Texas Democratic Senate nominee James Talarico, 36, leaned into his most controversial moment this week, defending a 2021 floor speech in which he declared "God is nonbinary" and daring critics to argue with Scripture rather than with him.

Appearing Thursday on "The Bulwark" podcast, Talarico recalled the remark and offered no apology. He acknowledged the provocation but insisted the theology was sound.

"While it's maybe provocative politically, I don't think it's controversial theologically. Most Christians believe that God is beyond gender."

He then invoked Galatians, noting "In Christ, there is neither male nor female," and added a line clearly designed for the clip: "So, if you have a problem with what I said, don't take it up with me, take it up with the Apostle Paul."

According to Fox News, the original remark surfaced during a 2021 debate in the Texas legislature over Republican legislation focused on youth sports and transgender children. Talarico framed the context this way: he commented, "on the floor of the house when the extremists in the Texas legislature were trying to pick on kids who were different." A 2022 clip of Talarico urging voters to scale back meat consumption also went viral on Tuesday, adding to the portrait of a candidate who sits well to the left of the Texas electorate he's asking to represent.

Theology as campaign strategy

There's a particular kind of progressive Christian who loves to weaponize Scripture in one direction only. Quote Paul to defend traditional marriage, and they'll tell you he was a product of his time. Quote Paul to blur the gender lines, and suddenly he's an unimpeachable authority.

Talarico's argument rests on a selective reading that would puzzle most of the congregations scattered across Texas on any given Sunday morning. The passage he references, Galatians 3:28, is about the universality of salvation in Christ, not a statement about God's ontology or a mandate to redefine biological categories. Generations of Christian theologians have understood this. Talarico understands it too. He just finds the misreading more useful.

The phrase "God is beyond gender" sounds sophisticated in a podcast studio. In the pews of Baptist churches from El Paso to Beaumont, where Scripture is read in context, and God is addressed as Father because Christ instructed it, the line lands differently. Talarico knows this. He said so himself: "I know that I was being provocative with that comment."

Provocative is one word for it. Calculated is another.

Aiming at Cornyn and Paxton simultaneously

Talarico used the podcast appearance to aim at both Republicans competing in the May 26 Senate primary runoff. Neither Sen. John Cornyn nor Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton cleared the 50% threshold in the primary election, setting up a bruising head-to-head contest.

Talarico attacked both men in a single breath:

"Ken Paxton was impeached for using his public office to enrich his donors. And that's exactly what John Cornyn does at the biggest scale."

"I just believe that neither John Cornyn nor Ken Paxton deserve the honor of representing this great state in the United States Senate."

The strategy is transparent. Talarico wants to position himself as the outsider alternative to two flawed insiders. It's a smart line for a fundraising email. Whether it moves voters in a state that hasn't sent a Democrat to the Senate in nearly four decades is another question entirely.

Neither Cornyn's office nor Paxton's office immediately responded to requests for comment.

The filibuster, Black voters, and the Warnock fantasy

Talarico also advocated abolishing the Senate filibuster during the interview, arguing that voters elect representatives to govern and then never see results. "I think we should abolish the filibuster so that we can actually govern in this country," he said, adding that people "want to see the results of that vote."

This is a familiar progressive wish. Abolish the procedural guardrail that protects the minority party, and suddenly Washington can "actually govern." What that governing looks like, of course, depends entirely on who holds power. Democrats who wanted to nuke the filibuster in 2021 were conspicuously grateful for its existence during Trump's first term. The principle never changes: progressives love institutional norms right up until those norms inconvenience them.

When pressed on how he planned to reach Black voters in the general election, Talarico pointed to Sen. Raphael Warnock of Georgia as his model, saying he was "deeply inspired by Reverend Raphael Warnock" because "he knows how to flip a red state." Talarico said he intended to "follow the same playbook" and pledged to do "the work to earn the trust and the respect and the support of every Black Texan."

The Warnock comparison is ambitious to the point of delusion. Warnock won in Georgia during a historically unusual pair of runoff elections with massive national investment, a divided Republican electorate, and a political environment that no longer exists. Texas is larger, redder, and less hospitable to the kind of coalition Warnock assembled. Saying you'll "follow the same playbook" in a fundamentally different state is like saying you'll replicate a soufflé by using the same oven.

The real audience

Talarico, who won his primary over Rep. Jasmine Crockett, is building a campaign designed to excite national progressives, generate media coverage, and pull in out-of-state money. The "God is nonbinary" line, the filibuster talk, the Warnock comparisons: none of this is aimed at persuading the median Texas voter. It's aimed at MSNBC green rooms and ActBlue donation pages.

That's a choice. And Texas voters will make theirs.