Texans should put election behind them and work together

Now what?

The midterm elections were held Tuesday, but Americans are still in the dark about what their results actually mean. The victors may eventually deliver on the promises they made during the campaign, but they haven’t even been sworn in to office yet. And many of those promises were about principles and values, or our civic process itself, rather than policy.

That’s not to say that policy isn’t important, of course. The voters I talked to, over the course of the election cycle, were concerned about health care and public educa- tion, climate change and gun violence, and so on.

But the 2016 presidential election revealed us to be a profoundly divided nation. For many Americans, Donald Trump’s victory was a cause for celebration. For others, it was an existential sucker punch. And it seems to have become harder, over the past two years, for Americans on either side of the aisle to understand each other, much less empathize.

By Election Day, many Democrats were hostile to the notion that they should even consider doing so. Trump has emboldened neo-Nazis and put migrant children in tent camps after separating them from their parents. And many Republicans had come to feel that they’re being painted by a very broad brush, wielded by ideologically motivated hypocrites who need to get off their high horse.

The gains made by Democrats across the country should restore some measure of balance to the policymaking process. But they won’t necessarily mitigate the polarization of the Trump era and could easily exacerbate it.

Trump is still the president, and he’s not afraid to make blanket assertions about Democrats as a group or to vilify them on an individual basis. And many Republicans consid-

er Trump’s belligerence a feature, rather than a bug. Many on the left think they have a point and have been arguing that Democrats should fight fire with fire.

I can see why Americans are tempted to go down this path, but they shouldn’t. Trump’s approach to politics has driven Americans apart and made it difficult for the rest of our leaders to get anything done. And although turning Americans against one another may have helped him get elected, it’s not the only way to win.

Bringing people together is also an option; Texans proved that in this year’s midterm elections.

Some pundits may look at Tuesday’s results once they’re all tallied and conclude that Democratic candidates underperformed. But those pundits would be flatly wrong.

No one expected Texas to turn blue a year ago or for Democrats to make as many gains as they did. I know that for a fact because I wrote a column last December for this newspaper arguing that Texas might turn blue this year, and lots of people told me I was crazy.

I wasn’t. I’m familiar with the evidence. In 2014, just 38 percent of the state’s registered voters turned out; Republicans swept the statewide races by roughly 20-point margins.

But my friends and neighbors were behaving strangely. They were registering voters, and organizing town halls, and attending political rallies, and blockwalking on behalf of various candidates.

Some of my friends even decided to run for office themselves. Trump’s election triggered an explosion of civic participation in Texas. It was impossible to predict what the results would be, but the change was undeniable.

And those efforts made a difference on Tuesday. More than half of the state’s registered voters turned out this year, and Democrats made more gains than anyone was expecting. But what I’d like to highlight here is that for the most part, they sought to unite Texans as Texans — rather than as Democrats or in opposition to Trump. Texas Democrats were focused on engaging new voters and turning out the party’s base; they were also reaching across the aisle to Republicans, on road trips to the reddest parts of Texas.

It’s possible that was merely a strategic calculation. There are a lot of Republican voters in Texas, and it can’t hurt to have their support. The Texas Democratic Party has been rebuilding since 2014, but it isn’t exactly a well-oiled machine, much less a juggernaut.

But most Texans do identify as Texans. And although division may suit the GOP’s purposes, most Americans aren’t enjoying the results. This weekend, reading the news, I found myself getting a bit demoralized. Americans seem so angry, and so hurt, and so hostile to each other. But Texans, I knew, would be working to get out the vote.

No one had expected Texas to turn blue in 2018. It was impossible to predict what might happen Tuesday. But it was a beautiful day in Harris County, and the Texans I chatted with were in a good mood. As Texas Democrats, they didn’t want to get their hopes up. But they had no reason to feel hopeless, even in the era of Trump.