{"id":7751,"date":"2022-05-12T01:52:48","date_gmt":"2022-05-11T18:52:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sites.austincc.edu\/accent\/?p=7751"},"modified":"2022-05-12T01:52:48","modified_gmt":"2022-05-11T18:52:48","slug":"q-a-with-state-representative-gina-hinojosa","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sites.austincc.edu\/accent\/q-a-with-state-representative-gina-hinojosa\/","title":{"rendered":"Q & A with State Representative Gina Hinojosa"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

By Pete Ramirez<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Edited by Angelica Ruzanova and Ky Duffey<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Texas State Legislature is not currently in session but that doesn\u2019t mean State Representatives are not working. ACCENT’s Editor-in-Chief, Pete Ramirez, recently had the opportunity to chat with Texas State Representative Gina Hinojosa of District 49 which covers a large portion of central Austin.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In their conversation, they discussed a wide range of topics affecting Texans such as how families of transgender people are dealing with the increased scrutiny from the governor, climate change, abortion restriction and why young people shouldn\u2019t lose hope in democracy.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Read the entire conversation below.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This conversation has been edited for brevity and clarity.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Pete Ramirez (PR)<\/strong>: Can you tell us about yourself?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Rep. Gina Hinojosa (RGH)<\/strong>: I\u2019m in my third term at the Texas House so I\u2019m in my sixth year. I\u2019m running for reelection. I have a Republican opponent in the November election. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I was on the school board for one term before I ran for the House. I was president of the Austin ISD school board.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I ran for the school board because my son\u2019s school was going to be closed along with a bunch of other inner-city schools and I got angry and decided to run. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019m a lawyer and I represented employees in discrimination cases.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019m originally from South Texas. From the valley- Brownsville. I went to public school down there and then I came to UT in Austin and I\u2019ve been here ever since except when I went to D.C. to attend law school at George Washington National Law Center.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019m also married with two boys.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

PR<\/strong>: Can you give us a quick rundown on the Texas Legislature and your duties as a State Representative?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

RGH<\/strong>: We meet every two years here in the Capitol. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

We get paid $600 per month so it is not a salary that many people can live off of and most legislatures have other jobs to support themselves and their families. As a result, it limits who can run because most people can\u2019t take six months off every two years to come to Austin and work. I\u2019m able to because I live here.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We are required to pass a budget for the state every session. Other than that, it\u2019s just whatever is the agenda that the Speaker and Governor set. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

We file our own bills. I\u2019ve focused a lot on public education, environmental issues, renewable energy issues and efforts to combat climate change as well as reproductive health and corporate reform issues.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The thing about being in the House, is you\u2019ve got to know about everything. Every issue you can think of comes before us. I only have a staff of three and we often feel like we are just inundated with policy issues to work on. Also, a lot of the policy issues we have to work on are unfortunately made up by politicians. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Right now we\u2019ve spent a lot of time trying to protect the kids and families of kids who are transgender because the Governor has decided that Child Protective Services is going to investigate them and threaten to take them away from their families. I have constituents who are scared so they reach out to me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But there are always these emergencies that are created by our statewide politicians for political reasons and the result is that we don\u2019t get to focus on the things that really matter to Texans.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

PR<\/strong>: What is the job like in between sessions and how do you help constituents during this time?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

RGH<\/strong>: A lot of it is informal so really every legislature\u2019s job is going to look different. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

For me, with the example of the transgender kids, we\u2019ve reached out to lawyers and advocates to get resources to families, educate families about what to do if CPS shows up at their door and expose the problems that are not being dealt with.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

One of the hardest things about this issue is people are terrified to speak up and be public because they don\u2019t want to lose their kids. They are afraid.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We have a responsibility to tell their story. To fight on their behalf against this.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

PG<\/strong>: It\u2019s a midterm year. You are up for reelection along with all other State Representatives.  How important is voting to you?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

RGH<\/strong>: It really is the foundation of all of our rights, to vote, right? I mean that\u2019s how we hold the government accountable. Government has enormous influence and say over every individual’s life and if we\u2019re not a government by the people then we are living in something that is not a democracy but something that is closer to having a king or a dictator.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Voting is everything and because when more people don\u2019t vote, the government doesn\u2019t work as well as it should. Because more people don\u2019t vote we have politicians who get elected by what is just a small fraction of the population and it\u2019s typically more far-right and far-left because a lot of these races are determined in primaries that happen in March.  While we need more people voting in November, the turnout in these March primary elections is so abysmally low that it\u2019s just a small sliver of the population that is deciding who will represent us.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We\u2019re so gerrymandered where Democrats are packed into these districts, Republicans are packed into these districts that even though most people pay attention to the November races, most of it is baked in March.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now, in the race for governor, that\u2019s not the case. That\u2019s a state-wide race. Attorney General, U.S. Senators and all other statewide races are open to the entire state to vote on those.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

[Voting] is everything and we saw in the last election that lots of people who voted by mail had their ballots rejected.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u00a0And I mean, an unprecedented amount of ballots were rejected because of the new voter suppression law\/anti-voter law that was passed during the special session. The one we broke quorum to try to fight against and get Congress to pass some comprehensive voting rights protections. They didn\u2019t do it and we ended up with a bad anti-voter bill and we saw that lots of people were disenfranchised this last election as a result.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

PR<\/strong>: Why is it important for young voters to participate in elections?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

RGH<\/strong>: Well, let\u2019s talk about climate change. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Young voters are going to deal with the impacts of a warming planet far more than older people are, right? Young people are likely to be around a lot longer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The policies that we enact today are a result of who you vote for and what you tell politicians you expect from them in order to earn your vote. That\u2019s going to be affecting you for the rest of your life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Also, data shows young people are not voting their numbers and so the concerns of young people are not front and center for many politicians.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019ll give you an example: I had a bill that would\u2019ve required a polling place to be on the campus of every large university.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I couldn\u2019t even get a hearing on that bill because the committee chair didn\u2019t care. She wasn\u2019t afraid of the young people in her district.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Votes move politicians. You\u2019re supposed to be responsive to your people. If people don\u2019t vote, politicians aren\u2019t going to care what they think.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

You can have all the data in the world and it doesn\u2019t hurt but if you don\u2019t have the votes to back that up, you\u2019re not going to move policy because politicians don\u2019t do something just because it\u2019s the right thing to do. I know that\u2019s shocking but that\u2019s not what moves politicians.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

PR<\/strong>: What is your view on the abysmal voter turnout during midterm elections and primaries and what are you and the Democratic party doing to turn that around?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

RGH<\/strong>: Right now we have to find a way to tap back into people\u2019s hope for a better tomorrow. We\u2019ve all been so beat down by the pandemic by the ugliness of politics, with the insurrection and Donald Trump as president. Just the nastiness of politics. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I do worry that people won\u2019t feel the hope that we need to inspire us to go out and vote and think that we can change things. We need to figure out how to talk about policy in a way that gets people excited about what we do so that people want to engage.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If you think about climate change, for instance. There\u2019s a depressing issue for most people. It feels overwhelming and hopeless, right?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What gives me hope about that is that we spent a year doing research on climate change. What we found is that Texas really is the problem and solution when we are looking at things at a national level. We create more methane emissions and more CO2 emissions than any other state by far but we have the largest wind energy sector and we have the fastest-growing solar energy sector.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So there is all this innovation happening in Texas but we are also a big contributor to the problem. We here as Texans hold a lot of the cards to fix this problem and it is fixable. It\u2019s fixable in ways that are not so extreme.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There are things we can do that wouldn\u2019t impact our daily lives at all that would have a significant impact on global warming. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

We try to educate people. I think if we can get the information that we have out to the public they may feel like maybe it\u2019s not as hopeless as they feel it is.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

PR<\/strong>: What are your thoughts on SB-1 (Texas\u2019 new restrictive voting rights law) and do you think it has made it more challenging for Texans to vote?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

RGH<\/strong>: Yes, it has. It\u2019s also scared a lot of Texans. We talked about the vote-by-mail problem where ballots were rejected.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We also have a problem that we have lost constituents to work our polling places to be what’s called election judges because we now have criminal penalties that penalize honest mistakes and people are afraid. As a result, you might\u2019ve seen on social media places that said \u201conly Democrats can vote here\u201d or \u201conly Republicans can vote here\u201d because we didn\u2019t have enough precinct judges. They\u2019re the people who sit at the table, check your voter card and send you to the next volunteer. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Citizens make our elections work and when they are afraid to participate our elections don\u2019t work.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We saw very troubling problems and barriers during the primary elections and when you have, in November, more than twice as many people voting, it\u2019s going to be that much more impacted. We need to get everyone educated and comfortable with our new system. We\u2019re working in my office to try to explain what are the changes and what people need to know in order to feel confident about participating.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Another example is people are afraid to register voters because they\u2019re afraid they are going to do something wrong and will be charged with doing something illegal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We need people to understand you can still register voters. Those penalties aren\u2019t on the people, they are on the government.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s going to take community partners to get out the word and educate people about what the law is so they can feel comfortable about participating.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There is so much opportunity to get students at ACC engaged in policy and voting and politics. I think it\u2019s an exciting prospect.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

PR<\/strong>: There\u2019s been an obvious recent surge of right-wing policies being implemented in Texas such as the near-total abortion ban. How do you feel about this and what gives you hope about the future of Texas and the Democratic party? <\/p>\n\n\n\n

RGH<\/strong>: Well, you all. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The young people give me hope. We need you all.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Roe v. Wade was decided in 1973 by the U.S. Supreme Court.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

My whole life abortion has been legal. Y\u2019alls whole life abortion has been legal. What\u2019s it going to be like when it\u2019s not? Are y\u2019all going to allow for this to happen? <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Where you can\u2019t make these basic decisions about your body or about your family. There are no exceptions for rape or incest. There\u2019s not an exception for when a woman is pregnant with a fetus that is not viable.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Are we really now going to tell women, \u2018no, we\u2019re going to force you to go through nine months of pregnancy for a baby that will not live\u2019? That\u2019s what our law says now.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Are we really just going to take that? I think it\u2019s an extreme attack on our human rights and I can\u2019t believe that in this country, given our experience with freedom, we\u2019re going to tolerate it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

My hope is that y\u2019all rise up and organize and say absolutely not. Change who is in power to change the laws.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

All it takes is for young people to vote. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

PR<\/strong>: If ACC students want to get more involved with local government or activism, what advice would you give them?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

RGH<\/strong>: Whatever is your passion, there is a group for you to get engaged with on policy issues. Google it or call my office and we\u2019ll connect you to some group.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s about showing up. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

If you care about something, show up to those meetings. You get to know people who are making things happen and you become one of those people making things happen. At first, you may feel uncomfortable and you may not know what’s going on but eventually, you\u2019ll catch on and you can be part of the change.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

PR<\/strong>: Anything you would like to say before we wrap this up?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

RGH<\/strong>: I think it would be super cool if ACC did a town hall on voting or engaging students. Even to have members of the Texas House Delegation hear what are the issues y\u2019all care about.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s so important that we hear from you and know what are your hopes, dreams and struggles and how can we help with them.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Pete Ramirez Edited by Angelica Ruzanova and Ky Duffey The Texas State Legislature is not currently in session but that doesn\u2019t mean State Representatives are not working. ACCENT’s Editor-in-Chief, Pete Ramirez, recently had the opportunity to chat with Texas State Representative Gina Hinojosa of District 49 which covers a large portion of central Austin. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4103,"featured_media":7752,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12,1263],"tags":[1448,38,1094,98,100,1450,1451,1454,1457,1447,1458,1449,1445,1453,1446,897,1011,1195,1460,1342,1452,1444,1456,1455,864,624,1061,1459],"class_list":["post-7751","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","category-politics","tag-abortion","tag-acc","tag-accent","tag-austin","tag-austin-community-college","tag-austin-isd","tag-brownsville","tag-capitol","tag-child-protective-services","tag-climate-change","tag-cps","tag-democracy","tag-district-49","tag-george-washington-national-law-center","tag-governor","tag-midterm-elections","tag-midterms","tag-pete-ramirez","tag-roe-v-wade","tag-sb-1","tag-south-texas","tag-state-representative-gina-hinojosa","tag-texas-house","tag-texas-state-house","tag-transgender","tag-ut","tag-voting","tag-voting-rights"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.austincc.edu\/accent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7751","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.austincc.edu\/accent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.austincc.edu\/accent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.austincc.edu\/accent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4103"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.austincc.edu\/accent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7751"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sites.austincc.edu\/accent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7751\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.austincc.edu\/accent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7752"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.austincc.edu\/accent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7751"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.austincc.edu\/accent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7751"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.austincc.edu\/accent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7751"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}