Here\u2019s some background on the March primary, the most recent polling, fundraising information, and top issues in the race.<\/p>\n
Unlike the 2022 gubernatorial election<\/a>, which saw a melee<\/a> between Abbott and several Republican contenders challenging him from the right, this year\u2019s primary election ended with a comfortable margin of victory for the governor. Abbott won the Republican primary with about 82 percent of the vote, according to the Texas Secretary of State. Meanwhile, Hinojosa beat<\/a> eight other contenders in the Democratic primary and secured almost 59 percent of the vote.<\/p>\n Survey respondents have named economic issues, such as inflation and jobs, as their foremost concern in several major Texas polls<\/a>, and both gubernatorial candidates have responded accordingly.<\/p>\n Abbott\u2019s platform includes<\/a> several proposals intended to lower costs associated with insurance, homebuying, and health care. Concrete legislative ideas include establishing a roof fortification grant program<\/a>, allowing developers to build pre-approved house designs, and capping monthly co-pays for inhalers and epinephrine at $25.\u00a0<\/p>\n Abbott\u2019s platform also includes<\/a> property tax reforms, such as ending school district property taxes for homeowners, requiring two-thirds voter approval for rate hikes, and creating a new petition process to force an election to lower rates.<\/p>\n Hinojosa, who has cast herself as an economic populist<\/a>, frequently criticizes Abbott for high average property taxes, no-bid state contracts<\/a>, and the state\u2019s new education savings account program<\/a>, which she calls \u201cthe voucher scam.<\/a>\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Hinojosa has proposed<\/a> distributing $1,500 checks to each Texas household from the state\u2019s Economic Stabilization Fund, colloquially called the Rainy Day Fund. She has also called<\/a> for an end to tax breaks for big corporations and vowed to \u201cpreserve homeownership for Texans by stopping private equity firms from buying up housing<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n Data center development has been a major issue in the race. Hinojosa has called<\/a> for a total moratorium on new build approvals and for a special legislative session on the issue. In turn, Abbott has directed<\/a> executive branch agencies to rigorously regulate data center development, culminating in a September order<\/a> to the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality to temporarily halt all permits sought by data centers.<\/p>\n Mirroring other statewide races<\/a>, Abbott has blasted Hinojosa for her stance on social issues, especially on gender ideology<\/a>, while Hinojosa has generally focused more on affordability.<\/p>\n All recent polls show Abbott leading. Surveys conducted by YouGov, ActiVote, Verasight, Beacon Research, Emerson College, Slingshot Strategies, and the University of Houston Hobby School of Public Affairs \u2014 the most recent major polls, with survey dates ranging from October 10 to October 21 \u2014 all put Abbott ahead by a range of 1 to 5 percentage points, according to the New York Times<\/a>.<\/p>\n Some polls conducted in September put Hinojosa ahead, including surveys by ReconMR<\/a>, Marist Poll<\/a>, and the New York Times<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"One way or another, this year\u2019s gubernatorial race will be one to remember. If incumbent Gov. Greg Abbott…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":481185,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[132,134,133,3496,392],"class_list":["post-481184","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-austin","tag-austin","tag-austin-headlines","tag-austin-news","tag-gina-hinojosa","tag-greg-abbott"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/481184","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=481184"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/481184\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/481185"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=481184"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=481184"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=481184"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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