Blogs: 88th Legislature

James Henson talks with Harvey Kronberg, publisher and of Harvey Kronberg’s Quorum Report, about the vibes in the legislature as well as the longer trajectory of politics in the state, and the place of Quorum Report in the Texas media universe.

After a bruising 2023 legislative session extended by four special sessions, Texas voters continue to convey little confidence in legislative efforts to address key problems in the state such as the reliability of the grid, public school safety, and improved border security, according to a University of Texas/Texas Politics Project Poll conducted in early December. When asked about their support for key legislative priorities during the session, the issues deemed most important by the largest shares of voters were areas in which the legislature either failed to pass significant legislation or achieved mixed results.

With one year to go before the 2024 presidential election, the latest University of Texas/Texas Politics Project Poll finds former president Donald Trump dominating a crowded Republican primary field and holding a comfortable lead in a hypothetical re-match with President Joe Biden, who faces no serious competition in the Democratic primary so far. The poll also asked Texans about educational savings accounts and other public education issues at the center of the third special session of the 88th Texas Legislature currently underway in Austin. The poll found a modest majority, 51%, supportive of “establishing a voucher, educational savings account, or other ‘school choice’ program in Texas,” with slightly less than a third, 30%, opposed, and 19% holding no opinion. The latest University of Texas/Texas Politics Project Poll was conducted October 5-17, 2023, among 1200 self-declared registered voters in Texas. The margin error for topline results is +/- 2.83% (3.3% adjusted for weighting).

After the repeated failures of the Republican legislature to pass voucher legislation throughout their two decades of total control of the state’s political process, the GOP leadership’s determination to focus efforts yet again on creating a voucher bill invites attention to one of the many challenges still facing the legislature in its latest attempt: it’s lack of importance to most voters.

Within hours of the Texas Senate’s acquittal of Attorney General Ken Paxton, Gov. Greg Abbott’s statement on the verdict added one more exhibit supporting the argument that politics as usual were triumphant in the wake of the historic impeachment battle. Abbott’s statement was noticeably brief, in absolute terms and especially compared to the detailed statements issued by Lt. Governor Dan Patrick from the dais immediately after the Senate voted, and by Speaker of the House Dade Phelan in quick response. But the pithy sentence that capped Abbott’s (very) measured praise of Paxton spoke volumes with just a few words: “I look forward to continuing to work with him to secure the border and protect Texas from federal overreach."

Donald Trump’s sudden reiteration of his fervent support for suspended Attorney General Ken Paxton during the 11th hour of his impeachment trial in the Texas Senate (delivered, of course, via social media) reminds anyone paying attention of their entangled trajectories. But with Paxton facing his potential moment of comeuppance in the Texas Senate, it also invites attention to Paxton’s significantly weaker position among Republican voters when compared to the seemingly limitless durability of Trump’s appeal among Texas Republicans.

Setting aside for the moment the logic and legalisms of both the Paxton legal team’s invocation of the prior-term doctrine and the House managers’ response, public opinion polling suggests that relatively small shares of Texas voters have heard “a lot” about Paxton’s legal problems, including in the run-up to the 2022 election.

While stifling the autonomy of state governments has been an ongoing project of the state’s Republican elected officials for several years, the latest University of Texas/Texas Politics Project Poll found Texas voters much more positively inclined toward their local government than toward state government.

June 2023 poll ing suggests that campaign promises by Republicans to cut property taxes, followed by the Republican victors’ failure to deliver in the extended legislative session (so far), has likely exacerbated Texas voters’ dissatisfaction with legislative performance on the issue – and fed their low expectations of ever seeing their property taxes go down.

After a regular legislative session that found lawmakers attempting to use a historic budget surplus to address major fiscal issues and infrastructure needs while also pushing some cultural hot buttons, the latest University of Texas/Texas Politics Project Poll found Texas voters with low expectations of the impact of their actions, and dim views of the legislature’s responsiveness. When asked in general terms about their confidence in legislative efforts to address areas deemed critical by voters in Texas Politics Project polling conducted earlier in the session, most Texas voters lacked confidence in lawmakers’ efforts. Fewer than one in five voters was willing to say they were ‘very’ or ‘extremely’ confident that the legislature had increased the reliability of the electric grid or the water supply, improved the safety of Texas’ public schools, or improved security along the Texas-Mexico border.