Democrats Julie Johnson and Colin Allred blast each other's records in battle for a newly drawn Congressional District in North Texas

It's a game of political musical chairs, and when the music stops, only one of the two Democrats who have served North Texans in Congress will be able to represent residents again next year. 

Former Democratic Congressman Colin Allred of Dallas and the woman who succeeded him in office, Democratic Congresswoman Julie Johnson of Farmers Branch, are now in a battle for the primary runoff in the newly drawn 33rd District, which is now only in Dallas County. The district has a majority of Latinos and Democrats. 

The Democratic Party will likely lose the 32nd Congressional District, where both Johnson and Allred have served, to the Republicans because of the mid-decade redistricting last year. That's why these candidates moved to the 33rd District.   

Allred finished first during the March 3 primary with nearly 44%, and Johnson came in second with more than 33%. Two other candidates in the race, Carlos Quintinilla and Zeeshan Hafeez, endorsed Allred. Early voting begins one week from tomorrow, Monday, May 18, and lasts for five days only—ending on Friday, May 22. Election day is Tuesday, May 26. 

In interviews with CBS News Texas, both Allred and Johnson are blasting each other's records. 

Allred criticizes Johnson's stock trades

Allred criticized Johnson's past stock trades. A report by the publication Notus last year described Johnson as among the top 2% of stock traders in Congress. Federal records show that on January 15 last year, and again on February 12, she purchased stock from Palantir, a company ICE and the Department of Homeland Security use to track people in the U.S. illegally and deport them. 

Johnson voluntarily divested all her stocks, she said, because she supports a proposed stock trading ban for members of Congress. Allred said, "For six years in Congress, I could have traded stock. It was legal, but I thought it was unethical. Julie Johnson has been one of the top stock traders in the entire Congress. She's benefited and profited from some of the companies that I think are contributing to some of the violations of civil rights around us every day. Palantir is used by ICE in their mass surveillance efforts. If you say you're going to stand up to this administration, you can't also be profiting from it."

In response, Johnson said, "It's a false argument. Everyone knows I've had independent money managers. I immediately sold the Palantir stock when I became aware that we had it, and I made $90 on it. His representations are absolutely false. He's lied about the whole process because he doesn't have a record to run on. He was in Congress for six years when we had a Democratic trifecta, a Democratic House, a Democratic Senate, and a Democratic president, and he couldn't pass anything. He doesn't have a positive record of his own."

Johnson criticizes Allred's voting record

Johnson also criticized Allred's voting record, particularly on ICE. She pointed to Allred's votes for the No Sanctuary Cities Act and Laken Riley Act during the Biden administration. The Laken Riley Act requires DHS to detain certain people who crossed illegally into the U.S. who have been arrested for burglary, theft, larceny, or shoplifting. Riley was a Georgia nursing student who was murdered by a man in the U.S. illegally. 

Johnson criticized the measure and voted against it when it came up for a vote and passed in both the House and Senate last year. "It's long been the law of the land in this country that if you commit a crime, that you can be deported. We can revoke your permission to be here, and I fully support that." 

"But what I don't support is eroding our due process of voting, our constitutional protections," said Johnson. What Republicans have been doing is saying, a conviction is no longer necessary, an allegation is enough. So, this concept that we all grew up with, innocent before proven guilty, that doesn't work in Colin Allred's world. He voted for that because he took a hard right turn when he was running for the Senate. Secondly, it's about sanctuary cities. Colin Allred was only one of 12 Democrats to vote to allow governments to punish these cities." 

When asked about it, Allred acknowledged his past votes. "This was under President Joe Biden and a very different ICE, a very different Homeland Security Department, one that was, I think conducting itself largely consistent with the law and the Constitution. Unfortunately, this is just not where we are now." 

Allred and Johnson on defunding ICE

"This administration has turned ICE into a political tool to attack its enemies," said Allred. "It's also been using it to terrorize communities. The stories that people tell me on a weekly basis of their experience with ICE are heartbreaking. To me, this is diminishing faith in our entire government, but also specifically, in law enforcement. It's dangerous what they're doing. It's making all of us less safe and the exact opposite of what we should be doing."

Allred had also received criticism after he voted for a Republican resolution in 2024 that criticized President Biden's handling of the southern border, where record numbers of people crossed into the U.S.

While the former Congressman has been very critical of ICE under President Trump, he recently changed his position and said he now wants to abolish the agency altogether. 

"I think we have to move on from it because this is something that I cannot tell you with any confidence that after 12,000 agents have been hired in the last year by this administration, after the training time has been cut from five months to six weeks, after they've been going out there in communities with masks on, covering up their names, violating civil rights, that I'm going to be able to reel that back in," said Allred. "To me, that's not going to be something we can do to give people confidence in law enforcement again. I think we have to start over now." 

Allred said other law enforcement agencies would have to pick up immigration enforcement duties. 

When asked if ICE should be abolished, Representative Johnson said, "I have consistently voted for defunding ICE. I think the program- we need customs and enforcement and immigration in this country. You can't just have no immigration policy." 

"But I think ICE needs to be completely brought down to the beginnings and rebuilt into what it should be, which is a responsible immigration enforcement agency. Its current form, its current leadership I do not support. I have voted against funding them every single time. I will not give them one penny until they completely reform how they operate."

If elected on May 26, either Johnson or Allred will face the Republican nominee in November. Republicans Patrick David Gillespie and John Sims are competing in their party's primary runoff. Because this is a Democratic majority district, either Johnson or Allred is widely expected to win in the midterm election this fall.

Watch Eye On Politics at 7:30 Sunday morning on CBS News Texas on air and streaming.