Trump Gets a Texas Wake-Up Call as Gina Hinojosa Fights Back

0:00Ben Meiselas:This episode is brought to you by Claude by Anthropic. Claude is the AI for minds that don't stop at good enough. It's the collaborator that actually understands your entire workflow and thinks with you. Whether you're debugging code at midnight or strategizing your next business move, Claude extends your thinking to tackle the problems that matter and finds connections you might have missed. For problems worth solving, get started at claude.ai slash Spotify. Donald Trump is getting a rude awakening in Texas as his approval is plummeting, folks. The latest YouGov Economist poll has Donald Trump at net negative 21 in Texas.

0:41Ben Meiselas:Let me repeat that. Net negative 21. And Donald Trump's buddy, Mr. Data Center himself, Governor Abbott, his disapprovals are getting higher and higher by the day. And it's a nightmare scenario for Abbott, Trump, and these MAGA sycophants who have caused such grievous harm to Texas because not only is there a Senate race that people are paying attention to with James Tallarico surging ahead of Ken Paxton, the utterly corrupt buffoon, but also there's a governor's race, folks, and it is neck and neck. Gina Hinojosa, the Democratic candidate within one point of Greg Abbott and Gina Hinojosa's favorability is through the roof.

1:26Ben Meiselas:It's like plus 18. She is beloved in the state. She is traveling around from city to city. She's going into red cities, purple cities, blue cities. And one of the things you're seeing in Texas is a break rank movement of people just saying, Greg Abbott wants data centers in our backyard. He's ripping away our healthcare with Donald Trump. These Trump MAGA sycophants are out to hurt us. They've betrayed us. Take a look at these two polls in the past two weeks in Texas in the governor's race. The Texas poll, Texas polls recon poll has the race at a one point race. Abbott only up one. The Fox poll regime media has Abbott only up one.

2:13Ben Meiselas:And you just take a look at what Abbott and Trump are doing in Texas. Bulldozers have begun tearing up the beloved Big Bend National Park there. Just a stone throws from Santa Elena Canyon, as Lincoln Jordal is explaining. So DHS, yeah, Trump's Border Patrol and ICE Gestapo DHS waiving every environmental and cultural resource protection. No surveys have been done. People don't even know what the heck is really going on. But bulldozers and heavy equipment arriving in Big Bend, and it is getting pummeled right now as Trump is doing a border wall there where I think there's only like less than 1 % of crossings even taking place there.

2:59Ben Meiselas:And they're not even explaining what the heck is going on. Meanwhile, Donald Trump giving an interview on Friday saying he really wants to see Texas having data centers everywhere. And you should know this about Greg Abbott. So Greg Abbott invited all the data center hyperscalers into Texas and said, we won't force you to pay any taxes at all on your energy costs from your data center. If you come into Texas and suck up all of our resources, you don't got to pay taxes on it. So all the data centers, those hyperscalers showed up, put in their data centers and everyone's backyard there. And then Greg Abbott's like, oh, what?

3:39Ben Meiselas:People don't want this. People don't want this. But me and but Donald told me to do it. Here's what Donald Trump said on Friday. Now that Greg Abbott's pretending maybe we should do like an audit. What are you going to audit yourself, Abbott? You're the one who invited them and waived their taxes on energy costs, you idiot. Here play this clip. I saw Texas the other day sort of is against data centers. I think it's a mistake. And I'm not taking positions or I'm just think it's a mistake because there are other communities that want it. But when a community wants it, it means a lot of money is going to come into that community.

4:15Ben Meiselas:Unsightly, potentially. Well, I don't think they're unsightly. I mean, I'm looking at some of these data centers, the most incredible buildings I've ever seen. They go for two and a half, three miles. Now, Congress member Greg Kassar, a Texas Congress member, also points out the following too, right? The cost of living right now in the U.S. and Texas, it's impossible. It's a struggle. And Trump said he was going to make everything more affordable on day one, right? No new wars, no more never-ending wars. Everything would be affordable. The Ukraine-Russia, Russia's invasion of Ukraine would be over in 24 hours.

4:48Ben Meiselas:Electricity prices would be in half. Gas prices would be under$2. Remember all of those promises from the con artist and thief rotting in the Oval Office and trying to rot our country like the rot he has done to the White House? Well, remember Trump's tariffs against the world? Where's your tariff rebate? Well, I'll tell you, big corporations are getting tariff refunds, but not you who had to pay them because this was all passed on to the consumer. It's a tax on consumer, Trump's tariffs. Apple got$2.2 billion. Amazon got$600 million. Go company by company. They got huge refunds. They got huge amounts of money.

5:25Ben Meiselas:What about you? Nope. Trump screwed you over. That's for sure. Let's take a look at Gina Ginosa's travel. She went to Hood County right here and she talked to people who were part of this break ranks movement, which is big in Texas right now. Former MAGAs, former Trump voters, former Republican voters saying, nah, y 'all put data centers in our backyards. Y 'all have lied to us and betrayed us. You're a bunch of frauds. You're a bunch of Trumper frauds. We know what you did now in Atlantic City and New York. We know how you bankrupted all of your companies. Take a look at Gina Hinojosa traveling to Hood County and speaking with some of these voters.

6:08Ben Meiselas:Let's play this clip. Did you vote for Abbott? Did y 'all vote for Abbott before? I did. I'm not an ass-gizzard. You're the first person to verbalize our problem at this level. That's why we're wearing these shirts. Break-break shirts. Oh, okay. Tell me, break rank. What does that mean? All of the Republicans in the state of Texas that are being hit by data centers and gas power plants and AI, we will break rank. This is not about being red. This is not about being blue. This is not about you being purple with pink polka dots. This is about human rights. When you see somebody like me, I'm like, we'll break rank.

6:47Ben Meiselas:I said, everybody in this area is going to break rank rank. And my deal is, where the hell have you been the last three years? Yeah. You won't even come talk to us. Within your same sick county, you won't even come listen to the problem. Right. You know, so why the hell should I vote for you? I'm so happy that you came. And I will tell you that this morning listening to you won me over. What about over here? This 75-year-old businessman from Texas saying he deeply regrets his decision to vote for Trump after ICE arrested his 45-year-old Venezuelan wife. Here, play this clip. How do I feel? I feel totally betrayed.

7:33Ben Meiselas:I mean, you never think or I never thought a guy like me would ever be involved in anything like this. Eight officers, ICE agents, swarmed Jasmine, detained her, didn't tell us why, and rustled her off into a car. No explanation was given. I was just in total disbelief. Nothing like this has ever happened to me. You know, I have several businesses. I'm law-abiding, and I pay a lot of tax. What would you say to somebody watching at home who may think, well, John, he's criticizing the president or the administration on this issue of immigration because of political reasons? Oh, I'm definitely not.

8:20Ben Meiselas:I voted for Trump. They are picking up law-inbiting citizens. They're destroying families, jobs. You underscored, John, that you voted for the president in the most recent election, I assume. Yeah, I wouldn't do that again. Not after this fiasco. This is like the Gestapo. I would never have thought the United States would act this way. Go after the criminals. We're all for that. But leave the mom and pops and the kids alone. Love, Jasmine. That's it. But now, why don't we bring in Gina Hinojosa, who is running an incredible campaign right now. This is the conversation I had with Gina moments ago.

9:05Ben Meiselas:Let's bring it in. This is a great one. And now I want to bring on Gina Hinojosa, who's running for governor of Texas, the Democratic candidate for governor of Texas. This race is neck and neck. There have been two polls in the past two weeks, one from Fox, one from Texas A &M. that has this as a one-point race between you and Governor Abbott. Everybody knows Governor Abbott, MAGA Republican extremist. He's endorsed the disastrous bill that has hurt so many people in Texas. He's endorsed attacking people for just wanting health care and education and a better life. And he just seems to just be so disconnected from just the daily needs of what people are experiencing in Texas as he wants to figure out what can I do to help you with golden ballrooms, Donald, and Mar-a-Lago upgrades and help you with your 21 ,000 stock trades.

9:59Ben Meiselas:And you want tax immunity? Can we help you here in Texas, Donald, with you and your family's tax immunity? Gina, people see videos like this and they're like, Ben, don't get our hopes up in Texas by saying it's a close. We don't want you to inject hopium. Give us the real. So Gina, what do you tell people though about this governor's race? Yes. Well, just the facts. The facts are that Democrats are winning all across Texas this year, where we haven't won in a long, long time and sometimes ever. And this is because people want change. It's not that people are like, yay, team Democrat. People are like, whatever this is, we don't want it.

10:35And it creates this great opportunity. And that's what you're seeing in the polling. It is what we are seeing on the ground. Even Republicans, even MAGA Republicans are tired of Greg Abbott and people are struggling a lot in Texas. So to give you more facts, in 2018, Beto ran against Ted Cruz. That's the closest we came to flipping Texas, right? That was last time we had a midterm election with Trump in the White House. This year for my primary, I got twice as many votes as Beto got in 2018, even though I had eight opponents, because there's just more energy. We have Democrats running in every race, working at all across the state.

11:18Young people are back. Latinos have swung back in a big way. So this is our year and our best chance in 25 plus years to win. And it is not hyperbole. It is facts.

11:32Ben Meiselas:Well, and this is why the Abbots and the kind of Magas of the world in that vein, although I should say lots of MAGA's are leaving MAGA and they don't consider themselves MAGA anymore. But this is why they and Fox and others want to throw on labels and figure out how do we divide people and put people into camps? Because if you just look at what Trump and Abbott have done to the state of Texas and you take a step back and you say, objectively, this is what it's looked like when they've run all levers of government. Are you happy about this? They were in charge for a very long time. Objectively, on probably a 70 to 30, 80 to 20 basis, I think it should be more than that.

12:18Ben Meiselas:But people will say, no, we don't like this. So then what do they want to do? Let's blame this group or that group or this person or fear monger you. Well, it could have been much worse if we had this. And it's like, no, take responsibility. You know, and I think this moment in Texas, people are saying, we gave you your shot, Abbott. We gave you your shot, all the people that you brought and you screwed us and you hurt us. And this is going to be different this time. I think there's some of that going on also. Yeah, absolutely. Just like you said, everybody knows who Greg Abbott is. He's been in office 12 years.

12:55Actually, he's been in statewide office 30 years since I graduated from college. And people want change. They know it's harder to make it in Texas today than it used to be. And this is Greg Abbott's record. We have the most uninsured of any state. We have the most uninsured children. We have the most people being disconnected from their electricity because they cannot afford to pay their bills. in Texas that is a powerhouse in energy, right? We have the most bankruptcies of any state and it is mostly our small businesses that are struggling. We have over 150 whole school districts operating at four days a week because they cannot afford to operate at five days a week.

13:38That is Greg Abbott's record. He owns it. People know it and people want change. It is unacceptable. We know our worth in Texas. We know we deserve better. In fact, we know we deserve the best. And this is not that.

13:52Ben Meiselas:You know, Donald Trump gave an interview on Friday with something called Punchbowl, where he repeated a line that he goes around the country and says, and Trump says, data centers are liquid gold and data centers should be in everybody's backyard. And, you know, he's very close with Abbott. And part of the planning is they want they want data centers in everybody's backyard. That's what Abbott was pushing. Every community liquid. This is what they sold to people. You want to get rich. You want lower taxes. You want a better life. Data centers, data centers, data centers. And what you saw on a bipartisan basis is people saying, no, that's not actually what we want in our backyards.

14:30Ben Meiselas:We don't want that. And you've been calling out this just proliferation and really just, you know, demolition of communities, you know, with Abbott and putting these data centers everywhere. I've seen all these videos that you put out where you walk with people in the communities. I don't even know what their political views are. I just know they don't like those things right there in their backyards. And it's just interesting because now all of a sudden you've kind of got Abbott seeing this as like, oh, my gosh, maybe people don't like this. and now he wants to change the position. It just looks so phony because the damages, I mean, dude, you opened it, you did this.

15:06Ben Meiselas:Like this is on your hands already. So now you want to say after the fact because you're worried about losing a race. That's what I think people see is like, dude, you're just, you're a phony. You're a phony, you're a fraud. Yeah, yes. In fact, Abbott invited the vampires into the house and now he's claiming he doesn't know how they got here. So people know it. They know he's to blame. he was having press conferences with CEOs of data centers saying, we're going to have more data centers in Texas than anyone. That was just at the end of last year. And so for him to reverse course, everybody sees it and everybody is calling him out on it.

15:44We have just this avalanche of data centers in Texas because Greg Abbott signed the most rich tax break of any state for these data centers. They pay no electricity. I'm sorry. They pay no tax on their electricity. And so they're coming here. They're guzzling all the electricity. They're guzzling all the water. No consequences, no protections in these rural areas where they're unincorporated, right? They don't have city councils that can pass ordinances. No, they're unincorporated. So the people are absolutely unprotected from the power of these data centers. Greg Abbott put them there and now people are calling them out and they're mad and you see it in the polling.

16:25Ben Meiselas:Yeah, I mean, no taxes on electricity is crazy. I mean, it reminds me of, it's like, okay, we know Abbott and Trump are locked at the hip right now. And it's like, what are you pushing in the White House? Tax immunity for yourself too. So you and your family don't have to pay taxes. And then, you know, you have the Republicans like, yep, we just wanted them to narrow the scope. So we made sure that it was just about Trump and his family and his corporations and his trusts. And I'm like, what are we even doing here? And there's like, there's another way. It doesn't have to actually be putting these people in, these billionaires or protectors of the billionaires out there who are literally out there to screw us and to cover up Epstein files.

17:14Ben Meiselas:And it's like, that's not what government is, people. like you could have people like you who were like, yeah, maybe we help people with health care. We help people with education. We help people get good paying jobs. We, you know, are transparent. It's just, it's this wild thing because, you know, you get into this election season and it becomes very gamified and you, you see it, you know, the way that me, this person, that person, dah, dah, dah, dah, dah, dah. It's like, step back. What are we even like, what are we doing here? Like, what's the point of government? It ain't about giving tax breaks to data centers to like kill the people in your state.

17:48It's just a crazy thing. That's right. It's why nobody trusts government. I don't trust government right now. Government is working for the billionaires. Just like you said, we're paying into a system that is working against us right now. So I've proposed$1 ,500 to every Texas household. It comes out of what we call a rainy day fund that is like overflowing. It's billions. It used to be a 10 billion. We'll take it back to 10 billion and use the rest to give back to the people of Texas because we have to prove that government can do something good for people. This is not a normal position, but these are not normal times.

18:27I just went through how Texans are struggling. I will tell you weekly I am running into Texans who are donating plasma as a second job. They are working Texans, teachers, crane operators, and they stand in line at the plasma center. before they open two to three times a week to earn enough money to pay their bills. This is unacceptable. It is tragic. It is Greg Abbott's Texas.

18:54Ben Meiselas:And when you travel in the state, tell me about what you're hearing from independents, Republicans, Trump voters, anything that is kind of noteworthy there. Yeah. So we were just in the panhandle. We were in Lubbock, Amarillo, and we went to find out what was happening with data centers. And there is this organic movement. People showed up in shirts that said break ranks, and they have always voted Republican. But break ranks means don't vote for the Republicans who did this to us. So it is a time that is crazy politics. And it's just like all of us suddenly realize we're in the same boat. And it is this populist sentiment that people understand they deserve more.

19:43And that it is these billionaires, these data centers, Elon Musk, who are taking what we worked for, what we what is our inheritance, our land, our water, our money, because Greg Abbott lets them. He's given Elon Musk the keys to the castle. He gives them anything he wants. People see it. They're disgusted by it. They're disgusted by the corruption they see in Texas. Rick Abbott's given a billion dollars in no bid contracts to his donors. I mean, this just goes on and on. And it's what happens after 30 years of one party control. There's just no accountability and people are done. People see it and they're done.

20:25Right.

20:25Ben Meiselas:And now Trump and Abbott say affordability is a made up word. They say we don't even know what that word even means. And so it's just all a fabrication. then they say, we're living in the golden age right now already. I think Trump said on Friday that from a scale of zero to 100, he would give himself a 150. That would be his grade on how the economy is doing right now. And so they're not even saying, well, in the future, we're almost there. You have some advisors who are like, just wait, next quarter is our quarter. Just wait. Next quarter is our quarter. Just wait. And they kind of drag people along.

21:01Ben Meiselas:But But the message from Trump and Abbott is this is it. This is the golden age and everybody is rich. And it's like, no, you just enriched yourself, which is why, though, I think their pivot is, all right, let's make the biggest issue stopping people from voting because, you know, that's our only shot. And I know you gave an important speech on this and you made voting rights a pillar of your campaign. Talk to us about that. What we know is after the Voting Rights Act was gutted about four months ago, now there are no rules. And so Republicans in Austin have said they're coming back to redraw maps.

21:39When that happens, they will eliminate five Democrats from Congress. Two years later, Texas will gain another five congressional seats from the census because we're growing faster than all the other states. We will take seats away from mostly blue states. And that's another five seats where the same Austin Republicans control. They will draw those maps for themselves. That's 10 Democratic seats off the table in our U.S. Congress. There is not a path to Democratic control of Congress when that happens. The math no longer works. Texas becomes too big. And that is what is at stake in this governor's race.

22:19We need a governor who will veto rig maps. I will be that governor. And that's why we need every American to care about this race, because no matter what party you belong to, when an election is decided before the first ballot is cast, then we all lose. We no longer are America when that happens.

22:40Ben Meiselas:Gina, we have seven million subscribers here on the Midas Touch Network and a broader network across channels outside of our YouTube. What's your final message to people, whether they're in Texas or outside of Texas? What's your message in this moment? And where could people learn more about the campaign if they want to learn more about it? Thanks, Ben. I invite every American to join this effort, join this fight. You can go to GinaForTexas.com and do what you can. But please do everything you can because we are in a moment in history and this might be our last best chance. That's why I'm running for governor.

23:13That's why all across the state, Texans are working so hard to win for themselves, for their families, for our country. And I invite you to be a part of it.

23:24Ben Meiselas:Gina Hinojosa, thanks for joining us. And we're going to follow the race, come back on in a few weeks. We'd love to have you back on. Thanks, Ben. Everybody hit subscribe. Let's get to 7 million subscribers. Before you go, our book, WTF America, is available for pre-order now. It's the story of how we got here and how we fight our way back. To pre-order, scan the QR code or click the link in the description. Let's do this.