David defeated Goliath. James Talarico’s victory speech in Texas

We have just taken back Texas.

We have just shown that all the money in the world is no match for the people of Texas.

We have just demonstrated that a politics of division cannot compete with a politics of love.

And we have just sent a message to every billionaire major donor, to every major donor with assets running into the trillions, to every corrupt defender of this political system that no longer works.

In this state, in this country, power belongs to the people.

A story from the Scriptures comes to mind – that of a young shepherd who faces a giant. For forty days, Goliath taunts and mocks him. On the day of the battle, he appears in full armour. He carries so many weapons that he needs someone else to hold his shield.

In this election campaign, we have taken on our Goliaths: the richest man in the world, the most powerful man in the world and the entire Washington establishment.

David was neither as tall nor as strong as Goliath. He did not have as many weapons. But he had hope. He had faith. And he had a sling.

You have been my sling. The people of Texas have been my sling. And tonight we have defeated Goliath.

The Scriptures have taught me, and my own life has taught me, to always back the underdog.

Before becoming a politician, I was a state school teacher. I taught language and literature at Rhodes Middle School, in the west of San Antonio. And, as I always say, teaching at secondary school is the best possible preparation for a career in politics.

The West End is a beautiful neighbourhood, steeped in history. But it is also one of the areas with the lowest income in the whole of Texas.

Every day, my students fought heroically to overcome the obstacles of a rigged system. My students were not just children. They were survivors, dreamers, fighters.

Their unshakeable determination and indomitable spirit were evident every day.

As I grew up, I observed that same fighting spirit. I had seen it in my mother, the daughter of a preacher from Laredo, who left home at the age of nineteen.

She moved to Austin and met my biological father, a twenty-one-year-old who had dropped out of secondary school and whose drinking problem sometimes led to violence.

One evening, he became violent again. But that evening, my mother’s love found the strength to stand up to that violence.

He loaded all our belongings into his little Ford Escort, drove me to the hotel where he worked, and pleaded with the manager to allow us to stay in one of the rooms until we found a small flat in east Austin.

There was insufficient space for a small bedroom, so I slept in a cot inside his wardrobe.

She took great pride in that cupboard, which she had decorated with photographs and toys; no one could have convinced her that it was not a small bedroom.

Always back the underdog.

We were the underdogs in this race.

We have weathered nearly forty years of doubts and disillusionment. We have spent more than 300 million dollars – more than has ever been spent on any Senate campaign in American history.

We have tackled all the negative advertising, smear campaigns, foreign bots and AI-generated deepfakes that money can buy.

Those attacks were the last howls of a dying establishment. The death rattle of a status quo that knows its days are numbered.

They played dirty because they were desperate.

However, we have never lost hope. We have never lost faith. And against the power of big money, against all the odds, we have reclaimed our power.

Always back the underdog.

We have built a movement unlike any other this state has ever seen. We have united Texans from all walks of life and all persuasions into a single team to take on this corrupt and dysfunctional political system.

First-time voters, people who had voted for Trump three times, workers from every corner of the state, weary and ready for change.

This victory is for all those who were written off and left behind.

This victory is for every teacher and every nurse, for every farmer and every livestock breeder, for every young person trying to buy a home, for every parent trying to put food on the table.

This victory is for every Texan who has ever wondered whether anyone was listening.

We have listened to you.

And tonight, the world is listening to you.

To the Texans who have supported this movement, I wish to express that your trust fills me with humility, and I will strive every day to prove myself worthy of it.

And to the Texans who didn’t vote for me, I want to say: I’ll be your senator too.

I will always be at your service. I will always fight for you.

This victory is not about the Democratic Party or the Republican Party. It is something much bigger.

Something isn’t quite right in America.

Our economic system is not functioning. Our political system is not functioning. Even the bonds between us appear to have been severed.

And that’s because the most powerful people in the world want it that way.

My grandfather was a Baptist preacher in South Texas. And when I was little, he used to tell me that we follow a barefoot rabbi who gave us two commandments: love God and love your neighbour.

Because there can be no love for God without love for one’s neighbour.

Every single person bears within them the image of the sacred. Every single person is holy.

Not just the neighbour who is like me. Not just the neighbour who prays as I do. Not just the neighbour who votes as I do.

I am called to love all my neighbours as I love myself.

Because, despite our differences, we all want the same things.

A safe neighbourhood. A good job. A high-quality, adequately funded state school. And the chance to see a doctor when we need to.

However, the billionaires who own the social media algorithms, who own the cable news networks, and who own the politicians we see squabbling on our screens, want us to tear each other’s throats out.

They want us to focus on what makes us different, rather than on what makes us similar.

They want us to look left and right, at one another, instead of looking up at them.

The real conflict in this country is not between the right and the left. It is between those at the top and those at the bottom.

Those at the top go to such lengths to keep us angry and divided because our unity is a threat to their wealth and power.

We’ve seen it in this election campaign. We’ve seen it in every smear advert funded by billionaires.

Those at the top divide us by political party, race, gender, religion and culture, so that we do not realise they are emptying our pockets.

They are cutting funding for our schools. They are dismantling our healthcare system. They are raising taxes on all of us whilst cutting their own.

It is the oldest strategy in the world: divide and conquer.

However, this evening we delivered a very clear message to those at the top.

We will not be swayed.

It is evident that readers are weary of being pitted against one another. They are weary of being told to hate one another.

We have been living with this sort of politics for ten years.

Politics as a bloodthirsty sport. Politics as a means of provoking and humiliating one’s opponent. Politics as professional wrestling.

It destroys families. It puts an end to friendships. And it leaves us all feeling uneasy, all the time.

People of all political persuasions are hungry for a different kind of politics.

Not a politics of hatred. Not a politics of fear. Not a politics of division.

But a policy of love.

My faith teaches me that love is the most powerful force in the universe.

Love is not passive. Love is not neutral. Love is not weak.

Love demands that we stand between the bullies and their victims.

Love requires us to look evil in the eye without batting an eyelid.

That kind of love has always been a threat to those in power.

That kind of love is revolutionary.

That kind of love is creative.

Hate is predictable. Hate is tedious. Hate is not a good thing. Hate is hate.

Hate cannot bring down our energy bills.

Hate cannot teach a child to read.

Hate cannot build a future.

But what hatred cannot do, love can.

Love can transform a student into a scholar.

Love can turn a wardrobe into a bedroom.

Love can turn an enemy into a friend.

Love can transform an election campaign into a movement.

Love can heal what has been broken in America.

We cannot overcome the politics of division with further division.

We cannot prevail under those rules; we must alter the rules themselves.

In my experience, when you hold out an open hand instead of showing a clenched fist, you’ll be surprised by who’s willing to take it.

We did not win this campaign by alienating our neighbours, making them feel ashamed or ridiculing them.

We have embodied a new kind of politics, a politics rooted in a deep love for our state, for our country and, above all, for all our neighbours.

The organisation mobilised its 60,000 volunteers across every corner of the state and, working together, they delivered bottled water to Sandbranch, a community south of Dallas that has no running water.

The publication has donated school supplies to a primary school in El Cenizo, a small town on the border.

We have collected more than 20,000 pounds of food – over 9,000 kilograms – for families in Fort Worth who are struggling to cope with the high cost of living.

Before the world changes in the ways you see on television or read about in the newspapers, the world changes from person to person, from neighbour to neighbour.

In every moment when we choose to be kind. In every neighbour we choose to love. In every prayer we offer up for someone who would not pray for us in return.

That’s how we won Texas.

This is a victory as big as Texas.

And now we’ve got a remit as big as Texas.

These elections have been a race towards a vision of what this country can become.

Texas state schools that are the envy of the nation.

A Texan economy that is second to none.

And Texan families are stronger and healthier than they have ever been.

It won’t happen overnight. But a gigantic nation deserves gigantic dreams.

And we know how to get there.

We must rid politics of big money, so that no billionaire, no one with a fortune running into thousands of billions, can buy our elections.

We must free our economic system from the rigged mechanisms that benefit only the richest one per cent.

We must adopt a universal healthcare system, so that no one ends up bankrupt simply because they fall ill.

We must invest in our teachers and our pupils, so that anyone who starts off at a disadvantage has a real chance of succeeding.

We must put an end to these endless and corrupt wars, which drive up prices and kill our brave men and women in uniform.

And we must heal the deep-seated spiritual corruption that lies at the root of all these crises.

We must overcome the divisions that separate us and rebuild the bonds that unite us.

Here, in the State of the Lone Star, we have forged a new kind of politics.

A response to this decade of divisions.

We have shown that, when workers unite and overcome all dividing lines, we can achieve extraordinary things.

We won this campaign because the people who desperately want change will now get it.

That old way of politics is dying. And a new way of politics is emerging.

Through each and every one of us. Through every person deemed defeated. Through every David who takes on every Goliath. Through every Texan who has believed in our state and believed in this movement.

Now the real work begins.

Two thousand years ago, when those in power were harming their fellow human beings, that barefoot rabbi did not stay in his room praying.

He entered the seat of power and overturned the tables of injustice.

“As this movement heads towards the seat of power, as we head towards the US Senate, we know what this moment demands of us.”

Texas, the time has come to start turning the tables.