Democratic gubernatorial candidate Gina Hinojosa took aim at Gov. Greg Abbott’s record on data centers and campaign contributions while saying she would prioritize education funding and putting money back in Texans’ pockets during her campaign stop Wednesday evening in El Paso.
The rally at the Epic Railyard Event Center marked her third stop in El Paso ahead of the Nov. 3 general election, where she hopes to unseat the Republican incumbent, who is seeking his fourth term in office. The rally kicked off with a performance by El Paso rapper Krystall Poppin, who had the crowd chanting “915,” “Go, Gina” and “Go, Poppin.”
Hinojosa was introduced by New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham and Arizona Sen. Ruben Gallego, who urged attendees to bring people to the polls during the last two days of early voting and on Election Day.
“Get her over the finish line,” Lujan Grisham said.
Hinojosa, 52, is a civil rights lawyer and state representative from Austin. The rally followed a volunteer event and stop at the University of Texas at El Paso to mobilize supporters to hit the polls.
“There’s one fight,” Hinojosa said. “Is this going to be a Texas for the people, or is this the billionaires’ world and we just live here?”
Abbott, 68, has made two campaign stops in El Paso and has a third scheduled onThursday.
Hinojosa and Abbott are among the slew of state candidates stopping in El Paso during the last week of the early voting. Democratic Senate candidate James Talarico visited on Monday, and his Republican opponent, Ken Paxton, will come Sunday.
Hinojosa said she wants to secure the American dream by reallocating state resources to save public schools and giving $1,500 to every Texas household through what she dubbed the Greg Abbott corruption tax refund. She also said she wanted to suspend the gas and diesel tax in the state and reign in health insurance companies.
Hinojosa also took aim at Abbott’s email communications with tech billionaire Elon Musk, which the governor’s office withheld from release under state open records laws.
“Hundreds of pages of redacted emails that he refuses to hand over. These are documents that, as a legislator, I am routinely given when I ask for them. Not this time – very suspicious, not this time,” Hinojosa said at the rally. “I think they’ll show he sold us out.”
On Monday, a Travis County judge ruled that Abbott must allow Hinojosa to review unredacted communications between he and Musk. Abbott’s attorneys filed an appeal, according to Bloomberg Law. The 15th Court of Appeals on Tuesday issued a stay on the ruling which prevents Hinojosa from immediate access to the documents.
Hinojosa after the rally said though she may not be able to publicly disclose the contents of the emails, she would use the information to create legislation to put a stop to potentially corrupt dealings. Her term as a state representative ends before the next Texas Legislature session begins.
“As a legislator, I have power to take action, to be able to right the wrongs that are happening, and to ask questions to make sure the public gets the information that they need,” Hinojosa said.
Abbott’s office did not respond to a request for comment.
Musk has donated $5.5 million to Abbott’s reelection campaign, Texas Ethics Commission filings show.
Hinojosa also said she wanted to put a moratorium on data center agreements.
“When I am governor, we will put a pause – a moratorium on any agreements until we can pass laws to make sure that the people of El Paso and Texas have a seat at the table to decide if and how these data centers come into their communities,” Hinojosa said.
Abbott promoted Texas as a destination for data centers before public backlash and concerns about how resources such as energy and water would be impacted by the operation of the facilities throughout the state. In early August, Abbott issued a series of guidelines for data center operations that, in part, aim to make the companies pay for their own electric infrastructure and eliminate incentives.
Hinojosa said it was no shock that the permits were still being issued after the governor’s directives and said data centers are part of the reason the state is losing billions of dollars in revenue.
“We are losing more than a billion dollars a year in this state because of it – that’s money the rest of us have to pick up the tab for,” she said, referring to sales tax breaks given to data centers.
The post Gina Hinojosa targets Abbott’s data center record, promises financial relief at El Paso rally appeared first on El Paso Matters.
Read: Read More