Land commissioner race on every Texas ballot pits incumbent Dawn Buckingham against Bay City Democrat Benjamin Flores

Further down the ballot from the races for governor and U.S. Senate, Texas voters are also choosing who will run the state's oldest statewide office.

The land commissioner leads the General Land Office, an agency that predates statehood and goes back to the Republic of Texas era. It manages roughly 13 million acres the state owns, sends money earned from that land to public education, runs veterans' land programs and oversees how long-term federal disaster recovery dollars are spent after hurricanes and floods.

It is also the custodian of the Alamo, whose daily operations are run by the Alamo Trust.

The candidates

Republican Dawn Buckingham has held the job since 2023 and is the first woman to hold the office. A ninth-generation Texan and eye-focused plastic surgeon by training, she has overseen a makeover of the Alamo grounds in San Antonio costing more than half a billion dollars and has called the site her "greatest love."

Her campaign did not answer an interview request from Texas Public Radio, which reported on the race this week.

Democrat Benjamin Flores, who served on the Bay City council and is running statewide for the first time, came to the U.S. from Mexico in 1996, became a citizen and works in cybersecurity. His family lives on a small Bay City ranch, and he also runs a pig farm there, according to TPR.

Where they differ

One dividing line is Hurricane Harvey recovery money. Critics accused the land office, under former Commissioner George P. Bush, of discriminating against communities of color in handing out federal mitigation funds; the Biden administration agreed, while the Trump administration this year found Texas had not violated civil rights law. Buckingham has called those allegations politically motivated.

Flores told TPR he would try to steer the money back to Houston residents hit by the hurricane.

The other is the border. Buckingham has backed Operation Lone Star, the state's border security effort, and after the 2024 election offered President Donald Trump a 1,400-acre state property in Starr County for deportation processing and detention. Flores said immigration enforcement is not part of the land commissioner's role.

"There is no capacity in which the land commissioner in my view, and I don't think by legislature, should be trying to enforce certain laws that do not belong under the general land office," he told the station.

UT San Antonio political science chair Jon Taylor told TPR the post has often served as a stepping stone to higher office. Buckingham holds a large fundraising advantage, though TPR reports polls show a close race.

Election Day is Tuesday, Nov. 3.

Sources

texasstandard.org