Bloomberg Audio Studios, podcasts, radio news. Governor Rabbit, thanks so much for being with us.
Always a pleasure, Thank you, Julie.
The Texas Stock Exchange, what specifically do you expect it to do for this economy? It's electric, it doesn't necessarily bring a lot of jobs here, but what do you expect it to do?
Listen, For one, it is going to completely transform Dallas, Texas. Dallas, Texas is already a massive financial center, but when you put a stock exchange in there, that will make it really the financial heartbeat of the entire country. Importantly, Julie, one thing that it does is this, it's so important to all different types of businesses to have access to capital.
This will be a stock exchange that will ensure any type of business is going to have access to capital in a business friendly state like the great state of Texas.
You know, I've talked to people about the Texas Stock Exchange who say this is just a pipe dream, it's not going to happen. What do you say to them?
They simply don't know the fact.
So let's run through a couple of facts like this and that is as you know, but the others may not know Texas is the dominant economy in the United States. A lot of people are still locked in to the perception that New York is the leading economy. They have fallen behind for many years.
Now.
The economy that's moving the country is the state of Texas. For the last month and last year, Texas ranks number one for the most new jobs.
For the past twelve years.
Texas is ranked number one for the most new economic development projects where businesses are coming from other states or expanding within the state of Texas. But then look at the financial sector itself. There are more financial sector employees in Texas than there are in New York. Something that's very important to a stock exchange is rapid transactions. The thing that provides those rapid transactions are data centers.
Already, the Dallas.
Area has enough data centers to make sure that the transactions will take place at the accurate speed. However, Texas has the ease and the speed to add even more data centers than do places like New York and New Jersey. And then look at what's going on with the creation of the stock exchange. It's the best funded stock exchange to go seek permission from the SEC. Ever, and then
look at the leaders of it. Leaders of it have come from the NASDAQ, come from the New York Stock Exchange parent company, have come from businesses like Charles Schwab, and also Julie. Very importantly, the lead investors in this are all of the most significant traders of stocks and other things like that in the entire country. And so all of the elements have come together to really ensure that Texas is going to kick off the stock exchange very prolifically.
You know you talked about data centers here in Dallas. I do want to ask you this though, those take a lot of power, and there have been a lot of questions about our power grid here. Are you confident that the power grid can support data centers to support this Texas Stock Exchange.
So, Julie, let me bring you up to date.
So with what we've done, with the laws that I've signed, which is more than a dozen of them, Texas now has the stable power grid that ever since I signed those laws, no Texas has lost power because of the.
Texas power grid.
Right now, Texas provides more than one hundred thousand megawatts of power on any particular summer date.
You may not know what that means. But here's what it does mean.
Texas provides more power than New York and California combined, and so we have far more power than the study of New York As. But I signed laws that invest more and more power generation. Between now and twenty thirty, Texas is going to increase our power generation by fifty percent.
Add to that.
This component, we're providing economic incentives for dispatchable power such as natural gas fed power, and we are we are seeking to have data centers come and provide their own power source so that it will not be taking power away from homeowners or business owners.
Elon Musk, very well known Texan now has got a lot of business here. Do you expect him when he goes public to put his companies on the stock exchange?
You know?
This obviously is the kind of thing that Elin is is very interesting. He's into innovation, He's into things involving Texas. He's into uh the need for speed and recognizes that this delivers the type of less regulation, more speed uh than well than maybe some other options. And this really dovetails with the way that Elon must does business.
Have you discussed it yet with him?
Sure?
I have and and I think I think it's the kind of thing that really is up his alley.
I want to ask you a little bit about the port strike now. Are you concerned about what will happen in Houston and what plan does Texas have in place to help if this really comes to fruition for a long period of time.
Well, listen, Julie, this is a disaster. It is a disaster caused by the Biden Harris administration. They've seen this coming for months. They've had months, if not close to a year, to be able to negotiate it. And during the time when they had the ability to negotiate a solution of this, they were either on the beach or they were out fundraising, not taking care of it the
way they should. And know this, Julie, and that is when you look at the magnitude of the porch, you know, ranging from New York all the way down to the Gulf Coast, and see that the products they're going to be stuck on docks because of this, once again is going to be Biden and Harris in their neglect here.
That's going to lead to more inflation shortages in stores.
People going to be paying more for groceries more for items like clothing and things like that. Americans are already saying that the economy is the number one in the United States. They're angry at the Harris and Biden administration. This is going to stoke that anger even more and it could tilt the scales and the upcoming.
Election, even though you have an election coming up and whether who is responsible on like at this point though, what is the plan? Is there a plan in Texas to help in terms of the ports or do you believe this is just one that's up to the federal government.
Well, listen, the federal government has been in charge of this the entire time, and for obvious reasons. There's an NLRB, there's a Department of Labor, there's the negotiations that the President has already talked about that he was involved in. But the negotiations the President was involved in have been fruitless. And so this is something that will fall heavily upon the Biden and Harris administration because this doesn't involve Texas.
This involves the country and the countries leaders in charge of this, whether it be Biden, Harris, whether it be the Secretary of Commerce who says she really wasn't involved in this, whether it be the Secretary of Transportation Buddha Judge who was doing nothing but trying to prepare walls
for the debate. They have abandoned ship, abandoned their responsibility to address what's going to be a pressing issue that's going to come back to haunt them because the unlike COVID that disrupted the supply chain, this is directly caused by the Harris Biden administration.
Last question is, as you bring up the election, you have a Senate race here in Texas, one that poll show is extremely close. Are you concerned how this will be down ballot?
Listen, what we've seen is in the most recent three polls, Ted Cruz is beginning to pull away.
And there's a reason for that.
His opponent had been advertising on TV for something like five months, in advertising on TV when Ted Cruz was not Now Ted Cruz is doing advertising pointing out to Texans exactly why Ted Cruse's opponent is not a right fit for the state of Texas.
He holland All read.
Ted Quiz's opponent is against the border wall, against border security, He's in favor of men participating in women's sports. All of those things are hostile to the value sets not just of Republicans, but also of independence and even some Democrats.
Devor Rabbit, thanks so much for being with us. We appreciate your time today my pleasure.
Thank you. Take care, Julie