The failure of the Texas power grid during a cold snap was a year ago, but Democrats are quietly confident voters haven’t forgotten who was in charge when the lights went out
It was the first day of Texas’ 2021 winter storm when Sarah Williams’ family was closing on their new home in Harker Heights, about an hour’s drive outside of Austin. She remembers salt being sprinkled on the entryway outside the title company she visited as the town prepared for snow and freezing temperatures.
While the Texas 2021 legislative session pumped out a six-week abortion ban and a new set of voting restrictions, state lawmakers did little to address the grid’s faulty infrastructure. Cynthia, a 79-year-old from Houston, told The Daily Beast it’s been frustrating to see those policies get enacted while the grid goes on unaddressed.
Texas Democratic candidate governor Beto O’Rourke toured the state earlier this year to talk with voters about the grid failure, campaigning on a message of fully weatherizing the grid and connecting it to one of the two national power grids. Democratic lieutenant governor and attorney general candidates are hammering on the grid, too, hoping the issue can help launch them to success.
The bill was much more relaxed regarding natural gas facilities, which were behind many of 2021’s grid failures.But state-level candidates aren’t the only ones trying to play in 2022’s grid politics. Some Texas candidates running for federal office are trying to bring a national approach to the issue.
But with winter waning and Texas’ grid having avoided any major hits this season, questions remain whether voters will still be angry enough to turn their backs on Republicans this November. “Absent another comparably catastrophic failure, it’s very unlikely that the issue will convert Republican votes to the Democratic ticket. Republican discontent on the issue is neither very high nor very intense,” Henson said.
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