ANGELINA COUNTY, Texas — Republican incumbent Trent Ashby has won his fifth term in the seat for District 57 Texas House of Representatives. Ashby will once again serve Angelina, Houston, Leon, Madison, San Augustine and Trinity counties as their representative.
“It’s going to be extremely important that we have folks who represent rural Texas that will stand up and champion its causes,” Ashby said. “We need to be sure that we maximize our representation for the next ten years to ensure we have good, strong, vocal rural champions in the Texas legislature.”
Ashby described himself as a proponent of “fiscally conservative budgets, better funding for our public schools, lower taxes, private property rights, and strong rural values.”
On Oct. 29, Ashby announced along with two other Republican candidates that he would be running for Speaker of the House.
"Given the collective challenges we will face in upcoming legislative session, as we continue our battle with COVID-19 and work to balance a budget despite revenue challenges, it is critically important that the next Speaker fosters the trust and cooperation necessary to overcome these challenges and deliver the results that all Texans expect and deserve," Ashby said in an interview with The Texas Tribune.
He will be running to replace Republican House Speaker Dennis Bonnen, who will retire after serving one term due to a political scandal in 2019.
Ashby has held the office since 2013 and currently serves on the Defense & Veterans Affairs and Public Education committees. In his tenure, he has authored or joint-authored 84 bills and has twice been selected as one of five House members to negotiate the final state budget.
In 2017, Ashby spearheaded the one-time influx of $212 million into the Teacher Retirement System. He is most recently responsible for publishing a letter to Greg Abbott with nearly 90 other lawmakers asking for a statewide plan on broadband access.
Ashby says that the coronavirus pandemic “laid bare the challenges many rural Texans face in terms of connectivity.”
“There was a study done here in the deep East Texas region,” he said in an interview with Texas Standard. “The people that do have broadband in limited parts of this 12-county region, they’re paying 400% more for their Internet than many of our urban counterparts.”
Ashby said that while he will focus on helping businesses recover from the COVID-19 economic recession, he wants to expand rural healthcare.
“Through telemedicine and other advancements, there’s an opportunity there to help the folks who are blessed to call rural Texas home, in terms of increasing their access to medicine and health care," Ashby said in an interview with KBTX.
Ashby has said that his “rural roots run deep,” citing growing up on a dairy farm and his bachelor’s in agricultural economics from Texas A&M University.
Prior to being a legislator, Ashby was a member of the Lufkin ISD Board of Trustees. He is currently a member of the National Rifle Association, the Angelina Chamber of Commerce and Angelina County Economic Development Partnership.