The daughter of a BNG columnist helped flipped the last urban county in Texas from red to blue in this week’s midterm elections.
Lydia Bean, daughter of BNG columnist Alan Bean, was elected county clerk, defeating Republican Mary Louise Nicholson, 55.8% to 44.2%.
Fort Worth is the seat of Tarrant County, which is the last urban center in Texas to flip Democratic in modern times.
While other urban Texas counties — such as Harris (Houston), Dallas, Bexar (San Antonio), and Travis (Austin) — solidified their status as Democratic strongholds years ago, Tarrant County has remained a battleground state.
Tarrant occasionally tilted Democratic in national elections — supporting Beto O’Rourke in his 2018 Senate bid and Joe Biden in his 2020 presidential bid —but flipped back to Donald Trump in 2024. Unlike nearby Dallas, Republicans maintained solid control over local offices for decades.
That all changed Tuesday, when “Democrats swept the top of the county ballot, flipping the Tarrant County Commissioners Court from a 3-2 Republican majority to a 4-1 Democratic majority — the first such shift in decades — while Democratic candidates also carried the statewide races for U.S. Senate, governor and railroad commissioner,” said the Fort Worth Star-Telegram.
Lydia Bean
Bean was one of 15 Democrats to win local races in Tarrant County Tuesday.
She earned a bachelor’s degree from Austin College in 2002 and a Ph.D. from Harvard University in 2009. Her professional experience includes working as a nonprofit consultant, small business owner and teacher. She was a fellow in the Political Reform program at New America and previously taught at Baylor University.
Bean is a member of Broadway Baptist Church in Fort Worth.
Broadway Baptist has been active in fighting injustice in Tarrant County Commissioner’s Court, which for the past four years has been led by an ultra-conservative Republican majority that has made headlines for its harshness.
County Judge Tim O’Hare has run the Commissioner’s Court with an iron fist and frequently has clashed with Broadway members and Pastor Ryon Price over issues of racial justice and the conditions in the Tarrant County Jail, where 80 people have died in custody since Sheriff Bill Waybourn took office in 2017.
Waybourn was not up for election this year, but O’Hare and two county commissioners were, and all three were ousted by Democrats. That gives Democrats control of the county commission for the first time in decades.
Democrat Alisa Simmons defeated O’Hare for the county judge role, 56.4% to 43.6%. She is the first Democrat to win that seat in 40 years.
Democrat Jared Williams defeated Republican state Rep. Tony Tinderholt for a seat on the commissioner’s court, 55.4% to 44.6%. And Democrat Nydia Cardenas defeated Republican incumbent Manny Ramirez 51.8% to 48.2%.
As a result of this week’s elections, Tarrant County also will get a Democratic district attorney, district clerk and six of the county’s 11 criminal state district court benches. Democrats also flipped four family district court seats.
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