Waller County, near Houston, was the second fastest growing county in the U.S. Another three Texas counties were among the 10 fastest growing in U.S.

North Carolina and South Carolina have become two hot spots for growth in the United States.

Texas’ population grew at a slower pace in 2025 than in previous years, according to new federal data. Nearly 32 million people now live in the state.

Texas remains younger than other states, but the number of older Texans has outpaced that of any other age group.

An influx of highly educated people from other states helped shift the state’s economic fortune. But in many parts of Texas, residents are struggling as jobs dry up.

The U.S. Census Bureau has again pushed back the release of the 2020 census results — a delay that will almost certainly force Texas lawmakers into legislative overtime this summer to redraw the state’s political maps. Greg Abbott would need to call lawmakers back for a special legislative session in the summer. Texas would have expected to receive the second set of numbers as early as mid-February while lawmakers were in Austin for their regular legislative session. “My guess is you all will be back in a special session sometime this summer or early fall,” Potter said. The state Constitution says state House and Senate seats must be redrawn by the Legislature during the first regular legislative session after the census is published.

Credit: Eddie Gaspar/The Texas TribuneCounting for the 2020 census will continue through October, a U.S. district judge ordered late Thursday night in a decision that requires census workers to continue operations in Texas and the country past the Census Bureau’s self-imposed Monday deadline. The Census Bureau had already begun concluding its field work despite an injunction last week to continue counting past Monday. “Employees should continue to work diligently and enumerate as many people as possible,” the agency wrote to its census takers. In August, the Census Bureau abruptly announced it was shortening the census response period by a month, raising concerns in Texas, a state that has been historically undercounted in the census. As time was running out, Texas launched a $15 million ad campaign chasing an accurate census count.