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Taco Policy is where people, politics, and power collide — Texas style. Each week, host Kat Vargas of Howdy Politics travels to taquerías across the state to sit down with elected officials, organizers, and everyday Texans making change in their communities. Together, they dig into recent news, the fights shaping Texas — from public schools and healthcare to voting rights and government corruption — and what you can do to make a difference.
Smart, sharp, and a little spicy, Taco Policy is your seat at the table for the future of Texas.
Host: Kat Vargas (00:00.266)
HD-70 is the most competitive seat in either chamber of the state legislature.
The taco will never break your heart. You should be spending 140 days working for the people of Texas. When Collin County goes blue, I'm telling you, the rest of the state of Texas will be blue.
Host: Kat Vargas (00:22.328)
So we are here this week with my rep, Representative Mihaela Pliza in HD70 here in Plano. I am so glad to have you on.
Thank you so much. Thank you. super excited to sit down, have some tacos and talk politics.
We at Salsa Verde here in the district. Before we kind of get into everything, because I see your tacos, I was very impressed with her order, by the way. Like you were like ordering in Spanish, you knew how to say all the things, and we're willing to be like adventurous on some things. So what is your taco policy? What is your taco order and how religious are you about it?
Okay, well, I like to try new tacos. There's a sign in this restaurant that says a taco will never break your heart. And I'm strong believer in that. So I like to try new things, but I will be honest, I think my go-to taco is a good barbacoa. I, as a staffer, worked for two San Antonio reps in the legislature. So I've had good tacos before, but I'll tell you, as an immigrant kid,
My mom, she was always cooking traditional Romanian food. So we were eating like sarmale, nipite, ciorba de burta. Like we were having all the traditional Romanian stuff. So any opportunity I had to eat a taco as a kid, like your classic taco emoji, you know, was like my favorite thing, you know, as a kid, because I just, we never really ate that in my household. So.
Rep. Mihaela Plesa (01:54.95)
But yeah, today I'm having chicharrones, I'm having some pinga de pollo, and I'm having some alpasor. So I'm excited to try it out.
I love that. Well, like we are here in HD 70. For those who don't know, I didn't just ask you to come on because you're my ref, although I do love you. It is actually HD 70 is the most competitive seat in either chamber of the state legislature. And you have managed to, you flip this seat two cycles ago. You want it even more decidedly this last one.
with attacks from Abbott. One of my favorite tweets after the election was he had said, oh, that he won all his targets and he posted missed one. And I just, I love that. And it was something that I needed after the election. Like that was like, all right, like we had so many losses, but it was like, we won 70 and it was one of mine. But so what is, what is that like knowing that like you are target number one?
You are.
Well, look, I am a strong believer in competitive districts. I think that we should have more competitive districts in the House of Representatives than just say one or two. I think it makes not only the legislature better, it makes the policy that come out of the legislature, it makes it look more like the state of Texas because I'm not just talking to my primary voters. I have to talk to all my 200,000 voters.
Rep. Mihaela Plesa (03:18.414)
100,000 people that are registered in my district, I've got to talk to all of them and tell them about what my vision is for the district and how I'm being affected for them in the legislature. yeah, I think Governor Abbott and I have this kind of back and forth where we kind of campaign against each other a lot. He didn't want to talk about the fact that he was targeting our seat and that we put in the work.
and that he constantly puts in money to try to flip us. we've got people on the ground. We've got people showing them to the block locks, people coming to our town halls, new people every day that are trying to get engaged because of something that Governor Abbott has done, a policy that he's passed that hurts my district and hurts the constituents of this district. Vouchers is a big one. Not expanding SNAP benefits and EBT and access to school lunches.
for kids during summer programs, all these things have horrible implications for the constituents of HD 70. So, you know, I think a little competition is good. And I think that it makes more people wanna get engaged.
And I hope people know, this is the most competitive seat. You would expect that money would come pouring in to defend this seat, and it doesn't. The money that does come in is you hustling. So when people normally have block walks, they'll show up, they'll give a little speech, they'll take a picture, they're gonna knock a couple of doors to get more pictures to post on social, and then they're out. They're like, I want to fundraiser, I'm gonna go home. Not like you.
Like I think I would love to see like your band record because I bet you have knocked more doors probably than anyone in North Texas like just yourselves and you were out there hustling and it's not you don't wait until get out the vote. You knocked doors really early even as an incumbent you still that last cycle and when it comes to fundraising like that is again that is you hustling and putting in the work like you are always at an event. You're always doing something you know our district really well.
Host: Kat Vargas (05:22.446)
So one, again, I hope people understand that you keeping the seat is 100 % the efforts of representative pleads that to keep this seat, a fight for the seat. It was the first time we've had a Democrat in Collin County in 30 years. I think there's a blueprint for the way that you run your election for others who maybe are hurting for resources, who are the underdogs in their race, who have a much harder fight. What is your advice to other candidates who are like, I don't have the support that I need?
I know I can do this, but I don't have the support.
Yeah, well, thank you so much for all of that. I really appreciate it. And I just want to start off by saying that this district is not my district. This district belongs to the people of HD 70 and I'm just honored to be their representative in the House. And I'm going to continue working really hard to earn their trust and their vote 100%. As far as the primaries concerned, I've gone through really competitive primaries before, so I'm not scared of a primary. I'm not scared of a general. What I'm scared of is the people of Texas not having a voice and being.
bought out. mean, these districts are being bought out and $4 million in 22. We've seen millions and millions of dollars coming into these house districts. There's a reason why. And it's because the buck stops with the Texas House fighting for voting rights. The first quorum break that happened, right? It was about voting rights. That's Texas Democrats. Then again, building a bipartisan coalition to defeat Governor Avid's voucher scam two sessions ago.
That was Texas Democrats building that bipartisan foolish and putting in the work. And then most recently bringing attention to what Trump is trying to do by steal and cheating in the next elections, right? And through gerrymandering, that was Texas Democrats kind of standing up and reigniting a flame within not just the party, but with the people. And I think that's why you're seeing large turnouts for the no Kings rally and calling County and things like that. So.
Rep. Mihaela Plesa (07:17.646)
I'm really excited, but really the blueprint is knocking doors and in 22, I think I knocked over 10,000 doors personally myself that's on top, you know, on top of my campaign. when you see these races that are being won with 40, 50,000 votes, you know, to knock 10,000 personally yourself to have conversations at the door with that many people. mean, that's one in three people that met me personally. So any
negative campaigning that's, she's a socialist or a communist or a blintard or whatever. These people have met me. We had conversations about how I want to work on infrastructure development, make sure that small businesses still have the resources to succeed in this district. I think knocking doors is really important, but I also think that not being swayed by the consultants class is really important.
You know, I had a lot of people telling me what it is I should be running on, telling me what my constituents want to be here. The best poll is knocking 100 doors a day and talking, you know, on the phone with 100 of the people who are going to help donate to your campaign. Not, you know, lobbyists, but like the $5, $10, $20 donors, because those people are going to show up to your town halls, are going to show up to your block blocks, and they're going to definitely show up to the polls.
And that's, think, where we make the difference, right? So I just keep working and keep hoping that I can earn the trust of HG 17 constituents.
love that you said about the consultant class because it's such a problem. And I think, you know, when I see how like you run your campaign, even like during the legislature, you are, you listen to your constituents. Sometimes I am like hard calling your office and I will send the howdy doers, you know, out to call if there's something, but it doesn't mean that you always say, okay, I'm going to change. Cause sometimes it's, there's other louder voices in the district. Vote.
Host: Kat Vargas (09:16.94)
There's been some votes where it's been like, hey, you know what? No, my district was really loud on this. This is how I need to vote. And you do always vote in line with the district. You really keep track of the calls that come in. You really know going into session what the district wants. And so you talked about it a little bit with what's happening online is not always the reality of what's happening on the ground and not the doors. And so what are some of those issues that you see as the consultants are online? We're talking a lot about. But when you're at a door.
all.
Host: Kat Vargas (09:44.566)
It's not what people are talking about. What are some of those issues?
Well, think, you know, health care is number one top of mind, think, for most of everybody, whether you're an employer that needs to make sure that their employees are healthy, that their employees' families is healthy, right? Or you're, you know, a teacher that needs to make sure that the students are healthy in class, right? I think health care is always top of mind, but I think sometimes Democrats, we always want to only talk about one part of health care, right? And I think the conversation is much bigger than that.
I've worked on early childhood intervention programs for kids with disabilities. That's a huge issue in our district. The Medicaid waiver waiting lists for families is super long. That's something I hear about all the time when I'm knocking doors, but not so much on a mailer, right? Or on a push card. And I think that having that clear like distinction of what the topic is around healthcare, or let's say if you're talking about the economy or infrastructure development, know, knowing exactly where the
The traffic is what red light doesn't work. think that's something that makes it like more relevant to the person that's actually gonna go vote. And that's gonna make them actually come out and vote for you. That's why knocking doors is so important, right? I think that we could be stronger on talking about, you know, gun control and gun safety and common sense gun reforms, right? I'm somebody.
that represents Collin County, but I've always said that I know we can protect second graders in our classrooms and the Second Amendment and being very specific on what I want to do there, right? Safe storage laws, red flag laws, think those are really important topics that I hear about on the doors, right? But it's how we're talking about it on the internet, on social media, in our mailers and how we're messaging this. So I think that the best candidates are the ones that knock doors.
Rep. Mihaela Plesa (11:37.548)
are the ones that are willing to go into spaces that maybe Democrats don't typically go to or Republicans that are running, you I think they maybe should come out of their bubble a little bit and have more conversations with the general electorate because that's where people tend to be, right? That's when you have really great legislation coming out of the legislature, right? But lately it's just been a lot of donors coming in trying to buy these seats and moving the legislature so far to the right.
that it's become really, really hard, even when we work together and we have successes, people are against that, right? People don't want us to work together and that's really wrong. I mean, we should be spending 140 days working for the people of Texas.
talking more about gun safety and gun reform. And we hear a lot, on the first part it was, hey, maybe we're focusing on only abortion instead of wider healthcare. And I definitely hear that. But we also hear a lot here in Texas, especially that, Democrats know we shouldn't touch gun safety. That's not something we should talk about. But you were willing to, even before the shooting of the Allen Alleyball, which again, I wanna say, I'm so grateful you're my rep, because when that happened, one of the first like...
call or text that I have like from you just being like, hey, is your family? Okay, is your husband okay? Like you knew he had responded and you wanted to make sure and it wasn't what Intel can I get what information it was just like let me check in and then you did have an entire family of victims were your constituents. and you continue to say I've already said this is a problem and I think you and I have had conversations that when that happened, it was not a shocking thing for it to happen in our district.
It was very surreal when it happened, but I think when you spend so much time advocating and saying this is going to happen if we don't do something. When you don't do something, you're not surprised when it happens. You also touched on we've seen the ledge go more extreme. You know you were a stacker before you became a member and so you remember in 2021 was when we really saw the shift on guns really. Hit into overdrive where we had permitless carry that passed.
Host: Kat Vargas (13:46.03)
The previous session they had said, you know, Jeff Leach told advocates there's not an appetite for that. Don't worry about it. Oh yeah. But then all of sudden in 2021 he was like, alright, he was one of the ones leading the charge on it. Basically what I'm trying to say with all that is it that Democrats? Do we need a shift more moderate or is it no? Is it issue by issue and knowing our values and really sticking to those values? I think.
think it's knowing how to talk to people right sometimes we like to throw a lot of statistics out and kind of talk over people's head. I think that we just need to meet people where they're at most people want to feel safe in their communities, I haven't met a constituent yet that's like no. I want people to run out and shoot guns in the air during 4th of July or whatever right I never had that conversation for me personally the reason why I felt so.
confident and comfortable in having these conversations is because I've seen my friends, you know, I'm so grateful I haven't experienced gun violence in my life, but I've seen my best friend growing up, her dad took his life with a gun. I saw the El Paso shooting that was someone from Collin County that grow halfway across the state, all the way across the state because of racial rhetoric in our community, right? And so it does happen.
Some of the most recent shootings in our state have been individuals from Collin County. And so I'm very aware, it's very present to me as to, you know, what having so many guns in the hands of people that maybe shouldn't have them, what that does to our society. I see what it does to my staff, you know. They are afraid sometimes when we're in places because of the violent rhetoric that we've seen, the assassinations that have happened in our community.
But I think that that's another reason why we need to be talking about it. mean, the leading cause of deaths in children in our state is gun violence. Sometimes, you know, because we're not storing our weapons correctly, right? We're not teaching correctly. And so I'm not against guns. I'm a Texas woman. I was born and raised in this state. We've had guns in my household my entire life. come, you know, my stepfather was in the military.
Rep. Mihaela Plesa (16:05.446)
I come from a family where we were very open with firearms and we educated ourselves on firearms and I myself have a firearm. But I also believe with great response with, you great power comes great responsibility and owning a gun and a firearm is, you know, one of the biggest powers so that you can have. That's why it's an amendment in our constitution. And so I think that we should be responsible gun owners.
We're kind of talking about a lot of the county stuff and we do see that Collin County is essentially this kind of hotbed for a lot of extremism because there's been very rapid growth in Collin County in the last 20 years. It used to be like white farm town. Now we are extremely diverse. Part of how HD 70 came to be was that there was no way for them to cut up Collin County in a way to maintain all their current seats and not violate the Voting Rights Act.
because we do have huge minority populations in your district. There's a large Hispanic population, ANHPI population. Like my son's school is a majority minority school, which is very common, you know, within your district. So you're representing a lot. And so what we see is a lot of that, that pushback on the change that people are very afraid. And we're also seeing that play out nationally. And we're seeing people turn away.
from a lot of what we see happening in DC and the White House. You this week we saw the East Wing completely demolished, which was so hard. And it felt so silly to sit there and be crying over this building, knowing that like niggers were getting kidnapped by ICE and know, snap benefits are running out. But it was the same for me, like where I was so lucky in last administration to be invited to go. I know that you were able to go once as well. And it's when you're like, man, I'm just this regular person from Texas and I was invited.
to sit in the West Wing and have a meeting with some of the most important people in the country. It was the people's house. Like nothing, he simplified it being the people's house more than regular everyday people that were invited in there. Hispanic Charities Month was canceled at the White House this year. They didn't host celebration. We were there last year. And so the symbolic of it coming down was really hard to see that this is not the people's house anymore. This is him and it's being torn down so he can build this.
Host: Kat Vargas (18:29.582)
250 now $350 million, you ballroom, said, that's getting it's all these private donors that are coming through, which is real sketchy. And it's you can see it's this pipeline. But I know that your parents, you shared, you know, immigrated, they tape communist Romania. And I was reading and I sent you this week for I was like, hey, is this true? Where as that was happening, the Romanian government built up this huge palace while people were starving.
And while like economy crashed, all these things were happening and that was the focus was the palace. That's what they thought was important. And there's this week we had Donald Trump, you the press secretary say the ballroom is his priority. Yeah. Can you talk more like what does that feel like to you having grown up hearing the stories from your parents and now seeing this play out here in America?
Well, I think just my immigrant story is the foundation of everything I do in politics. It's the reason I ran for office. It's the fact that my parents came from communist Romania has always been just a foundation of all the policy priorities that I push because of the stories I grew up hearing, right? And growing up here in Plano, like I've seen this community completely, you know, expand from me being literally the only ESL kid.
in the early nineties at Brinker Elementary. And the reason I speak Spanish today is because there was no Romanian like teacher and they were like, okay, what's the closest thing? And it's like, it's a Latin language. Okay. The Spanish teacher. And so, you know, I have vivid memories, six, seven, eight year old little Mihaela in class. And that would be
I did not know that yet. That is so interesting.
Rep. Mihaela Plesa (20:15.384)
taken out and have my own little kind of like ESL class where the teachers like she's speaking to me in Spanish. I'm talking back in Romanian and we're learning English together, you know like so this community has always been a diverse community since my family decided to move here, you know in the early 90's and we just expanded that and I think that's why they had to gerrymander Collin County and they had to make kind of like a semi blue swing district.
there should be two competitive districts in Collin County, right? It shouldn't just be my district that is one of those swing seats. And I look forward to having another competitive district, right? Because like I said before, competitive districts are really important. But I think the funniest part of all of it is that Republicans love to say I'm a communist, right? Even though I'm like, have you read my bio? Like my family are literally political refugees.
because of communists, right? But I remember growing up and my mom would tell me like the Romanian government created the securitate, right? Which essentially was a police force that if you found out your neighbor was doing something that they were not supposed to be doing, getting healthcare that they weren't supposed to be getting or whatever, you would tell the securitate.
what they're doing and then they would come into your house and they would do an investigation and then they would disappear people and whatever. Right? And they were in the universities, they were in the schools, they were in your workplace, they were in the churches and the churches were basically done away with because it all, everything was about political ideology and being loyal to the Communist Party. And it was very nationalist and it was like bringing up the people, right? And that's where the People's House,
Casapoporuli came into play, right? Is that Chaushaslu went to North Korea and he saw all of the military parades and the building and he saw all this like grand pompous stuff that was happening in North Korea at the time. You have to remember it was the Cold War. So all the communist countries were working together. So it was Romania, and if we had Cuba, whatever, right? And he wanted to resemble that. And so that's how he built
Host: Kat Vargas (22:21.07)
I'm so familiar.
Rep. Mihaela Plesa (22:39.064)
has to happen, the people's house. That parliament is the heaviest building in the world. It is the largest parliament building in the world. It has such an albatross around the government of Romania because they have to maintain that building, right? Like they have to make sure that, I mean, it's crumbly. I've met with the people that basically maintain the building.
They came to the state capital, I've been to Romania, to try to figure out how they can raise money because they don't have the money to maintain such a large investment. And I mean, look, at a time when people are having their SNAP benefits cut, when our military personnel is not going to get paid, I can't even believe that we're bailing out Argentina for billions of dollars.
buying Argentine meat instead of investing in our cattle ranchers and in the agricultural environment that what is Texas has made, you I think it is shameful and I can't, I don't understand how some of my colleagues don't see the resemblance between some of their policies that they're pushing, preventing books and libraries, closing down libraries, the type of information that's being, you know, provided into.
education and into books. Those are all things that the communists were doing in Romania. All while Ceaușescu was putting, you know, gold-plated faucets and gold-plated sinks and just, you know, this gilded, you know, environment, the people were waiting in soup lines for bread and cheese. I don't know if this sounds familiar at all to anybody.
But that's why I ran for office is to prevent what my family went through in the 1950s, 60s, 70s in Romania. And now, you know, we're seeing some of those policies being enacted not only in the state of Texas, but all throughout the nation. The big bad bill gives people tax exemptions for tanning beds while we're cutting rural hospital bed funding.
Rep. Mihaela Plesa (24:53.848)
They're picking tanning beds over hospital beds. I mean, if this wasn't for the oligarchs, I don't know what is. This is exactly the kind of stuff that happens in dictator countries. So I'm really afraid. I hope to keep educating people, keep shining a light on, you know, why my family left and why we have to continue fighting because this stuff doesn't happen in a vacuum. We are essentially living in Project 2025 right now.
Yeah, and it is it's is wild to see the Republican members of the legislature and there are still some on paper moderate members that are close that they don't vote that way. But we knew it's how they used to vote that have all just completely crumbled and there was no better example of that than when redistricting redistricting came when that letter from the DOJ came down and said Trump wants five more seats. You need to find those seats for him in Texas.
At first, it no, it's not going to happen because the congressional Republicans really didn't want it. They knew it make some of their seats competitive and it would just be unpopular voters period. And then even at first in the ledge, it was not happening. I remember like texting you texting other members. Everyone's like, we don't know yet. We don't know yet. Maybe in a later session it'll happen. He didn't add it originally. And then the floods happened and the flood gave them the perfect cover.
to add it in and they coul hostage for this flood re releasing flood relief on before anything had even always had the power to do those checks july 4th. had had he even been in the sta He's always gone when the he loves to show up afterwa see, you you were on broke for him and you kn
You know, took a lot. had to really weigh your decision. I don't think people know that we didn't have the numbers to break until the moment y'all got on the plane. Yeah, it was very like touch and go. There were a lot of phone calls you and I had calls and one of the things I told you, was like, grab if you go, I thought you're back. Yeah. And you got that from a lot of people in the district. And that's why you ended up eventually. There was a lot of pressure on that. But why, you know, other than just hearing from people in the district.
Host: Kat Vargas (27:16.286)
Why was it so important for you to go and make that see it? And you ended up being like one of the loudest people once I were gone. You were like, I'll go on Fox News, I'll on anything. You were very loud about what was happening. Is that because of the parallels to what happened in Romania or was there something else going on?
I think well, thank you so much for first of all everything that you've been doing to help with the corn break and just being that source of like resources and hope and just like being someone that we could talk to candidly about that because it really was a hard decision not so much because I was like my election or you know I knew the district if I had a conversation with them and explain to them hey look this is what's happening I that's the part of leadership right like.
being able to communicate with people and saying, hey, this is why we're making this decision together. So I knew that breaking quorum was the right thing to do because we had to stand up to Trump. And I had seen other legislators that didn't do that and then what happened, right? So we knew it was an opportunity to take a stand, a really strong stand and bring national attention to this issue because that's really what it deserved. Cause it's not just about Texas and these five seats that we're going to lose, right?
This about the bigger picture that Trump is trying to do all this kind of like in the back seat of in the back room of everything, right? He brought up the Fox News. Yeah, I was really in because once I'm in, I'm in right. And I know how important it is to have those conversations with not just my constituents, but really all of Texas to let them know what's going on. And I was so we were so busy and we were traveling because we had to move hotels because of the multiple bomb threats we had.
And we literally, I was in the process of going from one hotel to the other and doing the Fox News and my phone literally ran out of battery because we were doing so much just to educate anybody that was willing to listen. This is not about red and blue. This really isn't. There are Republican lawmakers in California that filed. I copied their bill, right? And filed that amendment and presented that when we came back and said, OK, OK, guys, you want to do?
Rep. Mihaela Plesa (29:28.492)
Redistricting, let's just wait till after we get a census. So no redistricting and that's representative Kylie's bill out of California. So look, we'd have plenty of examples to show that this gerrymandering war that we have going on is not about red and blue. It's about the haves and the have nots. It's about the oligarchs and the billionaires that are trying to maintain power and the people trying to get it back. And that's why it's important for people to get involved and to understand, look,
gerrymandering hurts everybody. It's going to limit everybody's voice. It's not about, you're a person of color, you're a white person, you're a Republican, you're... This is about wallmakers sitting on their leather chairs and picking their voters. It's about them going, no, we want, we don't want Maria over here, we want John over here. Or the other way around. And that should infuriate...
everybody. Because if we had more competitive districts, if we had more districts like HC 70, where I'm I mean, I won my last election with 52 % of the vote, right? I have to be very aware of what the 48 % of my district want from me. And we have to have those conversations, right? I think that the legislature would look different, it would sound different, and more people in this state would feel represented.
And like I tell everybody, the most important word on my yard sign or whatever is that word representative, right? That means I'm doing a job for y'all. And I think a lot of people have just gotten really comfortable in their comfortable seats. And I think it hurts everybody, right? It hurts down ballot people and it hurts people that are in very safe districts because they're not doing that voter engagement to get people out.
Like you said, you have to be responsive to the district because your race is close. And so it requires you to listen. And then you've got people who I'm always going to pick on Leach, who isn't worried about a general election. And so he's like, the only people I'm going to be worried about are my big donors that come in. And I'm going to worry about the primary extremists because those are the ones I've got to win to hold my seat. And that's who he caters to.
Host: Kat Vargas (31:47.566)
He is one that people alway say if you could get rid of one person in the ledge, who would it be? And I always say it would be Jeff Leach because he has I don't think he would like getting the Mrs. Talk about what your policy. But it's that he's someone that to me like he just goes with everywhere the wind blows. We saw with permitless carry. He said, you know, well, there's no appetite for it, you know, in 2019 and then in 2021 he was like, yes, I'm doing this. And you know, even after Alan, you know, he wasn't willing to say like, hey, we've got to do something.
when I get a call from Jeff, like.
Host: Kat Vargas (32:17.422)
this happened in my district. And you know, or even to work on even legislation for the first responders like that mental health care is very expensive and the city's luckily Allen's a city that can't afford it. There are firefighters who are still today getting mental health care services from that May incident. And the city again, very fortunate like we're a fire family, very fortunate that the city said whatever it like, we've got y'all. That's because we're in a city that can.
Had this happened out in more rural area, they would have no access to that help that they need. Those families wouldn't have access. Even in Allen, the families from Allen didn't have it. It was the state didn't come and set up shop. The fire department said, you know what, we're going to open up this helpline and we're going to figure out where we can point people to for resources. And we're just going to hope. And because my husband was one of the only Spanish speakers, he was just in calls at home where someone would call and he was like, OK, they need they need help finding.
you know, a mental health care specialist or this person still missing their belongings. How did I get them that all these things that he was, you know, would navigate. And was like for a month after. So there's a lot of services that Leach could have said. Yeah, I've seen something. And he was like, even he said, I don't want to touch guns. He could have said, I want to do something about the service and the aftermath and what happens. And he just said no. So I'm always going to kick on you.
Well, I can think of worse members in the legislature than Jeff Leeds obviously.
are worse, but I look at him and I say that he's one of those ones that's real sneaky. And there's a lot that are very, very sneaky who come off very reasonable and they know how to say things in a certain way, but they vote the same way as the extremist. Now they're not Harrison who has no business in the ledge. Harrison is just there to try to get, you know, clicks on Twitter and, but I would like more people like him because that man doesn't even know how to show up for his own bill hearings.
Host: Kat Vargas (34:09.74)
What makes all yeah, if we have people like him, I'm like, man, they wouldn't pass anything. There are more of him because they don't know how to pass things versus we do have some people who are a little bit more sly and they know what they're doing more. They kind of circling back on all that topic in hand, looking at these maps, they're going through court right now. We don't know what's going to happen. I'm of the mind that they're going to go through if they do go through.
Your district actually will be impacted as part of your district falls into the current Texas 32. Yeah, which I believe it would still say in 32, but 32 is going out now. We're right now. 32 is pretty much Dallas, but now it's going to go way out of East Texas and it's going to basically flip. I think it's like a 6040 seat for us now and it'll flip to a 6040 seat for Republicans pretty much. So you're impacted that ends up impacting the down ballot when you're you know, have a race that's you won by 2 % of the vote.
where it's like, okay, because of that, well, they're probably going to be up in that part of your district a lot more. Yeah. To try to win that. has an effect. So like you said, it does affect every single Texan. Well, what do you say to Texans who are like, if this goes through, like, do we just like say, that's it? We've lost these seats, we give up? Or what is it that we can do to make this hurt and to say, we're going to take as many of these that are going to be competitive as possible?
Yeah. Well, I think that a lot of people would like for me to say, yeah, we got to like forget those and focus somewhere else. But I, I don't agree, first of all, that the maps are going to go through. We've seen this court reject some of the similar maps. They just rejected Louisiana's, think most recently. I'm not 100 percent sure that these maps are going to go through. That kind of leaves all of this in a very sticky situation. Who's going to end up drawing the maps? Are we going to go back to the?
2021 maps, are we gonna have the judges essentially draw the maps? So it's going to be interesting to see what happens, but I'm not sure that the maps are going to pass. House District 70 will be affected by it because CD32 is in parts of it does overlap. But the thing that I'm most pissed about to be honest is that it's once again the same groups of people, the same communities of people.
Rep. Mihaela Plesa (36:30.082)
that are being disenfranchised. So I'll give you a perfect example. CD32 encompasses the Douglas community, which is the first historically freed African-American community in Collin County. Currently this district is gerrymandered in with Rockwall. Okay. So they just piggybacked on the already horrible gerrymandering.
that they had already done in this part of our community, in this part of Collin County. And they know, they know that that's a historically black community. They know that. And so they're using AI technology is essentially what's happening now. And they're going in there with AI and precisely cutting out individuals. Once again, because it's the lawmakers that are choosing their voters and they don't want those people to vote or they want to
disenfranchise their vote by putting them in with communities that share no interest with them, right? mean, Rockwall County and Southwest Collin County are very different communities. So my heart just really goes out to them because that's the intent here is to make people feel like their vote doesn't matter, draw these districts so that they're very competitive, like they're competitive in certain areas and then.
dumping a bunch of money from West Texas billionaires or Jeffrey Ass or whatever oligarch that's trying to like do evil in our community, cut down our public schools or take food out of starving children's mouths. And they're doing it with AI precision technology. And it's sad, but I do believe that the people are waking up. Like I said, I don't think that this is a Republican or Democrat issue. I think this is a people's issue.
I think they're tired of it. I think they're tired of seeing the rich getting richer and then having to know their insurance policies going up or not even being able to get homeowners insurance because of where they live. Right? I think that those are the things that they're going to go to the ballot box for. And I don't know what Greg Abbott or Ted Cruz or Ken Paxton or any of these people that want to endorse against me in my race have ever done to make sure that these kids get food.
Rep. Mihaela Plesa (38:52.29)
to make sure that people have access to the ballot box or the workforce if they're disabled. mean, look, it takes to do something, right? Well, there's a lot of kids still waiting for them to do right.
It's a tragic
Host: Kat Vargas (39:05.934)
Yeah.
money that you're talking money they would have to money that's just sitting summer food programs for k sitting there when it com federal money that we as payed in and just because t Democrats. So like we're n get their own money back. kids, they can have health a thing of they cannot put politics aside and say I'm
for Texans. It is absolutely insane.
Yeah, it's obstruction politics. It's all about owning the libs, right? It's not about owning their own mistakes. At the end of day, Texas has a $330 billion budget. We have billions of dollars sitting in the rainy day fund. It is rainy. It is rainy. Kids need resources. Teachers need to figure out how their... I we have teachers in my district that are working side hustles. That should not be the case.
Right? And so that's what we should be focused on. Child care, health care. I mean, these are the bedrocks of healthy societies and that's really what started the Texas miracle. That's what businesses think they're getting when they move to Texas. But then they get here and they realize that that local school, right, is about to shut down and maybe they have to spend 20, $30,000.
Rep. Mihaela Plesa (40:36.27)
to put their kid in a private school or whatever because they don't have a local community school anymore, right? Then they get here and they realize their property taxes are much higher than they were in other states, right? And so what are we going to do? The best way to attack property tax increase is to increase the basic allotment. And that's the truth of it. And if you live in a recapture district like HD 70, you will immediately see that. And so I think that is where we really need to be strong.
not just as Democrats, as Texans, to bring it back to what made this state awesome, right? We were the friendly state. We gotta continue to be the friendly state. Backroom bills don't encourage the friendly vibe and mentality. People don't care about that. People wanna make sure that they can afford a house with a bathroom. I've all the...
or not on how many times have you been asked about a bathroom bill?
I have not been asked about a bathroom bill, I think ever. I was asked about children's sports. I think maybe less than a handful of times. So less than five times I was asked.
I do not 10,000 doors and it was less than a handful of time. So it's not an issue that most Texans are like worried about care about where all like like kids be kids, whatever.
Rep. Mihaela Plesa (41:53.718)
Most people love their sports so much they don't want government to get involved.
love people. That details Texans were about everything. Now we know that for the state house, it's very unlikely. Now I do think we can flip some seats, but it's very unlikely that we take the majority in either chamber this cycle. It's something we can kind of work towards and start building. So our statewide race has become all the more important. We did see this week I saw the UN doors, Gina and Ahosa for governor.
She is our first major candidate that's come out. I've looked at this endorsement list and it's going to be Gina. She is going to be the nominee because there's so many names, including your name, that I was like, their name would not be there if there was some other shiny object coming into this race. It's going to be Gina. We know that education is her bread and butter. That is why she got into politics. She's been one of the biggest fighters. while I don't think, you know,
There has to be something for name recognition with average Texans, but ledge nerds will all know her. She was, you know, on the committee fighting vouchers, Susan nail fighting against star test. All these things really gets it and knows how to talk in a way people can really understand. Why was it important for you? Because this was very like you endorsed her right away. So why is that so important for you? Because you don't normally do that. Yeah.
So let me just tell you something about my friend Gina, okay? This woman is a fierce fighter. She's not just a fighter. She is a fierce fighter and she is a fighter like that I really, really respect. There's a lot of fighters in the Texas Democratic Party, but the way she shows up is so pure. It's so humble.
Rep. Mihaela Plesa (43:40.782)
It reminds me a lot of like kind of the people that I they got me involved like in politics like the Ann Richards and the Barbara Jordans, right? Like the legacies that I grew up on and she isn't someone that just kind of shows up to big fights. She shows up to all the fights in 22, like literally when nobody thought I was going to win in that general election, like everybody thought.
you know, because there was so much money coming in and I was like, you know, I had an unpronounceable names what they said and no money. Gina showed up, you know, and she brought resources with her. She brought other house members that came and they showed up and they knocked doors and it wasn't like just the photo op doors, like they knocked the doors. They cleared their list out. She helped bring money into the district, right? Not just in 22, but then in 24 again.
That was on top of all the other stuff that she's done around education, around women's healthcare, around public safety, around infrastructure development. I mean, she has been at all the right places at all the hard times. Not the wrong times, but the hard times. And that's why when she called me and she's like, hey, I'm gonna run for governor. Will you endorse me? I was just like, not only will I endorse you, but you just let me know what I need to do to show up for you.
Like you showed up for me and my constituents, because I believe in her just like she believed in me. Because she's seen Governor Abbott firsthand. She has been there and watched the corruption of his administration and how they have basically just basically used Texas as a tool. He's got a hundred million dollars in his campaign war chest. How did he get that money?
And I think that Gina is gonna do a great job of articulating to the people of Texas how he has sold this state out to the biggest donors. And I'm really excited to join her on the campaign trail. I think she's gonna do a great job. And I think the people of Texas are going to, they're ready for change and that they're gonna wanna listen to what she's gonna have to say, so.
Host: Kat Vargas (45:56.566)
love that you mentioned to that Gina came and helped you in 2022 whenever you first won this seat because that's something we don't see. I won't call anyone in particular out, but with a lot of our
Call him out.
A lot of candidates, their focus is fully on their race. And there is not a lot of resource sharing down the ballot. And it frustrates the hell out of me because no one is going to go down ballot and vote for Mahala, please and HD 70 for their Texas House race and leave the top of the ballot empty. If you've convinced them to vote for a Democrat down ballot, they're going to go up up to as well.
So it's frustrating for to see like you fight for resources to see other districts that we should have flipped last cycle having to fight for resources. What do you need from statewide candidates? What you are down ballot candidates need to see more from our statewide to make sure it is a full team strategy.
What I first of all shout out to all the reps that have come out and knocked doors in HD 70. There's a long list of members down from Christian Manuel and Beaumont, John Rosenthal who's now running for railroad commissioner. Trey came and knocked so I've had a hand if I haven't said your name I'm sorry. I still love you but no a lot of members have and I encourage all members whether you're in a safe district or.
Host: Kat Vargas (47:03.296)
Trey Martinez Fisher was in.
Rep. Mihaela Plesa (47:16.366)
you know, kind of like a closer district to come in on doors and HD 70 because it will really change your perspective on how we should legislate in the house. Because I'm telling you, like there's a lot of mixed households and you might get, you know, your person might say it's the wife and you're now talking to the husband, you know, and I think those conversations are super important that everyone should have.
We get so many of those, and I get so many two words. I'm there for the kid, and they're in college, and I'm like, well, can you please make sure they've got their ballot? And I'm like, I don't
I really want to answer your question, but I have to tell you this funny story. So me and Christian were knocking on a door in the district and the husband was a huge supporter. He's like, go out, put the yard sign up. So me and Christian, we go put the sign up and everything. We finished the block and by the time we come back, the wife was coming out and pulling up the yard sign.
reverse is like my god
Yeah, and Christian was like, your district's giving me PTSD. Like, I don't know. But look, I think that what districts like my need is A, we just need people to show up in the district, help us knock doors. Districts like Collin County, we love to have Democrats here, right? Whether you're Collin Allred or James Talarico, you're going to get a welcome in Collin County. You're going to get a welcome in HD 70, right? Whether you're Joe Jaworski.
Rep. Mihaela Plesa (48:35.23)
or your all the other Beto or your any of these amazing candidates that we've had that have shown up in Collin County, people are going to show up because they're they want to hear what they have to say and they're excited because look, when Collin County goes blue, I'm telling you, the rest of the state of Texas will be blue. And so I encourage everybody to come and stop in Collin County, but also like our congressional districts, right?
A lot of these candidates, need to come, they need to have conversations. If they have the resources, invest them here. Cause I'm telling you, the Republican party of Texas is going to invest a lot of money in house district 70. It is on the top of their list. They're already giving campaign speeches and I'm a Colonel in the Democratic army. So, know, they're expecting Democrats to put up a fight in this district.
We gotta show up and put up a fight in this district. I've gone to other people's districts. I'm gonna be helping a couple of people that I think are really strong, like Gina, in this next election. But we really all need to work together. I tell everybody the bottom of the ballot is closest to your front door. But we need strong candidates at the top of the ticket too, helping us make the case, right?
Absolutely. And kind of last thing, as we're kind of rounding up, you know, we just had no Kings last weekend. Collin County had a good showing. I was in Dallas. We had several thousand people in Dallas. As I'm looking out, though, I'm like, I need you to show up. Yeah. And knock on doors and do what you can in a lecture. Yeah. One protest to protest. It's a lot of the really unglamorous action is what I said. It is that talking to your friends and family with hard conversations, it's sometimes it is
posting on social media when you're normally like, I don't share anything political. I don't want, you know, my aunt to be upset and say, no, I'm going to do that. I'm going to go knock doors. All these things that a really great example of this is we saw Caitlin Drake, who's one of my really good friends, flipped that Senate. She broke the Republican super majority in the Iowa Senate. It was a 20 point flip for Democrats. But one of the days that she was knocking door, she sent us a picture and it was almost like a hundred people.
Host: Kat Vargas (50:54.648)
that we're knocking doors that day. And that's what we need. If we flips like that, we need 100 people showing up. And it is very rare that you ever have more than a handful, a couple dozen. We've got a people doing that. And so what is your kind of take on? Yes, no Kings is great. I don't want to discount that. Having a community, people not to feel alone. Yeah, everything came out. It's all great. But where do we go from there?
I love this question because this question takes it back to my very first campaign speech back when I first put my name on the ballot in 2021. So it's almost been four years to the day that I launched my campaign for office. And I launched it basically saying this. I marched, I protested, I voted, and I still didn't feel represented, right? So we cannot end up being those people.
Right? We have to show up to the ballot box. And I just recently read a study that says that when we have big like marches like this, sometimes there's a negative effect because people, what they do is they're like, well, I showed up in March. I posted it on my social media. I got a bunch of people to see that I did this. And then like, they feel like the work is done, like Bush with the mission accomplished banner. And it's like, nah, the mission has just started. Right? And that's why I encourage any candidate.
that when you're doing an event, especially when we're getting out the vote, do it at a polling location, right? Don't hold it somewhere and then tell people to go out and vote. Hold it right next to where that polling location is and then walk and march to the ballot box because that's where the change is gonna happen. The change is at the ballot box. That's where the Republicans are the most afraid is at the ballot box. That's why they feel the need to gerrymander.
That's why they feel the need to throw people off the voter rolls. That's why they feel the need to remove us from Eric and make it harder for people to vote and not extend voter registration and mail-in ballot and all this stuff. That is why. Because they know the power of the people is stronger than the people in power. And once we recognize that and we realize how powerful our vote is, there's nothing that we can't do.
Rep. Mihaela Plesa (53:14.454)
And so that's why I just encourage people like, yeah, it was great. I loved reading the signs. But we got to take it a step further. And we really got to now be not just committed, but be consistent in that commitment to show up for the candidate of your choice, whether it's me in House District 70 or any of our Senate candidates, Gina Hinojosa running for governor.
Fantastic.
Rep. Mihaela Plesa (53:41.504)
or any of the other candidates, we've got, you know, county commissioner seat that's going to be very competitive in Collin County right now, right? Those are opportunities to really have our voice heard and really take back the power from the people that have been abusing it.
Yeah, and people want to get involved. Definitely find your local candidates. If it's not Mihaela, find your local ones. If you don't live here in HD 70, find out where you can volunteer locally to go knock on those doors.
Should be Mahala,
Host: Kat Vargas (54:09.774)
pick out one or two candidates and say even it's just five or $10 a month. If you can be a standing donor because when it's five or $10, but they know they can count on it, you can hire staff because you know that money's coming in. And right now with infrastructure building time, it's time to hire new campaign managers. It comes people. All that stuff is happening right now. I don't think people realize there is a lot of turnover in the ledge between sessions because everyone kind of figure out where to go and all those things. So do that. Become a standing donor to the Texas Democratic Party.
Yeah
Host: Kat Vargas (54:39.566)
Definitely volunteer and then if you do want to donate to a statewide candidate right now, we really gotta get Gina's numbers up, help her launch be really great. So get five or 10 there if you can. All those small ones do matter.
Yep. And our campaign and HD 70 has seen to have the largest return on investment of any democratic campaign in the state of Texas. So when you donate to our race, that money is going back into all of the races. And so I'm just really, really, really grateful for the support that we've seen. It really does matter. We don't need all the money, but we do need some of the money. And let me tell you, these Trump tariffs have not only made back to school more expensive,
have not only made Halloween more expensive, yes, but it's also made campaigns more expensive. The t-shirts we buy, the literature that we have to print, the paper, all of that stuff. It's more, Trump's tariffs are making campaigns more expensive.
I didn't think about it, like yard signs, everything. Cause yeah, that all of us come in, have some imported stuff. everything. Yeah. That is insane.
So even now that I'm about to relaunch our campaign, you know, I invite everybody to come out and get involved. But yeah, I'm getting my invoices and I'm looking, I'm going, wait a minute, I don't remember this being, and it's all more expensive. And that's because of Daddy Trump and his big bad bill.
Host: Kat Vargas (56:05.102)
tariffs, but I also saw right before I walked in that actually inflation is now back up to 3%. So with with Biden, we had been trending down. Now we are back up to where we were in January. So he's you know, he got in. It was like, oh, let me go back up. We've lost any gains that you know, we are making and it's going to continue that way. People are definitely hurting. I do want to say before we close out that we know this player on Tuesday, but then at the end of the week on the first
snap benefits will, not go out for those who depend on it. So if you can go to your local food pantry, please donate what you can. Monetary donations go the furthest. I know for our district, Minnie's food pantry is one of the best.
And North Texas Food Bank is also in our district and we are having a food drive in our office right now. And we're also going to be doing a turkey drive giveaway on November, I believe it's November 22nd. You can go to my website and get the full information if you or you know somebody that needs a Thanksgiving meal, our office is doing a Thanksgiving drive. And so come and get your turkey, get all the fixing.
And we really, really hope everybody has a really happy holidays this season.
Well, thank you so much for joining this week's episode of Taco Policy. I am definitely going be ready to hit doors with you. Come on. We're almost at that time now. Luckily, it does not look like there's going to be a primary or anything. So we'll kind of swing through that and really move on in the general. But thank you so much for your time, for the way that you fight for our district and that like this is the one office. don't have to worry about calling. If I'm calling, it's just like so I like I know officially my.
Host: Kat Vargas (57:47.22)
No, my opinions gotta be noted, because I know you're always in my stories and everything, but I appreciate it. Thank you so much.
Thank you, it's such an honor to represent you.
Thank you. If you enjoyed listening, be sure to subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. We're also on YouTube so you can watch the entire episode. Make sure you subscribe there too so you don't miss what's next. We'll be back next week. In the meantime, you can follow me on social media at at howdy politics and check out our brand new show account at at taco policy on Instagram. Remember, this is your seat at the table for the future of Texas. This is taco policy.