Texas Bullpen Podcast
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Texas Bullpen Podcast
Screwed by the Worm, A Not-So-Secret GOP Summit, and Jane Bids Adieu - Episode 32
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The fellas wax poetic about the Great Screwworm Invasion of 2026, a not-so-super-secret GOP summit planning for November, and the abrupt resignation by Texas' Secretary of State.
In the right.
SPEAKER_05Do you want me to come over there and pat your back or something? Yeah, please do actually.
SPEAKER_00You don't do that enough around here. Yeah, we certainly don't. No. You pat my thrown in my direction.
SPEAKER_02Back, I pat your back.
SPEAKER_00Oh, okay. That's a good idea. Should we pat each other's backs later? Yeah. Good morning, everybody. Happy well, for us it's Friday, but for you all listening, it's Saturday. Welcome to the weekend. Yeah. It's been quite a week. As Richie has described multiple times this week, it's been one full of Saturdays. Yeah.
SPEAKER_04It's the week of eternal Saturdays, because we have just been burning it at both ends and in the middle.
SPEAKER_00And if you can't tell, Richie's got himself a little bit of a man flu.
SPEAKER_04The man flu is striking me.
SPEAKER_00But he's he's toughening it out for the brand.
SPEAKER_04You just gotta settle up and ride anyways. But yeah, I mean we've been busier than a screw worm at a cattle auction.
SPEAKER_00So Yeah, unfortunately the screw worm's getting busier, uh, especially in Texas.
SPEAKER_04There were some updates uh today that's a little bit more.
SPEAKER_00I mean we might as well just jump right into it. So this week we had the first confirmed uh case of screw worm in Texas. And that kind of lit everything on fire. So tell us.
SPEAKER_04There was a lot of kind of hubbub leading up to that because State Representative Don McLaughlin was uh sent a letter saying that he had heard reports that screw worm wasn't was in with about a mile of the border, and that was pushed back on by USDA and the Texas uh state officials saying that the closest reported confirmed screw worm sighting was 25 miles from the border in a goat uh on some you know Mexican ranch. The next day, however, USDA had to say that there was a potential uh confirmed new worm, uh New World screw worm that had been found in Texas on a ranch in uh Zavala County, and they had sent that off for testing, and then that night uh USDA Secretary Brooke Rollins hopped on a phone press briefing with uh Texas media and confirmed that there was a screw worm found in an umbilical lesion on a three-week old calf. Um and so that immediately this is something that for well over a year, their uh international response, America, Mexico, Panama, other Central and South American uh partners, and Texas state officials as well have been monitoring the slow monitoring the situation. This is a highly monitored situation, but the slow advance of Screwworm up from where it had been contained behind the Darien gap in Panama. However, uh over the past couple of years, there had been increased uh traffic through there, both because of the immigration. Uh there had been movement of worm-bodied uh animals through there as well. You know, there was some uh talk about you know the cartels livestock operation as well, which again is not something that is you know highly regulated by the Mexican government.
SPEAKER_00So uh Wait, you mean the Mexican government that is infiltrated heavily by the cartels?
SPEAKER_04Uh well we don't uh let's not cast stones here, I guess. Yeah, yeah. Although let's definitely cast stones. But let's cast stones. So uh but this happened. It had been I mean, you can say a lot of things about the state and federal response to it, and a lot of people are saying a lot of things. But I literally just got back from a press briefing uh with the governor, um, USDA Admiral, and some of the other Texas uh Parks and Wildlife, Texas Animal Health Commission. There's a lot that's been done on this in preparation for it to appear in America, and now that it is here, we're able to take, I think, a lot more stringent steps than what were able to happen in Mexico. So what they told us today is that since that first one instant in that calf, there has not been another instance identified in that invested infested zone. They went through all the other animals in that uh ranching operations herd. Not another one of them tested positive, or not tested positive, not another one of them had uh screw worms in it. Um and there is a quarantine on there on warm-blooded animals. There's checkpoints, you know, coming and going, your animal, if it's moving, has to be inspected. And there's been ramped up uh fly traps and the dispersal of the sterile flies, which is kind of the primary way of combating screw worm. And it was what was used back in the 50s and 60s that eventually exterminated screw worm from America. So uh there's a lot that's being done, and there's a a lot more that's gonna continue to be done, and and uh but again, so far there's only been one documented uh uh occurrence of this in America. It will likely continue to spread. That's what the governor was saying today. Uh because it's a seasonal thing. In the warmer months it spreads, it's got you know, whatever during the winter it contracts, but uh there's uh certainly a lot being done on it.
SPEAKER_00And Abbott said, I think, in the hearing to or the meeting today that you know there's there's a chance if we get to winter that just the cold weather kills off these things. But I think he also said we can't handle a second summer of this, right? He did say that.
SPEAKER_04He did say that. Um and that's I guess kind of the game plan right now. Uh so three months to stop the spread? Yeah, kind of. Uh 300 billion sterile flies to stop the spread, more like it. So that was a lot of the big what was for me more interesting information from the briefing is an explanation on the timeline of the production of sterile flies. So right now USDA runs uh or helps run a Panamanian facility that produces, I think, a hundred million a day. Sounds like a lot. They think they need maybe sorry, two or three times that amount amount. Wow. And so they have allocated money to refurbish some Mexican fruit fly facilities into uh screwworm facilities. Those should be coming online next month. And then they have already broken ground on building a sterile fly production facility in uh Edinburgh or uh at the Moore Air Base, uh, which there used to be one there back in the 70s, uh, but it it it went away. So the timeline on that has been highly uh expedited, and they're working in finding ways to expedite it even ther further. So right now the target date was of November of 27 for that opening. Uh Abbott wants to move that up to May so that then they can really keep hitting them hard on the sterile flies and and hopefully push it back again.
SPEAKER_00So a uh a friend of the program reached out uh this week to tell us about her father, who was one of the I think scientists on the screwworm response team back in the 70s. And um apparently he was saying that you know it was encouraging that the the response got um has been organized so quickly and that you know the the facilities have been put up and running in such a a quick fashion. Um but clearly, you know, that as the decades went by screw worm response strategies just fell by the wayside. And you know, I'm sure funding for it got stripped here or there, or they decided to divert it elsewhere for something else, or maybe the fruit fly thing. I don't know. You know, it's it it happens uh as you know things become not a problem for a while, and then all of a sudden here it is, it's a massive problem. Right. And this this could devastate Texas's agriculture industry.
SPEAKER_04It could. That's certainly the risk uh is that it will put a further strain on already, you know, America's uh cattle herd is at its lowest levels in 75 years. Uh the border has been closed to uh cattle and animals for a while now already. Uh we're not importing beef from other parts of the world largely. There's some exceptions, but uh uh I mean it could be opened up further, is what I mean. Um and so there's a lot of uh worry that if this really starts breaking out and it does become a mass infestation, that it will heavily damage. I think some of the numbers bandied around could be like $1.6 billion of damage to the Texas cattle industry alone. Wow. Uh yep, might be slightly misstated, but it whatever the number is, it is massive. And I mean, back I was looking at some of the numbers on you know, when screw worm was just a reality of life and not something that, you know, we thought we could control. You know, it was infecting uh infesting rather uh up to I think a million uh head of cattle documented a year. Wow. It decimated Texas's uh whitetailed deer population, I think, by like 80% over the course of a few decades. It it really has the ability to uh dramatically reduce animal populations. Uh it also, right, we talk about a lot in cattle and other type of livestock and other type of large animals, but it can infest your pets too. That's something that a lot of people uh were stressing. The USDA secretary and some of the other ones, like, check your pets. If they have a lesion, if they have a cut, that is where screw worms like to burrow and plant their eggs, which turn into larvae, which then eat your animal. But the way that this thing moves and spreads isn't so much by the some you know bold new screw worm just like sprinting 25 miles. Like the penguin going off and her zog. Yeah, it's not his penguin. Like it doesn't fly a long way. How this spreads is somebody puts their pet who has an infestation in their car and drives it to some other county, and then that fly gets out there. Um, you know, cattle livestock movement, things of that nature. Drink, things of that nature.
SPEAKER_00Everyone drink. Um you know, and there was this thing kind of kicked off this week with a scrap between Don McLaughlin and Brooke Rollins. You go into more detail about that little fight that happened.
SPEAKER_04Well, yeah, and I'd mentioned it a little bit earlier, like McGaughlin said it was within a mile, and then USDA said, you know, that's not true, this is a lie, it's 25 miles away, and then the next day they had to, of course, correct and say, no, it's here, actually. Um but we've seen a lot of finger pointing on this. Uh we've seen Republicans going after each other, especially rural Republicans, uh over what's viewed as sorry, incompetent USDA response. We've seen Sid Miller come out. Yeah. And of course, Sid's uh public feud with the USDA over screw worms is longstanding. Uh he is very publicly sparred with Brooke Rollins over this because he wanted to uh deploy a specific type of screw worm fly trap. Uh and the USDA said that it wasn't effective, it wasn't, you know, doing what needed to be done. There were other fly traps out there that did a better job of it. Um Miller didn't take too kindly to that. And the Texas Agriculture Commissioner and that whole kind of wing of government has largely been cut out of Skirworm fly response. They're not on the task force, they're not, they certainly weren't at the briefing today uh when the Edinburgh uh facilities had their groundbreaking. Uh Miller was not invited. Nate Sheets, his primary opponent, who was backed by Abbott, was invited and was there. But the Agriculture Commission resources are, as far as what has been released, operating independently uh, if at all, on this stuff, while it's really the governor's controlled state agencies like the Texas Animal Health Commission, Texas Parks and Wildlife, and other things like that uh are the ones leading the thrust on this. And uh the Ag Commissioner is nowhere to be seen.
SPEAKER_00And clearly there's some politics being played out there, massive grudges. Yeah, absolutely. But you know, there's more political implications for this. We're already in a what's going to be a very difficult cycle for the GOP. A big aspect of that is the kind of pregnant economy right now and uh the affordability problem. And imagine if screw worm devastates the cattle industry, prices of beef are gonna go way up.
SPEAKER_04Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Um, you know, I was talking with a friend last night and he just kind of sardonically responds, um uh, you know, I'm not gonna go like three years without eating beef because it if it ever gets that bad, like it just will be so uh costly where you'll start to see shortages uh in grocery stores on this, like we saw when supply chain issues hit during COVID on various goods.
SPEAKER_04So it's there's certainly a potential for that.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, and that's not to say it will happen, and also it's not to say it'll happen uh to that effect by November, but this is definitely something Republicans have in the back of their mind, like, oh geez, another thing we gotta deal with in this uh already difficult election, right?
SPEAKER_04Inopportune timing. And I will say, like, I don't know, it seems like it's a full force of government response. And one of the things that the USDA people keep pointing to is like all of the prediction models on uh screwworm spread had it breaching the border a year ago. And they said that because Cassie just had an audible reaction in the background there. The live audience for it. Because of the She's gonna have to start clapping for us when we really get there. Yeah. The ramped up, scaled up, you know, sterile fly, uh dispersals and things of that n uh in the Yeah, man, I almost said it again. Uh it was able to slow the advance enough to allow for more time and more preparation. And that's where if we go back, because I was doing some reading. As you do, as I want to do, uh, about the you know, the early development of this sterile fly production and things. Because the reason why that works is female uh screw worms only uh screw once. That's it. They only mate once and then they die. So if you inject, did you see how much I d debated whether or not to say so? If you dump in a whole bunch of sterile, you know, eunu male flies, uh they will mate with the females, no you know, viable eggs will be produced, and then that population of screw worm declines in the direct correlation to how many sterile flies are injected into that community. And so this was done back in the 50s using like atomic energy waves that they beamed into these flies that makes them sterile. Um the one of the national nuclear groups responded to one of my tweets with this super interesting 15-minute uh informational movie that was developed about all of this, and it's really interesting. Uh certainly go give it a watch. Now it does, you know, warning, it does show some live infestations of screw worms and animals, so don't watch it over you know, lunch or anything like that. Uh, but it's extremely interesting to actually get into how this works. And uh they were talking uh today too about like the technology that's available now when it comes to dispersal allows for a much more targeted um ability to stop it, which is probably what led to why it took so long relatively compared to the models to get it here, because they were hidden where they're at.
SPEAKER_00Well, and you know, even though some of the facilities and abilities to respond had been mothballed and now obviously are being ramped back up, the technology is significantly better to respond uh this time around. And um, you know, the the um the person who texted us about her her dad that was involved in this, she said um he spent most of my early childhood in Mexico releasing sterilized flies from a low-flying propeller plane. It's just you know, it it worked obviously, but it's a lot more rudimentary than what we got right now.
SPEAKER_04And I mean they still there's you know, there's aerial dispersals and there's ground box dispersals, they'll disperse them from trucks in the region. Like there's all different ways to deploy these uh special force flies, you know, on the area. Uh and they're doing I I think they're throwing just about everything against the wall, see what see what works. But basically it all boils down to we're nuking the bugs.
SPEAKER_00Have you ever seen uh Starship Troopers? Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_03It's like I'm doing my part.
SPEAKER_00Let's kill these bugs.
SPEAKER_04We need to suit up in the entire human population and start just and you know the I'm doing my part is a very fun little joke from that movie. But the big thing that they kept stressing and is that people need to be educated to know what to look for so that you can report it. You need to be inspecting your animals, you need to be Although didn't Sid Miller have kind of a viral comment on this? Yes. Now I didn't watch the full context of that, but what it looked like he was saying is he would understand if there are ranchers who see screw worm and don't report it, and instead treat it themselves. Because this is the thing, it's not COVID, it's not some virus that you can't see, like it's a it's a bug. And it's treatable. You treat it with uh ivermectin, you there's some smears that you can put on there, like there's stuff. I don't know, like at the bagel shop.
SPEAKER_00There's there's a lot of wait a second, are you saying you can treat screw worm with ivermectin?
SPEAKER_03Yeah. Yeah. Uh that's how it works. Give me some of that horse drug. Uh yeah. You lost your train of thought. It works.
SPEAKER_00How do you think I'm alive?
SPEAKER_04Sounds like you need some more of that. I might this weekend. I might. Um, some horse paste. Uh you can get it from tubes from tractor supply, you know. You just have to know that that's a highly concentrated dose that's made for horses, not people, so you need to dilute it to a certain amount.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. What about the aquarium cleaner?
SPEAKER_04Wasn't that the other way that people were trying to kill COVID at the beginning? Uh that that was that was tinfoil. That was but, anyways, right. I think what the ad commissioner was getting at is there are probably people because once it is spotted, it is like a 20 kilometer quarantine. You know, I mean, you're gonna have your operations uh I wouldn't say shut down, but it will certainly have a lot of occupation uh uh problems with it as you're trying to move cattle and things like that. But that was one of the things that they were really stressing at this conference is like, look, we're trying to address this in a way that stops it, but that doesn't stop the economy, right? It's not gonna ruin the food chain, you know, right? It doesn't infest and infect the meat, like it's it it's going to be fine, is what they were largely saying. Like we're taking every available step to to retreat it. Push them back. And Secretary Rollins said that she didn't believe that there was a big likelihood for a mass infestation, you know. And as of right now, so far we've had one gaff. Yeah. And that's it. So we'll see. I mean, there's going to be, I'm sure, more. That's what Abbott was saying, but uh they're all over this, you know.
SPEAKER_00And they should be, and we'll see how the response like a fly to honey. Yeah.
SPEAKER_04I've been trying to work out new like Texas sayings based on all of this.
SPEAKER_00Like a screw worm to an open wound with a building board. Um yeah, I mean it's it's it's obviously an emergency situation, but it is not out of control yet.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, it's it's certainly not one that like the people that are involved in this are surprised by. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Hi everyone, we'd like to thank the sponsor of today's podcast, the Lowy Law Firm. For over 20 years, Adam Lowy has helped injured Texans recover and heal. From car accidents to dog bites, Adam Lowy is there to help and gets results. Go to LowyLawfirm.com to find out more and get a free consultation. Adam, of course, is very well known on Twitter for his commentary and observations on Texas politics, so be sure to give him a follow as well. Thanks to our sponsor, the Lowy Law Firm.
SPEAKER_00This week we had a kind of we had not kind of we had the inside scoop on the uh GOP summit that occurred in the command over there and pat your back or something?
SPEAKER_05Yeah, please do actually.
SPEAKER_00You don't do that enough around here. Yeah, we certainly don't. No. You need you need more uh uh positive reinforcement. You pat my direction back, I pat your back. Oh, okay. That's shall we pat each other's backs later? Yeah. Is that a date?
SPEAKER_04Uh would you still love me if I were a screw?
SPEAKER_00Certainly not. Certainly not. Cassie's groaning off screen. This is not amusing. She is really regretting sitting in here for this. Um there was a gathering in Austin. All Republicans put on by the Speaker of the House, uh, over 70 people at this thing at the Omni Hotel in Austin. The purpose was to get on the same page in terms of what is it looking like this session or this year for the majority party in the state, and how to stem the bleeding. Um, you know, it's it's clearly a tough cycle for Republicans. They all know it. Um, but uh question is how can we, as Republicans, save enough seats and try and preserve the majority that we have and prevent what looks like a democratic wave from coming and crashing in or from developing into a tsunami. You know, we'll see. But uh they met and it was pretty interesting. Um you know, we we were getting some inside information on what was being talked about. There were some messaging points being made, you know, like Dave Carney, Abbott's top uh advisor was stressing to people in the room, you know, don't talk about the if you're talking about accomplishments, and we're talking about the uh five billion dollars that went to schools from the legislature last year. Don't frame it as, oh, we gave five billion dollars. Frame it as we gave teachers a five thousand dollar pay raise. So some just like campaign nuts and bolts was a big part of it. And you know, a lot of these guys have never run a general election, at least a competitive general election before. Most of them in most cycles could just mail it in and be fine because of after redistricting how safe a lot of the seats became. That is not the case this time. One attendee told me that basically everyone who is uh below R plus 12 is in trouble right now in this cycle. And stipulated things can change. Maybe the economy improves, maybe the Iran war ends, and Trump uh comes out on top with it, and that changes the political perception. But right now, those are all losing issues for Republicans, and they know it. Um and it's combining into this it's not just 2018, the numbers they were showing in this meeting are two and a half, two to two and a half times worse than 2018 for Republicans. And of course, in 2018, Republicans nearly lost a statewide seat in that U.S. Senate seat. But more importantly, they lost two state senators and they lost 12 uh state house members, and that was the the main effect, plus all the the judicial races down ballot that flipped. So the perception, the diagnosis is pretty dire at the moment. Uh there was a uh an analysis shown by Ragnar Research polling firm run by Chris Perkins, one of the top GOP pollsters, not just in the state but in the country. And it was on the SD9 election. We've talked about SD9 and the fact that the reason Taylor Remett won, the Democrat defeated the Republican Lee Wamsgans, is because all of the crossover vote pretty much went to Remett. And that includes not just independents, but Republicans. There is no way there were not enough Democrats in that seat to win the race. You had to have crossovers, which includes Republicans, go to Remett. This was relayed to the crowd, and then they also showed a post-election poll that was done where they they gauged the electorate in that special election runoff why they voted the way they did. And of particular note voters who cast ballots for Trump in 2024 but voted for Remett in that special election, 72, I think it's 72, over 70%, said they did that because they didn't like either the direction of the GOP now or they didn't like how Trump has handled things. Whether you agree with it or not, that is the perception among voters, and these Republicans have to confront that. And so this whole meeting, the purpose was to um to figure out how to go about doing that and how to go about preserving what they can in this election. So um it was you know, I I think the the other main you got a little shout out too, didn't you? And I did, I did. Uh at one point the speaker I was tweeting tidbits from the meeting, and at one point the speaker stands up and tells everybody, whoever's leaking to Brad Johnson, stop it. And uh they didn't stop. Sorry, but hey, made for a great story.
SPEAKER_04Um something which only our Texas Bullpen subscribers got to enjoy. No other no other coverage like ours on that one. So if you're not a subscriber, you need to go to TexasBullpin.com forward slash subscriptions. Subscribe today. You can get if you subscribe subscribe for a year, you get this lovely little mug. Whatever you put in it is up to you. Brad Hands paints these in the basement. At least in the legally, that's a joke. Um is it illegal for me to do that? To joke about it? Oh no. Well, I don't know. So to hand paint those in the basement. Get a sued for false representation, you know. That'd be terrible. I know a thing about two about that.
SPEAKER_00Well that you know that that the assessment was given in this meeting, and they also did specifically talk about races. Um we also the day of the summit, we published uh an analysis that had been done by Texans for lawsuit reform based on uh 2018, or the the ORVS, which is the optimal Republican voting strength calculation that they use to basically rate districts. And um it it gives an assessment on what's safe, what's not. But the assumption was made that let's say uh I think it was based on 2018 when uh uh across the board the average underperformance of the Orvis was 7%. And they listed out if that were to be replicated this cycle, who would be in danger? Um who would be in danger of losing as far as GOP held seats, and it was quite a lot. It was um, you know, some usual ones such as Denise Fiolobos in the um uh the Corpus Christi seat. That's that's still a lean dem seat. You got George Brago in 118, Angie Chan Button in 112, Janie Lopez in 37, Mark Lahood in 121, Caroline Harris Davila in 52, Morgan Meyer in 108, Don McLaughlin in 80, Ben Baumgardner in 63, Cheryl Bean in 94, John McQueeny in 97, Mark Durazzio in 122. And so the calculation is just that they took the Orvis rating for each of those districts and subtracted 7%. All of those candidates, uh elected officials and GOP nominees, would were now under 50%. They expanded that to 9%, guessing you know, this might be worse than 2018. And that included Lacey Hole in 138, Carisa Richardson in 61, Jeff Leach in 67, Terry Wilson in 20, Mano de Ayala in 133, Hillary Hickland in 55, Matt Shaheen in 66, Mitch Little in 65, Mike Schofield in 132, and Candy Noble in 89. The the wagons be circling, and that is pretty much the uh a big part of the target list that Democrats are going after uh this in this cycle. Um and actually the DCCC or DLCC Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee put out its list of targets that mirrors heavily, especially that first batch of uh Republican seats that I mentioned. And it includes uh well, shout out to to Calegio um in at the Texas Tribune for uh breaking this, but that includes Vialobos, Lopez, Harris Davila, Richardson, Leach, Bean, Meyer, Chen Button, Brego, La Hood, De Ayala, and Hull. And so there's a lot of overlap. Clearly, everybody knows what the seats are that are that are gettable under certain circumstances, and it's gonna be a massively expensive election and bruising fight in the Texas House. Democrats feel like they can seriously winnow down the Republican majority, and it's certainly possible.
SPEAKER_04Which would have a big impact on you know what happens next session and everything else.
SPEAKER_00Speaker politics, what policies can advance, what can't. Of course, every time we mention uh 2018, uh two things should follow. First of all, there's no straight ticket voting this time around. How does that affect things? I've been trying to figure my way out through that. And um the first batch of results that I of data I looked at shows there really wasn't that big of a difference between 2018 and 22. Um, but without knowing how many people voted straight ticket, it's it's really just impossible to see. But then the other side of it is what happened after Democrats really gained a lot of ground, which was Republicans moderated substantially in the 2019 session, and they focused only on school finance and property taxes. So um a lot of a lot of prologue there for this um uh this election, and as you said, it could uh impact a ton of stuff going into next year in the legislature. Um let's see, what else do we have? Uh oh, also I mentioned a lot of money being thrown into this. Well, stay tuned for something very interesting on Monday, Monday's newsletter related to that. So make sure you're subscribed at Texasbullpen.com. Richie, the I think the big uh political news of the week, um, maybe other than the GOP summit, was Jane Nelson deciding to uh submit her letter of resignation, retire in the middle of July. Um you know what's the what's the story there?
SPEAKER_04Uh well the story is that Jane Nelson, Secretary of State for what the past three and a half years, yeah. Um, is going to be stepping down going into next month. And that's uh obviously a little interesting because we're in the middle of an election cycle. SOS handles the voter files, they they run state elections. Um used to be state senator for a long time. So uh her tenure at the SOS, especially the last little bit of it, had been marked by some interparty uh fight over whether or not to close the primaries, meaning that only somebody of that party affiliation can vote in those party primaries. This has been something that the Republican grassroots had wanted because of the idea that Democrats were voting in the Republican primary in order to skew which candidate wins that contest and picking the more moderate one or whatnot. Nelson had uh pushed back on that sum and certainly had said that it was not possible to implement it for this election cycle. Uh this led to a lawsuit uh as well from the Texas GOP against the SOS and the uh Texas Attorney General's office under Ken Paxton, you know, weighed in on this, siding with the Texas GOP, trying to force the SOS to institute uh closed primaries for this primary season. Obviously, that's uh over now. Yeah. Done past. Done past. Uh so there was no love lost between that branch of the party and uh with Nelson's uh announced exit. Uh there's certainly been a lot of scuttle butt about who will be next. Um lot of different names have been banding it out. One that's been frequently mentioned is Nate Shatzlein, uh state rep up in the DFW area. Um there's been some other ones, though, too. What have what have you been hearing?
SPEAKER_00Aaron Powell Well Shatzlein is the main one, and it seems like there's a lot of momentum for that, and there are people adv pushing actively for that.
SPEAKER_04And Shatzline, right, is more of a right-wing affiliated, or I mean uh grassroots affiliated like house rap. He's one of those guys that are generally on the further out of the chamber. Trevor Burrus, Jr. Certainly.
SPEAKER_00Um kind of the reform caucus guys. Trevor Burrus, Jr. He was he was uh uh signed the contract with Texas, so that's you know the reform guys was a pretty wide talking the group. We're talking the But D he was like ground one on like we're going against the speaker's establishment. Not just that, but he was on like the right flank of that. Yeah. So um yeah, he is he is a which is generally not the type of Republican that Abbott puts into these positions. I was just curious. Yeah. Um, you know, the it's also interesting that uh Chatsline, of course, knows something about elections and he's I'm sure read election bills and won a couple elections. But he's never been like a an elections policy guy, like say Brisco Kane. Um which is to me the thing that raises a couple eyebrows on this you know purported selection. And it is he is being mentioned and he is being considered for this. There is a short list and he is on it for Abbott. Um I've I've heard Briscoe's name floated about, not a ton, but enough that um it's something to take seriously. Hancock's name has obviously been floated around on this. And I think you can never count John Scott. John Scott's The Return of John Scott. No, I think John Scott is uh enjoying making a lot of money right now in the private sector and not having to come be Mr. Fix It All. Yes. Or the state government.
SPEAKER_04Which I mean he's been SOS before.
SPEAKER_00Yes. He was the SOS before Nelson. He also was interim A G, right?
SPEAKER_04It was yeah. Yeah. There was some special designation because he came in and then Angela Colmonero came in after that, and they're technically I think had different so he was like the super special attorney general uh for like a handful of weeks.
SPEAKER_00Um you know I've heard a couple of names within Abbott's staff. We know Abbott likes to appoint his staff to you know, we talked about the bench before, but more than just that. Uh so you know this is this is up in the air, but the one that seems to really have legs is Shatzline. And um And to be fair, like all of the people that we've mentioned do indeed have legs.
SPEAKER_04But Shatzlein seems to be the most how many legs does a screw worm have? I the well in their larvae state I don't think any.
SPEAKER_00Oh, is that how larvae work? Okay.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, they're maggots. Yeah. Kind of look like you, actually.
SPEAKER_00Oh. That's the nicest thing you've ever said to me. I would still love you if you were a screw worm. Would you?
SPEAKER_04Yeah.
SPEAKER_00The feeling is not mutual.
SPEAKER_04I'd freaking irradiate you though. I'd shock with them givered.
SPEAKER_00Um Yeah, so that's at this point it's it's Jat's lines to lose, but it he may lose it. I don't know. Is it I think this is a rapidly Who even wants to be SOS going into November yet? Well, okay, so one thing we we missed uh earlier when talking about the SOS and w and at least the context for Nelson leaving is that the voter file is very flawed right now.
SPEAKER_04There are this is something you're hearing out there, right?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I mean it's not just I'm hearing it. It's it's been reported. Like there are there was a lawsuit filed by county election officials against the state back in February about problems with this. There's um uh people in the uh in the elections world who have been uh trying to sound the alarm about it. You know, um John Eakin is uh you know a frequent poster on on Twitter. Um and he uh he has talked about this a lot and he has made a lot of accusations about this thing being royally screwed um in in multiple different ways. Um you know, I think he he mentioned one of the biggest problems was that a lot uh hundreds of thousands of voters, voter records, did not have or had a flawed or no precinct number. And so it's next to impossible to figure out what districts those people are in because they don't have a corresponding accurate precinct number. Um, you know, that's what that's the debate that's happening right now. Um that there's a lot of it's not just those county elections officials that sued the state, there's a lot of irritation across the state among the people who actually run elections in the state, which are the counties, because Texas has a bottom up uh system for elect to run elections. This it's a it's a massive problem and um or at least it sounds like it. Uh I haven't done a forensic audit myself, nor would I know what to look at if I tried. But
SPEAKER_04So whoever gets the nod is going to be walking into a situation right before a very fraught election for Republicans.
SPEAKER_00So it's you know they're gonna have their work cut out for them, it sounds like I think that's an understatement. And it uh it raises the question, why would anybody want this job? But hey, somebody's gotta do it, I guess. Which I guess brings us back to John Scott, who just you know, he always takes on these gigs. So maybe it's him once again. Last thing I want to touch on before we end is a an announcement from Google uh this week that they are moving forward with a data center uh facility up in the panhandle. I forget the second county, but one with Gray County. Oh my gosh. And I know, right? Sound the alarm. Um but the announcement came alongside this you know, parallel announcement that they are putting ten million dollars into this water infrastructure fund uh to supplement and I assume to help fix the water supply problems, probably in the areas where their facilities are going. Um now.
SPEAKER_04And this type of fund would be used for like maybe drilling additional ground wells, maybe investing in treatment facilities, fixing leaky pipes, yeah, things like that.
SPEAKER_00Uh you know, I think it's worth noting though that ten million dollars in when it comes to water, especially on a statewide level, is a drop in the bucket. No pun intended. No, well, pun very much intended, actually, on that.
SPEAKER_01Wow.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. You intend puns? I did. I do. I certainly did then.
SPEAKER_04But uh this is obviously a response to the growing pushback from local communities about water usage and things of that uh You caught yourself there.
SPEAKER_00And you know, of the the companies looking to build data centers in Texas, Google is one of the ones doing it, at least trying to being more responsible about it, and not just you know, popping up as two dudes in one truck with computers running heavily in the in the back of it and connecting to a power line. Um they're it is a sophisticated operation. That won't appease the people who don't want data centers in Texas at all, but they are they're not the uh quintessential bad actors uh in the industry that we have seen some examples of. Um but you know, with the announcement of that water fund, but also more uh television ad spending shows that they they know the PR fight they have on their hands and how they're losing it, losing it big time. Uh another the uh the net choice went up on TV this week in Houston, at least. At least that was where the buy was that I saw. And I don't I didn't see the the ad, but they're running similar ads in other states to touting the benefits of data centers, whether it's to lower property taxes, to uh help fix locality budgets, things like that. And it feels like a really disjointed response because you've got all these different groups trying to compliment one each other, one one another on this PR effort, but I don't clearly they're not making much headway, at least right now. And I don't see how they're all singing from the same tune on this right now, and I don't think they are. Well, Andy.
SPEAKER_04I forgot what I was gonna say. I completely went blank.
SPEAKER_00We are in tatters right now.
SPEAKER_04I know so I think we're gonna Vibes are low, supplies tenuous. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Um yeah, I lost it completely.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, the man flu's hitting you hard. Um that's all we got this week, I think. And I'm sure that we'll have a lot more to talk about with data centers, but they're not going anywhere.
SPEAKER_04Well, those those computers aren't going to water themselves, you know. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00You've really been trying to make that saying happen.
SPEAKER_04Well, it's like it's not even a saying. You gotta go in and hose down your laptops.
SPEAKER_00They get too hot, they get too much. Okay. Now we're just in the delirium stage of this podcast. So uh make sure to subscribe to texasbullpen.com. Uh a lot of good stuff coming next week. Uh in Rhetorian Box, five days a week, plus our wonderfully thought out six days a week. Analysis, newsletters. What do you six days? Oh, I was talking about Daily Bowl. Oh, yeah. Um and then of course Scoville on Saturdays. On every Saturday, recapping the five spiciest moments of the week.
SPEAKER_04And let me tell you, when we were launching this, we go, man, is there really going to be enough to have five spicy things every single week? We have to cut stuff every week. There is it just keeps getting spicier and spicier, and we're technically in like the the dead season, you know. It's interims, you're on vacation, but man, Texas Politics is a beast that does not sleep.
SPEAKER_00Nope. Not much of an interim so far, and not much of a a dead summer so far, but uh hopefully we can recharge this weekend. Oh yeah. No more Saturdays for you this week. No more Saturdays. Thanks, y'all. We'll catch you next week.