No state may benefit more than Texas from the social programs included in President Joe Biden’s Build Back Better agenda, an array of recent analyses show — despite the fierce opposition to the bill from the state’s Republican leadership. And over time that dynamic could make the state a crucial proving ground for one of the White House’s core political bets.
Because Texas has so many low-income families and because state policy has done so little to support them, studies show that the state will reap big benefits from the legislation’s key provisions strengthening the social safety net and investing in the education, health care and nutrition of low-income families, though most of them are temporary. …
The gusher of federal assistance that the Build Back Better legislation would channel toward Texas — assuming the bill eventually clears the Senate and these provisions survive there — will test a central component of Biden’s political strategy: the belief that delivering material benefits to economically strained families will win back voters drawn to conservative Republican messages on cultural and racial issues. CONTINUED
Ronald Brownstein, CNN
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