A recent U-Haul survey shows Texas was the top choice for Americans who moved in 2021.
HOUSTON — Gov. Greg Abbott picked up some major endorsements from housing and construction groups in Houston on Tuesday.
Eighteen statewide and Houston trade groups announced their support for Abbott during his campaign stop at Road Runner Moving & Storage in southwest Houston.
The location was no accident. The business helped highlight that Texas is a top destination nationwide for families and businesses.
A recent U-Haul survey shows Texas is the top state for folks moving from out-of-state while California is the number one state that people are leaving.
“U-Haul has run out of U-Haul moving trailers in California. They’re all going elsewhere,” Abbott said.
Tesla and Oracle are among the big-name companies that have recently moved to the Lone Star State.
“Low taxes and pro-business puts Texas as the number one in the nation for commercial real estate development, adding $65 billion to the Texas economy and 428,000 jobs,” said Krys Weyand, with the Texas Land Developers Association.
That data is from a leading commercial real estate group during COVID last year.
Abbott has long pushed Texas’ economy as a strong suit and he spun it into a pretty good joke.
“During and after COVID, Texas has grown now to the ninth-largest economy in the entire world,” Abbott said. “Larger than countries like Australia and Russia and that makes me more powerful than Putin.”
The governor, of course, was kidding and the crowd roared with laughter.
On the same day, his chief democratic challenger Beto O’Rourke hosted a campaign launch call where supporters could dial-in. He also tweeted a response to the Austin American Stateman’s article on last year’s Texas power grid crisis.