NEW: Greg Abbott Lied to Texans About Data Center Permitting Pause

Austin, TX – Democratic nominee for Texas Governor Gina Hinojosa released the following statement after new reporting from Public Citizen identified 35 permits given to data centers by Texas in the weeks after Greg Abbott’s so-called pause. This is after Greg Abbott received $22.5 million in campaign contributions from data center interests and allowed 596 data centers to be planned or built with the largest tax breaks in the country.

“Greg Abbott’s tough talk on data centers is nothing more than an election year stunt,” said Hinojosa. “Abbott invited these data centers to Texas with the richest tax breaks in the country, and then pretended to pause approvals for political gain. If Greg Abbott really wanted to protect Texans he would have called a special session to pass laws on the books. This is exactly why nobody believes the arsonist will put out the fire, because time and time again, Abbott puts billionaires first and Texans last.”

Despite Abbott’s tough talk, these massive data center corporations have been circumventing his audits since day 1. After letting global corporations build data centers all over the state, especially in rural communities, Greg Abbott tried to rein in the problem he created with meaningless letters and a so-called data center “pause” that conveniently ends in December, right after the election.

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