Trump, tech and Texas: What's next for America?

State is key in keeping US leader's hold on power even as it pushes the tech frontier

- Bhagyashree Garekar

AUSTIN, Texas — Friends in Washington warned me that I was going to Texas at exactly the wrong time and season — that Austin was going to be uncomfortably hot and sticky. Being a transplant from Singapore, that scared me not at all. But they were right. Texas is hot all right.

It is smack-dab in the middle of a political fight, instrumental in either keeping US President Donald Trump's hold on power or weakening it midway into his term in the 2026 congressional elections. The Lone Star state's economy also runs hot; it is the fire underneath the bubbling pot of the national economy. Record numbers of businesses flock here every year, contributing to its gross domestic product of more than US$2.6 trillion (S$3.3 trillion), making it a larger economy than Canada, South Korea or Australia.

For 13 straight years, Texas has led the nation in job-creating projects. But while the numbers are impressive, they do not tell the whole story. To grasp Texas, skip the stats and simply look around Austin. The state capital has an unsettled air, like the city itself is on the move, hurrying into a future hastily imagined.

More than US$20 billion in new projects is reshaping its skyline, reinventing neighbourhoods, workspaces, shopping areas and parks. On the somewhat unkempt roads, it feels as though the future, too, is hurrying to find a foothold amid the ruins of the past.

At a traffic junction, I saw a motorist honk at a Waymo robotaxi when it waited a beat too long after the traffic light turned green. The sight is a little unsettling: There is no one behind the wheel of the medium-sized car. The traffic is heavy. The driverless car moves forward in a smooth motion, with no jerks or starts, almost like a tracking shot in a movie. A head is visible from behind, a lone passenger in the back seat. It would not be the first time that a frontier spirit is shaping the next chapter of the American story.