Experts in the News

State GOP leaders should insulate themselves and start thinking about a replacement for Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, political science fellow Mark Jones said. Paxton’s top employees recently filed a whistleblower’s complaint accusing him of bribery and abuse of office.

"(The president) is at high risk, and he is reportedly having symptoms ... (which) gives me pause as to whether he should just be monitored at home at the White House,” said Peter Hotez, fellow in disease and poverty.

“This is the calm before the storm,” said Tony Payan, director of the Center for the United States and Mexico. “The next three weeks are going to be crucial because the president is going to try to fulfill his commitment to the United States. There might be a state response, but if not, farmers are going to get pushed out, if not beaten, sent to the hospital or, God forbid, killed.”

Peter Hotez, one of Houston's experts on vaccines and a health fellow at the Baker Institute, believed President Donald Trump should be hospitalized after his positive test for Covid-19. Hotez also told ABC 13 News that "if he gets severely ill, especially a month before the election, that's a major national security issue."

“If we have a very close election, say, like we had back in 2000 where a few hundred votes in Florida was the difference between a George W. Bush or Al Gore victory, we could be in for a very long fall," political science fellow Mark Jones told KHOU News