Brent Hagenbuch takes an early lead over Jace Yarbrough in the GOP Senate runoff for North Texas

Brent Hagenbuch led Tuesday in the Republican primary for state senator in a conservative North Texas district.

Hagenbuch had 59.4 percent of the vote to Jace Yarbrough’s 40.6 percent, with early votes from six counties in the 11-county Senate District 30, which includes parts of Denton and Collin counties, according to unofficial results.

The winner will have a clear advantage over the winner of a Democratic runoff. Voters in the district favored Donald Trump over Joe Biden by 24 percentage points in 2020.

Hagenbuch and Yarbrough were the top two vote-getters in March’s Republican primary. Hagenbuch topped Yarbrough by about 2,400 votes, with 36.4 percent of the vote to Yarbrough’s 33.9 percent in a four-candidate race.

As Tuesday’s election approached, the two were locked in a bitter campaign to succeed Sen. Drew Spring, R-Muenster, who did not seek re-election.

Yarbrough, a 37-year-old attorney who has sued the government several times to advance conservative causes, accused Hagenbuch of living outside the district. Yarbrough and another primary opponent sued Hagenbuch over the dispute. The case has not yet been decided.

Hagenbuch, a 64-year-old former head of the Denton County Republican Party who owns a trucking business in several states, said Yarbrough is trying to become a career politician.

Hagenbuch spent more than $3 million on the campaign, according to reports filed with the Texas Ethics Commission. His campaign received $425,000 in last-minute donations from the conservative group Texans for Lawsuit Reform. The campaigns of Gov. Greg Abbott and Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick also donated about $30,000 to Hagenbuch in the final week of the campaign.

Hagenbuch also loaned his campaign $1.8 million, according to the Texas Ethics Commission.

Yarbrough’s campaign spent nearly $700,000 on the election. Yarbrough loaned his campaign $200,000.

The winner will face either Michael Braxton or Dale Frey in the November general election. Early returns had Braxton leading with 58.4 percent of the vote in the Democratic primary.

A Houston-area Senate seat was also up for grabs Tuesday. Democratic state House Rep. Jarvis Johnson faces off against state Sen. Molly Cook, an emergency room nurse.

They are vying for the 15th District seat vacated by John Whitmire, who resigned from the Senate in December after being elected mayor of Houston. Cook won a special election earlier this month to finish Whitmire’s term.

Early returns showed Johnson ahead with 51.7 percent of the vote. The winner of the primary will face Republican Joseph Trahan in the November election.

This is a developing story.