On the record is brought to you by Steve and Adele Dufilho.

San Antonio is a. Fast growing, fast moving city with something new happening every day.

That's why each week we go on the record with Randy Beamer and the newsmakers who are driving this change.

Then we gather at the reporters roundtable to talk about the latest news stories with the journalist behind those stories.

Join us now as we go on the record with Randy Beamer.

Hi, everybody, and welcome back to On the Record this Week.

Thanks for watching.

I'm Randy Beamer, and this week and for the next couple of months, politics is in the news because of a number of those runoff races still between Cornyn and Paxton.

And nobody dropped out, at least as of right now as we talk.

John Taylor, professor and chair of political science and geography at UT San Antonio, thank you very much for coming in.

Pleasure.

We'll start with John Cornyn and Ken Paxton.

You know, the president was talking about endorsing one of them.

The deadline passed for them to drop out.

Didn't endorse.

Nobody dropped out.

What's going to happen in that race?

We're having a crystal ball.

Your guess is as good as mine.

We're done now.

Oh, okay.

Honestly, it looks at this point that the president may not endorse anybody because I think he likes both of them.

I think he understands that if he endorses one over the other, the other is still going to be on the ballot at this point, which means you could get 40 or 45% of the vote as a protest vote as much as anything else.

And so I think what's going to happen is it's going to go forward and it's going to become even more expensive.

It's been already the most expensive election hundred.

Million so far, the.

Most expensive in U.S.

history, not just Texas history.

It is nasty.

It is amazingly divisive.

And as a political scientist, like a journalist, it's also fun to watch.

No offense, people, but it is.

And so and with context here, if people think this is the nastiest race in Texas history.

Oh my God, how horrible.

They don't remember Jim Maddox versus Ann Richards.

Oh yes.

Yeah, I do remember that.

And that was much worse than this one, although this is pretty close to a scorcher too.

So here's what's going to happen.

We're going to see nasty commercials.

We're going to see all sorts of attacks.

We likely will not see a debate.

And I'd be amazed if we did.

We'll see whether or not the president will actually intervene or not.

I don't think he will.

He can't really at this point.

Which means that who's going to be happy and smiling like a Cheshire cat?

James Talarico.

He'll be able to watch from the sidelines for the next two plus months, while Paxton and Cornyn hammer it out.

Do you think it's partly because of money?

Because Trump, he would alienate some millionaires who could help him and whoever wins down the.

Road, big time alienation.

And that's the problem.

He's got to walk a fine, fine line here, which is why I think he's going to end up staying out of this race.

Now, I say that in 24 hours from now, he endorses somebody.

And how about, the electability issue?

You think Paxton will win?

Is that electability for him?

An issue might be an issue.

I mean, the argument was made in the Democratic primary.

Well, about about Jasmine Crockett versus James Errico.

But that said, Republican rank and file, with all due respect, don't seem to like John Cornyn.

This goes back well over a decade, decade and a half.

You had a censure vote by the state party.

You got you got booed off the stage in Houston for a state convention.

Rank and file seem to just love Ken Paxton for all of his baggage, for all of his foibles and faults.

I mean, they seem to like him.

And so what.

About that baggage?

Seriously?

You know, in the runoff and then in the general, he can just pull up Cornyn and Talarico and play those and that.

And will that be effective?

Is the question.

The answer is it won't.

With about 45% of the electorate who are very likely to vote for Paxton, irrespective of what comes out.

That said, can Talarico use those Cornyn ads and those independent ads to go after that bloc of independent voters, potential swing voters, that small percentage of Republican voters who may say, you know what, I just can't stand Ken Paxton, either not going to vote or I'll vote for Talarico as a protest vote.

Important Senate race.

But we have also, after redistricting, very important congressional races.

Do you think Republicans will gain those five seats?

They redistricted for in Texas?

I don't think they will.

In fact, we could call this a dummy mander, as in, you know, that's the term how?

As in, they hope to get five seats, they will likely pick up House district 32 in the Dallas area and and Congressional District nine in the Houston area.

They were really drawn to become Republican districts CD 15 to the south, which is currently Dela Cruz's district, which is a Republican district.

While it was drawn to be Republican, they had to draw voters out of other districts to make it slightly more Republican.

But they didn't expect Bobby Pulido to show up.

And he has very.

High recognition.

Big time name recognition.

Also doesn't help that that de la Cruz would attack Pulido and Quinceaneras.

That's become a big issue.

You look at it.

Is.

Yeah.

And so that district, to be honest, I think that's going to be a Democratic pickup, 34 with Vicente Gonzalez was drawn to be more Republican.

But Gonzalez seems right now to be able to hang on there.

And then Henry Cuellar in 28, for all of his faults, for all of his issues, for his so-called backstabbing.

President Trump with a pardon.

He's facing pretty strong opposition with Serna, who's a county judge from Webb County.

But Henry Cuellar has shown an amazing capacity to survive even strong challenges.

And honestly, I've put my money on still winning this, which means of those five districts that they try to redraw now 35 is another one.

They may or may not pick up close to the five seats 35, which is on the southeastern east side of Bexar County.

It's also includes Karnes, Guadalupe and Wilson counties.

That's drawn to be Republican and not heavily Republican.

Now, those are five that we're talking about flipping.

But what about Democrats flipping say, Tony Gonzalez seat.

That once a really open question because we have a Republican candidate.

Again, with all due respect, who has some serious baggage.

Brandon running around the arcade guy.

The arcade guy who was who was, an opponent of Tony Gonzalez, both in 24 and 26 and 24.

He almost beat Gonzalez in the runoff by roughly lost by 400 votes and, well, underfunded.

This time he's not underfunded, raised about a million and a half.

And so he lucked out in some respects with the Gonzalez scandal and became the default Republican nominee, even though he had not initially been endorsed by Trump.

Trump endorsed him after Gonzalez dropped out.

Katy Perry is now out, became the Democratic nominee, and Katie is well known in Bexar County, but not necessarily well known elsewhere.

She has a decided fundraising advantage and disadvantage at the moment.

This is a district that's a anywhere between a plus four to plus eight Republican, which means in a wave election year, if the stars align and if the Estao can get more money and organize better.

And she already I've heard or is already beginning to do that, particularly in places like Del Rio, it is possible that this could be a Democratic pickup.

Not saying it can happen, but how possibly.

Electability of a Brandon Herrera, the arcade guy he pulled out of a recent, radio show because there was this Confederate video that came out where he had spoken at a group, and it was a lot of video on him.

As a former influencer, do you think that in the general election that could also flip 2 to 4 percentage, whatever?

I think it absolutely could.

And do you think in particular, how 23 was redrawn?

The 23rd district now encompasses the Stone Oak area, Fair Oaks area, Dominion over toward the El Paso suburbs.

Now they move parts of 23 and 21 around and Bexar County.

Now, while that is a conservative area, a Republican area, traditionally it's not necessarily a strongly Republican area.

And more business, more business.

Yeah.

And until you use the so-called term suburban moms that are in play here, too.

So with the right circumstances, particularly with with opposition research, it conveniently been done by Tony Gonzalez the last two election cycles.

Padilla now can literally use his ads against him.

Well, how about wave elections?

You talk about that.

Yeah.

And electability or popularity, the governor's race, everybody assumes Greg Abbott will will coast.

Right.

You think that is even a possibility at this point?

The default position is, is that until you prove otherwise, Republicans are going to win the governorship.

With all due respect to Democrats watching Taylor out there, you say that.

But the last three election cycles, Democrats have lost literally by a 6040 margin to Abbott.

That said, this election cycle, the governor's going into the race with about a 35 to 36% approval rating at best.

Normal politics would tell you if a governor has a 36% approval rating, he's in trouble.

But the the thing that offsets that at the moment is his money advantage.

He's got almost a 100 to 1 money advantage over Gina.

And also, who's not necessarily well known from the Austin area as a state rep.

Does she have a puncher's chance?

Absolutely.

In fact, polling suggests a lot of polling suggests she's anywhere between dead, even to maybe 3 or 4 points behind which in a wave election, again, with the stars aligning, with with everything just in the right place, right time.

Is it possible?

Sure.

Is it likely?

No.

Do you see a wave election?

We're months out, and anything could happen until then or before then.

A wave election nationally, I think, is absolutely going to happen.

The question is how big the wave will be.

Normally in a midterm election for the incumbent party in power in the white House, you will lose a substantial number of seats, on average, about 25 to 30 U.S.

House seats.

We saw in 1994 a loss of 71 we saw in 2006, a loss of like 56, 58.

And so it is quite possible you could see that take place given the president's approval numbers, given the economy, given the war in Iran, given issues related to immigration and all those concerns that are in play here, it is quite possible Democrats are much more energized than Republicans.

If that Safe act passes in Congress about voting and restrictions, is that likely to help Republicans as much as they're hoping.

They're hoping it'll help them?

The ironic thing is, based on some of the stuff that's out there, in terms of the main points of the Save America Act, it could actually impact Republicans.

Far worse, particularly in swing states.

Are red states, even in places like like, you know, red Texas, where people don't have a passport, people don't have a real ID, women who are who don't have a marriage license that actually has their name.

On it, voting by mail, is that going to be as big an issue as.

Trump thinks?

It's a huge issue.

The irony is, he claims that no country in the world does it.

There's about 45 countries in the world that do mail in voting, and it's been relatively successful.

State of Oregon was the first to do it in the 1980s, and they did full elections that way.

It's been successful.

We see very, very little voter fraud in this country.

It is an issue in search of a solution, in search of an issue.

Well, thank you very much.

There's a lot of things we could talk about and and will down the road.

Thank you very much.

A man who knows everything about politics in Texas and beyond.

John Taylor, PhD, professor and chair of political science and geography at UT San Antonio.

Thanks.

Pleasure.

The issue of stray animals and dog bites has been in the news in the last couple three years in San Antonio especially.

But it's a problem that goes back literally decades here to talk about the latest on that, how the city is dealing with it is the assistant director of animal Care Services, Doctor Antonio Caldwell.

Thank you very much for coming in.

Hi.

You are new to the job here in San Antonio.

But you worked in this for years.

Down in Brownsville.

You came from, where are we in San Antonio in this problem right now that we've been dealing with, as I said in the news, dog bites especially, first of all.

Yeah.

Thank you, number one, for for having me.

I'm very excited to be here.

And just to talk about the challenges that occurs here in San Antonio.

What I will say is that, our organization, serving community of 1.5 million, is, is very much like many organizations that, strive for public safety as well as, saving lives.

And it's a difficult thing to balance.

I will tell you that our save rate for this year, it's hovering right below 90%, which is something that is, is a difficult thing to achieve when you're bringing in almost 30 to 32,000 animals, annually.

Another save rate is the live release.

The life.

Release rate.

Yes, I apologize, we call it the save rate and Browns.

I'm still transitioning to the lingo here, but it's the life release rate.

Essentially.

Absolutely.

And where is that compared to, say, decades ago?

And even in Brownsville, where they have a big problem as well.

Yes.

The border city definitely has its own set of challenges that are very unique to the region.

I will tell you, when I first took the helm in Brownsville Animal Services, we had a save rate of about 24%.

When I left in November, we were just about 75 to 76%.

And so, that was a two year period where we had those, unique growth and, and huge opportunities for growth and in life saving rates.

What I say here in Brownsville, in, San Antonio, is that I have been told that at one point, we were in the low 20s as well, in terms of life release rate.

And again, over the years, collectively, our community and organization received funding and resources, to improve that, that life saving rate.

And a big part of that was spay and neuter over the decades.

And I guess the pandemic that kind of slowed down.

Where are we now in the spay and neuter in terms of numbers or rates?

We are in a very good spot.

Our organization helped, spay and neuter over 40,000 animals, last year alone, the implementation of two clinics that, serve the east and west side of our, city.

Our, our community can go and get their animals fixed at no cost at all.

And not very many municipal organizations can offer that type of service.

So I think that our community is very, very fortunate to have that, we wish that more people would take advantage of it.

We are working on a campaign to create the education and the awareness of that facility and what our community has, to, to take advantage of.

And so, that should be rolling out in the next few months or so.

How about dog?

Dog mauling, dog attacks, dog bites.

We had a couple of fatal, dog attacks a couple of years ago.

Really focused on this issue.

There's been some changes in the department since then to deal with that.

More people investigating, more citations, that kind of thing.

Absolutely.

For the animal, services, the component that investigates those cruelty as well as those dangerous animals that staffing, was almost, doubled, if not tripled, within the past few years, unfortunately, there was, a fatality that, occurred that sparked that change.

And I really, my heart goes out to, to the family that that occurred to, but it was definitely a moment that that change the, ability to provide service and animal services forever.

And so very thankful for our community and our city leadership to recognize the need and provide those resources so that we can, again, can maintain public safety as our top priority.

Always.

And we used to talk about stray animals, packs of, dogs and things like that.

But now th you look at it as loose animals that people own a lot of these animals, but they just don't take care of them.

They don't keep them enclosed.

Is that the biggest problem?

Now.

We do have a lot of instances where animals are roaming free of restraint.

Most animals that are lose their homes are within just a few blocks of where we find them.

We are pushing, greatly for our community to take advantage of our low cost or free microchips.

Those are the best way for us to to get the animals back home where they need to be cared for.

We also are definitely, making sure that we hold our community accountable.

If you're animals forming, roaming free of restraint, we will, cite you.

We are trying to also take an educational approach as well, to make sure that people are aware of our city ordinance.

And those that they definitely, need to make sure that they're always upholding, but again, that number one, goal is to make sure that our public feels safe.

I hear stories sometimes that, you know, people are not able to walk in their neighborhoods because they're the neighborhood animals are kind of roaming free.

And we want to make sure that our community feels safe, in their homes, in their neighborhoods.

When you take in a stray animal, microchip or not.

So the microchip, you can automatically find the, the owner on that.

But how many are microchip these days that you that you catch?

Yeah.

I don't have exact numbers in terms of the percentage, that come through our shelter that are not microchip, but, it's significant.

Otherwise, we would be able to get those animals back home and our shelter would not be at capacity as it is on a daily basis.

You know, you talked about spay and neuter.

We definitely understand that we're not going to be able to adopt and foster our way out of the problem of, of the stray animal population.

And so, again, that focus has got to be on, accessible, low cost and affordable spay and neuter, in order to get out of the the hole that we're in.

What about the citations?

And, punishments, that kind of thing?

More severe for attacks, bites, things like that.

Are we seeing that?

We are seeing a, a decrease, this month of of citations.

Now, that doesn't necessarily that our officers are not doing their jobs.

What more predict is.

Yes.

What we predict is that people actually are coming more into compliance.

And we've seen before, and so the necessity to, to cite, it's still there.

But we are seeing an increase in, compliance.

But again, it could be, seasonal.

It could be something that we see an uptick in.

But I will tell you, for, for last month, our citations were down.

Just a small percentage.

What's the biggest challenge for the department?

For you?

For me, it's definitely an educational aspect.

And I was very happy to hear that your own, organization is looking at some education.

Yes.

Carla is going to be running tips for tails.

Throughout the day and for, I don't know, during our kids programing on PBS kids.

So.

And that's local.

So we want to get the awareness out for kids because they're the ones who are going to be important in this over the next few years.

They are all right.

And I love that.

I am a new grandfather.

And so my my thoughts are definitely, you know, on children right now.

But, I definitely want to to commend you on that.

But we do agree education, are the cornerstones of resolving the issue and being just very intentional and having a sustainable, plan for the future so that, the next generation, again, continues to feel safe in our beautiful and vibrant city here in San Antonio.

Well, thank you very much, doctor Antonio Caldwell, assistant Director, Animal Care Services, thanks for coming in.

And thanks for the plug for, the color and program.

Absolutely.

Thank you for having me.

On reporters roundtable, we got a look inside the newest Toyota plant down on the south side.

Just manufacturing axles, half billion dollar, roughly.

Plant man.

Who brought you that inside?

Report is Jasper Kenzo, son.

Dean, business reporter of the San Antonio Report.

Thank you very much for coming in.

A lot of people don't know about this newest plant, yet, but this is a huge deal because they're going to manufacture axles not just for the Toyota vehicles produced here, but all over.

Yeah, yeah.

This new rear axle plant will, manufacture just that 500,000 rear axles a year.

Once it really gets going, for Toyota's plant here in San Antonio, but also two other truck plants in Mexico.

And it's just, 500,000, you know, axles.

But, how many jobs are starting to hire?

Where are they in the process now of opening this plant?

Yeah.

So this plant kind of got off the ground in 2024.

That's when Toyota secured tax incentives, launched its plan for for building a new plant here.

They're planning to open in a couple of months, and then they'll ramp up production, through the end of the year and really hit that, full time, full steam ahead, point sometime in 2027, they're hiring 411 new workers.

And that's a mix of, workers for their old plant because they're bringing some workers sort of across the way to this new facility, and then brand new people that, will never have worked for Toyota before.

And this is, one of those things that the, economic development people in San Antonio been pushing for and pushing for, but Toyota as well, how much more expansion out there are?

They could they do because they have a lot of land.

Yeah.

And that's a rare thing, particularly in urban areas.

This is one of the only Toyota facilities in the US that's actually in a large urban area.

So they have a lot of flexibility and availability to expand.

How much they will is a better question for Toyota.

But I will add, because of the land out there, you're not just seeing Toyota expand, you're seeing some of its suppliers continue to come to the area.

That was a big deal when Toyota launched this facility way back in 2006.

And you're continuing to see it.

Sanko, a Japanese plastics manufacturer that works with Toyota, broke ground earlier this year in the area, and you're seeing other manufacturers continue to come to the south side because there's so much available land there, and they're getting so much more high tech now.

Years ago, I went to Huntsville plant in Indiana plant before they built this one.

This one, it seemed.

I mean, the regular plant, if you call it that, seems very high tech, robotic, but you say even more so at this new axle plant.

I wouldn't, I wouldn't know if it's more so, per se, but it was fascinating touring the plant and seeing these giant robotic welding arms whirring through the motions.

Getting ready to, to produce full time.

I mean, it is dozens of machines, and robots and then workers to man all of those.

So it is very impressive.

It's very technological.

And it's just fascinating to see humans do this kind of thing.

And Toyota, what was built on the south side back then in the middle of nowhere.

But as a business for 40, you've seen a whole lot grow.

How much more growth have we seen, over the past few years?

And will we see because of this new plant?

Yeah.

Well, a lot of those make headlines.

You have JCB, which is continuing to build out in the area I mentioned.

Sonko.

There's been a big push, both from local business development groups and political leaders to capitalize on the South Side manufacturing hub.

That's growing.

There's the proximity in New Mexico, which is very inviting for businesses.

And again, land is cheap.

You don't find a lot of places close to population centers where there's available land.

And now they, even though there are business here, have been for a while.

They did get some tax breaks for this.

In 2024, Toyota got roughly 30 million in tax incentives from Bexar County and the city of San Antonio.

That's an estimate.

We'll sort of see how that plays out and how property values play out in the future.

So it's impossible to know exactly how much those incentives are worth.

But that was key in getting Toyota to to expand its footprint in San Antonio.

Another story you wrote recently that, kind of ties into this, I guess, is the mayor's new Economic Security Advisory Group, focusing on high tech and military.

Is that aimed at getting more of that kind of work here?

Yeah, absolutely.

I went to that press conference.

You had groups like greater sat there, folks who were really focused on business development.

I think this new Isa, as the mayor's calling it, will focus on policies that help local, tech companies and manufacturers and research groups that are already in San Antonio.

But they'll also play a role in trying to bring new ones to the city.

Right after the mayor announced that she also noted that she's taking a, business development trip to Taiwan, to try to bring more manufacturers here.

And members of this new Isa were a part of that.

So you'll you'll think you'll see, I think kind of a dual focus where members of this new advisory body are advising for the groups that already exist here and for the companies that already have roots in San Antonio, and also helping with the companies that might be interested in setting up shop here.

All right.

Well, thank you very much for coming in.

Jasper Kenzo, son in business reporter for the San Antonio Report.

Appreciate your time.

Thanks so much for having me, Randy, and thank you for joining us for this edition of On the Record.

You can watch this show again.

You can watch any previous shows.

You can also download it as a podcast.

Just go to klrn.org.

I'm Randy Palmer and we'll see you next.

On the record is brought to you by Steve and Adele Dufilho.