A Coffee Talk Without Coffee: Campaign Launch, the Border, and Why the TNM Has Not Endorsed

Daniel Miller ran this coffee talk from a dry hotel room in Decatur, fresh off a Wise County Conservatives town hall where all three of Greg Abbott’s leading primary challengers, Don Huffines, Allen West, and Chad Prather, were put on the spot with the Texas independence question on a live stream. His read of the room: voters are united in their dislike of Abbott and Dan Patrick, but most have not settled on an alternative, because the candidates sound alike on the border and property taxes. He counted it as massive progress that a sitting field of governor candidates now competes to be good on TEXIT, with Huffines noting from the stage that he has signed the petition to put it on the March ballot.

One week into his own run for Lieutenant Governor, Miller used the night to explain how he intends to campaign: no consultants, no year of brand building, no chasing a war chest against an incumbent sitting on roughly 25 million dollars. The plan is sweat equity, volunteers, and small contributions. He was blunt about why the establishment cannot stand him, forcing them into a public position on Texas and flooding their offices with constituent contacts, and he traced how the TNM went from zero legislative allies in 2009 to real friendships built on common ground.

He also drew a hard line on the endorsement question. The TNM has not backed anyone, because political independence alone is not enough. A candidate has to be sound across all three legs, political, cultural, and economic independence, and so far none of the field has said enough about Alamo and monument protection, an issue the organization has fought on for years.

Questions answered in this episode

• When cartels fire on Texas National Guard troops from across the river, what should the rules of engagement be?
• Where do the petition signature counts stand right now?
• Would property taxes be acceptable if they were explicitly tied to representation?
• Does the Texas State Guard need to be adapted for an independent Texas, and why is it the answer to the border that the National Guard cannot be?
• As an outsider, will you be an enemy of the Austin establishment, and do you have a plan to defeat the backstabbers or turn them into allies?
• Should Texas stand up a second, state-controlled border inside the national border and refuse unauthorized entry?
• If you win, will you keep doing coffee talks as Lieutenant Governor?
• What is your opinion of Biden and the proposal to have the IRS monitor any bank account with more than 10,000 dollars in annual activity?
• What would be your first big issue to tackle after TEXIT?