State Rep. Regina "Gina" Inez Hinojosa, D-Austin, announced her candidacy for governor of Texas in October 2025.
The Brownsville native made the announcement in the historic Alonso Building in downtown Brownsville. Very few people gave he a chance of winning.
Hinojosa attended Oliveira Middle School and Hanna High School in Brownsville; UT-Austin, where she studied Government, and George Washington University, where she studied Law. Her father is Gilberto Hinojosa, the former Cameron County Judge and former Texas Democratic Party chair.
Before becoming a state representative in 2017, Hinojosa worked for the American Federal of State, County and Municipal Employees, and for the law firm of Kator, Parks & Weiser. She was also an Austin ISD school board member and worked part-time for Catholic Charities USA, Texas Rural Legal Aid, and the Equal Justice Center.
Here are her remarks at her campaign kickoff event:
So, wow, there are a lot of you in this building. Thank you, it’s good to be home. Twenty-six years ago, I was in this building the day I made the best decision of my life. It was the day I married my husband, John Philip Donisi.
On that day, we had a raucous, phenomenal party in this building. We celebrated with our friends and family, so many of whom are here today to take this leap of faith with me, just like you did then.
And along the way, I've made new friends. Some who are here with me, who made the trek to Brownsville to be with me on this momentous, exciting day. And from the bottom of my heart, I just want to say thank you to all of you for being here with me. It means the world to me.
You and my family, you are and you have always been the source of my courage. That same courage you heard about in the video you just watched that my grandmother Maria Luisa Hinojosa instilled in me. I wear her ring on my hardest days as a reminder of my strength, and yes, I hear her voice tell me no te dejes. She would tell me it was a directive to know my worth and to fight for it. Because when you know your people have your back, you can do anything. When you know your people are with you, you can do anything.
It is a courage, and it is a faith to do the hard things. And because you give me courage, because I have faith in you, because I have faith in my family, my community, in God, and in Texans, I am running to be the next governor of the state of Texas.
My faith tells me that things can change, and my love for my community tells me that things must change. And in this moment of history, if we all have the courage to play our part, to do our part, I know that we have the power to be that change. We will be the change.
This is the (Rio Grande) Valley community that raised me and made me the woman I am today. Thank you. I am a proud product of Texas public schools. As I know, I said I went to Egly Elementary. There, I learned that we are all in this together, and we all have gifts and talents to contribute, and when you have your family and your community behind you, you can achieve anything.
And it was that upbringing that taught me that Texans can achieve anything… so long as Governor Abbott takes his big government boot off our necks. Because Texans are bold and proud people, we have big Texas-sized dreams and ambitions for ourselves and our families, and no one works harder to achieve them.
But despite the fact that Texans work harder than anywhere else in the state, that's a fact. Texans put in more hours of work than any other state in the country. Despite that fact, we have more Texans, more people making under $15 an hour than the national average. That has real consequences for the people of Texas.
Last night I was up late listening to J.P. Cindi Hinojosa. Let's give it up for and all the work she put into making this event successful. Thank you, Cindi. Really, thank you. And she was telling me that every day in court, every day in court, she hears evictions of working people, people who work sometimes two, three jobs, and still it's not enough to keep a roof over their head. That is shameful that that happens in the United States of America, but that is Greg Abbott's Texas. And despite the fact that Texans work more hours again than anywhere else in the nation, we have two times the number of uninsured than the rest of the nation. We have more uninsured workers, more uninsured children than anywhere else in this country. Again, the real effects, the impacts of that hurt Texans.
I heard the story recently of Dominga and her son. Her son who can't afford health insurance to treat his severe depression, and because he can't get the care he needs, because he can't afford health insurance, police have had to go to his home three times in the last week to respond to a crisis. Again, that is shameful. It is shameful that that happens to Dominga’s son and her family, but it is even more shameful that that happens across this state thousands of times every day.
And the most shameful part about it is that a million more Texans could be insured, but Greg Abbott refuses to pull down the federal dollars to pay for that insurance. Federal dollars that we put into the system as Texans, and you know why? Because that law was passed by a Democratic president, President Obama. We call it Obamacare. He is playing political games with the lives of Texans because he doesn't care. He doesn't care about us, and he stopped caring a long time ago.
Texas has one of the worst affordable housing prices in the whole country. Again, because Greg Abbott doesn't care and puts the priorities of corporate greed and private equity ahead of Texas working families. And while affordability contributes to our homeless problem in this state, guess what else contributes to our homeless problem? The fact that Governor Abbott contracts with private prison companies to dump ex-offenders on our streets who have no connection to our communities. That is legal trafficking of ex-offenders onto our streets, and it makes us less safe.
Now let's talk about our neighborhood public schools. Despite the fact that teachers are working more hours than ever and that you all are paying more property taxes than ever, national data shows that our kids are doing worse in important ways. And despite the fact that everybody knows that the best thing we can do for a child's education is to put a great teacher in the classroom, Texas teachers make, on average, $10,000 below the national average. That money is going to Greg Abbott's friends and vendors. You know why? Because nobody ever got rich off of paying teachers their worth.
It is time for change. Instead of a governor who punches down, I will be a governor who builds up, or I will be a governor who has your back like you have always had mine. I will be the governor who knows how hard you work and works just as hard to deliver real results for you and your family. I will be the governor who puts a million Texans on health insurance. I will be the governor who brings down the costs of medication and who bans the prior authorizations that insurance companies require so that you can get the health care you need. You know what makes people mad? It is corporate greed and profits being put ahead of the people of Texas. It has to stop now.
I will be the governor that gives our hardworking small businesses a leg up. I will be the governor who gives cash back to renters because renters pay property taxes too and deserve a break. I will be the governor that bans private equity from taking over our housing and our neighborhoods, and I will be the governor that stops the private prison companies from trafficking ex-offenders on to our streets. And I will be the governor that once and for all bans the STARR test. And we will do away with the vendor contracts and use that money to prioritize teacher pay so that our teachers are among the best paying in the nation. Because Texas needs an education governor.
And Texas needs a governor who works for you, and I will be that governor, and I will be the first governor of the state of Texas from the Rio Grande Valley. But I will be the governor for the whole state of Texas. We can do this. We do hard things. Yes, si se puede. We are Texans. We've never been afraid of a fight, but this community that raised me to know my worth also taught me that nothing comes without hard work. And oftentimes, we have to work twice as hard as everyone else, but that's okay because that's what we do when we are called. And I am calling on all of you to join this campaign and join this fight for change.
But it is not just me who is calling you, because I know that you feel with every fiber in your body that we desperately need change. We need it for our kids. Yes. We need it for ourselves. We need it for our families, for our community, and we need it for our state. You feel it. You can feel it. That feeling. I know you feel it because I feel it too. It is a feeling that sometimes people mistake for fear, but it is not fear. That feeling we have. That feeling is opportunity, anticipation, energy, and power. And we unlock that power by having the courage to join together and fight.
And the thing about courage is that it is contagious. Join with me. Take this leap of faith, and others will see your worth, see your courage. We will grow. We will build a movement. We will build a force. we will elect a governor who cares about you. We will elect a governor for the people of Texas, and we will elect a governor who fights back. No te dejes. Register, join, go to ginaforaustin.com to sign up. Be part of this movement. Thank you Blue Texas for hosting us here today. Thank you for all of you for being here. Let’s fight back! We will fight to win.
