A sheriff candidate in a Texas border county that has never voted Republican in a presidential election said Friday he has been “shocked” by the number of residents who plan to support former President Trump in November.

Voters in Starr County, Texas – which is over 97% Hispanic or Latino – have overwhelmingly supported Democratic candidates in the last century, with 86% voting for former President Obama in 2012. In 2020, however, voters shifted away from the Democratic Party in droves, with Biden only grabbing 52% of the vote.

The county could now make a historic shift in 2024.

“I’ve been doing door-to-door campaigning in all pockets of this county,” Starr County Republican sheriff candidate Alberto Olivares told “Fox & Friends First” Friday. “I am just shocked with the number of people that just volunteer that they’re going to vote for Trump.”

FOX NEWS POWER RANKINGS: IS KAMALA HARRIS UNBURDENED BY WHAT HAS BEEN?

Olivares, a former Democrat himself, said Latinos have been historically conservative, but “for some reason” they have identified as Democrats for generations.

“We believe in God and supporting the family. We want a secure border, supporting our police officers, fiscal responsibilities. So we’re conservatives.”

Olivares added that people in his community are feeling the “financial squeeze” in addition to the border crisis.

“Border security being so close here is a very important issue. But so is the economy. And people are just struggling.”

Olivares, a former Border Patrol agent, said he decided to run for sheriff because “enough is enough,” adding it has been 118 years since the county had a Republican sheriff. 

“I never dreamed of being a politician by any means, but, enough is enough, and we need some real leadership in the sheriff’s office here. We need to increase security for the people. And, I think I’m the right guy for the job.”

With Vice President Kamala Harris at 47% and Trump at 49%, the national race is very tight, according to the latest Fox News Power Rankings.

Harris’ five-point improvement over Biden comes from upswings in key groups that had drifted away from the incumbent president, including Hispanic voters. Support has increased from 41% after the Biden-Trump debate to 57% now.

CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP

Fox News’ Rémy Numa contributed to this report.

As law enforcement officers hung back outside Khloie Torres’ fourth-grade classroom in Uvalde, Texas, she begged for help in a series of 911 calls, whispering into the phone that there were “a lot” of bodies and telling the operator: “Please, I don’t want to die. My teacher is dead. Oh, my God.”

At one point, the dispatcher asks Khloie if there are many people in the room with her.

“No, it’s just me and a couple of friends. A lot of people are,” she says, pausing briefly, “gone.”

Calls from Khloie and others, along with body camera footage and surveillance videos from the May 24, 2022, shooting at Robb Elementary School, were included in a massive collection of audio and video recordings released by Uvalde city officials on Saturday after a prolonged legal fight.

The Associated Press and other news organizations brought a lawsuit after the officials initially refused to publicly release the information. The massacre, which left 19 students and two teachers dead, was one of the worst school shootings in U.S. history.

The delayed law enforcement response to the shooting has been widely condemned as a massive failure: Nearly 400 officers waited more than 70 minutes before confronting the gunman in a classroom filled with dead and wounded children and teachers. Families of the victims have long sought accountability for the slow police response in the South Texas city of about 15,000 people 130 kilometers west of San Antonio.

Brett Cross’ 10-year-old nephew, Uziyah Garcia, was among those killed. Cross, who was raising the boy as a son, was angered that relatives weren’t told the records were being released and that it took so long for them to be made public.

“If we thought we could get anything we wanted, we’d ask for a time machine to go back … and save our children, but we can’t, so all we are asking for is for justice, accountability and transparency, and they refuse to give this to us,” he said.

Jesse Rizo, whose 9-year-old niece Jacklyn Cazares was killed in the shooting, said the release of information Saturday reignited festering anger because it shows “the waiting and waiting and waiting” of law enforcement.

“Perhaps if they were to have breached earlier, they would have saved some lives, including my niece’s,” he said.

The police response included nearly 150 U.S. Border Patrol agents and 91 state police officials, as well as school and city police. While terrified students and teachers called 911 from inside classrooms, dozens of officers stood in the hallway trying to figure out what to do. Desperate parents who had gathered outside the building pleaded with them to go in.

The gunman, 18-year-old Salvador Ramos, entered the school at 11:33 a.m., first opening fire from the hallway, then going into two adjoining fourth-grade classrooms. The first responding officers arrived at the school minutes later. They approached the classrooms, but then retreated as Ramos opened fire.

At 12:06 p.m., much of the radio traffic from the Uvalde Police Department was still focused on setting up a perimeter around the school and controlling traffic in the area, as well as the logistics of keeping track of those who safely evacuated the building. They’ve had trouble setting up a command post, one officer tells his colleagues, “because we need the bodies to keep the parents out.”

“They’re trying to push in,” he says.

At 12:16 p.m., someone with the Texas Department of Public Safety, the state law enforcement agency, called police to let them know a SWAT team was en route from Austin, about 100 kilometers away. She asked for any information the police could give about the shooting, the suspect and the police response.

“Do you have a command post? Or where do you need our officers to go?” the caller asks.

The police representative responds that officers know there are several dead students inside the elementary school and others still hiding. Some of the survivors have been evacuated to a building nearby. She doesn’t know if a command post has been set up.

At 12:50 p.m., a tactical team enters one of the classrooms and fatally shoots Ramos.

Among criticisms included in a U.S. Justice Department report released earlier this year was that there was “no urgency” in establishing a command center, creating confusion among police about who was in charge.

Multiple federal and state investigations have laid bare cascading problems in law enforcement training, communication, leadership and technology, and questioned whether officers prioritized their own lives over those of children and teachers.

Some of the 911 calls released were from terrified instructors. One described “a lot, a whole lot of gunshots,” while another sobbed into the phone as a dispatcher urged her to stay quiet. “Hurry, hurry, hurry, hurry!” the first teacher cried before hanging up.

Just before arriving at the school, Ramos shot and wounded his grandmother at her home. He then took a pickup from the home and drove to the school.

Ramos’ distraught uncle made several 911 calls begging to be put through so he could try to get his nephew to stop shooting.

“Everything I tell him, he does listen to me,” Armando Ramos said. “Maybe he could stand down or do something to turn himself in,” he added, his voice cracking.

He said his nephew, who had been with him at his house the night before, stayed with him in his bedroom all night, and told him that he was upset because his grandmother was “bugging” him.

“Oh my God, please, please, don’t do nothing stupid,” the man says on the call. “I think he’s shooting kids.”

But the offer arrived too late, coming just around the time that the shooting had ended and law enforcement officers killed Salvador Ramos.

Two of the responding officers now face criminal charges. Former Uvalde school Police Chief Pete Arredondo and former school officer Adrian Gonzales have pleaded not guilty to multiple charges of child abandonment and endangerment. A Texas state trooper in Uvalde who had been suspended was reinstated to his job earlier this month.

In an interview this week with CNN, Arredondo said he thinks he’s been “scapegoated” as the one to blame for the botched law enforcement response.

Some of the families have called for more officers to be charged and filed federal and state lawsuits against law enforcement, social media, online gaming companies, and the gun manufacturer that made the rifle the gunman used.

This week, the temperatures reached triple digits in southeast Texas, and the political season is reaching a fever pitch.

In an all new-episode of This Week in Texas, ABC13 talks with several of the candidates seeking the nomination to replace the late Congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee on the ballot.

At least 17 people have thrown their name into the hat ahead of the vote on Aug. 13.

ABC13’s panel of political insiders weighs in on the process and the possible pick.

“For you to even be considered, you have to be nominated,” Democrat political strategist Odus Evbagharu said.

Then, ABC13 discusses the possibility of a restriction on where demonstrators can protest within the city of Houston.

“I proposed the idea,” Houston mayor John Whitmire said. “I take full ownership.”

And ABC13 talks about the plusses and minuses of the vice president choices for Donald Trump and Kamala Harris.

“The month of July has been a cataclysmic shift,” Republican political strategist Court Koenning said.

It’s a red-hot edition of This Week in Texas.

Stay on the pulse of Texas politics! Follow Tom Abrahams on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.