The poll, released Wednesday, also showed Sid Miller and Don Huffines with comfortable leads in their Republican primary bids for agriculture commissioner and comptroller.
U.S. Rep. Chip Roy maintains a 10-percentage point lead over state Sen. Mayes Middleton in the Republican primary for Texas attorney general while state Sen. Nathan Johnson holds a slim lead in the Democratic primary for the position, according to the latest public polling released Wednesday.
Roy leads the four-person Republican primary for attorney general, with 33% of the 550 likely Republican voters surveyed between Jan. 20-31. Middleton, R-Galveston, trails Roy with 23%, followed by state Sen. Joan Huffman, R-Houston, with 13% and Aaron Reitz, a former U.S. Department of Justice assistant attorney general, with 6%.
Roy and Middleton were the only two Republican candidates for attorney general who had more polled voters with favorable opinions of them than those who said they did not know enough about them, with 54% and 45% favorability respectively. A majority of the likely Republican primary voters surveyed said they did not know enough about Huffman and Reitz to have an opinion about them. Likely voters still unsure of which candidate to vote for in the attorney general’s race comprised 25% of those polled.
Johnson led the Democratic primary for attorney general with 25% of another 550-person pool of likely Democratic primary voters, 3 percentage points ahead of former Galveston mayor Joe Jaworski. Private attorney and former FBI agent Tony Box held 13%. A majority of those polled said they didn’t know enough about any of the candidates to have an opinion and 40% said they were unsure who they would vote for.
The poll, conducted by the University of Houston’s Hobby School of Public Affairs, has a margin of error of plus or minus 4.18%.
Former state Sen. Don Huffines also held a steady lead over the other three candidates in the Republican primary for Texas comptroller, including a 20 percentage point lead over acting Comptroller Kelly Hancock and a 12 percentage point lead over Railroad Commissioner Christi Craddick. Among likely Republican primary voters, 33% percent said they intended to vote for Huffines, but 29% were still unsure of who they would vote for.
Hancock was appointed acting comptroller in June by Gov. Greg Abbott, however 58% of those polled said they did not know enough about him to have an opinion of him.
In the Republican primary for agriculture commissioner, incumbent Sid Miller leads his challenger, agriculture entrepreneur Nate Sheets, by 30 percentage points, with 48% of likely Republican primary voters supporting Miller. Abbott endorsed Sheets on Jan 21, right at the outset of the survey’s collection. Nearly two-thirds of those polled said they did not know enough about Sheets to have an opinion about him, compared to 38% for Miller.
The polling released Wednesday showed a tight race in the five-person Republican primary for railroad commissioner between incumbent Jim Wright and Marine veteran Jim Matlock, with Wright eking out a 1 percentage point lead at 21%. Engineer and former Democrat Katherine Culbert, Tarrant County Republican Party Chair Bo French and oil and gas worker Hawk Dunlap held 8%, 6% and 4% of likely Republican voters’ support, respectively, and 41% said they were still unsure of who they would support.
State Rep. Jon Rosenthal, D-Houston, is the sole Democrat running for the open railroad commissioner seat.
Meanwhile, the Democratic primary for governor is a crowded race with eight candidates, led by state Rep. Gina Hinojosa, D-Austin, whom 37% of likely Democratic primary voters supported. Hinojosa has a 30 percentage point lead over former U.S. Rep. Chris Bell, and 32% polled said they were still unsure of which candidate they would support.
The UH poll also surveyed 1,502 likely voters in the November general election for the governor and lieutenant governor races, where Abbott and Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick are both running for fourth terms. In hypothetical matchups, the incumbents both held leads over their Democratic opponents, with Abbott leading Hinojosa by 7 percentage points at 49%, and Patrick leading state Rep. Vikki Goodwin, D-Austin, by 5 percentage points at 46%. The general election survey has a margin of error plus or minus 2.53%.
Source: Ayden Runnels,
Photo Credit: U.S. Rep. Chip Roy, who is running for Texas attorney general, answers a question from a moderator as rival Aaron Reitz listens during a Texas Republican candidate debate forum at the Civic Center in Canton, Texas, on Jan. 17, 2026. Emil T. Lippe for The Texas Tribune
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