Texas Governor Greg Abbott is openly rolling out the red carpet for New York's wealthiest residents, and honestly, can you blame him? New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani has turned the Big Apple into such a tax-the-rich fever dream that billionaires are practically sprinting for the state line — and Abbott is standing there with a welcome mat and zero state income tax.
You almost feel bad for New York. Almost.
Abbott's press secretary Andrew Mahaleris laid it out plain as Texas sunshine: "Governor Abbott is proud to welcome businesses and job creators from across the country to Texas, where we have no state income tax, reasonable regulations, and a pro-growth environment that encourages free enterprise to flourish." That's not a press statement — that's a recruitment pitch. And it's working.
Here's the backdrop. On April 15 — Tax Day, because these people have zero self-awareness — Mayor Mamdani dropped a viral video proposing higher taxes on non-primary residences worth $5 million or more in New York City, along with expanded tenant protections and a grab bag of other measures allegedly targeting "wealth inequality." In a city of nearly 9 million people, Mamdani decided the best use of his time was declaring war on the handful of people actually generating the tax revenue.
Citadel founder Ken Griffin, the man who dropped $238 million on a 24,000-square-foot penthouse on Central Park South, called Mamdani's little video "creepy and weird." That's a billionaire being polite. Griffin already moved Citadel's headquarters from Chicago to Miami back in 2022 — and when he left, Chicago felt it. Office space shrank. Employees relocated. Philanthropic contributions dried up. New York watched that happen in real time and said, "Hold my kombucha."
The beautiful irony? Griffin was still planning to pour $6 billion into a new Manhattan office tower. Was. Because when you tell a guy his money isn't welcome, eventually he believes you.
Speaking at the Milken Institute Global Conference on May 6, Griffin said his Florida expansion was "unquestionably" the right call. That's the sound of another state cashing the check New York ripped up.
Meanwhile, Abbott keeps stacking wins. Dell Technologies just relocated its legal home from Delaware to Texas, prompting the Governor to post on X: "Welcome home, @Dell" and "This is what happens when job creators and innovators are welcomed, not punished." He added that "more businesses are sure to follow." He's not wrong.
Mahaleris twisted the knife a little further, noting that "punitive policies that target successful job-creating entrepreneurs only accelerate the trend of companies choosing Texas." Texas has seen its economic output per person jump more than 10% between 2021 and 2024. That's not a talking point — that's a scoreboard.
So let's recap what Mamdani has accomplished as mayor: he's made a viral video that scared capital out of his own city, handed Greg Abbott the easiest recruitment pitch in American politics, and turned New York into a cautionary tale for every blue-state governor watching from the sidelines. Mamdani's playing Robin Hood. Abbott's playing chess. And the billionaires are playing moving trucks.
This is what happens every single time. Progressive politicians treat wealth like a piñata, swing as hard as they can, and then act stunned when the candy lands in another state. Texas doesn't have to do anything fancy. They just have to not be New York.
And right now, that's the lowest bar in American politics — and Abbott is still clearing it by a mile.
As reported by Fox News.
