Clint Hackney

Clinton Porter Hackney was born on 5 March 1952 in Lufkin, Texas, to Don Vernon Hackney and Mary Lynne Porter Hackney. His family said he was a fifth generation Texan and a fourth generation Lufkinite. He learned to play the guitar at 12 and was an accomplished guitarist by 14. As a boy he dreamed of being a professional baseball player or a studio musician, and later of becoming Governor of Texas or Commissioner of Major League Baseball.

Politics came early. As a student at Lufkin High School he was a member of the Young Republicans, and the first campaign he worked on was George H. W. Bush's 1970 run for the United States Senate against Lloyd Bentsen. He graduated from Lufkin High School in 1970, following his grandfather, mother and father.

Hackney attended Texas A&M University, graduating in 1974 with a bachelor's degree in political science. He was a member of Company D-2 in the Corps of Cadets, a Battalion Scholastic Officer, a member of the Ross Volunteers and the Student Senate, and took part in the Memorial Student Center's Great Issues Committee, Opera and Performing Arts Society and Political Forum. He was named a Distinguished Student in three semesters.

After military service he entered the University of Houston Law Center. In 1976 he studied comparative law at Oxford University in England, and he received his law degree from the University of Houston in 1977.

After Texas A&M, Hackney served as a first lieutenant in the United States Army. In a short military career he earned his Airborne Wings as an army paratrooper, served in the Military Police, and was posted at Fort Benning, Georgia, Fort Riley, Kansas, and Fort Gordon, Georgia, before an honourable discharge.

Once out of the Army, Hackney chased one of his childhood dreams. With his good friend Steve Waring he formed a duo that performed in Houston and College Station, singing and playing light rock guitar at venues including Steak and Ale lounges and Marky Farky's on Allen Parkway. The act lasted less than a year, but he was always proud that he had made a living wage as a musician, and he later called it "the best job I ever had." His family wrote that he probably enjoyed it more than anything else he ever did.

Hackney practised business and commercial trial law, and less than four years into his legal career he helped form the Houston law firm of Kennedy, Burleson and Hackney. Over his career he tried cases from state court in Sulphur Springs, Texas, to federal court in San Francisco.

In 1980, aged 28, he was elected to the Texas House of Representatives as a Democrat from Northwest Houston, while remaining a partner at his firm. He represented District 84 in the 67th Legislature (1981 to 1983) and District 139 in the 68th, 69th and 70th Legislatures (1983 to 1989). He chaired the House Committee on Elections and later the House Energy Committee. Among his work, he helped rewrite the Texas Election Code in 1985, led the way for the construction and management of prisons by private enterprise, played a major role in creating the Texas Department of Commerce in 1987, and helped establish the state's Rainy Day Fund. Henry Cuellar, later a U.S. congressman, served alongside him after first taking office in 1987.

In 1984, while Bush was running for re-election as vice president, Hackney filed a lawsuit challenging Bush's right to vote in Harris County, where Bush used a Houston hotel room as his home address. Hackney later said the political aim was to help Democratic vice presidential nominee Geraldine Ferraro and that colleagues in the House had pressed him to file it.

In 1988 he was the Democratic nominee for an unexpired term on the Texas Railroad Commission. Republican Kent Hance won the race statewide by 59 percent to 41 percent.

After the 1988 campaign Hackney moved to Austin and stayed in the public business. He joined the Austin law firm of Ford and Ferraro as a contract partner and gradually built a practice representing clients before the legislative and executive branches of government in Austin and Washington, D.C. In 1996 he formed his own government affairs business, which continued until 2023.

For many years he was the Texas Construction Association's lobbyist at the Texas Capitol, representing contractors and helping ensure the construction industry had a voice in the legislative process. In 2026 the association publicly thanked him for his years of service after his retirement.

His other ventures included owning a commuter bus company, serving as a director of Cornerstone Savings and Loan, and involvement with the Southwest Energy Council. He also sat on bank boards and started several small businesses.

Hackney was a political commentator on the Texas State Radio Network. He created and wrote "Tales of American Political History," a weekly radio feature of political stories from America's past that was heard on stations around the country. Original recordings made in 2014 and 2015 with Joel Block of Block House Sound were republished by the Texas Construction Association in 2024 as TCA Radio with Clint Hackney, covering topics such as the story of the national anthem, the building of the transcontinental railroad, bootlegging and wiretapping, and his own encounter with George H. W. Bush. He also wrote a novel. In 2017 he and fellow former legislator Stan Schlueter recorded an oral history interview for the Texas House of Representatives.

After graduating from Texas A&M in 1974, Hackney married his hometown sweetheart, Gail Brown. They had four children, all born in the 1980s: John, Jennifer, Laura and Caroline. The couple divorced in 1990 but continued to work well together raising their children and remained lifelong friends.

On 10 January 2002 he met Susan Longo, a Connecticut native from the high tech world. His family described their relationship as the great romance of his life, and they were married for 24 years. He also gave time and attention to two stepchildren, Alexander and Jenna Wodopian, and he was a grandfather many times over.

The night before his first wedding, at 22, he told the wedding party in Lufkin that he had five great loves: people, politics, music, baseball and Texas A&M. He said later that those passions never changed. He also enjoyed golf, hunting, cards and board games, sporting events, travel, skiing, reading, writing and teaching, and he was a Houston Astros fanatic. He went by many nicknames, including Hacksaw, Hacker and Hack Tree.

Hackney began in politics as a Young Republican and served in the Legislature as a Democrat, and he was a lifelong student of American political history. He often said that "everything changes," yet he believed his own core passions never did. His family described him as a doer who felt guilty when he was not working or producing something, and as a dreamer who preferred to aim for the unlikely rather than settle for what he had achieved. He said he was never afraid to fail and that the journey in search of a dream was always fascinating to him. Reflecting on his 1984 lawsuit against George H. W. Bush, he spoke openly about regret and humility in public life.

Hackney is remembered as a legislator who shaped Texas election law and economic development institutions in the 1980s, as a long serving government affairs lawyer at the Capitol, and as a storyteller who brought American political history to radio audiences. Colleagues on both sides of the aisle paid tribute after his death. Representative Henry Cuellar recalled serving with him in the Texas House and his years of public service, and Republican strategist Matt Mackowiak called him "a good man and a great Texan." He was buried among notable Texans at the Texas State Cemetery.

Clint Hackney died peacefully on 21 October 2026, at the age of 74, at Belmont Village Westlake Senior Living Center in the Austin area, surrounded by those he loved. He was cared for by Hospice Austin. His cause of death was not made public. Quorum Report announced his death on 22 October 2026.

A visitation was held at Cook-Walden Funeral Home in Austin on 6 November 2026, followed by a graveside service at the Texas State Cemetery, where he rests on Patriot's Hill (Section 2, Row C, Number 6). In lieu of flowers, his family suggested donations to the Center for Child Protection, Hospice Austin and Swan Songs.