open because Cornyn is leaving. The calendar is short. Early voting is underway. The progressive wing is spending political capital on a state that has not sent a Democrat to the Senate in nearly four decades.

Similar loyalty tests have already surfaced when Fetterman defended the Democrat label but would not lock in a 51st Senate vote, and when state-level Democrats turned on one of their own over constituent access and discipline. Texas now supplies its own image of imperfect coordination: a Sanders-O'Rourke rally promoting a man who chose a high school gym in Fort Worth instead.

Democrats can bus in Vermont's independent senator and a former presidential hopeful. They still have to persuade Texas voters to break a streak that dates to 1988. Separate stages and an unanswered question about why the candidate stayed away do not make that climb shorter.

When the left's biggest names headline for you and you still book your own room, voters notice who wanted the shared stage and who did not.