HOUSTON — Governor Greg Abbott’s campaign is attempting to make up ground in key suburban areas just weeks before Election Day after recent internal campaign polling showed him down in Tarrant and Fort Bend counties
They’re counties that have swung blue in the past and are getting renewed attention from the incumbent Republican Texas governor.
Suburban voters are a key block of voters Gov. Abbott has leaned on in the past.
“We move at the speed of business in the state of Texas,” Abbott remarked at a campaign event in the Woodlands.
Abbott spent time there speaking with the Greater Houston Builders Association trying to maintain suburban voters.
Abbott invited the press but declined to take questions regarding his campaign.
“I don’t know what the end will be but I have to try and we did,” said Cynthia Ginyard, the Fort Bend County Democratic Party Chair.
Ginyard is known as one of the architects of flipping Fort Bend blue.
Abbott is polling down by double digits in favorability, according to reports in Fort Bend. It's a suburban Houston-area county that turned blue the last time Beto O’Rourke ran and stayed that way in 2020.
“I would say 9 to 10 down, but that’s understandable. The Republican party, including Governor Abbott, have gone totally extreme outside of the bell curve,” Ginyard said.
Ginyard said Abbott's stances on Roe v. Wade, immigration, education and property tax are a driving force in uniting the electorate against Abbott there.
“It doesn’t matter whether you’re Democrat, Republican or Independent. If your policies are inhumane, they’re inhumane and they don’t want to live like that,” Ginyard said.
Fort bend is one of the fastest growing and diverse counties and could reach 1 million residents in the near future. Abbott spent time block walking in the county earlier this year, underscoring his expectations to compete there.
“That lets us know that our voters are getting out there, they’re seeing it, they’re are getting it,” Ginyard said.
Abbott's internal polling also has him down by 4 in Tarrant County near Dallas.
Democratic challenger Beto O’Rourke’s campaign released the following statement on Abbott campaigning in Fort Bend and Tarrant counties:
“Greg Abbott has become too extreme for Texas. Voters in Fort Bend County, Tarrant County, and communities all across this state overwhelmingly oppose his extreme abortion ban with no exception for rape or incest, reject his push to defund public school classrooms, and disagree with his refusal to take the bipartisan, commonsense steps to keep kids safe from gun violence."
O’Rourke will be in Fort Bend in the coming days to campaign while Abbott will be in Dallas Wednesday.