Beto O’Rourke Says Third Trump Term Is Coming If Texas Democrats Don’t Fight Back

“No longer will we have a check on his lawlessness, accountability for his corruption and crimes, and we will see a Republican-majority Congress roll out the royal red carpet for a third Trump term,” O’Rourke said Saturday on MSNBC. “Those are the stakes, and that’s why we got to fight and we got to fight to win.”

On Friday, during a special session about last month’s deadly Texas flooding, a Texas House panel advanced the redrawn map, which would add five new Republican districts in Texas, but O’Rourke said it’s not a “done deal” and Texas Democrats can deny their Republican counterparts the numbers to certify the maps.

Trump’s team requested Texas Gov. Greg Abbott to call for a special session to redraw the map, and Republican lawmakers have been honest about their plans, saying they are redrawing the map for political advantage.

O’Rourke said he hopes Texas Democrats will deny Republicans the votes and “deprive” Trump of the five seats, but ultimately, he wants Democrats to inspire Americans, who have been waiting for Democrats “to fight and to fight to win.”

He continued by saying Democrats should aim to redraw districts now and gain even more seats in states that already hold a lot of Democratic seats, like California, New Jersey and Illinois.

“There are no refs in this game anymore,” O’Rourke said. “No courts are going to ride to the rescue. This is just an all-out bareknuckle brawl, and we’ve got to win it and be ruthlessly focused on it.”

He said if Democrats do that, they have a chance of “avoiding the worst possible outcome, which is Donald Trump stealing the 2026 election now in 2025” and Congress eventually letting Trump win a third term.

On Sunday, in a last-ditch effort, Texas Democrats said they would leave the state, facing possible fines and penalties, so the legislative session to redistrict the map couldn’t take place.

As Texas looks to redraw the state’s congressional map, O’Rourke said Texas will be every American’s future. He praised and critiqued his home state, stating “some really bad stuff” is happening in Texas, like its lax gun laws leading to a high number of mass shootings each year, its abortion ban, and low minimum wage. He also mentioned that Texas led the way for Roe v. Wade in 1973 and also produced Lyndon B. Johnson, who signed the Civil Rights Act of 1964 into law.

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“Some really bad stuff is happening in Texas, but some really good things have come from this state, as well,” O’Rourke said. “That’s why we need all hands on deck in this state, or what you see right now will be your future, no matter where you live in this country.”