One of the most talked about electoral campaigns currently in the United States concerns… the very obscure railway commission in Texas. Karl Rove, legendary figure in the Republican Party and political advisor to George W. Bush in the 1990s, announced that he will vote Democratic on November 3, for the first time in his life, in an open letter published in the Wall Street Journal on Wednesday, September 16.
In the United States, it’s a small political earthquake. Karl Rove is often presented as the man who has shaped the success of the Republican Party in Texas since the 1970s. “You could hardly be more representative of traditional Texan conservatives than Karl Rove,” summarizes Dafydd Townley, specialist in American politics at the University of Portsmouth.
“Openly racist candidate”
What Democratic fly could have stung the tutelary figure of the Texan Republicans? And above all, why is Karl Rove so enthusiastic about a local election, while the mid-term election campaign is in full swing in Texas, with a Republican candidate, Ken Paxton, in difficulty facing his Democratic rival, James Talarico?
The reason is Bo French. This Texan entrepreneur from a wealthy oil family won the primary in May against the favorite of the Republican establishment to become a candidate for the railway commission. “In itself, this should not have caused much noise, but the very divisive and controversial personality of Bo French propelled this election to the forefront of the political scene,” summarizes Dafydd Townley.
Bo French represents the fringe of the Maga movement doped with all the excesses of Donald Trump’s camp. “He is not the average Maga candidate. He pushes the extreme and uninhibited rhetoric of this movement a little further than the others,” underlines Clodagh Harrington, political scientist specializing in the United States at University College Cork in Ireland. “He is an openly racist candidate,” adds Scott Lucas, at University College Dublin.
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Cover image: Donald Trump at the Republican convention in Dallas, September 9, 2026. © Tony Gutierrez, AP
Bo French is notably a serial provocateur on social networks. He posted a photo on X of a crowd of University of Texas students celebrating a victory for the Texas Longhorns, the local American football team. In his eyes, there were too many Indian-looking students in this photo, which for him was proof that the migration “problem” “was much worse than anyone could imagine.”
It was this comment against the backdrop of the racist theory of the “great replacement” which was seen as one slip-up too many for Karl Rove. Other Republicans, such as the Speaker of the Texas House of Representatives, Dustin Burrows, also denounced Bo French’s comments. Texas Senator John Cornyn, whose seat is not in play for these midterms, called the Republican candidate an “embarrassment for the party.”
Repeated uncontrolled skids
“It is significant to note that Republicans of the caliber of Karl Rove are openly distancing themselves from Bo French, suggesting that there are excesses that go too far,” underlines Clodagh Harrington.
Especially since Bo French is not his first racist, anti-Semitic, or even homophobic provocation. He built his career on more or less controlled slippages. In June 2025, he notably published a poll on X asking who, Jews or Muslims, represented the greatest threat to the United States.
He also called for the deportation of “100 million immigrants,” even though the total population of the United States stands at just under 350 million people. In his passion for expulsions, Bo French also wants to drive all Native Americans out of their native land.
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Cover image: © France 24
Outings which had already caused him political problems when he was only president of the Republican Party of Tarrant County, in the suburbs of Dallas, from October 2023 to November 2025. On several occasions, his Republican colleagues had called for his resignation.
With such a pedigree, it may seem surprising that Bo French could continue to wear the colors of the Republican Party in elections. “That’s what the November elections in Texas are all about,” assures Scott Lucas. If Bo French won against a more conservative conservative during his primary, this is also the case for Ken Paxton for the Senate candidacy. “The question is whether there is still room for something other than Trumpism within the Republican Party,” says Scott Lucas.
Who will be the king of Texas oil?
A possible Democratic victory in Texas “could indicate that the very unified Maga front that the Republican Party has presented for several years is starting to crack, if the candidates’ extreme rhetoric leads to defeats,” suggests Clodagh Harrington.
This would be all the more significant for the Texas railway commission, because it is “a Maga candidate against the rest of the world, since Republicans supported the Democratic rival”, underlines Dafydd Townley.
And then, the “obscure” Texas railroad commission has more powers than it seems. First of all, it has nothing to do with railways. In fact, it regulates the entire oil and gas sector in Texas. In other words, the director of this agency has a say on 40% of American black gold production and 15% of national gas production.
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This commission has been controlled by Republicans for more than 30 years. If Jon Rosenthal, Bo French’s Democratic rival, wins on November 3, anti-Trump Republicans will be able to say that the president has made the imaginable possible: ensuring that Democrats are in charge of regulating all Texas oil.
It is also a “strategic election for Donald Trump and his ambitions to produce ever more oil and gas by reducing regulation of this sector as much as possible,” assures Dafydd Townley. Not sure a Democrat is on the same wavelength.
Not to mention another favorite of the American president: multiplying data centers to feed the American AI industry. Texas ranks second among US states with the most data centers, behind Virginia. Texas has relied on natural gas to provide the electricity necessary for these power plants… Here again, a Democratic railway commission could put a spoke in the wheels of Trumpian ambitions. If the Democrats win, it would be a waste for Donald Trump.
