As Election Day arrives, Republicans, Democrats work to get voters to the polls, sway Independents
On the day before the all-important midterms, the headquarters of Tarrant County's Republican and Democratic parties buzzed with activity to get out the vote on Election Day.
"We are block walking, making, posting, putting out signs, making sure we go get out to the community," said Allison Campolo, the chair of the Tarrant County Democratic Party. "Every single thing we can do today, we're doing it."
Tim Davis, Chair of the Tarrant County Republican Party, shared a similar story.
"We're phone banking today, we're texting, which is so easily done now with everything that we do," said Davis. "And then we're also organizing block walkers that are all over the county."
Record voter turnout predicted
Various data analysts are predicting a record turnout in Texas for the midterm election with possibly more than 10 million people casting their ballots.
During the early vote, the Secretary of State's office said nearly 7.8 million people in Texas voted - a new record in raw numbers and as far as turnout, which rose to nearly 41%. That's slightly higher than the past record in 2018, the first midterm for the Trump administration.
Aside from getting their voters to the polls, party leaders told CBS News Texas that they are also paying attention to Independent voters.
Ryan Data and Research said during the early vote this year, those who have a history of only voting in the general election and have no history of voting amounted to at least 35% statewide and in the big four counties in North Texas.
"So, we're seeing a lot of people who don't have any voting history or don't vote in the primaries," said Campolo. "So, we can't tell what persuasion they are. We're seeing a lot of those people turn out in historic numbers; the unknowns, the Independents, are turning out in huge numbers, and the polls indicate that those people are breaking for us."
Davis said he's optimistic about the Independents.
"Yeah, it's very important, really important because they're the folks, to your point, if the math continues, they're the folks that will be kind of the deciding factor in the election," said Davis. "Tarrant County is a right-of-center county. And so, I would suspect that a lot of those voters are right of center as well and will turn out to vote for our candidates."
Zachary Donnini, the head of Data Science at VoteHub, which works with the Data Desk at CBS News, said when it comes to the Independent vote, the Texas Senate race between Democrat James Talarico and Republican Ken Paxton could be make-or-break.
"If that number is more like five or more like 10, all of this turnout stuff doesn't matter because that's not a big enough margin for Talarico with swing voters to win a state like Texas," said Donnini. "Honestly, if Talarico wins Independents by 35 points, it doesn't matter what the turnout is tomorrow. Ken Paxton, with this early electorate, if he loses Independents by 35 points, it's over. He is going to lose. If polling is slightly overestimating that margin, given it has in the past, and Talarico is only Independents by 20 points, 25 points, then tomorrow's turnout is pivotal and will decide the race."
He said the Senate race could go down to the wire.
Watch Eye On Politics at 7:30 Sunday morning on CBS News Texas on air and streaming
