Hinojosa Said 'Texas Is Not for Sale.' Two Days After Winning, It's 'Our Terms.'

The Tale of Two Hinojosas

Let's lay out the quotes, because the quotes are the whole story. In an October campaign press release, Hinojosa promised, "As Governor, I'll protect our land and our livelihoods – not sell out to the highest bidder – because Texans deserve a leader who puts the people first."

She also wrote that after 12 years of Abbott "selling out Texas to his corporate donors and making working people foot the bill," he was giving Texas land to a trillionaire. "Let me be clear: Texas is not for sale." She called it "the One Fight that unites us all," a contest between a Texas by and for the people and "the billionaires' world and the rest of us just live here."

That is a hell of a thing to say about a fight you apparently plan to settle over coffee. Because on Thursday, per Fox News Digital's reporting, the same woman told CNN: "We can have a strong working relationship with Elon Musk and his companies. But it has to be on our terms. It cannot be just running over the people of Texas, and that's what changes now that I will be governor."

What Exactly Is on the Table

Before we get too dramatic, look at the actual size of this thing. The land at issue is at Boca Chica State Park, a 1,000-acre coastal reserve at the southernmost tip of Texas, a short distance from SpaceX's Starbase launch site.

The history is messier than the slogan. A 2024 Cameron County Commission agenda notice floated a SpaceX proposal for a land swap: Texas would hand over 43 acres of Boca Chica in exchange for 477 acres in the surrounding area, so the company could expand its launch facilities. That's the big version.

The deal that actually moved is much smaller. In August 2025, the commission approved a proposal letting the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department sell SpaceX four noncontiguous tracts totaling about 1.9 acres. Last year, the Texas Parks and Wildlife Commission voted to approve that deal, authorizing its executive director to "dispose of four tracts totaling approximately 1.9 acres at Boca Chica State Park."

So the existential battle for the soul of Texas, the billionaires' world versus everybody else, is currently about 1.9 acres. Somewhere a real estate agent is weeping with joy.

The Politest Possible Stall

Here's the most revealing part. At her first post-election press conference, Hinojosa did not rule the project out. She said she had spoken with the Parks and Wildlife executive director "to confirm that this issue was not on today's agenda and to request that no action be taken out of respect for this transition."

Read that again. Not "I will kill this deal." Not "I will tear up the paperwork on day one." A request that nobody do anything until she's sworn in on January 19, 2027. That's not a promise to block the sale. That's a promise to be in the room when it happens.

Her transition team didn't respond to Fox News Digital's questions about whether her outlook on SpaceX had changed, or what might stop Musk from getting his 1.9 acres. When a campaign that was shouting "Texas is not for sale" goes quiet on whether Texas is, in fact, for sale, the silence is doing a lot of the talking.

Musk Takes It Personally, Naturally

Elon Musk, a man who has never once let a perceived slight go unposted, responded on X. He said SpaceX and Tesla "have prospered in Texas, because we were not constantly operating under an oppressive and extractive state government." He added that as California "became increasingly difficult, due to extreme taxes and overregulation, we moved our major domestic expansions and HQ to Texas."

Note the word "oppressive." Note the word "extractive." This is the world's richest man describing a land deal in which he is the one asking the state for land. The man wants acreage from the public and is complaining about the public's tone.

And it worked, or at least it landed in the same news cycle as Hinojosa's softer words. We can't prove cause and effect from the reporting. But the sequence is: campaign fire, election win, Musk grumbles about the business climate, governor-elect discovers the virtues of a working relationship. You don't need a conspiracy board for that. You just need a calendar.

The Fox News Framing Problem

A fair note about the source here. Fox News is clearly delighted by this story, and the package it came in is stuffed with the usual flavor: a segment about Democrats "setting their sights on Elon Musk," George P. Bush warning that partisan attacks threaten Texas's business-friendly climate, headlines about a "blue tsunami." The framing is that a Democrat got elected and is already folding.

But strip away the packaging and the underlying facts hold up on their own. She said what she said in October. She said what she said to CNN. The quotes aren't Fox's invention. They're hers.

And it's worth being honest that governing really is different from campaigning. A governor-elect of the second-biggest state in the country is not going to declare war on the state's largest employers before taking the oath. That's reality. The question is whether "our terms" means something, or whether it's the phrase politicians use when they want credit for toughness and the deal to go through anyway.