Jon Rosenthal has won a seat on the Texas railroad commission, the powerful state regulatory agency, according to The Guardian, beating two challengers including Republican nominee Bo French.
Rosenthal, a Democrat, will join the three-member body that Democrats have been shut out of for decades. The agency regulates Texas's multibillion oil and gas industry and has not had railroad oversight since 2005.
His win came amid what the outlet described as a seismic blue wave in Texas that sent Gina Hinojosa to the governor's mansion and James Talarico to the US Senate. French easily won several counties in the Permian Basin, the heart of Texas's oil industry, while Rosenthal drew his largest voting blocs from Democratic-leaning urban areas.
The contest's policy debates were largely eclipsed by French's inflammatory rhetoric, including posts in September targeting south Asian American students at a University of Texas football game that drew widespread national furor. French, a former GOP chair for Tarrant county, also drew rebuke in June 2025 after asking his X followers whether Jews or Muslims posed a greater threat to America. Rosenthal ran on lowering utility rates, ensuring clean water and air and putting guardrails around new datacenters, citing his 25 years as an oil and gas engineer. Rosenthal wrote on X that he was humbled and honored, saying the politics of hate and division do not win in the Lone Star State.