American Democratic state representative from Texas who flipped a Republican seat north of Austin, becoming Texas's youngest state lawmaker at the time. A former teacher in his thirties, he drives a Chevy Colorado truck and owns Lucchese cowboy boots engraved with the Texas state seal.
Talarico is in seminary training to be a pastor. He wants to be the country's loudest Christian voice against Christian nationalism. He believes Jesus scrapped the Jewish legal system in favour of two sweeping values—love God and love your neighbour—and that this allows for gay people in church, demands health care for the poor and discourages hoarding wealth. He regularly attends Bible study with Republican politicians at the Texas state capitol. He fought bills to put the ten commandments in all Texas classrooms and to fund religious private schools with state money.
In 2025 Talarico and four dozen Texas Democrats fled the state to protest against a Republican effort to redraw congressional maps. He received an endorsement from Joe Rogan, America's top podcaster, catapulting him into parts of the internet where only Republicans go. He entered the 2026 US Senate race, running in the Democratic primary. CBS refused to broadcast his interview with Stephen Colbert for fear of the Trump administration weaponising impartiality rules against it; the interview aired online only, where it went viral.
Doubt is not a pleasant condition, but certainty is absurd.