9 hours ago
State of Texas: Sen. Kelly Hancock resigns to become acting Comptroller, announces campaign for position
AUSTIN (Nexstar) — Republican State Sen Kelly Hancock resigned from the Texas Senate and was hired to be the Chief Clerk at the Texas Comptroller's office on Thursday. The move puts Hancock in the position to become the acting Comptroller of Public Accounts when Comptroller Glenn Hegar leaves his position to become the next Chancellor of the Texas A&M System on July 1.
Hancock announced his campaign for Comptroller later that same day, becoming the third Republican in the race for the state's top tax-collector. Hancock has served in the Senate as a representative from the 9th district — based in Tarrant County — since 2013. He was one of just two Senate Republicans who voted to convict Attorney General Ken Paxton in his 2023 impeachment trial. Speaking about his new job and candidacy, Hancock said he is still the same person he has always been.
'I'm still the guy that shops at Walmart, and I'm small business owner,' Hancock said. 'Sure, I've served as a school board member for 13 years, served in the legislature, but that's not who I am.'
Hancock is vying to lead the agency that is tasked with rolling out the state's new education savings account program. That will provide state dollars to families who want to send their child to private school. Hancock said he will draw from his 13 years of experience on his local school board to approach that task.
'My love for kids and making sure that every — you know, every child — gets to achieve their dream. Education is how we do that,' Hancock said.
Hancock immediately received an endorsement from Gov. Greg Abbott. Former State Sen. Don Huffines and Railroad Commissioner Christi Craddick announced their campaigns for Comptroller earlier this year. Huffines is among those questioning whether this maneuver is constitutionally legal.
Huffines reposted a post from a conservative member of the media on X, pointing out the 'holdover' provision of the Texas Constitution. The provision states that a public official must continue to perform the duties of their office until their successor is named. This would appear to suggest that Hancock could not cease performing his duties as a senator until a special election is held to replace him.
That also appears to suggest that Hancock could not become Comptroller right away, because the Texas Constitution bars a public official from holding an office in the legislative and executive branches simultaneously. The move raises questions about his appointment to the position.
Asked about the contradiction, Hancock said he was hired to the office just like anyone else.
'There was an opening, I was asked to fill it,' Hancock said. 'Comptroller Hegar and I are good friends. We've known each other for a long time, and so that's the way we wanted to go about it.'
Huffines called the move by Hancock a 'gross manipulation.'
'It's a gross manipulation of the process by the establishment Republicans, the political elite, because they're scared of me, and they know that I'm going to win,' Huffines said.
Now that Hancock has officially resigned his seat, Abbott has to schedule a special election to replace him. The district is strongly Republican — Hancock won reelection in the 9th district by 20 points in 2022 — but given recent trends in special elections across the country, the seat has the potential to become competitive.
The U.S. Supreme Court reversed a ruling by a federal appeals court Thursday, clearing the way for plans to temporarily store nuclear waste at a facility in West Texas.
The 6-3 vote came in the case, Nuclear Regulatory Commission v. Texas, where the U.S. Court of Appeals in the Fifth Circuit sided with Texas and Fasken Oil and Ranch in their suit against the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to prevent the temporary waste site from being built.
The justices reversed the Fifth Circuit ruling. But the Court did not decide the underlying dispute about whether the NRC has the power to license private storage facilities for nuclear waste. While the Court's decision is not a final ruling in favor of the licenses, it clears a key hurdle for the waste storage plans.
Texas argued that federal law requires nuclear waste to be stored on site at reactors in the absence of a permanent storage site. Interim Storage Partners, LLC, the company trying to build the storage site in West Texas, argues that the law cited by the state — the Nuclear Waste Policy Act — does nothing to forbid the creation of a temporary storage site.
'The Fifth Circuit held that the NWPA 'doesn't permit' the ISP license, ISP App. 30a, but cited no statutory provision that says that. Nor do respondents. There is none,' the ISP writes in its response.
Currently, high-level nuclear waste generated from nuclear power plants is stored at the reactors themselves to avoid transporting the fuel. High-level nuclear waste is highly radioactive and dangerous fuel, which no longer has a fast enough fission process to be used to generate energy, but still poses a threat.
Because no federal waste storage site has been built, the NRC hoped to create a temporary storage site in West Texas. Opponents to the site, including the state, said that it would likely become a permanent site with no existing alternative. According to the NRC's website, high-level waste only becomes harmless after being stored for thousands of years.
The concern is not only over storage, but transportation. Transporting spent nuclear fuel requires strict oversight and protection. According to the Environmental Protection Agency, the most radioactive material is transported in casks, which are containers that are designed to withstand collisions, being dropped onto a steel spike, burning in gasoline for 30 minutes and withstanding being submerged in water for eight hours.
The state also expressed worries about the site's location near oil fields in West Texas. Gov. Greg Abbott submitted comments in the suit that said the nuclear waste site could inflict significant damage to the oil fields if an act of terrorism or an accident affected the site.
Texas has strived to lead the nation in nuclear energy production, with plans for the construction of several new uranium mines in South Texas and power plants purchased by large tech companies, like Google and Amazon.
Because nuclear power can produce energy without carbon emissions, it is a popular alternative to fossil fuel-heavy sources like coal. But after nuclear disasters abroad and in the U.S. at power plants, including the Three Mile Island plant in Pennsylvania, creation of new nuclear power plants has slowed significantly in the U.S. Meanwhile, foreign powers, like China and India, are ramping up production.
Both the Biden and Trump administrations made efforts to bolster nuclear energy in the U.S. by building new reactors and restarting old ones. Recent executive orders by President Donald Trump take measures, including speeding up the licensing process through the Department of Energy, beginning construction on 10 new reactors by 2030 and creating reactors for artificial intelligence data centers and domestic military bases.
This week Gov. Abbott traveled across the state to sign a $10 billion property tax relief package and a historic $20 billion water infrastructure bill. Both were priorities of this past legislative session.
Abbott started in Denton County on Monday to unveil the latest property tax legislation that will increase the homestead exemption from $100,000 to $140,000, and increase the exemption for disabled Texans and those 65 and older to $200,000.
Senate Bill 4 and 23, both authored by State Sen. Paul Bettencourt, R – Houston, will save 5.7 million Texas homeowners about $484 per year on their tax bill, and $907 per year for 2.08 million seniors, according to Bettencourt's office.
Even though both SB 4 and SB 23 passed unanimously in the Texas House of Representatives, the proposals did not pass without some criticism. State Rep. Brian Harrison, R-Midlothian, spoke out against SB 4 on the House floor before voting yes on the measure. He argues the property tax cuts do not go far enough.
'It is entirely conceivable that many or most homeowners and property owners will not see any real savings at all because the appraisals are likely to increase and eat up this new exemption,' Harrison said.
Gov. Abbott praised the work by the legislature to pass additional tax breaks for Texas homeowners. Both bills will need to be approved by a majority of Texans in the November election. When asked if the state will be able to keep providing these exemptions in the future, the Governor assured the state is in a good financial spot.
'We have some other reserve money to make sure that we will be able to continue to maintain the property tax relief in the future that we provide today,' Abbott said.
Later in the week the governor was in Lubbock to sign Senate Bill 7, aimed at investing $20 billion into the state's water fund. The governor called it 'the largest water law in the history of the great state of Texas.'
'Every day, on average in Texas, there's more than 1,000 more people who go to a faucet and turn that on because of the magnitude of the growth,' Abbott said during the ceremony. 'When they go to the faucet to turn it on, they expect the water to flow.'
Under the plan, half of the $20 billion would fund new water supply sources, while the other half would support water infrastructure development and repair existing systems. The funding operates as a revolving loan program, providing $1 billion annually for 20 years with repaid loans reinvested in additional projects.
House Speaker Dustin Burrows, R-Lubbock, emphasized the economic implications of the water crisis.
'People want to come here because of our economy, because of our culture, and they are coming here with U-hauls,' Burrows said. 'If they show up and they turn on that spigot, and water doesn't come out, those U-hauls are going to go the absolute opposite direction.'
SB 7 tasks the Texas Water Development Board with coordinating large-scale water infrastructure projects across regions, promoting standardized specifications for interoperable systems and minimizing eminent domain use by maximizing existing transportation and utility easements.
Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, accused the Biden Administration and members of the national press of covering-up the former president's declining health. It is the latest attempt from Congressional Republicans to paint President Joe Biden as unfit to lead.
Sen. Cornyn helped lay out the allegations in a U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee hearing. Following the hearing, he called out the Democratic party for the alleged cover-up.
'There's no question they had the ability to raise this issue earlier, when his incapacity became obvious to everybody who was paying attention. So Congress needs to look at whatever what possible remedies that we might be able to legislate,' Cornyn said.
Only two Democratic senators on the committee, Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Illinois, and Sen. Peter Welch, D-Vermont, attended the meeting. They called the hearing political theater. Other Democrats on the committee who did not attend the hearing called it a distraction from more pressing issues.
The office of former President Biden denies any cover-up.
A day after the hearing President Biden was in Galveston, TX to celebrate Juneteenth. Biden was presented a plaque for his role in designating Juneteenth as a national holiday. He spoke to the congregation at the Reedy Chapel-AME church.
'You know on this sacred day it reminds me of another sacred day, that wonderful day four years ago in the East Room of the White House when I had a great honor, of course objections from some, of making Juneteenth a federal holiday,' Biden said.
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