Texas Rural Report 10.11.2024
It is less than 30 days until the National Presidential Election and it’s 95 days until the start of the Texas Legislative Session. I took a small writing break over the last few months to work on some projects and focus on my newspapers. Now it is time to get back to work talking about the things that matter to rural Texas.
In this Edition:
Meanwhile in Austin
News that impacts Rural Texans
Some thoughts on the US Senate Race
The Rural Reporter Podcast Preview
AUSTIN NEWS
Interim Studies
Legislators have been holding committee hearings on their Interim Committee Charges and those meetings set the framework for what the next legislative session will consider. The Interim charges are directed by the office of the Speaker of the House and the Lt. Governor’s office in the Senate to the various legislative committees then invite testimony and hear from witnesses to help them develop policy solutions for the more pressing issues facing the state. Water, foreign ownership of Texas agricultural land, school choice, teacher certifications, the Texas Energy Fund, and Securing the Border are a few of the issues in the conversation.
House Speaker’s Race
At the beginning of every legislative session, the members of the Texas House hold an election to decide who will lead them as the head of their legislative body — in Austin, it’s donned the Speaker’s Race. In the Senate, it works differently. The Lt. Governor, elected in a statewide race by voters leads the Senate body. In other words, you vote for the Lt. Gov but your Texas house member votes for the Speaker.
The current House Speaker is Dade Phelan, a Republican from Beaumont. Phelan fought off a primary challenge and eeked out a win during the Primaries, and the group that lost to him in the primary battle has now doubled down to oust him as Speaker. Behind the effort to move Phelan aside are political heavyweights including Lt. Governor Dan Patrick, several Texas billionaires, Attorney General Ken Paxton, and a group we like to call the Scorecard Mafia. They want Phelan gone because they don’t have the control they desire when Phelan is in charge.
A few weeks ago, a group of legislators met at a not-so-secret meeting in Austin and “elected” a Phelan challenger, Rep David Cook (R)-Mansfield. Cook claims to have the support of 46 Republicans, who are rallying around a set of rules changes called the Contract with Texas.
Phelan has fortified his team by bringing on a Former House Member and Legislative Guru Mike Toomey and Former Governor Rick Perry to face the challenge.
From the Texas Tribune:
Here are the Texas House races that Democrats and Republicans think they can flip
Texas' political landscape for the next two years may come down to a few key statehouse races in Dallas, San Antonio, and South Texas. Republicans face little danger of losing their majorities in either chamber of the Texas Legislature, having redrawn the state’s political lines three years ago to fortify their incumbents. But Democrats — riding a recent wave of enthusiasm sparked by Vice President Kamala Harris’ nomination — think they can flip just enough House seats this November to beat back an all-out push by Republicans to pass school vouchers, which allow public money to be used to pay for private education.
The Texas Tribune is Hosting Small Town Big Possibilities -- Here's the link to participate
RURAL NEWS
Survey: Locals think vouchers, ESAs will hurt public schools
Legislators are considering vouchers, or ‘school choice,’ as public schools worry about a level playing field. Texas Republican leaders tout school voucher/choice programs as necessary and widely supported, but a new survey conducted by the Fredericksburg Standard-Radio Post shows voters here in conservative Gillespie County feel differently. Of the 449 people who filled out the 30-question survey, 66% opposed school vouchers, and 58% opposed education savings accounts.
Texas leads the U.S. in uninsured rate.
Texas has the country's largest share of Americans under 65 without health insurance, according to new Census Bureau data.
Rural workers optimistic, innovative but lack tech and access to training: report
A new report looks at the barriers and opportunities for rural workers to stay and thrive in their hometowns. The Generating Rural Opportunities in the Workforce report, a joint effort by the University of Phoenix Career Institute and the Center on Rural Innovation, found that workers living in rural areas are more than twice as likely to feel limited in their employment opportunities, 35% compared to 14% for folks living in cities and suburbs. Sixty percent of rural workers feel pursuing a career is out of reach.
Department of Energy tabs $360M to connect ERCOT to U.S. power grid
The power grid better known as the Texas Interconnection, operated by the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT), is famous for being isolated from the other major U.S. grids. But that may soon finally change.
31 Texas Schools Recognized at National Blue Ribbon Schools for 2024
Thirty-one Texas schools have been recognized as National Blue Ribbon Schools for 2024. This recognition by the U.S. Department of Education highlights schools that excel in academic performance or make significant strides in closing achievement gaps. Several rural School Districts are on the list, including Gruver ISD, Booker ISD, Nazareth ISD, and Quanah HS in my neck of the woods.
How a school voucher supporter won in a Texas House district with almost no private schools
Gov. Greg Abbott felt vindicated when nine Texas Republican lawmakers who helped block a school voucher program he championed last year lost their seats in the March primary. The governor portrayed their removal from office as clear evidence that Texans wanted a way to use public funds to send their children to private schools.
The Texas US Senate Race
I don’t comment here much on national politics, but the Texas US Senate race is one to watch. I shared this in a speech last week to the Amarillo Republican Women to highlight the role rural Texans will play in the US Senate Race for Ted Cruz.
Ben Shapiro said “ The Left despises Texas….should the left succeed in its attempt to turn Texas purple, America could turn permanently blue.
I want to close tonight and talk about the importance of this election, especially as it relates to Texas Republicans.
I am relatively certain that Donald Trump will carry Texas, as I don’t believe it Texas is in play for the presidential race.
The US Senate race might be a different story. In 2018, Ted Cruz won by only 214,921 votes in a statewide race where over 8 million votes were cast. There are four new elements at play in 2024 that have changed the landscape for Senator Cruz.
First, since 2018, Texas has added nearly 3 million new voters. There are competing ideas of how these voters will vote, but what we do know is that most of those new voters have registered in large urban and suburban counties - the four big ones Harris, Bexar, Travis, Dallas – and votes in those typically favor Democrats.
Second, always follow the money. A group called Ad Politics puts out a projection of political spending based on ad buys for the upcoming election. The most recent numbers for the Texas Senate race show the Democrats are planning to spend two times as much money in Texas to defeat Cruz vs Collin Allred. Texas has not been in “play” for the Dems for a few decades and they have not allocated any resources here. It is also of concern that the Texas GOP has been struggling internally with operations and fundraising and doesn’t have the organizational structure or the financial resources to fund the ground game like we did in 2018.
Third, support for Cruz is trending downward in the polls. A poll last week conducted by the Texas Hispanic Policy Foundation shows Cruz at 48% and Collin Allred at 45% which is a 2.83% margin of error. Cruz won in 2018 by 2.6%. The influential DC-based Cook Political Report moved the US Senate race from likely Republican to Leans Republican for the first time in history.
Fourth, Since 2018, Senator Cruz has had a few unfavorables that have caused him to lose some ground with moderate voters. The attacks on “Cancun Cruz” for leaving the state during COVID, the abortion issue, and his decision to get involved in endorsements against the rural Republicans over the state voucher issues have left some of his core voters possibly lukewarm in their support of him.
The Dallas Morning a week before the 2018 election, wrote an article that was critical of Cruz for holding rallies in rural Texas, specifically citing his rally in Panhandle in Pampa as a waste of his time. But I would argue, that Cruz’s strategy to rally rural Texas produced that slim margin of only 200 thousand votes that Cruz needed to win that election.
In 2024, Sen Cruz will not win this election unless the Rural Red Counties turn out strong. The outcome of this race is consequential. The Senate is currently controlled by Democrats holding a slim majority so this race could change the balance of the US Senate from Blue to Red. A Republican Senate is even more important if Kamala Harris wins the presidency, positioning the Senate as a necessary firewall in place to stop much of what her administration will try to push.
Texas Rural Reporter Podcast
We’re working on our next podcast release, and interview with Michael Lee of Booker ISD, an advocate for Rural Texas Public Schools, but while you wait, be sure to check out our interview with Wade Callaway the Superintendent of Gruver ISD, a rural Texas Panhandle school recently named a Blue Ribbon School for the 5th time!
Growing Greatness: Interview with Wade Callaway with Gruver ISD (Episode #1)
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