BEEVILLE, Texas, Sept 4 (Reuters) – The makeup and toys on Valencia Macias’ table are\u00a0items people buy on impulse at discount stores. But on \u2060a \u2060sweltering summer day in South Texas, she is trying to sell them \u2060to turn them into gas money, grocery money, student loan money: any kind of money.<\/p>\n
With three young children, a job as a medical assistant and nursing classes at night, \u200bthe 26-year-old has little time for politics. But when Texas officials withdrew funding for the only after-school program available in her rural town of George West, politics became impossible to ignore.<\/p>\n
Then, a TikTok video appeared: A Mexican American woman on the screen, Gina Hinojosa, talked about the \u200chigh cost of living and badly needed investments in Texas public \u200ceducation. Macias stopped scrolling.<\/p>\n
\u201cWith everything just getting so expensive and the gas and everything, it’s really hard to just make do,\u201d Macias said. Seeing a mother and a woman who looks like her, Macias made up her mind: \u201c100%, she has my vote.\u201d<\/p>\n
Hinojosa, a Democratic state \u2060representative, is trying to end an \u2060electoral drought that has defined Texas politics for a generation: no Democrat has won statewide office in Texas since 1994.<\/p>\n
Her strategy hinges on \u200bpersuading Latino voters like Macias that rising costs and strained public schools matter more than the cultural and immigration issues that have pulled many Latino voters toward Republicans in recent years.<\/p>\n
Hinojosa said that means resisting the tendency to treat Latino voters as a distinct political constituency with separate priorities. Instead, she argues they are motivated by\u00a0the same concerns as other Texans, including housing costs, schools and day-to-day expenses. So, her campaign delivers that message in Spanish to Latino audiences.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“We are as Texan and American as anyone,” she said in an interview in Austin. “Latinos are feeling the economic strain \u200bjust like families all across this country and in Texas in a big way.”<\/p>\n
Her campaign tests whether Democrats can regain support among Latino voters by emphasizing pocketbook issues.<\/p>\n
The test is whether it can overcome the political machine \u2060Republican \u2060Governor Greg Abbott has built over the last 12 \u2060years in office.<\/p>\n
He has name recognition, President Donald Trump’s \u200bendorsement and a vast support network that stretches beyond Texas. He has raised roughly $25.5 million between February and July, while Hinojosa raised about $6 million. Abbott holds more than a 22-to-1 cash-on-hand advantage, with $67.2 million \u200bto Hinojosa’s $3 million, the latest campaign finance reports show.<\/p>\n
Abbott spent years cultivating support \u2060in South Texas, regularly visiting heavily Latino border communities, building an extensive field operation in the Rio Grande Valley and making border security a centerpiece of his outreach.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Republican gains followed his sustained efforts to compete for Hispanic voters on issues including immigration, public safety and the economy.<\/p>\n
Hinojosa\u2019s betting that the sharp drop in support for Trump and the party he leads will lead her to victory. State polls have consistently shown she’s within striking distance of Abbott all year.<\/p>\n
Abbott is still favored to win in the Republican-leaning state. Hinojosa would have to break the three-decade Republican streak in the office. To stay in power,\u00a0Abbott has turned to a Republican playbook portraying Hinojosa as out of step with his law-and-order agenda on the campaign trail.<\/p>\n
\u201cGovernor Abbott is not taking the support of any voter \u2014 including Latino \u2060voters \u2014 for granted, which is why he is investing significant time and resources to earn votes in every community,\u201d Abbott’s campaign press secretary Eduardo\u00a0Leal said in a statement to Reuters.<\/p>\n
Recent \u2060polling suggests Latino voters favor Hinojosa over Abbott. An August 2026 Emerson College Polling\/Nexstar survey found Hispanic voters favored Hinojosa over Abbott by 17 percentage points and that 57% disapproved of Abbott’s job performance. That same statewide poll, which surveyed 1,000 likely voters, showed Abbott leading Hinojosa 49% to 45% overall, with a margin of error of 3 percentage points.<\/p>\n
Abbott recently released an “affordability agenda” \u2014 including property tax cuts, housing reforms, lower electricity costs, expanded low-cost health insurance, a $25-a-month cap on certain prescription drugs, and more. His campaign says the measures will help Texans offset rising living expenses.<\/p>\n
\u201cLatino voters care about the same issues that are important to all Texans: overhauling the property tax system, securing the border, putting dangerous criminals behind bars, and keeping Texas affordable,\u201d Leal said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Samuel Aguero, 28, a Navy veteran, voted for Trump in 2024. But as a single father of two daughters, his top issue is education \u2014 he says Beeville’s public schools need more state resources, and if Hinojosa offers specifics on improving them, he may back her instead.<\/p>\n
“We have to have higher standards in school,” he said. “Teachers should be paid a lot more, like, a heck of a lot more.”<\/p>\n
Hinojosa may benefit from electoral tailwinds that eluded Beto O’Rourke and other statewide Democratic candidates before her.<\/p>\n
Demographic trends have strengthened Democrats’ long-held belief that Texas’ growing Latino electorate could eventually reshape statewide politics. Texas \u2060now has about 6.5 million Latino eligible voters, roughly 1 million more than in the years leading up to Abbott’s last reelection campaign.<\/p>\n
But the key to Hinojosa\u2019s campaign is how many people actually turn out to vote. Nearly 4.5 million Texans voted in the Democratic and Republican primary elections in March, a recent midterm record.<\/p>\n
Record participation, fueled by the high-profile Senate primary battles involving Attorney General Ken Paxton and State Representative James Talarico, could offer Democrats a rare sign of momentum in a state where voter turnout has historically trailed the national average.<\/p>\n
Still, voters like Dawn Barraza, 54, an eighth-grade schoolteacher in Victoria, Texas, want \u201cchange.\u201d At a monthly outdoor market in \u200bBeeville, Barraza said\u00a0her family fares okay financially, but there\u2019s palpable frustration among Latinos in South Texas that Republicans are not addressing.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey need to be standing up for our people here; it’s high \u200btime everybody realizes that we’re not going anywhere,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
(Reporting by David Hood-Nu\u00f1o; Editing by Kat Stafford and Alistair Bell)<\/p>\n
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