Abbott vs. Hinojosa | Battleground Texas

The countdown is on, and the stakes in the Lone Star State have never been higher. From top-ticket races to the latest polls, campaign ads, and candidate interviews, we're tracking every move on the road to November. This is Battleground, Texas. Hello, everyone. I'm Greg Grugan in Houston. I'm Stephen Dial in Dallas. I'm Rudy Kosky in Austin. Governor Abbott, I'm calling on you to meet me at the governor's mansion in one week's time, October 15th at 10 a.m. To defend your record and so Texans can hear my plan to secure the American dream in Texas. Tick tock, tick tock. That was one week ago, state representative and Democrat gubernatorial nominee Gina Hinojosa challenging incumbent Governor Greg Abbott for a one-on-one debate. Today, that challenge turned into some political theater. You see, the cast of characters included an anti-Hinojosa billboard rolling truck. There it is right there. It was driven around the area and later parked next to one of the debate rally spots. And more trucks were also parked in front of the mansion. Delivery trucks. They're with crews unloading furniture for a UT tailgating event tomorrow. Now, Abbott is hosting Florida Governor Ron DeSantis tomorrow ahead of the big Longhorn Gator game. But today, the show at the mansion and at a nearby park here in Austin was produced by the Gina Hinojosa campaign. It included an empty podium, which was set up next to the Democrat challenger, who spoke to her supporters and answered some questions. Right over to your left is a truck talking about supposedly your 41 votes to raise property taxes. what's your answer to that and how do you explain your voting record on that it is um really um on brand for Greg Abbott to spend more money to tell lies about me rather than showing up in person to debate me lies are funded by his billionaire donors it is not true i've never not once voted to increase property taxes i only ever voted to decrease property taxes the votes he talked he's talking about our vote our votes for local control the only candidate in this race that has increased property taxes is Greg Abbott when he took over Houston ISD imposed a board of managers by the state that answers to the state that answers to Greg Abbott and a year ago this month they increased property taxes on the people of Houston in violation of our Texas Constitution that prohibits a state property tax. So if the governor wasn't in that podium, where was Waldo? The governor, well, he skipped the Hinojosa debate and was in Tyler, Texas this morning. He did post on social media a long video clip of his campaign event with East Texas law enforcement officers and some local sheriffs. As part of our laws to make sure we have the most secure border any state in the United States, I signed a law banning sanctuary cities. Once again mysteriously opponent Gina Hinojosa voted against banning sanctuary cities. She sides with the likes of LA and Chicago and Philadelphia and New York and all these other sanctuary city cities and states across the country. Texans do not want sanctuary cities. And if you do not want sanctuary cities, you gotta make sure you vote for Greg Abbott this election. All right, he can't seem to get a debate against Republican Ken Paxton. So instead, Democratic Senate nominee James Tallarico participated in a CNN town hall Wednesday. Faith and his interpretation of the Bible was a topic more than once, including this instance where he faced pushback on faith faith-based abortion messaging. And I actually think there's common ground we can find here. We may come to different moral and ethical conclusions when it comes to the question of should abortion be legal or not? It sounds like you and I do come to a different conclusion, that's okay. We're both Christians and the Bible is silent on the issue of abortion. It means you and I both have to look at different scriptures to try to come to a conclusion. But what I think we can do is actually come together on reducing the number of unplanned pregnancies and the number of abortions. Because if we treat this issue as a public health problem and not a culture war problem, then we can actually make progress together. Because you can look at the research and you see that certain policy levers like sex education, like healthcare can actually reduce the number of abortions and that's what I'm willing to work with you on. And I just want to add that the Bible is not silent on abortion. There is the Ten Commandments, thou shalt not kill. And as Catholics, we take great insults, I guess, sometimes when it's sprouted that way. Also during that town hall, Tallarico said, quote, I want to protect the good paying oil and gas jobs that support whole families. Paxson immediately pushed this clip out on social media. You can't call yourself a Christian and destroy God's creation with greenhouse gases. Renewables maybe are more variable, but then fossil fuels are destroying the planet. And so it's like, are those two things on equal footing, right? Then came this post from the Oil and Gas Workers Association. Thank you, James Tallarico. We appreciate your support for Texas oil and gas workers and USA oil and gas jobs. Like we reminded both friends just a few weeks ago, even Elon Musk and Tesla once had plans to completely end oil and gas. And Elon Musk is one of President Trump's best friends, closest advisors, and obviously SpaceX uses a lot of reliable, affordable USA natural gas. So we welcome James Tallarico's support. Whenever we talk about issues like permitting reform, bringing on more refining capacity, more production, building out infrastructure, and actually lowering gas, diesel, and grocery and utility costs for every American. Paxton went to social media today to promote his upcoming bus tour. He posted, Texans don't back down and neither do I. I have one message for the far left extremists who are trying to destroy Texas. Come and take it. Our statewide bus tour starts this Saturday. Also posting, I've always fought for Texans and I've won. Going on to list investigations and settlements he secured as attorney general. A heaping helping to unpack there, so stick with us. Battleground Texas will be right back. Welcome back. Call it the winds of change or perhaps irrational exuberance. Regardless, there is a sense of impending political change floating across the Lone Star State landscape. The looming question, is it real or merely imagined? For a healthy dose of thoughtful analysis, I checked in with my old friend, political scientist John Taylor at the University of Texas, San Antonio. John Taylor, Donnybrook, up and down the ballot. I know you know what that means because we're men of a certain age. And it's also every Republican for his bloody self. Give me your outlook on what we can see November 3rd. This is turning into a Texas Chainsaw Death match the way it's going right now. It's insane. I know you count on data, but you also count on instinct. I'm gonna ask about the data first. We've had a plethora of polling that shows all of these races close. What's your instinct telling you? Because we talked about this. There seems to be something different in the air. There's a vibe and that's the thing. As a political scientist, I don't like doing vibes because you're supposed to be quantitative and rational and all this. But there seems to be a vibe this year, and that vibe is definitely turning blue. And so we see this based on Greg Abbott, we'll just use him as an example. The man spent $140 million on ads versus Gina Hinojosa who's got maybe 25, 30 million tops. And he's running basically the playbook from the last election. And we've got a general demographic shift. Is it the perfect storm this year? Maybe. I mean, it's one of these things, let's slow your roll, let's see what happens on November 4th, the day after, to see where we are then. These ideas, are we seeing signs and wonders of a Democratic wave? Yeah, it looks that way, but Texas has a long history of Democrats managing to screw things up as we get to the finish line. We've seen a real shift in Latinos and Tejano voters in this state, particularly in this part State and San Antonio and South Texas, where only two years ago, Trump won almost all the particular counties along the Rio Grande. That ain't going to be the case this year. Okay, fellas, veteran analyst John Taylor perceives the combination of hard polling and clearly perceptible Democratic energy as a potential winning formula for Team Blue. Rudy is a longtime Austin resident. I'm guessing you know a thing or two about the vibe Taylor talked about. Yeah, for sure. Yeah, I agree with John. There's definitely blood in the water from that chainsaw fight that he mentioned, and we've been watching it, right? In Texas, I'd say preparing for that fight going on for more than two years. Democrats have spent a lot of time juicing up their base, the true believers, you know, the ones that have been raging in the streets, vandalizing Teslas. Meanwhile, the Texas GOP, what have they been doing? Well, they've been on a singular mission to hunt down those that they consider to be rhinos, moderate fiscal conservatives maybe instead of a perfect storm what we're seeing is the ultimate case of political malpractice by the GOP self-inflicted political suicide similar to when the Democrats you know drove out their blue dog moderates back in the 90s Greg yeah good stuff Rudy Stephen we talk so much about numbers so I'm gonna just stick with this vibe thing so from your vantage point are you feeling it or does instinct tell you it's largely irrational exuberance a mirage kind of like your Falcons dream of a Super Bowl that was shots fired right there i'll just try to ignore that part the vibes are high here but with us being in a bubble and talking about this all the time every day you still also have to look at reality and the reality is it hasn't happened in more than 30 years a democrat winning statewide but as we've been talking about all week the tail winds are in the sails of the democrats ship this is the best case scenario for democrats you have a bruised candidate at the top of the ticket you have more people interested in this midterm the president has the lowest approval rating he's ever had so we'll have to wait and see what actually happens and stop throwing shade at my falcons all right rudy quickly taylor confirmed that we all pretty much knew this that the tejano support for team red has evaporated along with the president's promise of rapid middle and lower class prosperity. Could that shift along with blue-leaning independents be enough for statewide Democratic wins? Greg, I'm not buying that it's going to show up at the ballot box just yet, but Democrats here in Texas, following that drubbing that they got in 24, certainly have done an amazing job reinventing themselves in a very short amount of time. You know, they look like that they, you know, were the party of voter against voter ID. They were the party that defined sex changes, that supported, defended sex change surgeries and pushing multiple gender identities, even for God. Then there were against income tax bans. Now they're, you know, for the ban, wanted open borders. Now they want the borders closed and no jails. But in the last 30 days, we witnessed 180 degree pivot from all those hot button issues. So what's going on? Is this a great political conversion? One of the greatest in modern history? Or is this just an old playbook from George Wallace? You know, he reinvented himself a lot of times. Greg, Stephen. All right, reversing position, the impact of President Trump going back on a televised, streamed, live execution. Next on Battleground. The execution of Fort Hood killer Nadal Hassan will no longer be live streamed. announcement coming from a Truth Social post this morning with the president essentially saying while he feels it might have been a strong deterrent to terrorists, many people do not want to see him die. However, the immediate families of the victims can see it if they wish. I spoke to SMU political science professor Matthew Wilson about the president's reversal. And I think if you took a poll among people simply saying, should he be executed or not, most Americans probably agree that he should. However, a lot of people who agree that he should be executed feel a little uncomfortable about the idea of a live stream. Who will be watching this? What use will be made of this? What will it make America look like abroad? Will kids watch this? There are a lot of different concerns surrounding the live streamed execution of a paraplegic. And I think that that prevailed on some cooler heads in the Trump administration and ultimately on the president himself. Yeah, I think Wilson spot on there guys. I think this was bad optics overruling a bad decision. Steve and I covered that shooting the memorial also with President Obama. Both were unifying moments, a lot of grief. I'll never forget it. But there's no doubt that Hassan should be executed. But live streaming from a secretary of war, boy that feels like a knee jerk thought out, right? Yeah, I don't know what the intent was of that and let's be clear echoing what you just said i've talked to multiple members of the military including former JAG officers and you know generals and others since this went public they have all said everyone agrees that he's going to be executed but live streaming it is just a step too far we haven't even had an execution on the military side since 1961 but live streaming it a step too far and not what america is all about really Greg, Secretary Hegseth has weathered a lot of criticism from Democrats before this, but now Trump has been forced in a very public way to do an about-face. Could this be your fired moment? Could that happen? What's your read? Rudy, Trump would never fire him for proposing a public execution and risk blowback from Christian nationalists. However, the president has absolutely no problem scapegoating cabinet members when his decisions go sideways. As in the failure thus far of the U.S. military to bring Iran to its figurative knees, resulting in the biggest, most consequential blunder of Trump's second term. Remember, Hegseth told the American people in February that Iran was toast and they know it. Later reporting, all of Iran's military capacity was completely decimated. Turns out that wasn't true then or now as the stalemate enters month nine. All right, I think we're going to break here. Our final thoughts when we come back. Welcome back to what we call our final parting shots. And for me, mine's going to be somewhat of a misfire. You see, Democrats today here in Austin held what they described as a shadow hearing into recent shootings in Texas by ICE agents. Now, I don't remember any shadow hearings about the victims of crimes committed by undocumented immigrants from this group, or a shadow hearing on real solutions to the very flawed immigration process that we have by this group maybe this missed opportunity this misfire today at the governor's debate that didn't happen you know maybe that was the missed opportunity or was this the missed opportunity a chance to do some real legislative work Greg all right Rudy under the category cutting their losses. Republican power brokers yanking $3 million from the party's Texas 28 candidate, Tano Tijerina. Turns out Democratic incumbent Henry Cuellar has built an insurmountable lead, so the GOP has decided to spend its cash elsewhere. Here's the irony. You may remember Cuellar was charged with corruption, but pardoned last December by one Donald J. Trump. Stephen? My focus is on down ballot races. We have talked so much about the top of the ticket. One thing is for certain, a lot of experts are expecting a large turnout at the polls. And so, yeah, we know the Senate race and the governor's race, the lieutenant governor, attorney general. But I'm wondering, will there be a shakeup? Will there be a shift in some of these statehouse seats and some of these city councils and county commissions? that may be the surprise that we see in a few weeks. All right, that's all the time we have. To see this episode or our past ones, go to our station's YouTube channels. And, you know, you can keep this conversation going with us on social media. Please do. We'll see you back on the battleground tomorrow at 3 on Fox Local. Until then, vaya con Dios.