Democratic Frontrunner for Texas Governor Gina Hinojosa on Flipping Texas, plans to beat Abbott

Texas feels like it’s getting more expensive by the month, and a lot of people are asking the same question: who is the state actually working for? We sit down with State Rep. Gina Hinojosa to talk about why she’s running for governor and why she thinks Greg Abbott is weaker than his campaign bank account suggests. She lays out her case that Texas is stuck in a system where working families pay more and get less, while donors and special interests keep getting the benefits.

We get specific on the issues Texans argue about at the kitchen table: rising rent and property taxes, soaring health insurance costs, prescription prices, and higher electricity bills after Winter Storm Uri. Gina also explains her long fight over public school vouchers, why she calls it a scam that drains neighborhood schools, and what she would change to strengthen public education, starting with teacher pay, class sizes, special education funding, and school safety.

Then we shift to immigration enforcement and transparency. Gina walks through why she filed a public information request seeking body cam and dash cam footage tied to the fatal shooting of Ruben Ray Martinez, and why she believes secrecy like that puts everyone’s rights at risk. We also talk about Texas holding more than 18,000 ICE detainees, the role of private prison profit incentives, and how campaign finance shapes policy decisions across the state.

If you care about Texas politics, the Texas governor race, public school funding, Medicaid expansion, and what accountability could actually look like, this conversation is for you. Subscribe for more, share this with a friend in Texas, and leave a review with the issue you want us to tackle next.

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Transcript

On The Road In Texas

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Like you're shutting us off to the world. Yeah. Okay. You how's your day been? It's good. We um got our team in the car. We're cramped in the car. Um I got part of my team going to get some lunch so we can eat on the way to the next event. But that's what we want, right? We need to reach as many people as we can. It's a big state. Yeah. Lots of people doing a lot of different kinds of interesting things. And so um, so it's good. But yeah, it's, I mean, it's going the way it needs to go.

SPEAKER_01 0:32

Well, Gina and Hosa, I have to say, welcome to the Tashara Parker Show channel and the Tashara Parker Show podcast. Happy to have you on. It's great to be here, I think. We got a lot to get to, and I don't want to waste your time. So we're gonna kick this thing off. Okay.

Why Run For Governor Now

SPEAKER_01 0:44

You've been in the trenches for years as a state representative, uh, but this is a different type of stage. We know that. What made you say now is the moment to take on Gria Gabbott?

SPEAKER_00 0:53

Now is the time to not be safe. We are in a moment in history in this country, in this state, where we gotta act dramatically and fast if we're gonna save what we love, if we're gonna preserve what we need for our families, for our communities, um, and for ourselves. And so what I have experienced in the Texas House is that more and more of our money is going to feed into a system that is actually working against us. I've been playing defense for a long time in the Texas House now, and I'm proud of the work we've done. We've slowed the bleeding, but we've lost too much. And now it's time to go on the offensive. Greg Abbott is weak, he is vulnerable, and once we win the governor's mansion, it's a whole new day in Texas. And that's why I'm going

Affordability And The Corruption Tax

SPEAKER_00 1:46

for it.

SPEAKER_01 1:46

Okay, speaking of Texas, when you're looking at Texas today, you know, it's an affordability crisis all over the country, but certainly when we're looking at our state. Rising costs, property taxes, public school issues, immigration, of course. What was the turning point or the tipping point, I should say, for you personally?

SPEAKER_00 2:03

So I focus on public school issues a lot. That's what got me into politics. I ran for the school board originally because my son's school was going to be shut down and I got mad and I ran and won. And now in the Texas House, I fought against that voucher scam that Greg Abbott um ultimately got, but we beat him in 23 because a public school agenda is a bipartisan agenda, has always been, right? It's very much a part of who we are as Texans. It's enshrined in our Texas constitution that we support our public schools. And so it was a space where I could work and be effective and make things happen. Now, since Greg Abbott has um turned his back on public schools really and made it a partisan issue, it's not a space where there's a lot of work that can be done for the good of kids anymore. And so at this point, um, it was, I believe, this last legislative session when they passed that voucher scam, despite legislators not wanting to vote for it on the Republican side, but fearing Greg Abbott, that I decided this is ridiculous. Um, this is not what Texans want. We need change.

SPEAKER_01 3:17

What kind of conversations are y'all having when it comes to your Republican colleagues uh on the opposite side? And I I hear what you just said, like, oh, they're afraid of the backlash of Governor Greg Abbott. It's the same thing at the federal level. They're afraid of the backlash of President Trump. I mean, a lot of these people, when you talk to them outside of politics, are cool cool as the other side of the pillow. Very cool. So I'm asking you, when y'all were having those conversations, this is completely off script, what are y'all asking them? Are you are you saying, like, are you gonna just let this happen, or what are those conversations like?

SPEAKER_00 3:54

So that's a great question. The day of that voucher vote, President Trump called in to speak to the Republican caucus, all the members of the House Republican caucus, and told them. He said, I need you to vote for this voucher, and I will come down there if I have to. And so they were told what they needed to do, and they complied. And it's not so much conversations anymore. Everybody knows what's up. Yeah. When we beat vouchers in 2023, Greg Abbott went and put in a million dollars against each of the Republicans who voted with Democrats in support of public schools and against vouchers. He put it, gave their opponents each a million dollars in their primary and took out nine of them. So nothing needed to be said at this point. But with Trump coming down and reinforcing that message, it was clear to them all how they had to vote. Dade Phelan, who was a former speaker who wasn't running for re-election, he voted against it. Um, and so did um former superintendent who's not running for re-election. Those were the only two Republicans who voted against it.

SPEAKER_01 5:17

Yeah, because they feel like they ain't got nothing to lose at this point.

unknown 5:20

At this point, right.

SPEAKER_01 5:21

Okay, you mentioned money and the amount that Greg Abbott has, uh, quite a bit of it. You've described this race as working Texans versus billionaires. I want to ask you, what does that actually mean to a single mom in Dallas or Houston trying to stretch their paycheck?

SPEAKER_00 5:37

Yeah, it means we work harder, we pay more, we get less. Health insurance, cost of health care, is more and more unaffordable. If you have health insurance, you're paying more, and it's harder to see the doctor you need. The cost of your medication is going up because now the health health insurance companies are taking a cut of that, right? Um, it means that the dream of homeownership is often out of reach. What used to be a standard middle class aspiration to own your own own home no longer is, right? Just paying the rent is hard these days. Property taxes are through the roof. Um, so the electric our electricity bills have gone up about $40 a month since Winter Storm Ure when the gas industry was allowed to make billions of dollars by withholding the gas that our grid needed until the price was right so they can make billions of dollars in hours. And we're all left paying the price for that. Greg Abbott let it happen. He got a million-dollar check from one of the gas companies after that legislative session where he let it happen, got a million-dollar check to his campaign.

SPEAKER_01 7:00

When I tell you health insurance can be its own show by itself, there's so yeah. As an entrepreneur and experiencing having to buy health insurance and what that looks like, and then still not being able to see the doctor that you need and or want, it's yeah, we can go down a rabbit hole with that for sure.

ICE Shooting And Missing Transparency

SPEAKER_01 7:18

Um, I want to switch gears now a bit to immigration. You filed a public information uh act request uh demanding body cam and dash cam footage after the fatal shooting of Ruben Ray Martinez. How did you first learn about that case and what troubled you most about this case?

SPEAKER_00 7:35

It was a random tweet I saw, I think it was Friday, on social media that said this was revealed that a young man in the valley where I'm originally from, South Texas, was killed by ice about a year ago. And I saw it and I started kind of sending it to people who have connections to press asking, is this real? Did this right? Because you got to check everything on social media these days, right? And um, the more we learned, the more we found out, yes, it's real, yes, it did happen, and nobody knew. And we just learned before walking in here that the one witness who was in the car with Ruben Ray Martinez was killed over the weekend in um a car accident in San Antonio. And and he was the only pro is the only witness that we know of that's not law enforcement that has come forward. The attorneys for Ruben Ray Martinez say that his statement was um it contradicted what law enforcement said. Um so I think there's just still a lot of information to find out. I requested body cam footage because we know state police were there too. This happened during spring break on South Padre Island. Yeah. And that's a time when it's just overrun with people, right? And young people, oftentimes drinking. And so they had a lot of law enforcement there to just control traffic and control the crowds. So they had state police there, and that's why I requesting that information. As a legislator, I'm entitled to it. Yeah, and I'm invoking that authority to see it.

SPEAKER_01 9:22

What does it say about transparent transparency in Texas right now?

SPEAKER_00 9:27

It says that we're in real trouble.

unknown 9:29

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 9:30

When government isn't transparent about taking the life of an American citizen of a Texan, we're all in trouble. The only way we can hold government accountable is if we know what is happening. It is foundational to who we are as a democracy. So to learn that that had been covered up for almost a year is unacceptable. It is infuriating, and it should be an alarm bell for all of us about our freedoms.

SPEAKER_01 10:01

Speaking of freedoms, Texas holds more than 18,000 ICE detainees. That's the highest in the nation. What is your long-term vision for immigration enforcement in the state?

SPEAKER_00 10:11

I want to make sure people understand why so many people are being held in detention. And its profit motives. Since last year, we know that private prison companies have these contracts with the government for these detentions. We know that about a week ago, the shareholders for these private prison companies were on a call and they were expressing disappointment that there weren't more people detained. They were under the impression there would be more people detained. For them, every head is a dollar sign. Right? The longer somebody stays in, the more money they make. The more people who get detained, the more money they make. Um and so it is uh it is profit-driven by these private prison companies, and it is immoral that that is the motivation for locking these people up. The governor of Texas has some authority here. Greg Abbott, after getting, by the way, tens of thousands of dollars from the private prison companies, created a new kind of licensing for these detention centers that allows for little children to be locked up with their parents. That is not allowed anywhere else in this country. That's why that's happening here in Texas. Anywhere else in this country, little children treated like that would be prosecuted as child abuse. But here, that is the corrupt reality we're dealing with in Texas.

Small Donors Versus Big Money

SPEAKER_01 11:43

Speaking of corrupt, uh Greg and Governor Greg Abbott is sitting on more than a hundred million dollars. You've emphasized small dollar donors and and not taking corporate PAC money. How do you compete against that kind of financial machine?

SPEAKER_00 11:59

That's a lot of money, but to your point, um, you don't get that kind of money doing the the work of the people. That comes from a deeply corrupt governance style, from some actions where the governor has defied past acts of other governors where he's giving no big contracts to his donors. Um, it's out of hand at this point. But yeah, we have to raise tens of millions of dollars. We are right now raising mostly from just individual small donors, and it adds up. This is a big state. If everybody puts in what they can, we can get there, and we will get there. I have no doubt that we will get there. But look, ultimately, Greg Abbott has a problem. His problem is that typically when you have money, you use it to boost your name ID, tell people who you are, what you're about. His problem is that people know who he is. They've been knowing him for almost 12 years, and the polls show that he is deeply unpopular, he is weak, and they don't like him.

SPEAKER_01 13:03

I want to ask you this because I'm from uh Houston, so Harris County. Uh Abbott mentioned that he plans to spend heavily to flip Harris County and to flip it red. What's your strategy to protect and expand Democratic strongholds across the state?

SPEAKER_00 13:19

Well, I will say that what we're seeing across the state right now is that Democrats and people in general are motivated in voting like we haven't seen in a bit, right? So it's a great sign that people have finally woken up and they want to participate. Um, but I think it's meeting people where they are. We're traveling the state, asking people, what do you want to see for your future? What are your hopes and dreams for your future? So we can build an agenda around that. Um we're not telling people this is what is good for you, because we we we have no idea unless we're talking to people. And it's different throughout the state. I will say the universal throughout this state is that everybody is struggling.

unknown 13:57

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 13:57

That that people are angry, that the dollar doesn't go as far, that um they're worried whether or not they can pay their bills at the end of the month. Um their incomes aren't growing as fast as their expenses. And in fact, in Texas, our income is growing at a slower pace than the rest of the nation. So what people are feeling is real, the data shows it. And the people of Texas need a governor who will work as hard for them to keep costs down, to provide opportunities as they work for themselves and their own families.

SPEAKER_01 14:32

I gotta ask you this from a standpoint of, you know, when I I've talked to so many candidates and they have their priorities laid out on their websites, et cetera, right? The language is there. Now that you've been on a campaign trail and you're actually talking to people, you've mentioned that it's different depending on where you are and where you go, but there are some things that that remain the same across our state. When you think about that as it relates to what's currently your priorities on your site, how does that change? What are your top three priorities now as far as you know, the data that you have talking to people now?

SPEAKER_00 15:05

So

A Clean Slate For State Government

SPEAKER_00 15:06

I have some priorities on my website, but let me say this. Government in Texas is so broken that it's not going to take one, two, or three things to fix it. It's gonna take a clean, slate, fresh start. We need to rebuild the system from scratch because the system is working against us with our own money and it hasn't worked for us for a long time. And I think the problem that Democrats have is that we've been defending an indefensible system for too long, right? So, yes, we have some issues. Public schools are like that's a passion of mine. I'm so in it that that I can recite that in my sleep. And and I see I have kids in public schools, right? So I I see the problems and I'm deeply engaged on those issues with people across the state. But many other issues we're still learning. Um we have some proposals on health care to rein in the health insurance companies to pull down the federal dollars to expand Medicaid. We can insure a million Texans just by pulling down the federal dollars that we've already paid into the system. Instead, it's going to insure Californians and people in other states. Um we have proposed something that I've voted on before, and that's cash back for renters, because if you think about it, renters pay property taxes too. And whenever we pass bills to give taxins property tax breaks, we don't include renters. We had an amendment, Gene Wu filed an amendment to extend property tax breaks to renters. It was voted down by Republicans. But I think that is something we need to pursue because renters are struggling to make it. And if renters are ever going to be able to afford their own home, they need some help, right? Um, and so we can help by minimizing the tax burden on them.

SPEAKER_01 16:59

How are you getting in touch with uh younger voters? I saw voters younger than 30 in one of the polls that was released lately are really backing you. So, what what has been your message? How do you feel like you've been communicating with them where they're getting a message like, okay, we see what you're out there doing, Gina? Like, let us let's show up and do what we need to do.

SPEAKER_00 17:16

We're on social media a lot. Yeah, right. And I think you just gotta go where the people are. And so we're invested heavily in that strategy, talking about issues and talking about what we're hearing young people um are concerned about. I will say young people are showing up to vote now in a way they did it last election. And and I think that it's just a different election. This time, things are so bad that I think um young people want to be a part of the change. And um and I think they're inspired. I think the Senate race, the drama in the Senate race has got people engaged in a big way. Um, but we'll keep at it, we'll keep visiting with young people, talking to them about what they want to see for their future. And if you think about it, these economic hardships that all of us suffer, for them, it it's a hit to their psyche because and it affects how they think about their future, what kind of future they can dream to even have, right? As they're just starting off in life. And it's a scary future right now, especially with AI, AI taking jobs. Um and so young people are very invested in what the future of this country and this state look like right now. And they and they realize that.

SPEAKER_01 18:37

I want to talk about a poll that your team was very excited about. Um release polling showing you statistically tie with Abbott and leading with independence. I mentioned young voters and Latinos. What are you seeing on the ground that supports that?

SPEAKER_00 18:50

Yeah, nobody likes Greg Abbott. Um, so I mean, it's it's wild. Uh you know what I think it is. I think it's a couple of things. One is he's been there too long. He's trying to be the longest serving governor in Texas history. People don't want that. Like I said before, politics as usual is broken and he offers more of the same. What's he gonna do for you that he hasn't done in the first 12 years that he's been governor, right? So people are ready just for a different approach and change. People are struggling, and we hear it all over this state. Mostly we hear he bit he's just been there too long.

SPEAKER_01 19:28

Yeah. Okay.

How Vouchers Shift Money Upward

SPEAKER_01 19:29

Um, you've used the phrase Greg Abbott corruption tax. What does that look like in real life for Texans?

SPEAKER_00 19:34

Yeah. Um, well, what it looks like is that most of the bills we're allowed to pass in the Texas House are vendor bills connected to the governor's donors. I mentioned the voucher before, right? So we took a billion dollars away from public schools that are already the some of the lowest funded in the whole country. We took that away, which let's also stress our public schools are the only choice for 5.5 most of the 5.5 million kids out there, right? So they could give basically a subsidy, an entitlement to wealthy parents who already have their kids in private school. Up to $30,000. Right? The thing about these vouchers that people might not realize is you still have to be accepted to the private school.

unknown 20:30

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 20:31

And they can deny you for all sorts of reasons except for explicitly denying you for race or um. Any of the other things that are protected. Right. I mean, but um but like they're not they're not appl approving uh Muslim schools, they're not approving schools for um, like if you're going to a Catholic school, they can discriminate if you're Catholic, right? Like only for Catholics or Catholics come first. Like they can even discriminate against some of the things that you can't typically discriminate against, like religion, right? Now there's a lawsuit on the Muslim issue, but um so it's only for certain types of kids. And most kids in Texas do not fit the bill.

unknown 21:23

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 21:23

You're saying a lot, and I'm reading between the lines. So I understand what you mean. What specific changes, though, and I know this is your your area, you have many areas, but this one is hits at the heartstrings. What specific changes would you make to strengthen neighborhood public schools and stop this whole voucher scam situation?

Paying Teachers And Fixing Class Sizes

SPEAKER_00 21:42

So I filed a bill last year, and it is my education policy. And it's taking all that money we're spending right now, setting it aside, and first pay teachers to be amongst the highest paid in the nation. We all know the best thing we can do for our kids' education is put a great teacher in the classroom. But for the first time ever, Texas is hiring more teachers that are uncertified than certified, which means our teachers don't have the same training and expertise and professionalism that they used to, because teachers are leaving the profession. They are leaving like in droves. They're disrespected, they're underpaid, and they're done. That's the first thing we need to fix in our public schools. Also, we need smaller classes. What's happening is we're shutting down schools everywhere. Class sizes are getting bigger. Um, we're trying to be more and more efficient, but these are little kids, they're human beings. It's not about that. It's about connecting with a child so they understand you care for them, you have time to teach them the way they need to learn. That's what public schools are supposed to be about. Our schools are supposed to show up for kids as they are and bring them along. Um, you can't do that when you have class sizes that are too big. Special education funding also should be a priority because those are the kids being left behind the most and they're entitled, legally entitled to an appropriate education for them. And then finally, school safety. Since you've all deparents, I I hear from parents who keep their kids at home because they are afraid. We need to invest in safety in our schools in a way that we are not, and those are just basics that we should be doing with our dollars before we do anything else. But that kind of approach, clean slate, fresh start, need to be taken for every area of government in Texas that we use taxpayer

Building Trust With Black Voters

SPEAKER_00 23:46

dollars for.

SPEAKER_01 23:46

I want to talk specifically about the voters now. Um, and one of the things that I wanted to touch on, a lot of my viewers are certainly Texans, but I have a lot of black voters that follow me and follow my work. So black voters have been, again, the backbone of the Democratic Party in Texas year after year after year. How do you intentionally, and how are you, I should say, intentionally building trust and partnership with black voters in this campaign? That's important to me.

SPEAKER_00 24:12

Um we just um we've been doing tours around the state, visiting with black communities, going to black churches, um, telling the story about my role in saving souls to the polls, Sunday morning voting, which happened because we broke quorum in 2021 and I organized that quorum break. We did that in collaboration. We could not have done that. Let me say this. We could not have done that without the help of the NAACP, who found us, the Black Church in East Austin, Mount Olive Baptist Church, who took us in when we broke quorum because we were saving souls to the polls. And without black pastors across the state who joined with us when we went to Washington, D.C. and fought for the John Lewis Voting Rights Act. That is part of my history, what is important to me. Um, people don't know that. So I like to talk to people about that, tell them that, and ask, what do you want to do? What do you, what is your, what is your hope and dream for yourself and for your families? I'm not gonna pretend to know what the black community wants. We had a really interesting meeting in Houston with um black barbershop owners and heard from them what are their concerns, small business owners, what are their concerns? And so we're trying to reach out to different communities within the African American community to um make sure that the agenda that we're building is ref a reflection of what they want to see.

SPEAKER_01 25:42

What are you hearing when you're out in some of these communities?

SPEAKER_00 25:45

A lot of the same about affordability. And and you know what, in its um, how do we support entrepreneurs, how do we support small businesses, which is an oversight in this state? Texas has um it's harder for small businesses to access capital than the rest of the nation. Small business owners make less in profits than the national average, right? So even though we have strong small businesses in Texas, it is bootstraps, they build it on their own, y'all build it on your own.

SPEAKER_01 26:19

Trust me, I'm glad you say y'all. Trust me on that.

SPEAKER_00 26:22

Y'all build it on your own. And and and the thing about what I love about small business is that it is a reflection of our best, boldest, ambitious cultural values as Texans, right? It is who we should aspire to be supporting in this state because it is a reflection of who we want to be as Texans. So I think we need to do more. And we propose, for instance, sales tax breaks for small businesses so that if you're selling items and you got to choose, do I buy it on Amazon or do I buy it at the small business, it's cheaper because the sales taxes is um less at the small business. Um tax-free small business Saturday after Black Friday, so that people on that Saturday have an incentive to go to small businesses and shop small business. So there are things we can do as government that again reduces the tax burden um for our small business owners.

SPEAKER_01 27:23

What about some of the hub changes that have been made recently? Any feedback or thoughts on what the say comptrollers has done lately?

SPEAKER_00 27:32

Here's my thought about this. I think of this quote from Ann Richards who would say, life is not fair, but government has to be. And that's what the hub program was all about, right? It was about um making sure that it wasn't just a good old boys system and that everybody got a piece of state contracts. Because guess what? We everybody pays taxes, right? And so it would not be fair if we did not have um relationships in the in that contracting world that were reflective of the rest of the state, because that can't be fair because everybody pays into taxes. So what what we can do is hold accountable these agencies to say, well, if you don't have, for instance, um any African-American or many women-owned or whatever it may be, businesses, why not? What is that about? There are plenty. Give us answers, right? So we can tie accountability into this system and making it be about fairness, making sure that because we all pay taxes, we all get the benefit

Voter Fatigue And A Politics Of Fear

SPEAKER_00 28:46

of them.

SPEAKER_01 28:46

How are you attacking voter fatigue? Folks are tired. Yeah. We have so many elections and just trying to keep up with each and every one. Folks are tired. So how are you guys organizing in a way that's attacking voter fatigue to try to get people amped up? Like obviously, we see that they are, right? With so much happening in the turnout as of the last week or so. But how are you guys tackling that? Because I have talked to a lot of people and they are tired.

SPEAKER_00 29:12

A lot of people are tired. And I know why. A lot of people are tired, but I don't know that the fear has ever been this great. And that fear is waking people up, getting people out the door, getting people to the polls, I think. And it's not a fear that Democrats have to even say anything about. Um, it's a fear like from a young man who said to me, I'm worried if ICE stops me and tries to take me, even if I show them my uh my birth certificate that I'm a citizen, what do I do? A young man lived by himself. Um he asked, Can I use my gun? That was the kind of fear that he felt. And I said, No, you you cannot use your gun. You need to stay connected to community, make sure community knows where you are. It's a it's an opportunity to not just be out there by yourself, but make sure you're connected to a larger community. But it it's that level fear, fear for personal safety. Um But I let me say this even though I think that kind of fear about what is happening in this country is motivating a lot of people to vote, we have a responsibility of as Democrats to offer a vision that can get people excited about what the future can bring. Now, let me acknowledge that there's a lot of distrust amongst all politicians, right? Like directed at all politicians, uh Democrats, um, Republicans for sure, but also Democrats. And so there's a lot of work to do to build that trust and to um to prove and show that you're authentic in what you in what we are running on. And that's that's my job this campaign. The first, so the most important thing for me, um, or the most exciting thing for me is all the appointments that the governor gets to make. Think of everything from the Texas Education Agency Commissioner who has almost godlike control over our schools, decides when to shut down school districts, when to take them over. It's a lot of discretion in that. Um, also Secretary of State who decides how to run elections in the state, like the immense power there, right? So um we'll be putting together a plan for those first hundred days, but a lot of that will be focused on appointments.

SPEAKER_01 31:52

Okay. How would you work with a potentially divided legislature?

SPEAKER_00 31:57

So when we win in November, that creates a space for Republican legislators who have not been free to vote their districts, much less their conscience, to understand there is accountability in November. And it's not just the primary they have to be worried about. And it and it creates a space for them to vote the way they need, they want to, right? So um many of the things that I talk about really there is bipartisan support for public schools, I mentioned, um, also um expanding Medicaid. There are a lot of Republican legislators who support that because it's common sense. They don't feel like they can do it because they think the only election that matters is their primary election, right? So um we'll be exploring bipartisan space, but it's bipartisan space because it is it is a populist agenda for the people, right? Doing the work and the business of the people instead of the special interests is popular with the vast majority of Texans.

SPEAKER_01 32:58

If someone says Texas will never flip, what do you say to that?

Can Texas Flip And How

SPEAKER_00 33:02

I would say don't say it can't happen because it already is. We see in Tarrant County, where a Democrat won that open Senate seat.

SPEAKER_01 33:10

Taylor Romette.

SPEAKER_00 33:11

Taylor Ramette, we see, and and what's interesting about that is Republicans saw it coming because just a couple months before they had already lost it in that open seat. He ran again it first in the runoff. They had time there to fix that. And they poured a lot of money into it. Steal. And they couldn't do it. And they couldn't do it. And he flipped a seat 31 points. Cy Fair outside of Houston, Democrats flipped three school board seats against big money book banners. As soon as the new school board was in, they put the books back into the library. In Leander, outside of Austin, they just flipped a mayor's seat, they just flipped a city council seat. Also, Robstown, they just flipped a mayor's seat. This has all been within the last couple of months, right? So people are motivated, communities are taking back power in all sorts of ways, but it is happening in Texas.

SPEAKER_01 34:13

One sentence Should Texans believe you can actually beat Greg Abbott?

SPEAKER_00 34:18

Absolutely. Um we are showing that people are excited about this campaign. The polling shows we are in a statistical tie with Greg Abbott. The polling shows that independents are with us overwhelmingly, and um that Greg Abbott is deeply unpopular. People want change.

SPEAKER_01 34:38

Rapid fire.

Rapid Fire And Family Roots

SPEAKER_01 34:40

What's your favorite food in Texas that says um I'm from Texas?

SPEAKER_00 34:46

Uh oh, that uh that's so hard. Because I got lots of them enchiladas, probably.

SPEAKER_01 34:52

From where?

SPEAKER_00 34:53

Oh, that's so hard. How are you gonna do this to me? Yes, give me one. Um probably from Polo's in in South Austin. Okay.

SPEAKER_01 35:00

Um favorite song that says I'm from Texas.

SPEAKER_00 35:05

Beyonce.

SPEAKER_01 35:06

Which one? You gotta give me something. This ain't Texas. Okay. Okay. All right. Um, let's see. Favorite accessory that you wear. This is, yeah, that's who I am.

SPEAKER_00 35:18

That's who I am. Well, I always wear my um, I always, well, actually, no, sorry. It's my grandma's ring.

SPEAKER_01 35:26

Oh, wow.

SPEAKER_00 35:26

This is my grandma's ring. She was in my launch video. Um, she gave this to me when she passed. She passed a couple years ago and she gave it to me uh a little before she passed.

SPEAKER_01 35:36

What do you think your grandma would say right now, seeing you doing what you're doing?

SPEAKER_00 35:39

I know she'd be so excited. My grandmother was strong, strong, strong. She taught me this saying in Spanish, no te dejes, which means don't let people push you around. And that's how she lived her life. So she would be very proud.

SPEAKER_01 35:55

Okay, we've talked about grandma, but one person who I haven't talked about is your dad. Okay, do you want to tell folks that relationship and his relation to the party?

SPEAKER_00 36:05

Yes, so my dad was the Democratic Party chair in the state of Texas for many, many years. Yes, he was.

SPEAKER_01 36:11

How has his support um, you know, been amplified in this phrase uh what you're doing? I know he donated and all the things, but how has that been having someone who pretty much knows what's going on as far as the inner workings?

SPEAKER_00 36:24

Um, he's been very supportive, very helpful. He has built up a a lot of great relationships across the state, mostly with the Democratic base, right? All over the state. And so he'll say, Oh, I have friends here, I have friends there, make sure you touch base with them. And so, in in lots of ways, it's made the state smaller for me because I have friends who are taking me in because they love my dad, right? There's a flip side to that too, right? I'm not my dad. And so things that people um don't support that my dad did will they'll sometimes attribute to me. So um I look, don't get me wrong wrong. I love my dad, I'm proud of my dad, uh, but I'm my own person, right? I built a record over the last few years um on my own, and um, that's the record I'm running on.

SPEAKER_01 37:13

Yeah, and that's the campaign that we're talking about here today.

SPEAKER_00 37:15

Okay.

Last Best Chance Closing

SPEAKER_01 37:16

Anything else, Jeannie, you want folks to know about you?

SPEAKER_00 37:20

Um that I never meant to run for office. Okay. I mean, my husband promised to never run for office before we got married.

SPEAKER_01 37:26

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 37:27

I didn't mean to have this kind of life. I wanted a quieter life for my family. But um sometimes God has other plans, and I felt compelled, and in much the same way, I feel compelled today to try to do everything I can to make the change I know we need. And what I am hearing across the state is that people are also feeling compelled to do the same. For everybody, it looks different. Right. But there is this knowing that people carry within them that this might be our last best chance. And people are showing up and doing what they can.