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Our verdict

LiberalMind endorses Carlos De La Cruz — as unproven in office, and on watch

Election Day is Tuesday, November 3, 2026. Texas early voting runs October 19–30 and is already underway. This is the whole race — a brand-new district, two unproven nominees, one documented disciplinary record, and what the sources actually show. Read the research, and decide which flaw you can live with.

The setup

The new 35th District is not Greg Casar's old seat — it is a new district wearing its number. The old 35th was a safe-Democratic corridor from San Antonio to Austin. The 2025 redistricting moved the 35th south and east: it now covers much of south and northeast San Antonio and its suburbs (Live Oak, Converse, Elmendorf) plus Guadalupe, Wilson, and Karnes counties. Casar was drawn into the 37th and is running there. There is no incumbent.

The new district is 57% Hispanic, 31% white, 9% Black, 3% Asian, and Donald Trump would have carried it by 10 points in 2024 (Trump 54.6%, Harris 44.2%). Cook's PVI is R+4. But Sabato's Crystal Ball bounds the "safe new seat" story with the longer history: Trump carried this territory by only 2 points in 2020, and Sen. Ted Cruz won it by 4 points in 2024 and by less than half a point in 2018. The Republican lean is durable; it is not deep. House Speaker Mike Johnson campaigned in the district in late August and called the seat "the whole enchilada" (KSAT guide) — and the money agrees with him: $18,776,702 in independent expenditures (PollingSource), $10,132,665 support against $8,644,037 oppose, the largest outside-spending total in this Texas tranche, for an open seat with no incumbent.

The raters, printed in their disagreement: Cook Political Report: Toss Up (moved from Lean R on October 23, 2026, at the end of a Likely R → Lean R → Toss Up sequence across the fall). Inside Elections: Lean Republican. Sabato's Crystal Ball: Leans Republican. Cook sits one full step closer to the Democrats than the other two. (PollingSource's "Tilt R" is its expert-average label, not a rater.)

The polls are three and they split. PollingSource's average: Garcia 48.3, De La Cruz 47.3 — Washington Post, October 19, 605 likely voters: De La Cruz 48, Garcia 47; Poll Vault / Emerson, October 14, 417 likely voters: Garcia 51, De La Cruz 49; Normington Petts (Democratic-sponsored, for House Majority PAC), October 14, 400 likely voters: Garcia 47, De La Cruz 45. One caveat travels with these numbers, and we carry it the way the source printed it: PollingSource's own note says its polling "tested a matchup that is no longer live: Cruz is not the Republican nominee — Carlos De La Cruz Jr is," and that its average "resets once the final matchup is polled." That appears to be a name-matching artifact in PollingSource's system — the polled Republican is displayed as "Cruz" — but until the artifact is explained, we treat the TX-35 polling average as provisional. The three named polls and their dates are printed as reported.

The confirmed ballot: Johnny Garcia (Democratic) and Carlos De La Cruz (Republican). No Libertarian, Green, or independent candidate for TX-35 was located in any source; the two-candidate roster should still be confirmed against the Secretary of State's certified list, and we say so rather than pretend otherwise.

Johnny Garcia (Democratic)

The record. Garcia is a Bexar County sheriff's deputy — nearly two decades of service, per his campaign — and a self-described "old-school moderate," backed by the Blue Dog Coalition (KSAT guide; San Antonio Report via Wikipedia's citation trail). He won the May 26 Democratic runoff with 63.8% (12,834 votes) over educator Maureen Galindo. He has never held elected office — unproven in office. His platform, per his campaign materials as compiled: affordability, workforce development and apprenticeships, reining in data centers, fighting corruption, protecting social-assistance programs, public safety, and comprehensive immigration reform including border security, pathways to citizenship, and work visas (Focus on San Antonio preview).

His money, from PollingSource's candidates block: raised $2,201,579, cash on hand $149,503. (His opponent's totals were not displayed in the same source this pass — a genuine gap, printed in his section, not filled in here.)

The suspension record — documented, and labeled at both halves of its sourcing. In October 2026, Fox News Digital reported on Bexar County Sheriff's Office records obtained through a public-records request — the employer's own records, released into the campaign by the opposition; both halves of that sourcing are part of the fact:

The Sheriff's Office confirmed the suspensions were the agency's final decisions. Garcia's campaign responded by framing the release as "politicized claims" from Republicans and pointing to his nearly two decades of service as a deputy and hostage negotiator.

In our taxonomy this is proven in-service conduct: employer-final discipline, twice, a decade apart, neither instance criminal. The 2020 item is the heavier one — an unsecured service weapon and badge, stolen from a car, is exactly the kind of fact a law-enforcement candidacy has to carry in the open.

Pros: Two decades in uniform in the county he would represent; a Blue Dog-backed, self-described moderate profile in a district that does not elect liberals; a 28-point runoff win; a public-safety-first platform in a public-safety-first district.

Cons: Never held elected office; a documented disciplinary record in the one uniform he has worn, including a stolen unsecured firearm; a platform whose immigration plank — pathways to citizenship — is his party's program, with no record of ever breaking with that party on anything, because he has never held a job where he could.

The flaw, plainly: Garcia's flaw is that the only in-service record he has ever compiled contains two suspensions, and the worse of them is about the thing he is running on. A hostage negotiator with twenty years in is a serious candidate; a deputy who left his Glock, four magazines, and his badge in an unlocked car is a documented one. Voters get both men in the same file, because both men are in the file.

Carlos De La Cruz (Republican)

The record. De La Cruz is a U.S. Air Force veteran and a San Antonio gym owner and small-business owner from Universal City (KSAT guide; Focus on San Antonio). He is the brother of Rep. Monica De La Cruz (R, TX-15) — a family fact, printed as such; his record is his own. He describes himself as a "Texas Trump Conservative," carries President Trump's endorsement, and had Speaker Johnson campaign for him in the district (the endorsement and the visit are documented by KSAT; one low-authority local source adds a two-year Air Force service length, which we treat as unverified and do not rely on).

He won the May 26 Republican runoff with 57.6% (18,827 votes) over state Rep. John Lujan — who had voted for the redistricting bill that drew this seat. His platform, per compiled coverage: border security, law enforcement, the economy, veterans' affairs, energy. He has never held elected office — unproven. His FEC totals were not captured in the source pass behind this article; we do not print a money figure we do not have, and his absence from the money table is a gap in our file, not a zero in his.

No scandal or verification failure for De La Cruz was located in the sourced record.

Pros: A veteran and small-business owner running on the district's stated issues; Trump's endorsement and the Speaker's personal attention; a runoff win over a sitting state representative; a clean located record.

Cons: Unproven — no votes, no budgets, nothing to grade; the thinnest public file of any nominee in this tranche, down to an unverified service-length detail in the one source that offers one.

The flaw, plainly: De La Cruz's flaw is absence. He is a surname, a service branch, a gym, and an endorsement — which, in a district drawn for his party and trending the way Sabato's history says it trends, may be enough. Under our criteria, unproven is a watch posture and never a demerit. It is also all he is.

OUR CALL

LiberalMind endorses Carlos De La Cruz — as unproven in office, and on watch.

The criteria, in order. Neither nominee triggers a disqualification, and neither is an extremist — Garcia's Blue Dog backing is genuine moderation of branding, and we credit it. But Garcia cannot pass the Manchin test: he has never held office, so there is no in-service break to certify, and his stated program is his party's program. Against that stands the one proven item in either file that prices at full weight: two employer-final suspensions in Garcia's law-enforcement service, the second for leaving a firearm and badge unsecured to be stolen. Proven in-service conduct is the heaviest species we price below disqualification, and it sits on the Democratic side of this ballot. De La Cruz offers alignment and nothing else — which, under a doctrine that treats unproven as watch rather than demerit, is enough to earn a qualified endorsement and nothing more. He will be graded on his first term like every unproven endorsee we have ever carried: on the votes.

For the complete Election 2026 breakdown — every race on your ballot, claim by claim — go to liberalmindhq.com.

Vote early. Research your candidates. Choose the best moderates, whatever their party — no extremism from either side. And encourage your friends and family to do the same.

Sources

Election result — November 4, 2026

Winner: Johnny Garcia (Democratic) — called by the Associated Press. This result was appended on November 4, 2026 (results wave 1); the original article above is unchanged, exactly as published before Election Day.

AI-assisted article — but the sources are human, and the facts are very real.

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