BELTON, TX — Campaigning that has been ongoing for months has officially arrived at its final weekend.
Though over half of the registered voters in Texas made their voices heard already, local candidates took to Central Texas to focus on those who haven't.
Senator John Cornyn secured an office in the Texas Senate 18 years ago and shows no interest in packing his bags just yet.
“If we want to have the Texas of our future, like we saw before this pandemic hit,” Senator John Cornyn said. “We need to make sure we have the right people in the right places to rebuild our economy and provide those opportunities for those people”
The seasoned Senator took to the pavement, making 21 stops across the Lone Star State in a last effort to remind Texans to participate in American democracy.
“If we’ve already voted, we’ve done half of our job,” Cornyn said. “The rest of the job is to get every single person out that we can influence, our friends, family, the people we go to church with, you name it! Get them to the polls on Tuesday.”
Surveys show he’s leading in the polls, but his challenger MJ Hegar believes the way he’s handled the pandemic among other things makes the opportunity to unseat him greater.
“He has made my job easy,” Hegar said. “He made it easy for me to beat him in the debate, he’s making it easy for me to make the case that he needs to go, because his policies just cause Texans to suffer unless they’re in the top 1%.”
Cornyn told 25 News that she talks a big game after being defeated once already.
If there’s one thing the two can agree on, it’s being proud of their home land.
“The more people who take part in our democracy, the more healthy that democracy is, and just the surge and turnout is so inspiring,” Hegar said. “All the grassroots enthusiasm, regular people standing up and saying enough is pretty incredible.”
Cornyn looks to serve a fourth term. If defeated, Texas would see its first democratic Senator in over 30 years.
It's something he believes won’t be the case.
“Which leaders are best prepared to rebuild our economy after this recession that we’re in, as a result of a mitigation effort caused by the lock down, and I don’t think there’s any question who that is,” Cornyn said.
