Two years since Republican Gov. Greg Abbott rammed through a landmark $1 billion private school voucher program, Texas Democrats have elected an entire slate of candidates with backgrounds in public education.
Democrats' gubernatorial candidate Gina Hinojosa is a former Austin ISD school board president, who has vowed to fire the Texas' education commissioner, while U.S. Senate nominee James Talarico (D-Round Rock) is a former Rhodes Middle School teacher who first ran for office amid frustration with the state's 2011 cuts in education funding.
While it's unclear how high the issue ranked on voters' minds in a noisy election, it's clear that education motivated a large number of Democratic candidates to run for office this year.
Beyond their top-of-ticket races, Democrats put up a slew of teachers, school board members and education-focused candidates this cycle, including Adrian Reyna, an SAISD union leader in San Antonio's Texas House District 125.
Now in the wake of a Democratic wave, the party is on track to flip a Texas House that seemed far out of reach headed into this election — fueling speculation about how they'll approach the issue now that they finally hold the keys to one of the state's policy-making bodies.
"I imagine vouchers will be a big conversation in the next session," Texas Majority PAC executive director Katherine Fischer said on a press call Wednesday morning.
"They've been a big conversation for a few sessions now. Obviously, they finally passed, and now we have a Democratic statehouse and a Democratic governor and lieutenant governor, so I think that will probably be a high priority."
Tackling a fraught school funding system will be no easy task.
Aside from the voucher program, which directs taxpayer money to private schools, Texas GOP leaders have been ramping up school property tax exemptions as a way to keep seniors in their homes, and even promising to do away with school property taxes altogether in the upcoming session.
Many school districts are hurting for money, but even on a night where Democrats swept state-level races, voters in several local school districts shot down much-needed school bonds and requests to increase tax rates.
While local administrators and education advocates are still reeling from the losses on school finance measures, they're also cautiously optimistic about what's possible with new leadership.
"While we were disappointed that our local NISD propositions did not pass… With the election of Gov. Gina Hinojosa, and a new state Legislature, we have renewed hope," said Melina Espiritu-Azocar, president of Northside AFT, the teacher union for Northside ISD, one of San Antonio's largest public school districts.
Northside ISD had four tax measures on the ballot that were all voted down. If they had passed, it would have paid for staff pay raises and infrastructure projects.
NISD is the fourth-largest school district in Texas, with about 96,000 students enrolled.
State Rep. Diego Bernal (D-San Antonio), a senior member of the Bexar County delegation and an influential education policy writer, said school districts should feel a little relief if the Texas House does in fact flip.
Bernal sits on the powerful Texas House Public Education Committee, the same place Hinojosa and Talarico cut their teeth.
/
He expects to be a guiding hand on education policy under Hinojosa's administration.
"I have no doubt that the House will focus on school finance. The House will focus on accountability. The House will focus on STAAR, and of course, the House will revisit vouchers," he said. " I really hope and believe that the Senate will do the same."
Throughout her own campaign, Hinojosa has vowed to fire Texas Education Agency commissioner Mike Morath, who was appointed by Abbott and took office in 2016. Morath has since led the state's efforts to take over underperforming school districts, especially in urban areas.
/
"I will pause the rigged A-F accountability system that is based on a deeply flawed and rigged STAAR test, and we will end the STAAR test once and for all," Hinojosa told supporters during a campaign visit in San Antonio.
Democrats are already angling for Texas House Speaker, should they definitively flip the chamber.
A few days before election night, Republican Texas House Speaker Dustin Burrows was in town trying to defend his conference against criticism that they're anti-public schools. In addition to the $1 billion Texas offered families for private school tuition last session, lawmakers put about $7.7 billion into public schools at the same time.
"Last session you saw historic investments in our public education system," said Burrows.
But most of the public school dollars were tied to state mandates that school officials said put them even deeper in the hole.
Meet the new delegation
This election cycle education was among the defining issues for Bexar County's state House delegation.
On the West Side in Texas House District 125, voters foreseeably elected Reyna, 39, with 67.53% of the vote.
Reyna, who is replacing retired state Rep. Ray Lopez (D-San Antonio), will be one of the only public school educators in the Texas Legislature.
Over in Texas House District 118, one of the most hard fought and truly competitive races in Texas, Kristian Carranza flipped the seat back to blue with 61.69% of the vote.
And in one of the more shocking turn of events from last night, Zack Dunn flipped Texas House District 121, a historically business-centric Republican stronghold, with just 54% of the vote.
State Rep. Marc LaHood (R-San Antonio) was one of the lawmakers who rode in on the school voucher issue two years ago, but struggled to defend it on the campaign trail and lost his reelection bid to Dunn. The Northside district hasn't elected a Democrat since 1981.
The only general election debate of that race was held in October, where nearly all of the questions were about school vouchers.
LaHood was grilled about the program, which is very unpopular with public school advocates and whose initial rollout has been painted in an unflattering light.
"I could not be more anti-ESAs, anti-voucher scams," Dunn said at the debate. "This is a billion dollars that was taken away from our public education system, and it was given to private institutions."
"Fully funding our public education system is a great way to make sure we cover a lot of those bases in terms of safety, economic opportunities, all of it," he said during an election night interview.
Not only does the Texas Legislature lack teachers, Texas' GOP leader also spent millions rooting out some of their party's biggest public education supporters in 2024 to pave the way for school vouchers.
Last night's election was also a win for Michelle Williams, an educator and union leader from Houston ISD, unseating incumbent Charles Cunningham (R-Houston) in House District 127.
Williams and Reyna are both members of the Texas State Teachers Association, a statewide teacher union.
"TSTA is happy to see real education experts, such as these members of our union family, elected to public office," said TSTA President Linda Estrada. "Now they will step up to the political front lines and work to improve funding for our public school classrooms, raise pay for teachers and support staff, repeal or limit the private school voucher law and reduce teacher and student time spent on wasteful, standardized testing."
Carranza's House District 118 was a blue stronghold before state Rep. John Lujan (R-San Antonio) flipped it in 2022.
During that race, the San Antonio native campaigned against the passage of school vouchers because it its potential to hurt public school funding and enrollment, which are tied together in Texas.
/
This time around, Carranza ran against Republican Jorge Borrego, an equally well-connected up-and-comer in his party, who helped shepherd Abbott's school voucher plan while working at the conservative Texas Public Policy Foundation.
Before election night, Carranza said that if she was elected, the first thing she would do is call for an audit of the voucher program.
This story first appeared in the San Antonio Report.
Copyright 2026 Texas Public Radio
