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By James Bickerton
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Texas independence campaigner Daniel Miller has written an article arguing that Democratic wins across the Lone Star State on Tuesday will help Texan nationalists break away from the United States.
In the article for the Texian Partisan, the official news website of the Texas Nationalist Movement (TNM), which he leads, Miller said: “I believe no organization in Texas comes out of this election in a better position to do what it exists to do than the Texas Nationalist Movement.”
TNM leader Daniel Miller sent Newsweek an exclusive quote, saying, "Tuesday changed who holds power in Austin. It didn’t change who Texas belongs to. More than 700,000 Texans have signed up with this movement, more than the winning margin in 16 of the 18 statewide races. The new governor demanded a vote of the people on vouchers and asked Abbott’s office, 'What are you afraid of?' On a vote for independence, I’m asking her the same question."
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Newsweek contacted the Texas Democratic Party for comment on Thursday via email.
Democrats Sweep Texas
Tuesday’s midterm elections saw historic wins for Democrats across Texas, a state that backed Donald Trump by 56.1 percent of the vote against Kamala Harris’s 42.5 percent in the 2024 presidential election.
Democrat Gina Hinojosa was elected as the next and first Hispanic governor of Texas with 52.8 percent of the vote, defeating Republican incumbent Greg Abbott, who received 45.7 percent.
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In the battle for the Texas U.S. Senate seat up for election, Democrat James Talarico beat the GOP’s Ken Paxton, the state's attorney general, with 55.1 percent of the vote to 43 percent. This makes Talarico the first Democrat to be elected to the Senate by Texan voters since Lloyd Bentsen in 1988.
Democrats also took control of the Texas House of Representatives for the first time since 2000, ending more than two decades of Republican control. While final results are pending, they have flipped at least the 14 seats needed for a majority, and on Wednesday were projected to gain 21, according to The Texas Tribune.
Down-ballot Democrats also won elections to be Texas’s new lieutenant governor, attorney general, comptroller, railroad commissioner, land commissioner and agricultural commissioner.
Texas Nationalist Response
Writing in the Texian Partisan, TNM leader Miller said: “Some have already written to me, and many are asking the question I expected: how are we going to TEXIT with the Democrats in charge?”
However, he concluded: “I believe no organization in Texas comes out of this election in a better position to do what it exists to do than the Texas Nationalist Movement.”
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Miller said the Republican majority in the Texas House that twice “buried” legislation calling for a Texas independence referendum, in 2021 and 2023, was now “gone.” Both pieces of legislation failed to make it past the committee stage in the state legislature.
He added: “On January 12, 2027, a new majority will elect a Speaker, and that Speaker will name the chairs. In the Senate, the lieutenant governor's power over committees and referrals comes mostly from rules the senators adopt on the first day, and with a Republican Senate and a Democratic lieutenant governor, those rules are in play.”
Miller also said the nine Texas House Republicans who had signed the TNM’s Texas First Pledge, vowing to support an independence referendum and put Texas before any other “entity,” all looked on track to secure re-election.
Later in his article, Miller admitted that “some of our own people will argue that a Texas trending Democratic is a reason to stop, because an independent Texas might not govern the way they want” but added: “On Tuesday, Texans changed their state government in a single night, and they can change it again at the next election.”
The TNM is calling for Texan state lawmakers to introduce legislation that would allow a referendum on Texan independence to take place in November 2027.
Do Democrats Support An Independence Referendum?
There is a history of some Texan Republicans flirting with Texan nationalism, for example, elected officials signing the TNM’s Texas First Pledge. In 2022, the demand for an independence referendum was included in the Texas GOP’s policy platform following its state convention in Houston.
According to The Dallas Observer in 2021, Joe Shehan, a local TNM organizer, “admitted most of the new recruits come from a conservative or libertarian background.”
By contrast, state-wide Texas Democratic candidates and lawmakers have shown little interest in Texan independence.
Of the 32 state-wide candidates currently listed as being signatories of the Texas First Pledge, all but two are Republican, and none are Democrats.
Speaking in 2023, Gilberto Hinojosa, the chair of the Texas Democratic Party, condemned legislation introduced by a Republican legislature calling for an independence vote.
In an interview with The Dallas Express, he said: “As the party of tyrannical control, Texas Republicans’ new secession plan comes as no surprise — especially considering they have already put forth some of the most anti-democratic, anti-freedom and anti-American bills we’ve seen in decades.”
The independence referendum legislation failed to make it past the committee stage, as happened in 2021.
Support for State Secession
A YouGov survey published in February 2026 found 18 percent of Americans would like their state to break away and become an independent country, down from 23 percent two years ago.
The most support for secession was recorded in California (27 percent), Washington (25 percent), New Mexico (25 percent) and Texas (24 percent).
Notably, Democrats nationwide were more likely to support state secession than Republicans, by 22 percent to 14 percent.
Contact Newsweek editors on this story: Ben Kelly, Gray R. Thomas
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