Paxton, Trump falsely claim Texas Senate candidate Talarico is vegan
- Published on May 27, 2026 at 17:30
- 3 min read
- By Bill MCCARTHY, AFP USA
US President Donald Trump and Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton have repeatedly and falsely claimed Paxton's opponent in November's US Senate election, Democrat James Talarico, follows a vegan diet, saying the eating regimen should be disqualifying for politicians seeking to represent the cattle-heavy state of Texas. Talarico has denied the allegations and been shown in numerous photos and videos eating meat, eggs, dairy and other products that are not vegan.
"He's a threat to our very way of life and our values," Paxton said in a May 26 speech to supporters after defeating incumbent Senator John Cornyn in a bitter and expensive Republican primary runoff that was transformed by a late endorsement from Trump.
"I mean, he's a vegan who thinks God is nonbinary."
The scandal-plagued state attorney general unveiled a nickname he had debuted days earlier for Talarico, a state representative and rising national figure: "Tofu Talarico."
Republican National Committee Chairman Joe Gruters repeated the vegan claim on Newsmax after Paxton's victory. Trump took it up again in a May 27 post on his Truth Social platform, writing that Talarico "is a Vegan who dislikes meat, not exactly a good way to be if you're wanting to win an Election in Texas."
The Republican president has been reciting the same attack line for weeks. "He's a vegan. He's a vegan in Texas, and you can't get elected as a vegan in Texas," he said May 20 at Joint Base Andrews, days after telling reporters that "Texas doesn't like vegans."
Conservative commentators and right-leaning media outlets, including Fox News, have also amplified the claim.
A vegan diet includes only plant-based foods, such as fruits, vegetables, beans and grains. Foods deriving from animals -- including meat, eggs and dairy -- are avoided.
Talarico, however, is not a vegan, the campaign confirmed to AFP in a May 26 email.
The claim appears to stem from a resurfaced 2022 clip in which Talarico said his campaign for the state House of Representatives had "become a non-meat campaign" and was "only buying vegan products," a move he said would help fight climate change and protect animal welfare (archived here).
But JT Ennis, Talarico's press secretary, posted an "official statement from James Talarico on vegan accusations" to X in March 2026 (archived here). The statement consisted of a photo of the candidate taking a bite of a turkey leg during the Texas state fair in October 2025.
Talarico himself has also rejected the allegations, telling MeidasTouch on May 26, 2026 that his opponents were "lying about me being a vegan" (archived here).
He said during a May 14 interview on "The Jamie Kern Lima Show" that "vegan was not one of the accusations I thought was going to get thrown around in this campaign," before confirming that he enjoyed pulled pork and brisket (archived here).
And on the "The Bulwark Podcast" in March, he addressed the falsehood head-on (archived here): "I want to say this definitively and categorically that I deny all accusations of veganism, and you know, our campaign basically runs on barbecue these days."
Visiting a taqueria in Austin with former president Barack Obama on May 12, Talarico ordered potato, egg and cheese tacos (archived here) -- a selection some Republicans criticized, but that is nonetheless not vegan.
He also ordered breakfast tacos with bacon and eggs during a September 2025 interview with podcast host Kat Vargas, saying they are his "favorite" (archived here).
Additional videos shared by Talarico's campaign show him holding fried alligator bites and turkey leg at the 2025 Texas state fair; trying Chinese food and a chocolate-covered donut in Houston during Lunar New Year in February 2026; biting into another donut during the primary election in March; and eating chicken and steak at San Antonio's Fiesta festival in April (archived here, here, here and here).
Finally, during an interview with a content creator in February, Talarico described eating barbecue, ice cream and kolaches -- a Czech pastry popular in Texas which is traditionally not vegan -- on the campaign trail (archived here).
AFP previously fact-checked other misinformation about Talarico here.
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