{"id":97042,"date":"2025-12-22T12:25:08","date_gmt":"2025-12-22T12:25:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/97042\/"},"modified":"2025-12-22T12:25:08","modified_gmt":"2025-12-22T12:25:08","slug":"tv-talk-texas-comptrollers-race","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/97042\/","title":{"rendered":"TV Talk Texas comptroller\u2019s race"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"body-text-paragraph\">Acting Texas Comptroller Kelly Hancock and former state Sen. Don Huffines of Dallas, in dueling appearances on NBC5\u2019s Lone Star Politics, made competing cases for running Texas\u2019 finances as they compete in the March Republican primary for comptroller.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" style=\"aspect-ratio:4007 \/ 3102\"   class=\"dmnc_images-modern-image-module__QFaG- max-w-full h-auto text-white dmnc_images-modern-image-module__9Zlll bg-gray-light object-contain\" width=\"4007\" height=\"3102\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/MHLVAX2IA5DCJFQZ4VMMHXZ55I.JPG\" alt=\"Texas state Sen. Kelly Hancock, pictured during the first day of a legislative special...\"\/><\/p>\n<p>Texas state Sen. Kelly Hancock, pictured during the first day of a legislative special session on Tuesday, July 18, 2017 at the Texas state capitol in Austin, Texas.<\/p>\n<p>Ashley Landis \/ Staff Photographer<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" style=\"aspect-ratio:713 \/ 1024\"   class=\"dmnc_images-modern-image-module__QFaG- max-w-full h-auto text-white dmnc_images-modern-image-module__9Zlll bg-gray-light object-contain\" width=\"713\" height=\"1024\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/RCG2GEPOH4FQFYBHM7KGT65ZD4.jpg\" alt=\"Texas state Sen. Don Huffines (Ashley Landis\/The Dallas Morning News) \"\/><\/p>\n<p>Texas state Sen. Don Huffines (Ashley Landis\/The Dallas Morning News) <\/p>\n<p class=\"body-text-paragraph\">CONTRACT SHIFTS: Hancock focused on defending actions he\u2019s already taken on contracting preferences and shifting state support to businesses owned by disabled veterans. He\u2019s also implementing the state\u2019s new education savings account program, a massive school-choice expansion.<\/p>\n<p class=\"body-text-paragraph\">Hancock, a former chairman of the Senate Business and Commerce Committee, said moving away from race-based categories in contracts was necessary to comply with constitutional limits and ensure better value for taxpayers. <\/p>\n<p class=\"body-text-paragraph\">\u201cWe want to create a level playing field,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"body-text-paragraph\">FISCAL REVIEW: Huffines, meanwhile, criticized the scale of state spending itself, warning that the sheer volume of money flowing through Austin demands tougher oversight.<\/p>\n<p>Breaking News<\/p>\n<p class=\"dmnc_features-cta-social-article-cta-social-module__3beff secondaryRoman secondaryRoman-20 text-center text-gray-dark\">Get the latest breaking news from North Texas and beyond.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dmnc_features-cta-social-article-cta-social-module__8MgJa flex flex-wrap text-gray-dark secondaryRoman secondaryRoman-10 text-center justify-center\">By signing up, you agree to our\u00a0<a class=\"dmnc_features-cta-social-article-cta-social-module__lU9-l border-b border-gray-dark hover_border-0 focus_border-0 active_border-0\" href=\"https:\/\/www.dallasnews.com\/help\/terms-of-service\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Terms of Service<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0<a class=\"dmnc_features-cta-social-article-cta-social-module__lU9-l border-b border-gray-dark hover_border-0 focus_border-0 active_border-0\" href=\"https:\/\/www.dallasnews.com\/help\/privacy-policy\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Privacy Policy.<\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"body-text-paragraph\">\u201cWhen we\u2019ve got this much money, there\u2019s a lot of sticky fingers in the cookie jar,\u201d Huffines said. \u201cYou don\u2019t know unless you look.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"body-text-paragraph\">He also vowed to root out any remaining DEI initiatives in universities, schools and state agencies, saying they violate conservative principles and taxpayer expectations.<\/p>\n<p class=\"body-text-paragraph\">Gov. Greg Abbott has endorsed Hancock, praising his experience overseeing budgets and regulation. Railroad Commissioner Christi Craddick is also running in the GOP primary but did not appear on the recent program.<\/p>\n<p class=\"body-text-paragraph\">From staff reports<\/p>\n<p class=\"body-text-paragraph\">Lone Star Politics airs at 8:30 a.m. Sundays, hosted by NBC5\u2019s political reporter Phil Prazan and The Dallas Morning News political reporter Gromer Jeffers Jr.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Acting Texas Comptroller Kelly Hancock and former state Sen. Don Huffines of Dallas, in dueling appearances on NBC5\u2019s&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":97043,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[288,223,287,27,29,28],"class_list":{"0":"post-97042","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-texas","8":"tag-elections","9":"tag-news","10":"tag-politics","11":"tag-texas","12":"tag-texas-headlines","13":"tag-texas-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/97042","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=97042"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/97042\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/97043"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=97042"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=97042"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=97042"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}