What’s on Texas voters’ minds?
This is a preview of our Texas 2036 newsletter with our guide to our latest Texas Voter Poll and what’s on Texas voters’ minds. To receive this weekly look at our work, sign up here.
TX Voter Poll 2025: What’s on Voters’ Minds?
Texans are feeling the strain of rising costs, but they’re also expressing renewed confidence in the state’s economy and their children’s future.
The 9th Texas Voter Poll highlights how voters are prioritizing both immediate relief and long-term opportunity as they look ahead to next year’s elections.
What unites Texans? Lowering prices
The Texas Voter Poll digs into how Texans across different backgrounds view today’s biggest challenges.
What’s clear? A common goal to bring down everyday costs is uniting Texans like never before.
Texans are confident in the economy,
finding good-paying jobs
A majority of Texas voters remain confident in the state’s trajectory:
- By a 3-to-1 margin (54% to 18%), voters say Texas’ economy will outperform the U.S. over the next four years.
- 44% believe Texas offers more economic and job opportunities than other states, compared to 16% who believe the state has fewer opportunities.
- Two-thirds (66%) say they are confident they could find a good‑paying job in Texas, with Republicans more confident (77%) than Democrats (52%), and men reporting greater optimism (71%) than women (61%).
Chart sources: 9th Texas Voter Poll
Due to rounding, percentages in these charts may not add up to 100%.
Voters: concerned for the future, but more expect
better opportunities for the next generation
Many Texans remain uneasy about where the state is headed. 59% of voters say they are extremely or very concerned about Texas’ future, up five points from last year.
Even so, optimism for the next generation is growing. 32% of Texans believe the next generation will have better opportunities, a six percentage point increase from last year.
- The percentage of voters who expect either the same opportunities (14%) or worse opportunities (45%) stayed unchanged from last year.
Economic pressures drive the agenda
Large majorities of voters say they are more likely to support candidates focused on improving affordability for Texans, reflecting widespread concern over rising costs across the state. We look at the top 3 concerns.
1. Texans want to see reduced health care prices
✅ 82% are more likely to back a candidate who works to reduce health care prices. This was the top issue driving voter support.
What we learned: More than a third say someone in their household skipped or delayed medical care because they did not know what it would cost, the highest level since Texas 2036 began tracking the issue in 2021.
In September 2025, women under 55 (49%) and mothers with children (50%) are far more likely to delay care than men under 55 (40%) or older adults (26–31%).
2. Texans want relief from spiraling homeowner insurance costs
✅ 79% are more likely to back a candidate who works to reduce the cost of homeowners’ insurance.
Support was highest among suburban women (85%), seniors (85%) and homeowners (83%). Renters were less moved by this issue (68%), but it still ranked in their top five cost-of-living concerns.
What’s driving their concern? Nearly four in five voters tell us the cost of property insurance has increased for them in the past five years.
3. Texans want to see their property taxes lowered
✅ 78% are more likely to back a candidate who prioritizes reducing property taxes.
Why this matters? Even after multiple legislative sessions targeting tax relief, Texans still feel the weight of property taxes.
- Among homeowners, 81% said they’d be more likely to vote for a candidate focused on reducing taxes, compared to 69% of renters.
- Higher-income households ($100K+) showed the strongest preference (85%), while support among those under $60K was still high at 73%.
That’s just a glimpse of what Texans had to say.
Beyond the top three, our Texas Voter Poll reveals even more about what drives voter decision-making. See what Texans really want from their candidates.
Accountability in education matters to Texans
Texas voters give mixed marks to Texas public schools when it comes to preparing students for future success.
- 56% of Texas voters with school-aged children gave their local public schools either an “excellent” rating (36%) or “good” (20%), compared to 23% rated as “fair” and 18% rated as “poor.”
- But voters gave their local school district a six-out-of-10 rating when it comes to ensuring graduates complete high school ready for college or prepared to enter the workforce with a good-paying job.
- 78% of Texas voters say they are more likely to support a candidate who prioritizes improving education accountability.
Switching schools? It’s not off the table for some Texas parents
✅ 37% of parents of current public school students told us they had considered sending their child to a different school or school district within the past year.
The primary reason they gave us was academics.
Texas voters say they are likely to use the new ESA program
On the question of school choice: 46% of parents of school-aged students reported that they were either “very likely” (23%) or “somewhat likely” (23%) to apply for the new Educational Savings Account program.
The intensity was higher among public school parents (25% “very likely”) than among parents whose children are not in public school (17% “very likely”).
Political tone matters: Here’s what voters say
The Texas Voter Poll offers new insight into how Texans view leadership and the tone of politics today.
Voters signal a clear preference for candidates who are willing to fight for their beliefs, but they draw the line at violence in politics.
A majority of voters, or 52%, say they are more concerned about a society where people can’t resolve their differences vs. 37% who say they are more concerned about the other side’s political beliefs prevailing.
Texans Reject Political Violence
We asked voters to describe their level of concern about political violence in the nation as a whole and in Texas. We found an electorate extremely concerned about violence at the national level.
47% said they are extremely concerned about political violence in the country; 31% were extremely concerned about political violence in Texas.
We followed up by asking if political violence is ever justified to achieve political goals. More than nine in 10 Texans told us they don’t think political violence is ever justified.
Moving Texas forward
Texans are showing us where real, practical steps can make daily life better and where leaders can earn trust by focusing on results. We’ll keep using this data to shape policy ideas that move the needle for the most people.
Thanks for staying engaged and sharing this with a neighbor who cares about Texas’ future.
Want to see more from our voter poll? Check out the full findings.
About our Texas Voter Poll
Our 9th Texas Voter Poll, conducted by Baselice & Associates, surveyed 1,001 Texans from Sept. 25 to Oct. 1, 2025, with a ± 3.1% margin of error, to gauge policy support and voter confidence.