140 days decide everything. Decide them.
Every two years, the Texas Legislature rewrites the rules for entire industries in a single session — and the winners are decided long before the vote. Brannan Capitol Partners was built by Ryan Brannan, a former state agency chief, governor's advisor, and the 2025 Top Hired Gun Lobbyist of the Year, for one purpose: making sure that when Texas writes the rules, our clients are holding the pen.
We've been the decision-makers.
Most lobby shops sell access. Ryan Brannan was the person being lobbied — a commissioner who ran a Texas regulatory agency of 600 people after advising a governor on the policy fights his clients now face. The team behind him adds a commissioner-turned-advocate and a Fortune 500 government affairs attorney. When you have made the decisions, you know exactly what moves them.
Regulators, not just relationships
The firm's leadership has run a Texas state agency, served as a commissioner, and sat inside corporate government affairs. We know which arguments actually move an agency, because we have been the ones deciding.
Principal-led, every engagement
The person you hire is the person in the hearing room. Ryan leads every engagement personally — no account executives, no hand-offs — with senior team members brought in where their background moves your specific issue.
Legal depth in-house
Two licensed attorneys on the team — one a practicing Texas lawyer and counsel to a Dallas firm, one a political and campaign finance attorney. Bill drafting, compliance, and ethics questions get answered internally rather than billed out.
A direct line, all session
During session Ryan is in the building, not behind a scheduler. Clients call, text, and email him directly — and get answers while there is still time to act on them. When something moves at 10 p.m., you hear about it that night, not in next week's newsletter.
Coverage without gaps
Bill tracks tailored to each client, targeted alerts as issues move, ethics filings, board-ready reporting, and written end-of-session reports — a communication system refined over multiple sessions, run so nothing lands in your inbox late.
Clients who stay
Coastal insurance, port and coastal governance, law enforcement, healthcare policy — many of the firm's client relationships span three or more sessions, with contracts renewed on the record. Retention in this business is the only performance review that matters.
Two decades in the arena. Results on the record.
Ryan has spent more than twenty years in and around Texas government — governor's advisor, agency head, advocate — and the team brings a half-century of combined government and advocacy experience. The firm has worked every legislative session since 2019, regular and specially called alike, thirteen in all. What follows is a sample of outcomes, every one verifiable in the public record. Client identities stay confidential as a professional courtesy; the results speak without them.
Seven healthcare bills carried to the governor's desk in one session
Representing a statewide policy organization, the firm supported a coordinated healthcare agenda — led by landmark price transparency and direct-pay protections — and saw seven priority bills signed into law in a single session.
Six-bill child protection and public integrity package enacted
For a national philanthropy's Texas agenda, the firm supported a slate of child protection, obscenity-law, and government transparency measures. Six became law, most taking effect September 1.
The session's marquee bail-reform package delivered
Representing both a statewide criminal justice association and a major law enforcement association, the firm worked the session's highest-profile public safety agenda — SB 9 bail reform, the constitutional bail amendments sent to voters, community-supervision improvements, and the TDCJ sunset bill — with five client-priority measures signed into law.
A permanent Gulf Coast protection fund created
For a coastal public entity, the firm helped establish a dedicated Gulf Coast protection account administered by the General Land Office — signed with immediate effect, putting permanent structure behind coastal protection funding.
Port priority legislation signed — and the budget worked all session
Representing one of Texas's deep-water ports, the firm carried the port's priority bill through both chambers to signature, alongside session-long appropriations and budget-conferee work on its funding agenda.
Costly permitting mandates kept off the books
Representing a Texas aggregates producer, the firm opposed permitting legislation that would have rewritten operating requirements for the industry. None of it reached the governor's desk — the status quo the client needed, preserved.
Windstorm funding reform advanced; a harmful measure defeated
Across eight windstorm and insurance measures in House Insurance and Senate Business & Commerce, the firm advanced funding-structure reforms for coastal policyholders — and the one measure the client coalition opposed as harmful never became law.
A live threat to employer benefit programs, answered in hours
When legislation threatening employer injury-benefit programs moved unexpectedly, the firm briefed the client coalition's national task force the same day, coordinated allied lobbyists, and took the fight directly to legislative leadership offices. The programs stand today.
A coastal entity's governing authority kept intact
Two measures would have restructured a coastal entity's governance and operating authority. The firm opposed both and supported legislation strengthening the client's position. Neither threat became law.
An island city's full legislative slate delivered
Representing a Texas coastal city, the firm secured the city's slate of priorities — beach patrol funding, tourism measures, and more — an outcome city leadership publicly called a home run. The firm then worked all three called sessions that followed.
Direct access to physical therapy — a decades-long goal, won
Texas law required a physician referral before patients could see a licensed physical therapist. Representing the profession's statewide association, the firm carried the direct-access legislation into law — a change the profession had pursued for decades, achieved in the firm's first session on the issue.
Post-Harvey windstorm rate hikes held off the coast
After Hurricane Harvey, TWIA's member insurers moved to raise windstorm rates on coastal Texans. The client coalition's legislative effort reformed TWIA's funding structure — and coastal policyholders were protected from the increase.
Dedicated coastal erosion funding created where none existed
Texas had no dedicated mechanism to fund coastal erosion response. Legislation dedicating a share of hotel occupancy tax revenue in coastal counties to the erosion response account was signed into law — permanent funding, built from scratch.
You will never wonder what's happening in Austin.
Roughly 12,000 bills are filed every session. A handful of them can change your business. The firm's job is making sure you know which ones, before it matters — and that nothing catches you flat-footed.
- Bill tracks built around youEvery filed bill is reviewed against your interests, distilled into a curated watch list, and refined with you through the filing deadline and beyond — so you see the dozen bills that matter, not the noise.
- Real-time intelligenceTargeted alerts the moment your issues move, and a direct line to Ryan — call, text, or email, any hour of session. Committee developments reach you while there is still time to act.
- Board-ready reportingWritten end-of-session reports, passed-bill breakdowns, and priority-watch summaries clients present to their own boards and leadership — clear enough to forward without a cover memo.
Four ways the firm goes to work.
Legislative advocacy
Bill drafting, committee strategy, witness preparation, floor management, and coalition-building through the full arc of a session — regular and called.
Regulatory & agency affairs
Rulemaking, agency engagement, and procurement navigation, informed by first-hand experience running a state regulatory agency and serving as a commissioner.
Appropriations & funding
Riders, dedicated accounts, grant support, and budget strategy for entities whose priorities depend on state and federal dollars.
Strategic counsel
Session forecasting, political risk assessment, compliance and ethics guidance, and legislative reporting built for boards and leadership teams.
The partners behind the name.
Every engagement is led personally by Ryan Brannan. Behind him: a commissioner-turned-advocate, a Fortune 500 government affairs attorney, and the coordinator who keeps every client a step ahead of the building.
Ryan Brannan
Founder & PrincipalFormer Texas Commissioner of Workers' Compensation — an agency of 600+ employees and a $100M+ biennial budget. Three-time gubernatorial appointee under Governors Perry and Abbott. Practicing attorney, counsel to Glast, Phillips & Murray, and author of the Texas Bar Journal's insurance-law legislative recap across four consecutive sessions.
Beth Harkins
VP, Government AffairsState commissioner with more than a decade inside regulatory agencies and a national insurance policy network spanning a dozen capitols. Engaged on agency, rulemaking, and multistate matters — the phase where most of a client's real exposure lives.
Christine Archibald
CFO & Senior Advisor, Government AffairsAttorney and MBA who directed Fortune 500 government affairs across the western United States and practiced campaign finance law. Runs the firm's operations and compliance — and brings advocacy chops most firms' back offices can't touch.
Adrienne Dans
Executive & Legislative Affairs CoordinatorAdrienne runs the firm's legislative tracking, Texas Ethics Commission filings, and session reporting across the full client roster — producing the passed-bill breakdowns and priority-watch reports clients take straight to their own boards. She came to the firm from a Capitol office, and she is the reason nothing reaches a client late.
What clients, peers, and the Capitol press say.
“We hit a home run.”
FORMER MAYOR OF A TEXAS COASTAL CITY, ON THE FIRM'S SESSION“Ryan is a rock star.”
BILL MINICK · PARTNERSOURCE“The intelligence, authenticity, and generosity that define Texas's most respected professionals.”
US LEGE · 2025 BEST IN GOVERNMENT AFFAIRS AWARDS“Ryan Brannan has had a Texas sized impact.”
BOB WILSON · WORKERSCOMPENSATION.COM“This will be very helpful in discussions with my leadership — you have been extremely helpful.”
RISK EXECUTIVE · NATIONAL EMPLOYER CLIENT“Thank you for the update and for being so responsive!”
DEPUTY DIRECTOR · TEXAS PUBLIC-SECTOR CLIENTSessions are won before they start.
The 90th Legislature convenes in January 2027. Interim charges are being written now, relationships are being built now, and the clients who fare best in eighteen months are the ones already in the room. Start the conversation.
Austin, Texas 78701