Get to Know Your Candidate: Charles Schwertner — Texas Senate District 5
Georgetown Republican who has represented District 5 in the Texas Senate for more than a decade.
When Milam County voters look at their ballots this fall, one of the longest-serving names on it will be Charles Schwertner, the Georgetown Republican who has represented District 5 in the Texas Senate for more than a decade. District 5 covers 11 counties, including all of Milam County, and Schwertner is asking voters to send him back to Austin for another term.
Who he is
Schwertner is a sixth-generation Texan who comes from a farming and ranching family, and he still calls Georgetown home. He and his wife, Belinda, have three adult sons — Carson, Zachary and Matthew.
His path to the Capitol ran through medicine. He earned a pharmacy degree from the University of Texas at Austin and his medical degree from the University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston, then built a career as an orthopedic surgeon in Georgetown. He still practices medicine alongside his Senate duties.
Voters first sent him to Austin in 2010, when he won a seat in the Texas House. Two years later he moved up to the Senate, taking office in January 2013. In the Senate he has risen to chairman of the Business & Commerce Committee, which handles electric utilities, insurance, banking and technology, and he also sits on the Finance, State Affairs and Economic Development committees and the Legislative Budget Board.
What he stands for
Announcing his re-election campaign, Schwertner pointed to what he called "one of the most successful and conservative legislative sessions in history," saying, "I am humbled to announce my campaign for re-election."
His campaign highlights stronger border security, property-tax cuts, increased public school funding and teacher pay raises, and work to strengthen the state's electric grid. Among the bills he points to are SB 8, requiring immigration-enforcement cooperation agreements; SB 706, on Second Amendment reciprocity; and SB 617, requiring a public hearing before a city converts property to homeless housing.
Over his Senate career, he has also championed "Constitutional Carry" for handguns, E-Verify for state agencies, protections for landowners in eminent-domain cases, a larger homestead exemption, weatherization of the power grid, parental rights, and pro-life and pro-Second Amendment legislation. His campaign has announced endorsements from President Trump, Gov. Greg Abbott, Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick and Land Commissioner Dawn Buckingham.
For Milam County residents, his Business & Commerce chairmanship is one of the more direct lines to local kitchen-table issues: the committee oversees the electric utilities and insurance markets that rural Texans have watched closely since the grid failures of recent winters.
Senate District 5 voters will decide the race on the Nov. 3 general election ballot. Early voting runs Oct. 19–30.
