Beto O'Rourke and Ted Cruz will debate Tuesday night

SAN ANTONIO, Texas – Three weeks after their final debate, Senator Ted Cruz and Beto representative O 'Rourke will face Tuesday night for the second and perhaps last time, while Mr. Cruz is looking to expand his lead in the polls and O & # 39; Rourke is trying to restore the mitigation of hope among Democrats that he can dismiss Mr. Cruz and overcome the greatest dissatisfaction of the political history of modern Texas.

The rival campaigns initially agreed on three debates, but one of them was postponed and was not reprogrammed. Tuesday's debate will focus on domestic and foreign policy.

The battle between Mr. Cruz and Mr. O'Rourke captivated and polarized Texas and sparked tremendous interest throughout the country, with candidates collecting far more money than those in regular Senate races. O'Rourke had a record $ 38.1 million in the last three months, a record among all Senate candidates. And he enjoys some kind of celebrity status of pop culture, getting noticed by the young soul singer El Paso, Khalid, at the American Music Awards and performing on stage with Willie Nelson. On Thursday, he will participate in a public event organized on CNN in the border town of McAllen.

For weeks, several polls have shown the two candidates an extraordinary success in Texas, where the Democrats have not managed to get any positions in the state since 1994. But recently, polls showed that Mr. Cruz was ahead of Mr. O 'Rourke. A survey conducted last week by Quinnipiac University showed Mr. Cruz a nine-point lead. Another poll by the New York Times Upshot and Siena College raised Mr. Cruz by eight points.

Texas Democrats remain cautiously optimistic, some more cautious and others more optimistic.

Few, if any, Democrats led by all Texas Democrats in recent decades have excited Mr. O'Rourke's enthusiasm. In the 2014 governorship race, party candidate Wendy Davis had a first wave of enthusiasm, but then surpassed Republican Greg Abbott by 12 percentage points in the polls four months before the election. . Some Democrats were publicly whispering privately about his campaign's missteps. Mr. O'Rourke leads a tighter race and a smoother campaign, in fact turning much of his life into a social media feed that allows his fans to watch him move between events and to cut the hair.

"He has probably led the best Texas campaign of my life," said Garry Mauro, former state land commissioner, chairman of Hillary Clinton's campaign in Texas in 2016. "I'm on Facebook: Yesterday, 13,000 people watched it driving in the car. "

Some Texas Republicans have blamed Mr. Cruz for not taking Mr. O'Rourke seriously enough. These complaints have largely disappeared as a result of Mr. Cruz's attack, warning the conservative state hearings that O'Rourke is too radical and liberal for Texas.

"Polls are beginning to reflect the reality of Texas – we are a conservative state where Republicans dominate," said Allen E. Blakemore, eminent leader of the party G.O.P. political strategist in Texas. "The Beto campaign has always been built on a myth and it has taken $ 70 million from Liberals across the country to launch a staggering adventure. It's a game of vanity. "

Next week, President Trump will travel to Houston to hold a rally for Mr. Cruz, a gesture that many Democrats see as a sign that Cruz's campaign requires a presidential bailout. Mr. Cruz rejects this notion, expressing his confidence that he will win. In a recent interview, he stated that the only major question in his mind was voter turnout on polling day.

"The voters of the left will show themselves. Donald Trump makes them furious and this anger will push them to the polls, "said Mr. Cruz. "What will decide this election is the oil worker from South Texas, or the oil worker from West Texas, whose work is going well, the economy is booming. And he is focused on work, going to church and raising his kids, maybe going to the football game, and he may not go to the polls this year.

"The type of voter who usually votes in a presidential year and does not normally vote in a year without a cycle, without a presidential election," he added. "It's the voters we need to gather, who are just common sense conservatives, but we need to make sure they go to the polls."

At the first debate in Dallas last month, Mr. Cruz and Mr. O'Rourke clashed over immigration, gun control and police shootings, accused each other of accused themselves of not having made their comments. Mr. Cruz was in attack mode, turning a light moment into an opportunity to take risks, after comparing Mr. O'Rourke to Senator Bernie Sanders, a self-described democratic socialist. Mr. O'Rourke was opposed to Mr. Cruz, the national debate champion at Princeton University, but he was more reserved and struggled to turn his expansive conversation style into memorable answers.

In an interview Saturday, O'Rourke said that while he saw the debate as important, he did not think it was a turning point for his campaign.

"The level of attention in Texas right now on this race is exactly what we want," said O'Rourke about the debate. "We want everyone to be attentive and ensure that he has the opportunity to decide on the election of our life because, as we know, it is not just the only way to do it. State, but the country that is in the balance. "

"Cruz is an excellent debater," he added. "But I also think that the problems that I have heard from people during all our visits here and all over the state, I do not know that it is necessary to have a good time. to be a master talker to defend your cause. "

The gap between state concerns and national concerns has become more striking for O'Rourke. Some Democrats have called on O'Rourke to share his war chest with other Senate candidates in the country and the Democratic Senators Campaign Committee. On Monday, O'Rourke said he does not intend to share any of the $ 38.1 million he has raised in recent months.

"I'm focused on Texas," he told supporters in San Antonio on Monday.