The Texan Podcast - Governor Greg Abbott on the State of the State, the Future of ESAs, Property Taxes, and Securing the Border

Episode Date: February 11, 2025

Gov. Greg Abbott joined The Texan’s Senior Reporter Brad Johnson to discuss his most recent State of the State address, the future of school choice and education savings accounts in Texas, property tax reform, and securing the southern border. Listen to the more interviews wherever you get your podcasts. If you like what you hear, subscribe and leave us a review.

Good morning, everybody. This is Brad Johnson, senior reporter at The Texan. Today, we sat down with Governor Greg Abbott for a podcast. We discussed his state of the state, education savings accounts, property taxes, the border, and a couple other political topics. So, we hope you enjoy. Governor, thank you for joining today. Sure, my pleasure. So we're coming off your State of the State, the latest one in a string of a few. Where does this one rank for you in the hierarchy of the ones you've given?

Well, listen, every State of the State is important. It's important that we issue emergency items on the State of the state because, for one, the speech in general gives direction where the governor is thinking, but also for the emergency items, those are what I consider to be must-pass pieces of legislation. Those are things for which there could be special sessions if they don't get it done. It could be campaign issues going forward. And so this is a signal that this is something the governor takes serious. I think what happened after the last session and after the last set of elections, people now realize the governor says something is important. He's willing to put his political capital on the line to make sure that it gets passed. Saw the education savings account bill pass the Senate.

Latest one, you know, half dozen tries. Right, but the real test is the House, of course. You mentioned the turnover in that chamber. Where do you draw the line on what you will accept in an education savings account plan? You know, candidly, I've had multiple conversations with the House, with House leadership, and I believe that what they're going to be coming out with in their proposed bills can be very close to the Senate plan. The speaker has said as much publicly. And so I think that it's going to be very close to what the Senate passed one way or the other. And I feel also pretty confident right now.

The votes are there. The speaker says the votes are there. We've done our own vote count. And so I think it looks very promising that school choice will get across the line, and we will go from no school choice to having the largest universal school choice program on day one ever before in the history of the United States. A big reason why, if it does get across the line, was your involvement in the primaries last year. Do you plan on getting involved in future primaries down the road? So what my commitment right now is the same as it

was this time last year, and that is I will support any legislator who supports school choice this session, and I will reserve the opportunity to campaign against any legislator who does not support school choice this session. So another emergency item you had was actually at the top of the list, property tax relief. Your materials at the state of the states indicated compression. I know that's been what you have preferred in past years, but the Senate is moving their bill, which is a homestead exemption again. Do you support that? Where would you like, how would you like to see this fashion? Listen, the way this has worked in prior years, I'm sure it will be the same this year. And that is it's a process.

And, you know, we still have yet to see what the House is going to roll out. And then once we see where the House is and where the Senate is, the negotiating begins. That said, I did say something in the speech that is hugely important. Last session, we invested $18 billion to cut property taxes, but so many Texans didn't feel it. So many Texans are angry because their taxes are just going up. We need to end the reason why those property taxes are going up. First, for the audience, in Texas, the state does not impose any property tax whatsoever. Those are all imposed by local jurisdictions. But Texas tries to buy down those property taxes by injecting an infusion of billions of dollars. What happened after we

infused $18 billion into property tax cuts last session is local jurisdictions like Harris County and many others, they went behind their backs and they increased property taxes sometimes by much as 10%. And so one of our top shelf goals this session has to be to eliminate the ability of local taxing jurisdictions to increase your property taxes. And that item you're talking about is a two-thirds vote requirement by the voters, correct? So one of the elements to curtail the increase in property taxes would be to impose something like a two-thirds vote that takes place in November as opposed to some time period when people are not turning out in large numbers. But there's some other strategies that we're working on that would limit the ability for local jurisdictions to raise property taxes. Now that, if that comes into play, that seems to

be as transformational, if not more, than the caps we saw put on in 2019, correct? Right. Especially some things that I'm working on, we're studying, that would truly limit local jurisdictions from increasing poverty taxes. That would be the game changer. What's the reception been to that idea from local governments? At least a lot of them probably don't like that idea. Yeah, listen, local governments, they want to be able to have the freedom to raise taxes, have the freedom to spend what they want to spend, to not have the responsibility of having to live within a budget where they're going to have to find ways to cut expenditures. You see the federal government doing what it's doing to cut expenditures. The state is working on strategies ourself right now to cut state

spending. Same thing has to apply to local governments also. We see a lot of talk over the years, especially from Republicans, about cutting spending, yet it never really truly happens. Do you think we've turned a new corner on that? I think there is a corner that's been turned on that. And listen, again, the most innovative mind in the world, Elon Musk, he applies the innovative mind, whether it be to launching and then catching rockets, to going through budgets at the federal government level and finding wasteful spending, even fraudulent spending that's taken place. And the same process is occurring in the state budget, where we're seeking to uncover waste, fraud, and abuse in our expenditure so that we will be spending less, but also our spending will be more efficient and more accountable. And the same concepts have to apply at the local level also.

This was the issue last session that really broke the relationship between the lieutenant governor and the speaker. Are you worried about that this time around? I say it's premature and probably not because I anticipate that there's going to be a better line of communication between the speaker and the lieutenant governor this session than there was last session. You've had a long history, a good relationship with now Speaker Burroughs. What do you make of how he got into the position and the chances of getting priorities done going forward? Well, listen, my job as governor is to get bills to my desk. There are two things that are required. One is it must pass the Senate. The other is that it must

pass the House. And so I'm going to work with the Speaker and work with the House always because it's a core component of getting a bill signed into law. And as you mentioned in prior years on different strategies, let's say the Death Star legislation that really curtailed the ability of cities to go rogue and impose ever-expansion government. Listen, I worked with Dustin Burroughs on that very effectively, and it was a great policy for the state of Texas. And so there's that working relationship in the past. I think we can translate to the current situation. But listen, what I'm about to say is clear. What Speaker Burroughs has to do, he knows this, and that is he has to deliver on the issues that are most important to the people of the state of Texas. And he's articulated many times that he's fully committed to making sure

that he and the House, that they deliver on those pressing issues. You are the biggest state official in Texas. You have the largest amount of money to spend. What do you view your role in the state political scene as, as the heaviest hitter? Well, you know, certainly we put both our political capital as well as monetary capital on the line in this last election to make sure that the state is going to be going down a pathway that is what the people really want. You know, I'm not asking for anything that's contrary to the people. I'm actually trying to make sure that what the people want is going to be represented in the Texas Capitol and that we will be able to vote out and get to my desk policies and changes that the

people demand. And I have to get involved. I have to get engaged in the election process to make sure that the demands of the public are going to be met. And I can't sit on the sidelines. I got to make sure I get to my desk and that I sign laws that are going to make Texas a better state. Back on your state of the state speech, there was a moment when you were talking to Alexis Nungere, whose daughter Jocelyn was killed by two illegal immigrants. The speech itself was, of course, rehearsed, as all speeches are. But that moment especially broke from that. It was very genuine.

Walk me through what that was like for you. Well, I lost it a little bit, I would say. I mean, here's what happens. I have a daughter. And I can, I'm sorry to say, I can only imagine, it just, it breaks my heart to know that a mother lost her daughter and I can only imagine, and the thought went through my head, you know, of losing my daughter and it really caused me to kind of choke up And then you combine that with a sense of anger. There's no reason why this should happen.

You know, I've been talking about this before, just non-degree, all-star life. And that is, for one, the criminals coming across the border. Two, Trendy Aragor coming across the border. And Joe Biden doing nothing about it. And the fact of the matter is, Johnson should be alive today had we had a president and a Homeland Security Department that were securing the border and not letting criminals across the border. And so it just, for one, any loss of a child is heart-wrenching. But it's even worse when it's a result of government policies. You've been kind of the face of the border response for at least the last four years. but now we have President Trump back in office.

Renewed hope, it seems, to address the border issue. What are you seeing on the ground in the change that we saw with the Trump administration? So minor word change here. It's not new hope, it's new results. And we saw results begin on day one where there was a dramatic drop-off in illegal immigration, and that has continued and actually has improved. So several things are happening all at once. Because of the robust crackdown on illegal immigration, because of the deportation of people here illegally, because of the roundups taking place of all the criminals, that discourages

anybody to cross the border illegally, knowing that it's not the way that it was the past four years. They can cross the border illegally, and they're going to go through all that pain, all that trouble, all that time, all that expense, only to be sent back to wherever they came from. And that just discourages them from making the trek here in the first place or crossing the border. And so because of people like Tom Holman, because of President Trump, because of Kristi Noem and others, listen, there's a more robust effort than ever, meaning even far more than Trump, his first term in office. And so we're going to have the lowest border crossings, maybe tracing back decades, back to the Reagan era or something

like that. I have no idea. A lot of people are saying we've never seen numbers this low, period. And I think that process will continue. So it's going to be great for the country, great for Texas. Texas represents two-thirds of the border with Mexico. And we're the southernmost state closest to Central America. So whenever there's an increase in people who want to cross the border, Texas is caught in the middle of it. We're kind of the front line to deal with it. And so it's going to be more beneficial to Texas than any other state. What do you want the legislature to do on this question this session? So listen, we've got to remain vigilant. For one, I want us

as a state to partner with the Trump administration, knowing that the Trump administration is shorthanded right now. Under Biden, ICE was underfunded, Border Patrol was underfunded, Homeland Security Investigations was underfunded. They're short personnel. Texas can assist with that short personnel by providing National Guard, who I've deputized to work as Border Patrol agents, to work as ICE agents, so that they can perform the duties of federal law enforcement officials. I've also instructed and deployed our DPS officers to work in conjunction with ICE agents as they're making these raids, as they're making the arrests, as they're going through the deportation process. And so, bottom line, we need to have the personnel to assist the Trump administration. We also have

real estate assets that are very valuable to the Trump administration. I identified 4,000 jail and prison beds that were available for the Trump administration. I identified 4,000 jail and prison beds that were available for the Trump administration to house people who are apprehended, who are being detained, awaiting deportation. We identified 100 miles of land that we have acquired through easement that we can turn over to the federal government to build border wall. Texas built, under Joe Biden, two military bases on the border, one in Del Rio, one in Eagle Pass, that have beds available for the Trump administration, either for troops they deploy there, it could be Homeland Security, Border Patrol, whatever the

case may be. Texas has a lot to offer to the Trump administration, where we will be working with them as collectively, we work to have the most secure border ever. Last one for you. So you're heading to D.C. this week to try and get the $11 billion reimbursed for the state from the border expenses. How optimistic are you that you get that done? So, first of all, I will tell you that the Texas Republican delegation from the two senators to all the House members in the U.S. House are very optimistic. They're going all in on this. And listen, with their number and their size and their influence, if they're all in on something,S. House are very optimistic. They're going all in on this. And listen, with

their number and their size and their influence, if they're all in on something, it's going to get done. And if you look at all the other amount of money that's being spent, especially money that could be going to states like New York and California, this is a drop in the bucket. And then in addition to that, there are real tangible assets, such as the miles of border wall that we built, the miles of non-border wall but razor wire border barrier that we built, these bases and things like that. There's about $6 billion worth of tangible assets that we can transfer to the United States of America. So it's not so much reimbursing the state of Texas. It's paying for what Texas did for the federal government that the federal government is now able to acquire right and

title to. All right. Thank you, Governor. Thanks for joining. You got it. Good to see you. I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm