The narrative voters and businesses fleeing liberal strangleholds like California and New York to move to Texas to bring votes for Democrats is just not borne out in polling, according to Texas state Sen. Paul Bettencourt, R-Houston, on Newsmax TV.
"It's not only our experience, but we've actually polled in the Cruz-Beto O'Rourke race and found that 57% of the Californians exiled, émigrés who have moved into Texas, actually voted for Cruz," Bettencourt told Monday's "Spicer & Co." of Sen. Ted Cruz's last Senate race against the gun-control liberal O'Rourke.
"Now, why is that? They're escaping a terribly high-tax, high-regulation environment and they're coming to Texas, so they're bringing an economic conservative viewpoint."
Republican strategists hail the growth of a red state like Texas but have feared it might ultimately turn Texas purple, if not blue. Bettencourt told co-hosts Sean Spicer and Lyndsay Keith that Texas is welcoming its economic growth, along with its rapidly expanding voter base.
"We've got an open door policy on people moving and bringing businesses into Texas," Bettencourt added. "Gov. [Greg] Abbott's phone is ringing off the wall. We've got legislative prerogatives making it a very strong place for people to bring their business, especially from California.
"We've had people coming from New York, you name it, because we've been a job creation engine. But now we're also a place where businesses can have less regulation and good tax policies, as well as really a bipartisan majority of people who want new businesses to come to Texas."
When asked if Californians or New Yorkers might be turned off by the rare snowy weather in the Texas, Bettencourt demurred it is better than living in the swamp in Washington, D.C.
"I would not like to come north to D.C. – you guys live there and fight there, we try to fight leftist progressive down here," Bettencourt said.
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