But for Lowry, a retired social worker and special education teacher in this Central Texas city of about 100,000, all that matters is that Hinojosa wants to impose a moratorium on data center projects and Abbott doesn’t.

“He’s pushing for them. Everything’s so shady,” said Lowry, 56, who had voted for Abbott all three times.

Lowry, a conservative Christian and lifelong Republican, said she’s not switching parties. In fact, she plans to vote for Republican Attorney General Ken Paxton in his race for U.S. Senate. But her willingness to split her ticket for even one race is a sign the Texas political landscape — at least this cycle — is scrambling in unprecedented ways that could result in surprising statewide wins for the Democratic Party.

A recent Fox News poll showed Hinojosa, a lawyer and state legislator based in Austin, within a point of Abbott, a sign of weakness in a state where the GOP usually boasts a nine- to 12-point advantage. Last week, the nonpartisan Cook Political Report shifted the governor’s race from “solid” to “likely” Republican. The picture in the U.S. Senate race to replace John Cornyn is even tighter, according to Cook, which lists the contest as a “toss up” between Paxton and Democratic state Rep. James Talarico.

This wouldn’t be the first time polls have given Democrats reason to hope for an upset, only to be disappointed on Election Day. And Texas Republicans have shown a reluctance to split tickets over the past several decades. Republicans control the levers of power in Texas, and a Democrat hasn’t won statewide office since 1994. Texas last elected a Democratic governor in 1990 (Ann Richards) and a Democratic senator in 1988 (Lloyd Bentsen). But now some conservatives and right-leaning independents say they plan to vote Democratic in protest, dissatisfied with how the GOP is handling issues such as data centers, water, electricity, schools and the economy.

Even more unusual is how vocal some of these conservatives are about their dissatisfaction. They’ve adopted a slogan “Break Rank,” an indication that they are not content simply to sit out the election but want to punish their party with a vote for the opposition.

“My party has failed,” said Weeks, 66, who retired from the paper supply business to the North Texas suburb of Granbury where he’s been fighting both data centers and a bitcoin mine that arrived a few years ago, bringing round-the-clock noise.

“Nothing has been done by our party to help,” Weeks said. “Any Republican who has been in office since we started this fight, I’m not going to vote for them.”

Conservative friends accused Weeks of “making a deal with the devil,” but he’s defiant. “We’re going to vote for whoever we think understands our plight and she does,” he said of Hinojosa.

“We’re calling it ‘breaking rank’ because of the level of corruption,” in the Republican Party, she said. “We the people are breaking rank.”

Hinojosa is hopeful she can shave off enough votes among independents, rural and suburban conservatives to win. Before she spoke at the packed event near Temple, Hinojosa met with local Democrats to discuss their pitch to swing voters. A volunteer asked Hinojosa, who’s from the border city of Brownsville, how to persuade Latinos who voted for President Donald Trump to return to the Democratic Party.

“A lot of them have buyers’ remorse,” Hinojosa said, noting she’d spoken with some upset by recent fatal ICE shootings. “We can invite them back in. That creates an opportunity for us. They’re not saying ‘Yay, Democrats!’ But they are saying ‘We don’t want this.’”

In an interview afterward with The Post, Hinojosa emphasized the national implications of her race. A Democratic governor, she said, would block a Republican-controlled Texas legislature from further congressional gerrymandering in favor of the GOP.

“There can be no path to a Democratic-controlled Congress when that happens,” Hinojosa said. “Once they hold on and rig those elections, how do you get it back?”

This week, Hinojosa debuted an ad attacking Abbott on data centers.

“Our job is to raise enough money to tell people who I am and what I’m about. We don’t have to raise as much money as him, just enough to do that,” she said, noting that Republicans poured millions into Cornyn’s campaign yet he still lost his primary.

Abbott’s campaign, so far, has largely focused on Democrats broadly rather than singling out Hinojosa.

“The contrast in this election couldn’t be clearer. Democrats want higher taxes and support policies like defunding the police, abolishing prisons, and boys playing in girls’ sports. Governor Abbott is focused on the issues that matter to Texas families: slashing property taxes and lowering the costs of healthcare, insurance, electricity, housing, and education,” Eduardo Leal, press secretary for the Abbott campaign, said in a statement.

If Texas Republicans split their tickets, it’s not clear which Texas Democrats stand to benefit most. Weeks and Lowry said they won’t vote for Talarico because they consider him too liberal. Others like Glenda Berg plan to vote for Talarico and Hinojosa.

Berg, 84, a retired bookkeeper and lifelong Republican who lives near Temple in Belton and whose daughter attended the Hinojosa event, said she voted for Abbott and Trump three times but has been “appalled” by the president acting “against what democracy is based on.” In particular, she said she is opposed to the mid-decade congressional redistricting that Republicans championed at Trump’s urging.

“I’m very disappointed with the way [Abbott] follows everything Trump says and does,” she said.

Some Texas political experts question whether Hinojosa can win without Talarico prevailing at the top of the ticket.

Still, Texas is reliably Republican, and Abbott has a record of turning out the base. “Abbott going down would be an earthquake,” Jones said.

Jones predicted Abbott will hammer Hinojosa in the coming weeks with attack ads highlighting her liberal legislative record. As a state lawmaker for the past nine years, Hinojosa fought the state school voucher program, helped lead a legislative walkout in 2025 that delayed passage of a new congressional redistricting map, and voted against restricting transgender medical care for minors and limiting abortion access in the state.

“That might give pause to those voters who say they’re going to vote for Hinojosa as a protest against Abbott,” he said.

Logan Olson stopped by the Talarico-Hinojosa event in Killeen last week. A single mother and substitute teacher running a livestock business, she voted for Trump last election. Now she’s upset about data centers but encouraged by Abbott’s proposed regulations, noting “at least he acknowledged the people.”

“Our government needs to govern our economy,” said Olson, 36, railing against the culture wars. “We’re getting so lost with stuff that should be discussed behind closed doors.”

So will she vote for Hinojosa?

“I’m not sure yet.”