Lead Stories

Report: Texas public schools have largest non-Covid enrollment drop in recorded history

Total public school enrollment in Texas dropped by over 76,000 students, according to a Texas 2036 report released on Monday morning. The 2025-26 school year is only the second time public school education has dropped in recorded Texas history, dating back to the 1987-88 school year. The other recorded drop happened in the 2020-21 school year, during the height of the COVID-19 shutdowns. The enrollment drop is happening across the state, with only the Abilene area seeing an increase in enrollment, and only certain areas in central and east Texas holding steady. The biggest drops are taking place in south and west Texas, with the Midland, Amarillo, Edinburg and San Angelo regions all losing at least 2.5% of their student population.

“(The decline is) spread out across all types of students, it’s spread out across all areas of the state,” Mary Lynn Pruneda, the Director of Education and Workforce Policy for Texas 2036, said. “So that makes it really hard to point to one particular thing and say, “Yes, this is definitely the reason that there are fewer kids in public schools today.'” Schools are also disproportionately losing Hispanic and White students. While the overall public school population dropped 1.4%, the Hispanic population dropped by 2.1% and the White population dropped by 1.9%. Overall, Hispanic students made up 81% of the loss enrollment loss. The data also shows declines in traditionally underserved communities — with homeless students dropping by 8% and economically-disadvantaged students dropping by 2.3%. The drop is also primarily hitting the start of the education funnel — 60% of the lost students were in elementary school, “a shortfall that will move though middle and high school pipelines within the decade.”

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Ken Paxton ignored dozens of WinRed complaints while suing ActBlue

Texas retiree Charlene Allmon thought she was making a handful of modest, one-time donations to GOP candidates who flooded her email inbox. But the payments never stopped. Throughout 2024 and 2025, Republican fundraising platform WinRed drafted more than $15,000 from Allmon’s bank account. In a single day, it charged her 29 times. Panicked, she turned to Attorney General Ken Paxton for help. "Didn’t realize they were sucking my life savings out of my bank account," Allmon, an 87-year-old living outside Austin, wrote in a complaint to his office on Feb. 26. She never heard back. Allmon is among dozens of political donors who begged Paxton's office in recent years for recourse against WinRed and its Democratic competitor ActBlue, complaining of thousands of dollars in unauthorized charges and nonstop text messages requesting more money, according to public records obtained by Hearst Newspapers.

Paxton hasn't publicly taken action on their concerns. He uses WinRed to fundraise for his bid against U.S. Sen. John Cornyn — and deploys the same aggressive tactics flagged by some of the complainants. Neither Paxton’s Senate campaign nor the office of the attorney general responded to Hearst’s request for comment. Last month, the Republican attorney general sued ActBlue, but the lawsuit did not address what was outlined in the consumer complaints. Instead, he accused the platform of failing to properly block foreign and anonymous donations. “Fair elections are the foundation of our democracy, and I will work to ensure no illegal campaign donation flies under the radar,” he said when announcing the suit. Democrats have accused Paxton of suing ActBlue for political gain while giving a pass to the platform that helps his party. Candidates across the country use WinRed and ActBlue to process campaign contributions from online donors. The platforms are central to Texas’ U.S. Senate race, with Paxton, Cornyn and Democrat James Talarico relying on them to raise hundreds of thousands of dollars.

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‘Malaise’: Karl Rove warns the GOP’s House majority may be doomed despite gerrymander advantage

Fox News’ Karl Rove warned that the country’s malaise may doom the GOP’s House majority during a Sunday evening chat with Trey Gowdy. After criticizing both parties for pushing aside “the business of the people” to carve up states’ congressional district maps ahead of November’s midterm elections and arguing that while “this is not a new phenomenon,” it’s also not “a particularly helpful phenomenon,” Rove was asked about the underlying politics. “All right, Mr. Rove, there were more Democrats in Congress before Jim Clyburn’s seat was drawn. I actually worked for the federal judge that was on that three-judge panel,” mused Gowdy. “Is there a chance these new maps win the battle but lose the war? I mean, if you get too cute by half, is there a chance that it could backfire?”

“Oh, sure. You could in essence take, you know, like here in Texas, take big cities, which are typically Democrat, and split them up among several sort of suburban and rural Republicans and thereby reduce their margin and make them more vulnerable in an election year. Same thing could happen in the South, where you take these large, Blacks-dominated cities like New Orleans, or rural areas like in South Carolina that are dominated by Blacks, and who are traditionally Democrat voters, and split them up into several different Republican districts and make things more problematic in a swing year. You know, nothing ever plays out exactly in politics as we think it does,” replied Rove, who continued: "And take a look at this, think about this for just a minute. The Democrats think they’re gonna pick up between four and five seats in California and one in Utah, so they’re going to have five-to-six seat pickup because of redistricting. Republicans think in Texas, three-to-five, one in Missouri, one or two in Ohio, one in Louisiana if they go through with the redistricting there, and get rid of this abysmal district that runs from Shreveport to Baton Rouge, and looks like two birds drawing in every Black area they can in the state in order to create a district. Alabama, maybe one district if they get it done. Tennessee, as you talked about, maybe one. South Carolina, maybe, but I think it’s very difficult to do. But that means even if the Republicans pull it off, that means between eight-to-twelve offset by five-to-six. So the Republicans may pick up a net of three, or maybe of six. Now, maybe that’s enough to control the House, but maybe not, because that’d be a very small number of seats that would be lost otherwise. And with the president’s approval rating where it is, and with the normal malaise that we have, it’s hard to believe that the Republican losses are only going to be five or six seats."

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Senate Republicans weigh whether to swallow Trump’s $1B push for ballroom security

Key Senate Republicans are signaling a willingness to support up to $1 billion in security upgrades for President Donald Trump’s ballroom renovation project, despite Democratic attacks, as the White House ramps up its lobbying push. But the vote could put some of the Senate’s moderates in a politically difficult position, especially after the president said his ballroom would be funded through private donations. “Obviously, there have been three or four attempts on the president’s life, and that’s extremely serious, and we’re in a heightened era of political violence, but the ballroom itself should be paid for by private donations, as the president had indicated,” Maine GOP Sen. Susan Collins said, adding she wanted clarity on what precisely the money would be going toward.

But Senate Majority Leader John Thune projected confidence Monday that congressional Republicans will back the $1 billion in funding, arguing that the money will be focused on other Secret Service projects beyond the ballroom itself. “It’s to secure the building — and not just the ballroom. I think the entire East Wing, which is something the Secret Service is tasked with protecting when the president is using it,” Thune told reporters. “It’s pretty clear it’s a tool to keep the president safe.” The White House will ratchet up its push for the funding Tuesday with the US Secret Service director expected to join lawmakers at the Senate GOP lunch. The issue is becoming the latest political flashpoint that Republicans must navigate as they attempt to get funding for federal immigration enforcement across the finish line on a party-line vote in Congress. The push for as much as $1 billion in ballroom security funding – as part of a broader package that will include the immigration enforcement funding – was announced as lawmakers were away from Washington on a pre-scheduled recess and took some Republicans by surprise.

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State Stories

Netflix sued by Texas for allegedly spying on children, addicting users

Netflix was sued on Monday by Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, who accused the streaming company of spying on children and other consumers by collecting their data without consent, and designing its platform to be addictive. Texas said Netflix has for years falsely represented to consumers that it did not collect or share user data, when it actually tracked viewing habits and preferences and sold the data to commercial data brokers and advertising technology companies, making billions of dollars a year. The complaint quoted former Netflix Chief Executive Reed Hastings as saying in 2020 "we don't collect anything," as he sought to distinguish Netflix from Amazon.com, Facebook, Google with regard to data collection. "When you watch Netflix, Netflix watches you," according to the complaint filed in a state court in Collin County, near Dallas. Netflix did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

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Barrientes Vela and Reyna bring different backgrounds to HD125 Dem Runoff Election

The two runoff candidates for the Democratic nomination for Texas House District 125 presented two very different views on public service and how they can help the residents of their Bexar County area. Speaking on TPR’s "The Source" on Monday Adrian Reyna leaned into his experience as a teacher in the San Antonio Independent School District while Michelle Barrientes Vela pointed to her tenure in law enforcement as evidence of her commitment to public service. Reyna said he is grounded in traditional Democratic values which include public education and working class issues. “ “It’s pretty clear right now which party is speaking to the people that I serve in schools and I also work alongside. So, I want to make sure that we have somebody up in Austin who's fighting for the policies that are going to reflect and strengthen the communities that we come from,” Reyna said.

Barrientes Vela said her time as an elected Bexar County constable has prepared her to be a state representative for HD 125. “I believe my experience is very important, my law enforcement background, as well as being an elected official as a constable,” she said. However, Barrientes Vela’s time as the Precinct 2 Constable was unintentionally cut short. In September 2019 she announced her candidacy for Bexar County Sheriff. That announcement triggered the Texas Constitution’s resign-to-run rule because she still had more than 13 months left in her constable term in office. Barrientes Vela sued Bexar County to prevent her being replaced as a constable, but that suit was unsuccessful. Barrientes Vela said her many controversies in office were the result of county politics. “I was targeted and eventually there was a crime created and made up by some elected officials here in this county,” she said. On Jan. 23, 2020, Barrientes Vela was arrested and charged with aggravated perjury, two counts of tampering with evidence, and three counts of official oppression. A Bexar County jury convicted her on two felony counts of tampering with records related to Rodriguez Park security-payment logs. She was sentenced to five years’ probation. However, on Oct. 3, 2024: The Eighth Court of Appeals overturned the convictions and rendered a judgment of acquittal.

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750,000 flights: American Airlines gears up for record-shattering summer operation

The summer travel season is fast approaching, and Fort Worth-based American Airlines says it will fly more customers than any previous one before. The airline, which operates its central hub at DFW International Airport, said it will transport 75 million travelers across 750,000 flights between May 21 and Sept. 8, breaking a previous record it set in 2019. That means five flights and 500 customers will be departing every minute, American said. American’s summer travel period begins Memorial Day weekend, when it expects more than 4.2 million customers across more than 40,000 flights scheduled from May 21 through May 26. The busiest day of travel for that weekend will be Friday, May 22, according to American.

In a letter to employees, which was shared with The Dallas Morning News, American’s Chief Operating Officer David Seymour touted some of the airline’s recent operations initiatives he said are paying off as it ramps up for a busy summer. Since American adjusted its bank structure at DFW Airport, on-time arrivals have increased by nearly 10 percentage points and on-time departures are up by nearly 2 percentage points. Missed connections at DFW are down by 44%, according to Seymour. He added that a similar scheduling adjustment at the airline’s Philadelphia International Airport hub has also led to an increase in on-time arrivals and departures. This summer, American is also focused on its “Flagship reliability,” Seymour said, referring to its most premium business product onboard the airline’s widebody aircraft, like the 787-9 Dreamliner, and its new Airbus A321 XLRs. He emphasized the importance of the product for the airline’s customer experience and revenue performance.

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Voter says cease-and-desist letter won’t silence her criticism of Kendall County Judge candidate’s past

A Kendall County woman, who created a meme calling one of the candidates in the county judge runoff a “wifebeater” and “child support dodger,” said she will not be intimidated by a cease-and-desist letter sent by the candidate’s attorney. Challenger Ricky Gleason’s past has become a flashpoint in the bruising May 26 Republican runoff against incumbent Kendall County Judge Shane Stolarczyk. Toni Lott created the meme this spring after court records circulated in the community described Gleason’s 2006 arrest for misdemeanor family violence in Bexar County and a five-figure child support judgment issued against him by a district judge in the Texas Panhandle several years ago.

Lott said she altered a political ad for Gleason by changing the information contained in its bullet points and adding the name of a made up political action committee: Citizens Against Grifters. Lott messaged the meme to three people, who shared it with other people before it eventually made its way to Gleason. In late March, Lott and one of the original recipients of the meme received cease-and-desist letters from an attorney representing Gleason. The letter accuses Lott and the meme recipients of defaming Gleason and publishing materially false information about a public figure. “It was pretty obvious to me that he was trying to intimidate me,” said Lott, who claims she never posted the meme publicly. The author of the cease-and-desist letter, attorney Dennis Postiglione, told KSAT Investigates in a phone interview that publication is defined as anything communicated to a third party. The letter formally demands that Lott and the other resident retract, correct and clarify the graphic. “It feels like power and control versus what he’s running on, which is character and being open and honest, transparent,” said Lott.

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‘The tech market is the story’: Economist says tech layoffs continue to weigh on Austin housing

Tech layoffs continue to weigh on the Austin housing market as prices dropped to their lowest March level since 2021. Across the first quarter, prices are down 3.4% to a median sales price of $415,300, according to the Austin Board of Realtors.

Texas housing economist Amy Nixon said tech layoffs have an outsized impact on cities like Austin where a disproportionate number of workers are employed by tech. So far in 2026, tech companies have laid off nearly 103,000 workers, according to layoffs.fyi. As a result, there are fewer people with good incomes who are able to purchase homes as they come onto the market. "I think that part of the reason is property taxes; they’re obviously high in Texas. When your median home price is $200,000 or $300,000, like it was in the major metros for most of the 2010s, that’s not so much of a burden. But when you get to this price point where suddenly median homes are more like $500,000, that starts to be a little bit more of a factor. When the overall tax burden starts to increase, specifically when you’re looking at that property tax component, it starts to offset the no income tax or some of the other tax benefits that you get from living in the state," Nixon said.

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New book peers into the abyss that is Alex Jones and Infowars

Years ago, when I was still at the Chronicle news desk, I got a phone call from Mike Hanson, who at the time was Alex Jones’ main “producer,” sidekick, and chief personal promoter. I’m not sure of the year, but it was before the 2012 Sandy Hook school massacre. At the time, the Jones bullhorn was devoted primarily to proclaiming “9/11 was an inside job.” Hanson wasn’t calling about that; this was sort of a chest-beating marketing call. Jones was about to launch a weekly newspaper in Austin, and Hanson wanted to let me know that Infowars was coming specifically for the Chronicle. “You’ll be out of business in six months,” Hanson warned me. Indeed, over the next few weeks, vending boxes with the new publication appeared around Downtown. They disappeared just about as quickly.

My amateur Google searches now fail to provide evidence that Jones’ newsweekly ever existed. Meanwhile, the Chronicle – like every print publication, somewhat diminished by something called the “World Wide Web” – soldiers on. Hanson no longer works for Jones, and in his new book – The Madness of Believing: A Memoir From Inside Alex Jones’s Conspiracy Machine – former Infowars video editor and field producer Josh Owens suggests the two men are semi-estranged. Nevertheless, Hanson apparently still devotes time and energy to documenting his Jones-related history. Somebody has to do it, I guess. In a much better world, Jones’ entire history would instead disappear into oblivion. At the moment, he’s in the news again, for a couple of headline reasons. Like a handful of other right-wing grifters (Tucker Carlson, Candace Owens [no relation to Josh], Marjorie Taylor Greene), he’s suddenly lost his enthusiasm for Donald Trump (primarily over the war on Iran), and Trump has responded nastily in kind. More importantly, it appears that a modicum of justice has finally arrived for the Newtown, Connecticut families that Jones viciously vilified and harassed in the aftermath of their children’s murders at the Sandy Hook elementary school. The families eventually sued, and Jones repeatedly lost in court, but Jones’ lawyers managed to win endless delays.

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Dallas Morning News Editorial: 'Reformers' ousted Michael Morris. But they have no vision to replace him

A lawsuit, accusations, political scheming and a dubious ouster: Here’s a lesson in how not to run a regional planning agency that funnels billions of dollars into transportation projects throughout North Texas. Late last month, the North Central Texas Council of Governments terminated its long-time transportation director, Michael Morris. More specifically, Executive Director Todd Little sent him packing. After that, the Regional Transportation Council joined Denton County in a lawsuit against the COG and its executive board. Then, a judge temporarily blocked Morris’ termination. He has been reinstated, at least for now. The heart of the issue is who has the authority to fire Morris. With us so far?

Our newsroom covered these events in depth. Near as we can tell, Morris’ detractors ousted him for political reasons, removing one of the most consequential figures in shaping North Texas. There are many potential problems here. The first is that those who pushed Morris out have articulated no clear vision for who could replace him or his experience. That is no easy question. Whatever one thinks of Morris' successes and shortcomings, he has delivered the funds to keep this region growing time after time and he has been a fair arbiter for every segment. Some who wanted Morris gone have aired grievances against his policies: the number of tolled lanes of highway developed under his leadership, for instance.

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Quarterback who led Dallas Cowboys to their first Super Bowl dies at 83

Former Dallas Cowboys quarterback Craig Morton, one of only four QBs to start for two franchises in a Super Bowl, died Saturday in Mill Valley, California, at age 83. The Cowboys and Denver Broncos — the two teams he led to the Super Bowl — confirmed his death. Morton threw the first touchdown pass by a Cowboy in a Super Bowl in Dallas’ 16-13 loss to Baltimore in Super Bowl 5 in January 1971. After losing his job to Roger Staubach the next season, Morton eventually took over in Denver and led the Broncos to Super Bowl 12 — where they lost to Staubach and the Cowboys 27-10 in January 1978. Tom Brady, Peyton Manning and Kurt Warner are the only other quarterbacks to start for two franchises in Super Bowls.

“We are saddened to learn of Craig’s passing,” the Cowboys said on social media. “Our thoughts and prayers are with his family, friends and loved ones during this difficult time.” The Cowboys selected Morton with the No. 5 overall pick in the 1965 NFL draft out of California, and he backed up Don Meredith for his first four seasons. After Meredith retired, Morton took over as the starter in 1969 over the rookie Staubach and led Dallas to a 10-2-1 record before losing to Cleveland in the first round of the playoffs. In 1970, Morton started the vast majority of the season, leading the Cowboys to a 10-4 record. They earned defensive-minded playoff victories over Detroit (5-0) and San Francisco (17-10) before losing to the Colts in the Super Bowl. The competition between Morton and Staubach came to a head in 1971 after both started games and even alternated snaps at one point. Staubach ultimately won the job, and the Cowboys claimed the first Super Bowl title in franchise history, beating Miami 24-3 in Super Bowl 6. Morton got one last season as Dallas’ starter when Staubach suffered an injury in the preseason in 1972. The Cowboys went 10-4, but Staubach relieved Morton in the divisional playoffs and rallied Dallas to a 30-28 victory over San Francisco.

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Secretary of State Nelson and Bexar County leaders spar over timeline to integrate registered voters

The Texas secretary of state and some Bexar County leaders are sparring over the timeline to integrate registered voters in the county. Texas Secretary of State Jane Nelson said a timeline set by the county to integrate voter registration records from the county's new voter system for the November elections is "unrealistic" and "unworkable." In a return letter to County Judge Peter Sakai, who questioned whether timely data migration would occur, Nelson said her staff will respond with a schedule to connect the county's VR System to the state's TEAM System that is "timely" and "feasible." The state uses an elections management vendor named Civix.

It's the second time the county has called on the state to quickly integrate such a system. The first occurred before the November elections. The county's vendor then—Votech—suddenly went out of business. Nelson said last November that quick action cost the state more than $100,000 and affected the functionality of the core system for counties statewide. County officials have said TEAM is slow and has caused backlogs of registered voters and other glitches. Precinct 4 Commissioner Tommy Calvert has been among the most outspoken. Calvert said that there are "counties big and small are raising the alarms about the voter registration system backlogs caused by TEAM and the glitches causing the potential multiple mail ballots to go to voters rather than a single mail ballot they requested." "These errors could put Civix and the SOS in legal battles and cause unnecessary and unforced error into the confidence in the 2026 mid-term election," Calvert added. Alicia Pierce, assistant secretary of state for communications, defended TEAM from the county's criticisms. "The state has had five successful elections using the new TEAM system. Our staff has been working day and night to address any issues as they arise. We will be working with Bexar County on a reasonable schedule," she said.

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Tesla avoids trial in lawsuit tied to Austin mass shooting suspect

Tesla Inc. has successfully fended off a public trial over a Gigafactory Texas assault case tied to the former employee suspected in a mass shooting in March on West Sixth Street. The Austin company was granted a motion for arbitration, avoiding a trial the alleged victim said she hoped would shed light on Tesla’s missed opportunities to stop the assault that left three people dead and 15 injured. The case was filed after employee Lillian Brady sued the automaker in the aftermath of the shooting at Buford’s Backyard Beer Garden, alleging she had been assaulted in December at the factory by former co-worker and shooting suspect Ndiaga Diagne.

In her lawsuit, Brady argued that the automaker failed to provide a safe work environment and know the backgrounds of its employees. She also accused Tesla of withholding Diagne’s name after the alleged assault Dec. 4. In an earlier interview, she said she only learned his identity when Diagne was identified as the suspect in the shooting. Tesla fired him in January without notifying Brady. On March 1, police say he went on a shooting spree in downtown Austin before being fatally shot by officers. The FBI investigated the shooting as a possible act of terrorism. Last week, investigators said they found no evidence that Diagne was directed by a foreign terrorist organization. Tesla did not respond to a request for comment about the complaint being moved to arbitration. During an April hearing in state District Court in Austin, Tesla attorney Joshua Romero cited the company’s “broad” arbitration agreement, which says “any and all disputes arising from or related to your employment go to arbitration.”

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New Braunfels city attorney fired following mayoral election conflict

Following an hours-long discussion, the New Braunfels City Council voted to terminate Valeria Acevedo from her role as city attorney in a four to three vote on Monday, May 11. Councilmembers Toni Carter, Mary Ann Labowski and April Ryan were opposed. The item was intended to be discussed during the closed, executive session, but Acevedo requested the item be taken up in public prior to the start of the regular city council meeting. “I believe this level of transparency is necessary so that everyone can hear this discussion, as it may help dispel some of the confusion created by last week,” Acevedo said. “ … There is one thing that I want to address … and that is the fact that every vote counted. That is the fact that the election was carried out as it has been for years on our behalf by the county.”

The firing comes as a result of the discovery of a conflict between the city charter and the Texas State Constitution that led to mountains of controversy and discourse over the past week. Charles Zech formerly served as New Braunfels city attorney from 2001 to 2006 and is currently a contract attorney for the city, and said he was the one to bring the conflict to the city attorney’s office’s attention. Zech said he has spent his career analyzing city charters and is regularly contracted to assist cities in creating and amending charters. Zech said he saw a Facebook post stating that the New Braunfels mayoral race was to be decided by a plurality. He then checked the charter for accuracy and found that it was in conflict with the state constitution, which requires a majority vote – or more than 50% – for any office with a term of more than three years. Zech said he then contacted the City Attorney’s Office directly to inform them of the situation. Additionally, he clarified that he is not friends with Mayor Linnartz, nor did he go to school with him at any level.

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Republican officials urge unity, voter mobilization in Tarrant ahead of primary runoffs

With a little more than a week until early voting opens for the primary runoffs, Tarrant County Republicans and GOP candidates at the top of the ballot urged party unity ahead of the November midterm elections. Through party unity, prayer and mass mobilization of conservative voters, the local GOP can not only maintain control of the county’s highest elected offices but also drive a spiritual revival, speakers said at a May 9 “night of action” event hosted at Mercy Culture Church in Fort Worth. “You can win if you just mobilize the people who think like you to get out and vote,” said Bo French, former chairman of the Tarrant County GOP. He faces incumbent Texas Railroad Commissioner Jim Wright in a runoff for the GOP nomination for a seat on the commission that oversees the state’s oil and gas industry.

French took the stage Saturday afternoon with other candidates slated to appear on the May 26 runoff ballot: Attorney General Ken Paxton, who is running for U.S. senator, and Texas Sen. Mayes Middleton, who is running for attorney general. The March 3 primaries determined Republican and Democratic nominees for county, state and federal offices before the November midterms. In races where no candidate drew more than 50% of votes, the top two vote-getters face off again May 26. Early voting opens May 18. Hosted by Mercy Culture’s political wing, For Liberty & Justice, the event’s lineup of speakers also included outgoing state Rep. Nate Schatzline, a founder of the host group; Nate Sheets, GOP nominee for Texas agriculture commissioner; Kambree Nelson, a Christian activist and influencer; and Kyle Rittenhouse, a conservative gun rights activist who gained fame after being acquitted for killing two people during a 2020 racial justice protest in Kenosha, Wisconsin.

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'Really difficult conversations': Fort Worth stares down nearly $50 million budget shortfall

Fort Worth City Council and staff are facing a $49.3 million gap in the city's 2027 budget as property and sales tax income lag behind previous years. In a budget worksession held on May 5, Fort Worth staff presented an initial overview of the budget as it stands now, which includes a $49.3 million budget shortfall. Both increased expenses and lagging revenue are to blame for the gap, city leaders said. Council and staff have several more months to balance the budget before it goes up for a vote, but council members warned some cuts will be painful. "We're going to have really difficult conversations as we go forward, especially about public safety," Charlie Lauersdorf, who represents District 4, said.

The city has faced falling revenue as property values have stopped growing at historic rates, and the Tarrant County Appraisal District has made significant changes to its appraisal process. The shortfall is also thanks in part to growing expenses that are not easily shed from the budget, including an increase for the city's vehicle and equipment fund, costs of operating facilities funded by the 2022 bond, pay increases for city employees, and increases related to the city's newly adopted EMS service. Last year, the city initially faced a budget shortfall of $11 million, which they closed by the time the budget passed with a property tax rate reduction for taxpayers. City leadership accomplished that task in part by asking city departments to submit their budgets with a 1% reduction in expenditures. This year, city leaders have asked departments to make 1% cuts again and submit a budget with a 3% reduction in expenditures. With a 1% reduction, the city would save about $7.8 million; with a 3% reduction, it would save about $14 million. The salaries of sworn officers are excluded from the cuts.

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City Stories

San Antonio's Barn Door and Meat Market waitress gets $2,800-plus farewell tip from regulars served over 3 decades

Every Wednesday morning for the past 35 years, Maria Davila entered the History Room at the Barn Door Restaurant & Meat Market and served breakfast to a gathering of 30 or more guests. She poured their coffee, brought their tea and greeted each one by name: the billionaire, the banker, the developers and CEOs, power brokers of the business community known as The Civic Leaders Club. Davila knew the detailed preferences of each member: Red McCombs, the late billionaire, wanted five creamers and two Sweet’N Lows with his coffee. Pat Frost, the banker, liked hot tea. Marty Wender, the developer, drank Diet Coke. Most club members preferred their bacon extra crispy.

On May 6, Davila served her last breakfast for the group. When it ended, Wender thanked Davila for her service, collected $100 bills from each person and presented them to her as a final gratuity. “I wanted to cry,” Davila said. “They gave me $2,800. It’s the biggest tip I ever got.” The gratuity was partial. What Davila does not realize is that more money is coming. Members unable to attend are going to mail her checks. “When it’s all said and done, she’s going to get between $4,000 and $5,000,” Wender said. “She’s a very special lady. Everybody loves her.” Attention to detail is one hallmark of Davila’s work at the Barn Door, which closes on Sunday after 72 years. Warmth and kindness are others, which she uses to bring next level service to each table. Then there’s her story. She was born in Peru and came to the U.S. at 15 to visit an uncle in Georgia. She remained in the country after her mother, Violeta Martinez Rodriguez, arrived and then moved with her to San Antonio in 1980. Davila’s father, Juan Rodriguez, came the following year.

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National Stories

One in five HealthCare.gov enrollees dropped insurance coverage this year

The numbers are bearing out what many lawmakers feared: Many Americans can’t afford health insurance through the federal marketplaces without boosted subsidies. More than one in five people who enrolled in health insurance through HealthCare.gov during open enrollment and in the weeks immediately following were dropped from coverage for failing to pay their first month’s premium, according to internal Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, or CMS, documents obtained by NOTUS that haven’t been made public. The roughly 21% decline in enrollment in the 30 states using the federal marketplace is significantly higher than the rate of last year, when 12% of enrollees dropped off over the same time frame.

The numbers support widespread fears that the end of extra, pandemic-era subsidies, which congressional Republicans declined to extend in December, would leave Affordable Care Act plans unaffordable for some Americans. Faced with such a stark drop in enrollment, leadership at CMS, which is led by Administrator Mehmet Oz, is seeking to attribute a majority of the enrollment declines to rooting out fraud rather than people not paying their premiums, according to three CMS sources. The sources said it’s unlikely fraud is behind most of the cancellations. While marketplace fraud has been a problem in recent years, partly because insurance agents and brokers exploited Biden administration policies allowing year-round sign-ups, it’s more likely that a majority of the cancellations are among customers who were automatically reenrolled in their plans from last year and just never paid the premiums. That happens every year, but this year’s rate of cancellations is significantly higher. This year also saw fewer sign-ups to begin with, leaving total ACA enrollment at around 19 million people, around 3 million fewer than one year ago, according to CMS documents.

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Trump says Iran ceasefire is on 'life support' after rejecting latest proposal

U.S. President Donald Trump said Monday that the ceasefire is on “life support” after he rejected Iran’s latest proposal to end the war over its lack of satisfactory nuclear concessions. The stalled diplomacy follows recent exchanges of fire between the two countries, while Iran’s chokehold on the Strait of Hormuz and the U.S. blockade of Iranian ports remain in place. Trump also said Monday that he would indefinitely suspend the federal gas tax, though Congress needs to approve the move. The war continues to send fuel prices skyrocketing and rattle world markets. After Trump’s comment on the weakness of the ceasefire, the price for a barrel of Brent crude oil climbed 2.9% to $104.18. Trump will travel to Beijing this week for a rescheduled summit with Chinese President Xi Jinping.

But Beijing’s deep economic ties to Iran, as well as trade tensions over tariff threats stretching back to Trump’s first term, could crimp the meeting, even though the Republican president has for years effusively praised Xi. Democrats on Monday filed an emergency appeal with the U.S. Supreme Court seeking to halt a Virginia ruling invalidating a ballot measure that would have given their party an additional four winnable U.S. House seats. The ballot measure, narrowly passed by voters, was struck down by the Virginia Supreme Court last week.

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Virginia Democrats ask US Supreme Court to let them use new congressional map

Democratic officials in Virginia asked the US Supreme Court on Monday to reinstate a congressional map that would benefit their party ahead of this year’s midterm elections, the latest map drawing appeal to reach the high court amid a flurry of mid-decade redistricting. The emergency appeal follows a decision from the state Supreme Court last week that voided Democrats’ attempt to redraw Virginia’s US House map via an April referendum in a way that would help Democrats pick up four additional seates. The Democrats are asking the US Supreme Court to effectively put that order on hold for this year’s midterm election. The decision, the officials said, was “deeply mistaken” and had “profound practical importance to the nation.”

The US Supreme Court is already deeply enmeshed in a flood of redistricting taking place in states across the country as both parties seek to eke an advantage out of House boundaries in the fall election. Several southern states have moved to redraw their maps following a blockbuster decision in late April that severely weakened the scope of the landmark Voting Rights Act of 1965. The Virginia case will be handled, at least initially, by Chief Justice John Roberts, who oversees emergency appeals from Virginia and other states covered by the 4th US Circuit Court of Appeals. Roberts asked for a response in the case by Thursday evening. Though it was not based on the Voting Rights Act decision, Virginia’s redistricting was nevertheless seen by Democrats as a way to offset the advantage Republicans have picked up from that effort. But the state’s highest court ruled that the process state officials used to create the referendum violated the state constitution. “The irreparable harm resulting from the Supreme Court of Virginia’s decision is profound and immediate,” Democrats told the US Supreme Court on Monday. “By forcing the commonwealth to conduct its congressional elections using districts different from those adopted by the General Assembly pursuant to a constitutional amendment the people just ratified, the Supreme Court of Virginia has deprived voters, candidates, and the commonwealth of their right to the lawfully enacted congressional districts.”

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In bid to flip Senate, Democrats push deep into Trump territory

Former Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown lost his seat in a 2024 MAGA wave that put Republicans back in control of the Senate. Now, the onetime three-term Ohio senator is seeking a comeback in a very different political environment, with an unpopular war and high prices denting President Trump’s poll numbers and alarming Republican strategists. Standing on a recent weekday with about 30 United Steelworkers union members and supporters outside a closed paper mill, Brown talked all about the economy. The professorial Brown, 73 years old, blasted his opponent, Republican Sen. Jon Husted, 58, who was appointed when JD Vance became vice president. “He’s been on the side of billionaires, not on the side of steelworkers…or people that are struggling in this neighborhood,” Brown said.

Republicans are playing defense in Ohio and a growing number of other red states, where Democrats are counting on voter backlash to power them to victory this fall in their long-shot battle to retake the Senate. Brown gave similar stump speeches in 2024, when he lost to Republican Bernie Moreno, a staunch Trump ally, by about 3.5 percentage points. But uncertainty about the economy, gas prices, the Iran war and other issues since have frustrated the electorate. Husted, the former Ohio lieutenant governor, brushed off the idea that Trump’s sinking approval ratings could drag him down. Recent polls show Husted holding a slight lead. “I’m not talking about President Trump, in the sense that he’s not on the ballot,” Husted said. At the same time, he said that if Trump was on the ballot, it would make his election easier: “He’s won Ohio three times.” Republicans began this election cycle favored to keep the Senate: Democrats would need to defend all their seats and then notch wins in solidly Trump states to take the majority. Republicans were far more worried about losing the House, where dozens of seats are in play. But the states that Democrats see as truly competitive have gradually expanded beyond North Carolina, which Trump won narrowly in 2024, and Maine, where he lost. More states once considered solidly Republican are in the mix, including Alaska, Iowa, Texas and Ohio. GOP hopes for flipping a Democratic seat in Georgia have faded, although Republicans think they have a chance to pick up a seat in Michigan.

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Supreme Court clears way for a Republican-friendly Alabama map

Alabama can revert to a congressional map with only a single majority-Black district, the Supreme Court ruled Monday. The decision, based on the high court’s recent ruling on the Voting Rights Act, opens a path for Republicans to pick up an additional U.S. House seat. Alabama officials had urged the high court to allow the state to use a 2023 map that cuts two majority-Black congressional districts down to one, part of a move by several states across the South to redraw maps since the Supreme Court struck down part of the federal law protecting minority districts. The state had previously been barred from changing its congressional and state legislative maps until 2030. The court’s ruling comes a week before Alabama’s primaries are set to take place.

“Alabama’s case mirrors Louisiana’s, and they should end the same way: with this year’s elections run with districts based on lawful policy goals, not race,” state officials said in one of a series of emergency requests to the Supreme Court. Justices Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson dissented, writing that Monday’s ruling “unceremoniously discards the district court’s meticulously documented and supported discriminatory-intent finding and careful remedial order without any sound basis for doing so and without regard for the confusion that will surely ensure.” The ruling did not contain any opinions nor explanations from the court’s majority for lifting the lower court order. Alabama’s current congressional map was drawn to the standards of the Voting Rights Act before last month’s decision, and has two districts with a majority of Black voters represented by Democratic Reps. Shomari Figures and Terri Sewell. Figures flipped a GOP seat in 2024, and his election marked the first time Alabama had two Black representatives in Congress.

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Trump nominates a former Navy SEAL he fired from FEMA to run FEMA

President Donald Trump nominated ex-Federal Emergency Management Agency leader Cameron Hamilton on Monday to direct the organization once again, just over a year after he was ousted from the post. Hamilton served as the acting head of the agency from January to May 2025. The former Navy SEAL was fired just one day after publicly breaking with Trump’s efforts to dismantle the agency. “I do not believe it is in the best interest of the American people to eliminate the Federal Emergency Management Agency,” Hamilton told the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Homeland Security in March 2025, though he added that he believed FEMA had “evolved into an overextended federal bureaucracy, attempting to manage every type of emergency no matter how minor.”

Hamilton at the time was appearing before the subcommittee to discuss FEMA’s 2026 budget requests and distribution of aid. His comments were widely interpreted as a rebuke of Trump’s efforts to pare back the agency. Trump in June 2025 announced plans to abolish FEMA after the hurricane season, but his administration quietly backed off of this promise when catastrophic flooding devastated parts of Texas. The president initially sought to transfer more relief responsibility to state governments, a move that concerned many lawmakers from disaster-prone areas. In order for Hamilton to reassume his post, his appointment must be confirmed by the Senate — a process he avoided last year while he served as the acting head of FEMA. Hamilton has worked in the State Department and the Department of Homeland Security, but he only led FEMA for 5 months. This relative lack of executive experience could expose Hamilton’s nomination to Senate scrutiny during the confirmation process. Since being removed from his role leading FEMA, Hamilton has been working with private “disaster response and recovery operations,” according to his LinkedIn.

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Trump’s complaints about Iran war leaks prompt aggressive DOJ investigations

President Trump privately complained to acting Attorney General Todd Blanche about media leaks in the wake of the Iran war last month, according to administration officials familiar with the matter, prompting an aggressive push at the Justice Department to pursue those investigations. Blanche vowed to secure subpoenas specifically targeting the records of reporters who have worked on sensitive national security stories, one official said. In one meeting, Trump passed a stack of news articles he and other senior officials thought threatened national security to Blanche with a sticky note on it that said “treason,” another administration official said. Senior Justice Department officials have met with counterparts from the Pentagon to discuss the investigations, according to officials familiar with the meetings. In particular, Trump has focused his ire on articles that provided details on how he arrived at his decision to launch the war, and what his advisers had told him as he deliberated, officials said.

Launched 10 weeks ago, the conflict is now stuck in a shaky cease-fire. “In all circumstances, the Department of Justice follows the facts and applies the law to identify those committing crimes against the United States,” a department spokeswoman said. A White House official referred a request for comment to the Justice Department. Trump’s recent push to pursue the leak investigations comes as the Justice Department had already stepped up investigations into sensitive reporting about the lead up to the Iran war. The Wall Street Journal received grand jury subpoenas dated March 4 for records of Journal reporters. The request related to a Feb. 23 article that reported that Gen. Dan Caine, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and others at the Pentagon warned the president about the risks of an extended military campaign against Iran. Other news outlets, including Axios and the Washington Post, published similar stories that day. Trump launched the war five days later, on Feb. 28.

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Lead Stories

Iran says it will ‘never bow’ as Trump rejects peace counteroffer, prolonging Middle East conflict

U.S. President Donald Trump rejected Iran’s counterproposal to end the 10-week war in the Middle East, calling it “totally unacceptable,” while Tehran vowed to “never bow,” prolonging a standoff that has choked the Strait of Hormuz and roiled global energy markets. “I have just read the response from Iran’s so-called “Representatives.” I don’t like it — TOTALLY UNACCEPTABLE!” the president said in a Truth Social post on Sunday. Iranian state media framed Tehran’s response as a rejection of the U.S. proposal, which it characterized as a demand for “surrender.” In its response to the latest U.S. proposal, Tehran has insisted on war reparations, full sovereignty over the Strait of Hormuz, an end to sanctions, and the release of frozen Iranian assets.

Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian struck a defiant tone as negotiations proceeded Sunday. “We will never bow our heads before the enemy, and if talk of dialogue or negotiation arises, it does not mean surrender or retreat,” he said on X in Persian, translated via Grok. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, in an interview with CBS News’ “60 Minutes,” said the war was not over because there was “more work to be done.” Iran had neither surrendered its enriched uranium nor dismantled enrichment sites, and continues to support regional proxies and advance its ballistic missile program, he said. The Wall Street Journal reported that Iran rejected U.S. demands regarding its nuclear program and stockpile of highly enriched uranium. Instead, Tehran proposed separate negotiations and offered to dilute some of its highly enriched uranium and transfer the rest to a third country, with a provision that it be returned if Washington exits any eventual deal, the Journal reported. The U.S. wants assurances that Iran will end its nuclear program as part of any peace deal. Iran has reportedly agreed to suspend enriching uranium, but for a shorter period than the 20-year moratorium proposed by the U.S. Iran has rejected dismantling its nuclear facilities. Tehran has also demanded that the U.S. end its blockade of Iranian ports as a condition for it to open the Strait of Hormuz.

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After Virginia redistricting map is tossed, Democrats search desperately for a response

Democrats are struggling to respond to a major redistricting setback in Virginia, with some party leaders discussing an audacious and possibly far-fetched idea for trying to restore a congressional map voided by the court but showing little indication they have a clear plan. During a private discussion on Saturday that included Democratic House members from Virginia and Representative Hakeem Jeffries of New York, the minority leader, the lawmakers vented anger at their defeat at the Virginia Supreme Court, spoke about a collective determination to flip two or three Republican-held seats under the existing map and discussed a bank-shot proposal to redraw the congressional lines anyway, according to three people who participated in the call and two others who were briefed on it. They did not land on a specific course forward, and Mr. Jeffries and the other members of Congress agreed to consult with their lawyers about the most prudent way to proceed, said the people, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe a private talk.

The conversation reflected the desperation and fury that have gripped the party after the state Supreme Court struck down a favorable map that had been ratified by voters. The most dramatic idea they discussed — which would involve an unusual gambit to replace the entire state Supreme Court, with a goal of reinstating their gerrymandered map — drew mixed reactions on the call, said the people, and it was not clear that it would even be viable, or palatable to Gov. Abigail Spanberger and Democrats in the Virginia General Assembly. After Democrats had fought Republicans to a rough draw last month in a nationwide gerrymandering war, a pair of recent court rulings quickly gave the G.O.P. the clear upper hand in the race to redraw maps ahead of the midterm elections. Facing stiff headwinds, including President Trump’s low approval ratings and high gas prices, Republicans are looking for every advantage they can find to defy the odds and hold on to their narrow majority. Any plans to enact a new congressional map for this year’s midterm elections would require action in the next few days. In a court filing last month, Steven Koski, the commissioner of the Virginia Department of Elections, said any changes to the maps after Tuesday, May 12, “will significantly increase the risk” of his agency being unable to properly prepare for the state’s scheduled Aug. 4 primary election. A spokesman for Mr. Jeffries declined to comment.

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White House distances itself from tighter AI regulation

Senior White House officials are trying to soothe industry concerns that the administration could require tech companies to submit their advanced artificial intelligence models for federal vetting before releasing them to the public. A day after one top White House economic adviser publicly confirmed that such a review was under discussion — likening it Wednesday to the Food and Drug Administration’s yearslong testing of prescription drugs — aides to President Donald Trump were sending a different message: Not so fast. “There’s one or two people who are very intent on government regulations, but they’re sort of the minority of the bunch,” said one senior White House official. This person, like others in this report, was granted anonymity to describe sensitive policy discussions.

The back-and-forth messaging comes as tech industry officials anxiously await an executive order spelling out how the administration plans to prevent powerful new AI models from being misused to launch cyberattacks or even develop bioweapons. POLITICO reported Tuesday that the White House is eyeing a vetting system that could require AI giants such as OpenAI, Anthropic and Google to go through the government before releasing new models. While it is not immediately clear how onerous that oversight system would be, Kevin Hassett, the director of the White House National Economic Council, said in a Fox Business interview Wednesday that the administration was considering a pre-release safety testing regime akin to what the FDA does for drugs. “We’re studying possibly an executive order to give a clear roadmap to everybody about how this is gonna go, and how future AIs that also potentially create vulnerabilities should go through a process so that they’re released into the wild after they’ve been proven safe — just like an FDA drug,” Hassett said.

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Confident in China’s power, Xi is ready to host an unpredictable Trump

President Donald Trump is set to visit China this week for the first time since 2017, when he received a red-carpet welcome from children waving American and Chinese flags, and Chinese officials hoping to negotiate with a leader they viewed as a pragmatic businessman and dealmaker. This time, Trump will return to a Beijing that is a far more powerful, confident seat of global power than a decade ago — with a seasoned leader, Xi Jinping, who now understands Trump weaponizes unpredictability and holds no illusions about making lasting deals with the American leader. Instead, Xi wants to project China as a more reliable and responsible counterweight to U.S. volatility, U.S. and Chinese experts say. “China’s comprehensive national power has grown significantly since 2017,” said William Klein, who arranged Trump’s visit at the time as a senior official at the U.S. Embassy in Beijing.

The summit, which was delayed from March because of the war in Iran, comes as the U.S. is mired in a Middle East conflict that shows no sign of winding down. Trump’s standing, domestically and worldwide, has also been weakened because of the public’s dissatisfaction with the war and the severe damage to the global economy. As they meet this week, Xi and Trump, leaders of the world’s two biggest economies, are looking to stabilize the bilateral relationship after tit-for-tat export controls and sweeping U.S. sanctions on Chinese shipping firms and vessels suspected of doing business with the Iranian regime. In the more than 15 months since Trump’s return to the White House, Xi has displayed confidence in going toe-to-toe with his American counterpart, refusing to blink in response to repeated tariff threats and instead negotiating what was largely viewed as a mutual de-escalation. “China, after almost a decade of dealing with the U.S., has more experience and confidence now and is more clear-minded,” said Wang Huiyao, a former government policy adviser and president of the Center for China and Globalization, a Beijing-based think tank.

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State Stories

Austin SBOE candidates debate: which are worse for public ed? Private school vouchers or charter schools?

Democrats Allison Bush and Stephanie Bazan, competitors in the May 26 runoff election to represent District 5 and Travis County on the Texas State Board of Education, agree on most things – but not all – when it comes to shaping our state’s education system. When asked about the most pressing problems facing Texas public schools right now, Bazan said it’s private school vouchers. Bush argued it’s charter schools. And at a moment when Austin ISD faces a growing budget deficit and school closures, which presents the bigger strain on neighborhood public schools has come to the forefront of the runoff. More than 500 Austin-area students have been awarded private school vouchers, the Statesman reported March 5, a program that costs the state $1 billion in its first school year.

But Austin ISD is also losing money to charter schools. Maggie Stern of Our Schools Our Democracy told the Chronicle they estimate that the district lost $148 million from students transferring to charter schools in the 2024-2025 school year alone. “That’s obviously a pretty large number in a district that is talking about budget cuts and already voted to close campuses,” Stern continued. “That revenue loss has real consequences for the vast majority of Texas families who continue to choose their local public school.” Bazan and Bush emerged from a crowded Democratic primary to represent six Austin-area counties on the SBOE, the Republican-majority board that approves public school curriculum standards and textbooks, manages how the state’s large Permanent School Fund is used, and approves new charter school systems – privately funded public schools like Austin-area IDEA and KIPP meant to diversify public education options. In March, Bush pulled ahead with about 36% of the vote – over 83,000 votes – while Bazan earned about 49,500, 21% of the vote. The winner of this month’s runoff will face Republican Mica Arellano in November. And while the SBOE is often a branch of state government that flies under the radar, it incited statewide protests last month. In early April, members advanced a controversial draft of the state’s curriculum standards for social studies that centers Texas’ and Christianity’s role within national and world history, and a literary works list that includes references to the Bible. Both Bush and Bazan expressed deep concern to the Chronicle about what the SBOE has accomplished this month.

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Gov. Abbott activates state emergency resources ahead of severe storm threat

Gov. Greg Abbott on Sunday directed the Texas Division of Emergency Management to activate state emergency response resources as a massive storm system threatens much of the state with hurricane-force winds, giant hail, and the risk of tornadoes. The severe weather, expected to last through Monday morning, covers a vast footprint including West, North, East, Central, and South-Central Texas. Forecasters warned the system could produce wind gusts exceeding 75 mph and hail larger than 2 inches in diameter.

What they're saying: "Texas is prepared to confront the severe storms that pose a threat to communities all across our state," Abbott said in a statement. He urged Texans to monitor local forecasts and warned motorists never to drive through flooded roadways, invoking the phrase, "Turn Around, Don't Drown." Heavy rainfall is expected to be widespread, with some areas potentially seeing isolated totals of 3 to 6 inches, which could lead to significant flash flooding. As the system progresses, the threat is expected to shift toward the South and Southeast Texas coasts.

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Port of Corpus Christi rolls out new environmental guidelines as activity surges

The Port of Corpus Christi is introducing new environmental guidelines aimed at shaping future operations as activity at the port continues to grow. The announcement comes as the port has drawn national attention for a recent surge in activity, largely tied to the war in Iran. That increase, along with ongoing concerns about the Coastal Bend’s water supply, has sparked questions from community members about how local industry is addressing environmental impacts. Longtime Sinton resident Lilly Wilkinson said she has seen environmental changes in the area over the decades. “There was a lot of sludge and things and a lot of waste from the petroleum industry that dumped into rivers and creeks in the bays,” Wilkinson said, recalling what Corpus Christi Bay looked like in the 1960s.

Wilkinson said conditions today are much different. “The water now is so fresh and so clean I've never seen it this clean and pristine,” Wilkinson said. She shared her perspective after attending a community meeting hosted by the port announcing their updated environmental policies. Kent Britton, CEO of the Port of Corpus Christi, broke down the new guidelines. “We kind of have a cadence for our strategic planning at the port of three years. And so as we kind of update our strategic plan every three years, which we just approved, I don’t know, four or five months ago, then falling right on the heels of that, we update our environmental policy,” Britton said. Britton said many environmental regulations for their customers are overseen by agencies such as the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, but the port is focusing on changes within its own operations.

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Historic Stoneleigh hotel reopens in Dallas after $20M renovations

The historic Stoneleigh hotel in Dallas has reopened following a $20 million renovation, just in time for Mother’s Day. The upgrades include refreshed guest rooms, a redesigned lobby and the addition of a new Italian restaurant led by a Michelin-starred chef, offering a fresh dining experience inside the iconic property. Guests visiting the restaurant can expect an upscale menu featuring caviar, steak tartare and a variety of house-made pastas.

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Harris County treasurer arrested, charged with DWI in Galveston County weeks after burglary charge dismissed

Weeks after a grand jury declined to indict her on another criminal charge, Harris County Treasurer Carla Wyatt was arrested in Galveston County on Saturday for allegedly driving while intoxicated, jail records show. Wyatt, 56, was being held on a $3,000 cash bond in Galveston County late Saturday for the DWI charge. It’s the second time Wyatt has been accused of driving while intoxicated during her tenure as the Harris County treasurer after she was arrested in 2023 for allegedly having a blood-alcohol concentration of at least .15%, nearly twice the legal limit. That charge was dismissed in August last year after Wyatt completed a pretrial diversion program, court records show.

She was arrested again in Harris County last December and accused of breaking into another person’s vehicle in a restaurant parking lot with intent to commit theft. Prosecutors said several people watched as Wyatt searched through items inside a vehicle that wasn't hers. Sign up for the Hello, Houston! daily newsletter to get local reports like this delivered directly to your inbox. A Harris County grand jury declined to indict her on the burglary charge in April. Her attorney in that case, Christopher Downey, said Wyatt received a medical consultation following her arrest for cerebrovascular disease and a mini-stroke, information that he said was presented to the grand jury. It’s not clear whether Wyatt’s recent medical history factored into the grand jurors’ decision to no-bill the county treasurer. Wyatt had begun treatment for anemia and made certain changes to her daily nutritional intake and work habits, Downey previously told Houston Public Media. Wyatt also is in the throes of a shakeup in the county treasurer’s office after county commissioners in February stripped the office of a key function and voted unanimously to pursue dissolving the office, which would require voter approval. The county treasurer, elected in 2022, is set to be on the ballot again in November after she did not have any challengers in the Democratic primary election in March. Marc Cowart won the Republican nomination for the seat. No defense attorneys for Wyatt were listed in online Galveston County court records as of late Saturday.

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Texas A&M University System issues cease & desist to Muslim education entity

The Texas A&M University System is objecting to what it calls the unauthorized use of the Texas A&M name and trademarks by a Muslim education entity in North Texas branding itself as “TexAM University.” System officials say they’ve sent a cease-and-desist letter demanding the group stop using names, marks, domains and other branding elements they believe infringe on or dilute Texas A&M trademarks. According to the A&M System, the use of “TexAM,” “Texas AM University,” and similar variations could create confusion and mislead the public into thinking there is an affiliation or endorsement. The A&M System says the entity is not affiliated with Texas A&M University or The Texas A&M University System.

“The Texas A&M University System has a responsibility to protect the name and trademarks, which represent more than a century of academic excellence, public trust and institutional integrity,” Chancellor Glenn Hegar said in a statement. “When another organization uses branding that is similar, particularly in the same educational space, we must act to prevent confusion and protect the value of those marks.” The entity is formally known as the Texas American Muslim Institute of Technology at Dallas, according to the A&M System. Officials also say it is not recognized as a university by the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board. A&M System officials say they are prepared to pursue legal action if necessary.

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Texas law enforcement agencies brace for FIFA World Cup impact

As North Texas prepares to host matches and events tied to the upcoming FIFA World Cup 2026, law enforcement agencies across the region are ramping up security operations, investing in technology and coordinating staffing efforts ahead of what officials expect to be one of the busiest summers in recent history. North Texas officials estimate roughly 3.8 million visitors could travel through the region during the tournament, creating additional concerns surrounding transportation, crowd control and public safety. “So, there’s issues regarding transportation and traffic. There’s issues regarding security,” said Arlington Mayor Jim Ross. AT&T Stadium in Arlington, which will be called Dallas Stadium during the tournament, will host nine soccer matches.

The expected influx of visitors is prompting agencies across the region to adopt new tools and strategies. The Burleson Police Department is using body cameras capable of conducting real-time translations in 50 languages. “It’s a game-changer,” said Officer Jay Davis of the department. Meanwhile, the North Central Texas Council of Governments is investing $200,000 into artificial intelligence software designed to help 911 operators translate calls from non-English speakers. “We’re expecting to see a higher usage in language translation services,” said Rodger Mann of the North Central Texas Emergency Communications District. Dallas is also preparing to host the FIFA Fan Festival and the International Broadcast Center, both of which will require a significant police presence and security operations. The Dallas Police Department is receiving a $22 million Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) grant to help fund those efforts.

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Spurs coach defends Wembanyama amid 'disgusting' physicality

Coming to the defense of Victor Wembanyama following his ejection in Game 4 against the Timberwolves, Spurs coach Mitch Johnson said the physicality his star player faces on a nightly basis is “actually disgusting.” Wembanyama was kicked out of Sunday’s 114-109 loss in Minneapolis with 8:39 to play in the second quarter after swinging his elbow into the chin of Minnesota’s Naz Reid while battling for a rebound. Officials assessed a flagrant 2 foul following a review. Asked after Friday’s Game 3 about the fresh scratches and bruises across his body, Wembanyama said the physical punishment is “gonna happen” in the playoff environment. But Johnson had less patience following Game 4, pointing to the league’s responsibility to protect Wembanyama.

“The physicality people try to impose on him and the lack of protection is really disappointing,” Johnson said. “At some level, it’s starting to get actually disgusting, just in terms of when he tries to fight through things and be professional and mature and deal with some of that stuff.” Johnson said the Spurs have spoken to Wembanyama about defending himself against his opponents’ physicality. “I do think it’s getting to a point that if the people who are in charge of controlling the game and protecting the physicality of the game don’t do that, at some point he’s going to have to protect himself,” Johnson said. “We’ve been asking him to do that for a while.” Though Johnson defended Wembanyama for responding to Minnesota’s aggression, he clarified that he did not condone Sunday’s foul against Reid. “I’m glad he took matters into his own hands,” Johnson said. “Not in terms of hitting Naz Reid. I want to be very clear about that. I’m glad Naz Reid was OK. I didn’t want him to elbow him. But he’s going to have to protect himself, if they’re not. And I think it’s disgusting.” The league is expected to review the play on Monday, and Wembanyama could face additional punishment. Johnson said he did not believe anything beyond Sunday’s ejection would be warranted. “There was zero intent,” Johnson said. “To have anything on top of that, I think, would be ridiculous.”

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Texas can tax VELO oral nicotine products as tobacco, state Supreme Court rules

Despite not containing true tobacco, the Texas Supreme Court ruled Friday a line of oral nicotine pouches and lozenges are tobacco products, and the state can tax them as such. VELO products are made of a blend of plant matter and nicotine. The combination makes the products tobacco substitutes, subjecting them to state tax laws that the Texas Comptroller enforces, Justice Brett Busby wrote in an opinion for the court. “A VELO pouch is essentially a type of snus—a porous pouch that is filled with cellulose and nicotine isolate instead of pulverized tobacco,” Busby wrote. “In short, the primary ingredient in VELO pouches—a blend of powdered cellulose and nicotine isolate—takes the place and function of the tobacco plant matter in snus, a 'preparation of pulverized tobacco' that is taxable under (the Texas Tax Code)."

In a concurring opinion, Justice James Sullivan said he considers the presence of plant matter in VELO pouches irrelevant to the court's interpretation of tobacco tax law. "Respectfully, I’m doubtful that the presence of 'microcrystalline cellulose, a naturally occurring organic compound found in the cell walls of plants,' is essential to a VELO pouch’s having been 'made of . . . a tobacco substitute,'" Sullivan wrote, citing Busby's opinion and state law. In a statement, a spokesperson said the Texas Comptroller’s Office is “pleased” with the high court’s ruling. KERA News has reached out to RJR Vapor Co. and will update this story with any response. RJR Vapor Co. sells oral nicotine products throughout Texas, including VELO, a competitor of ZYN nicotine pouches. The distributor was seeking a $16,000 refund on taxes it paid in 2020 after the comptroller determined VELO pouches and lozenges were taxable as tobacco.

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New immigration rule for Texas occupational licenses leaves some beauty professionals in ‘limbo'

Jadira sweeps the floor of her beauty salon tucked into a southern Dallas neighborhood as a client and her two kids arrive. Jadira helps the four-year-old up on the salon chair as his mom explains the type of haircut she would like for her son. For the last 20 years, Jadira — whom KERA is only referring to by her first name because she does not have legal status in the U.S. — has been forging relationships with community members and has seen generations grow up and remain loyal customers. But she is now afraid that the trust and connections she has built could be taken away because of a new regulation that requires occupational license holders to show proof of legal status. “I’m worried about the new requirements to get a license because my livelihood depends on this,” Jadira told KERA in Spanish. “I’ve also talked to various people in the same situation as me, and we don’t know what to do.”

She said she’s “in limbo” without any clear guidance. Under the new requirement by the Texas Department of Licensing and Regulation (TDLR) that went into effect May 1, anyone renewing their license must show proof of legal status in the U.S. The new rule affects approximately 40 professions, including cosmetologists like Jadira, estheticians, nail techs, eyelash techs and barbers. “It’s a very radical change because it doesn't just affect those who work in the beauty industry, but the majority of Latinos without legal status in areas such as plumbing, air conditioning, electricity,” Luisa Carrillo, who runs a beauty school based in North Dallas, said in Spanish. “So we’re not just talking about beauty.” Carrillo is worried of what the change means for the future of beauty schools in North Texas – the ones that have predominantly migrant students. Some of her students have considered leaving the beauty school, she said.

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New Wilmer council member aims to take on rapid data center growth

A lifelong Wilmer resident campaigned on a promise to regulate the rapid growth of data centers in and around the small town south of Dallas – and won. Council member-elect Moses Garcia said apart from industry, he hasn’t seen much growth in his city of about 7,000 people over the years. “The last time that we had anything in Wilmer was the main strip in town, and that was done when I was like 10 years old,” Garcia said. Low tax rates and city incentives have turned the town and surrounding area into a hub of industrial development in recent years. Major companies like Procter & Gamble, Ace Hardware and Amazon have built warehouses in the largely rural corner of southern Dallas County.

Quality Technology Services – or QTS – recently began developing a multi-building data center campus southwest of the town. According to the company, several facilities are under development and more are under review. “South Dallas is a key growth area for the region’s digital and industrial economy, and Wilmer is well positioned to benefit given its location, infrastructure, and existing industrial base,” read the statement. “QTS expanded in Wilmer to support long-term growth and to serve as a committed community partner.” Four Granbury residents accused city leaders of secrecy and Open Meetings Act violations tied to a controversial data center and Knox Ranch annexation. The multi-billion dollar company has donated $25,000 to the Wilmer Fire Department and took part in an initiative to plant more trees in the region, but Garcia said residents are wary of the new development as data center growth threatens energy and water supplies in other small Texas towns. The QTS development caught his attention when he first began campaigning for Wilmer’s city council.

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Austin spends millions on outside attorneys to handle lawsuits

As the city of Austin enters another, leaner budget season, some say it should rein in spending and have more oversight on its contracts with pricey outside attorneys. Austin has spent tens of millions of dollars in recent years hiring attorneys to handle litigation against the city. A case before City Council this week highlighted the practice and pushed Council Member Mike Siegel to rethink the city's approach. The lawsuit stems from a botched raid and detainment of a couple at their home in South Austin in 2023. Glen and Mindy Shield's home off Channel Island Drive was raided by state troopers after the Austin Police Department believed an armed suspect was inside. Troopers busted down the door with explosives, used flashbang devices and caused more than $23,000 in damages, according to the Shields' lawsuit. In late March, the city had a chance to settle that lawsuit, but attorneys acting on behalf of the city opted to pursue the case further. Council OK'd more than $609,000 in payments to an outside firm, Richards Rodriguez and Skeith.

On Thursday, the council approved a possible $350,000 settlement in that case, in addition to the money paid to the law firm. Siegel, who voted in favor of that contract extension and the potential settlement, said the City Council needs more oversight in cases like these. "I think most people would agree that an outside attorney is more likely to be expensive for a variety of reasons," he said. "And then the question becomes, 'Are they more effective?'" KUT News reached out to the city's Law Department and the City Manager's Office, but neither would provide an on-the-record interview for this story. A statement from a city spokesperson said the city used outside attorneys in cases with a conflict of interest, when "expertise" is needed or when the city needs to "balance workload." "The City Attorney’s Office always takes into consideration the efficient use of public dollars when deciding to hire outside counsel and the firms hired understand this responsibility in their role representing the City," the statement read. The increase in spending has dovetailed with a boon in civil lawsuits against the city's police department after the 2020 protests. Austin has paid out more than $20 million to plaintiffs who alleged city police used excessive force against protesters. All told, Austin has paid out more than $48 million in settlements since that year for all cases filed against the city, and many of those cases have leaned on outside attorneys. Austin attorney Scott Hendler said that isn't uncommon for any city, but the six-figure contracts incentivize third-party trial lawyers to bill for as much as they can, slowing down the process.

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Dallas pastor Robert Jeffress says Pope is wrong about Iran

First Baptist Dallas' senior pastor Robert Jeffress said in a recent Fox News segment Pope Leo XIV is wrong when it comes to Iran, expressing his support for the Trump Administration's war on the regime. Iran's nuclear capabilities are part of the rationale that the Trump administration has earlier provided for launching a war on the regime, The Associated Press reported earlier this year. The White House has previously said the decision to launch Operation Epic Fury to destroy Iran's offensive missile and security infrastructure was based on a cumulative effect of direct and imminent threat that the regime posed to the United States, The AP reported.

Pope Leo, the first American Pope, expressed his strong disapproval of the war that the Trump administration has launched against Iran and has criticized the situation, saying "God does not bless any conflict," The AP reported. "The Pope is a good man, he is sincere in his faith, but he is sincerely wrong when it comes to Iran," Jeffress said. The pastor told Fox News that a few days after the U.S.-Iran conflict began, he was in the Oval Office with faith leaders and President Donald Trump, who said "Iran was within weeks of getting a powerful weapon that would destroy Israel, much of the Middle East and could bring great harm to America, and he had no choice but to act." Jeffress said, in the segment, he commends the president for fulfilling his "God-given" responsibility to protect the nation. He added the role of the government is to protect its citizens from evil-doers.

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National Stories

Private credit’s hot streak is over

Private-credit firms delivered eye-popping returns to investors in recent years. That hot streak is over. The latest earnings results across the industry show returns that appear to be entering a more modest chapter, just as investors have grown worried about other aspects of private-credit funds that lend to riskier companies. Ares Capital Corp., Golub Capital and other publicly traded funds marked down their net asset values in the last quarter after lowering the valuations of loans they made to software and other companies. Others like Sixth Street Specialty Lending also trimmed their dividends.

Apollo Global Management said this past week that gross returns on its direct origination funds that include investment-grade loans to companies were 0.5%, down from 2.6% a year ago. Gross returns reflect dividends paid to investors as well as their investment’s change in value, before fees. Earlier, Blackstone and Blue Owl also reported lower returns for the period from a year ago. Just a few years ago, investors had enjoyed mid- to high-double-digit annual gross returns, fueled by a confluence of unusual circumstances. During the pandemic, for instance, private lenders stepped up to supply credit to borrowers when others were pulling back, earning strong returns for doing so. That was followed by a dealmaking frenzy that drove up demand for borrowing. Then, when the regional-banking crisis hit in 2023 and banks pulled back on this lending, private-credit firms took more share.

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For struggling JetBlue, Spirit’s demise may offer an opportunity

Mere hours after Spirit Airlines shut down last weekend, JetBlue Airways announced more than two dozen new flights out of Spirit’s home airport. JetBlue’s speed in filling the void was not surprising. The airline is trying to turn itself around after years of losing money. JetBlue wants to make Spirit’s base — Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport, near Miami — the next pillar of its business, and seized the opportunity to attract thousands of travelers suddenly left in the lurch. Once celebrated as a hip, disruptive upstart, JetBlue has fallen on hard times. The company has shrunk somewhat in recent years to under 5 percent of domestic air travel, making it about one-fourth as big as the country’s largest airlines.

As a result, it is not big enough to compete head to head with American, Delta, United or Southwest. And its costs are too high to pursue the low-fare approach popularized by Spirit and others. That leaves JetBlue in a difficult situation: It needs to grow, but it has few easy or good options. “It is the most uncomfortable place in the world,” said John Grant, chief analyst at OAG, an aviation data provider. “You don’t know where you’re going and how you can compete.” From 2019 to 2025, JetBlue’s operating costs rose almost 29 percent as it matched industrywide raises handed out to pilots and other employees and paid more in airport fees. But its revenue climbed just 13 percent. The airline has lost money every year since 2019 and has about $8.5 billion in debt. JetBlue, which is based in New York, declined to make its chief executive available for an interview for this article. The airline has tried various strategies to put itself on a more sustainable footing, but few have worked out.

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With Netflix new ad-free standard plan at $20, streaming's tipping point into old TV is getting closer

Streaming companies are discovering that their most valuable customers may not be the ones paying the most. Instead, it’s increasingly the viewers who watch the most. The change is being driven by a move away from a subscription-only model to one that combines subscription fees with advertising. Because ads are sold based on viewership, the more time a subscriber spends watching, the more revenue that viewer generates. In March, Netflix raised prices for the second time in just over a year, pushing its standard ad-free plan to around $20 a month, versus an ad-supported tier at $9, signaling that how much a subscriber watches may matter as much if not more than what they pay upfront. “It’s a double payday,” said Kevin Krim, president and CEO of EDO, a company that measures the impact of advertising across streaming and linear TV. “As long as the ad-tier subscriber is engaged with the content and the ads, they will be at least as valuable or more than ad-free subscribers,” Krim said.

After years of resisting advertising, Netflix is now leaning heavily into that model, rapidly building out its advertising business alongside subscriptions. “We’re making good progress, and the opportunity ahead of us is massive,” Netflix co-CEO Greg Peters said after the company’s latest earnings report. Disney’s Hulu has long combined subscription and advertising revenue, and Paramount, Warner Bros. Discovery and Comcast have pushed similar strategies across their streaming platforms. Netflix’s advantage, however, comes from both its scale and how much its audience watches. According to the company’s Q4 2025 shareholder update, it has over 325 million subscribers globally, and viewers collectively watched more than 95 billion hours of content in the first half of 2025 alone, providing far more opportunity than competitors to generate advertising revenue over time. According to Peters, closing the gap between ad-free and ad-tier subscribers is a major focus for the company. The “gap is narrowing,” and closing it will be a “key opportunity for future revenue growth,” he said on the company’s recent earnings call.

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‘It’s literally going to break me.’ Commuting is now unaffordable for some American workers

Stephen Kaledecker was psyched when he was promoted in December to regional manager at the hotel chain where he works – but his enthusiasm cratered when gas prices started to skyrocket after the US-Israeli conflict with Iran began earlier this year. The new job entails thousands of miles of driving each month to properties in Ohio, Indiana and Illinois. With the price of gas topping $5 a gallon on his trips, he is spending more than a $1,000 a month on fuel. That means he will end up losing money, since his raise won’t cover the increased fuel expenses – and his employer won’t reimburse him for mileage once he fully transitions into his new role next month. But he can’t go back to his old position managing a hotel in Ohio, because the role has already been filled.

Having to decide whether to continue as regional manager, which he loves, has left him terrified and crying some nights in his hotel rooms on the road. While he was looking forward to advancing in his career, the Gahanna, Ohio, resident feels he can’t justify it financially. “It’s going to literally break me,” said Kaledecker, who has already put more than 20,000 miles on his 2018 Chevy Silverado, which he uses to carry equipment and supplies for the hotels, this year. “I look at my bank account and I’m like, ‘Okay, if I go here and do what they ask me to do, I’m not going to be able to get my prescriptions, or I’m not going to be able to pay that electric bill.’” Kaledecker, 46, is among the American workers feeling the pain from soaring gas prices, which climbed to an average of $4.52 per gallon nationwide on Sunday, up from $2.98 per gallon when the conflict began in late February, according to AAA. Workers with long commutes are being hit particularly hard, forcing some to make tough choices about whether to continue in their jobs. Others are asking if they can work from home more, while still others are narrowing their job searches to minimize the time required in their cars.

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Budget-conscious shoppers are feeding a boom in discount groceries

When Rachel Negro-Henderson started shopping at Aldi regularly during the pandemic — a change her family made when her husband lost his income as a crew coach — she'd sometimes have awkward run-ins with acquaintances. "People would not want to talk about why they were here, like it was a mistake," the healthcare administrator said. "They just stumbled into a grocery store because they needed a tomato." But after just a few years, those interactions have changed. Negro-Henderson, who lives in Audubon, N.J., with her husband and three kids, says she now sees people she knows there all the time.

A slew of factors has been making it harder to put an affordable meal on the table. Food insecurity mushroomed during the COVID-19 pandemic, and grocery prices have skyrocketed in recent years. Layer onto that inflation, the threat of tariffs and corporate cost-cutting schemes like shrinkflation and electronic shelf labels, which give retailers the ability to change prices based on demand. "Consumers are just to a point where [they're saying], 'Give us a break,'" said grocery industry analyst Phil Lempert. "This is food. You don't screw around with our food." Many of those facing economic pressures and frustrations have begun shopping at budget grocery stores and warehouse clubs in lieu of traditional supermarkets, their priorities shifting in pursuit of a good deal. Look to social media to see the change, where creators regularly post their favorite finds at Aldi or meals they've made entirely from ingredients bought at Costco. In the process, Lempert said, discounters have invested in improving their food and beverage offerings, shaking off any lackluster reputations they may have had in the past and ushering in a new generation of cost-conscious consumers.

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Berlin sceptikal as Putin proposes Germany's ex-chancellor Schroeder as Ukraine mediator

Russian President Vladimir Putin has proposed longtime ally and friend, former German chancellor Gerhard Schroeder, as mediator in the Ukraine war – an idea that has been met with scepticism in Berlin. Asked on Saturday who he would like to help restart talks with Europe, Putin said he would "personally" prefer Schroeder, who led Germany from 1998 to 2005. Schroeder, 82, has remained close to the Kremlin leader long after leaving office, standing apart from most Western leaders since Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022. German officials reacted cautiously, saying they had "taken note" of Putin's comments but viewed them as part of "a series of bogus offers" from Russia, government sources told AFP Sunday.

One source said a real test of Moscow's intentions would be to extend the current three-day truce. Schroeder's stance has made him a controversial figure at home. He has never publicly condemned the invasion of Ukraine, costing him several privileges normally granted to former chancellors. He previously held key roles in Russian energy projects, including work on the Nord Stream gas pipelines and a seat on the board of Russian oil firm Rosneft, which he gave up in 2022. Some German politicians from Schroeder's own SPD party – a junior partner in Germany's coalition government – say this makes him unsuitable for any mediator role. Michael Roth, former SPD lawmaker and chair of the foreign affairs committee, said a mediator "cannot be Putin's buddy", in an interview with Tagesspiegel. He stressed that any mediator must above all be accepted by Ukraine. "Neither Moscow nor we can decide that on Kyiv's behalf."

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Lead Stories

‘It will forever change who we are’: Rural Texans brace for data center invasion

Ryan Mote gestures to the property line between land that has been in his family for 100 years and the grounds of what is slated to become a data center campus. The parcels are separated by a welded wire fence barely visible against the brown-green grassland of Young County, about 90 miles from Fort Worth. Lake Graham glistens in the distance. At full capacity, 15 data center buildings on land the size of 657 football fields would become the neighbor Mote never wanted. “This is not good for our community,” Mote said. “It will forever change who we are.” Mote’s primary concerns aren’t aesthetics. He’s worried about the center moving in with the help of tax breaks and without a public vote. He’s worried about a lack of oversight and the effects on the environment and the health of people and wildlife.

He’s worried about water and electric demands that come with a project of its scale. These are the same issues being raised across rural Texas as the state’s business-friendly environment and lack of regulations — the same qualities that attract many to country life — fuel an expansion of server farms from the Panhandle to the Valley. Those traits coupled with Texas’ geography and favorable weather have long been magnets for the latest industry and infrastructure of the day: railroads, highways, oil rigs, wind and solar farms. Now, in the midst of an artificial intelligence boom, it’s data centers. To some, the data centers are an inevitable part of our future and an economic opportunity that can’t be ignored as the global AI race accelerates. To others, they’re a nuisance at best and at worst they’re noisy health and environmental hazards that destroy land and livelihoods. For Mote, one of an estimated 4.2 million to 7 million people living in rural Texas, and others like him, data centers could be a future neighbor — just not without a fight. “Country living is a whole different feeling,” Mote said. “It is based in God and community and love for the land and the resources around you. I just think there’s a different mentality — that you wouldn’t necessarily see the same fight at the city level that you would at the rural level.”

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CPS Energy pilot targets Texas data center power demand

The rapidly increasing pressure to provide electricity for data centers and other high-demand users could be eased by a CPS Energy pilot program that encourages energy-hungry customers to bring their own generation. The program — and others under consideration by the statewide electric grid operator — is a response to demand that’s projected to increase nearly 400% across Texas by the end of the decade as the state attracts more of the computing power needed for artificial intelligence and other aspects of today’s digital world. “We’ve been anticipating that we may need some new tools to help customers’ desire, as well as things that are being contemplated at the state level,” said Elaina Ball, CPS Energy’s chief strategy officer. “This pilot is one of the solutions that we’ve been pursuing.”

The effort by San Antonio’s city-owned utility is a microcosm of trends in the energy sector, she said, which have state grid operator the Electric Reliability Council of Texas also grappling with sharp growth in both commercial and residential demand. The Austin-San Antonio area is in the crosshairs as some forecasts suggest it could be the world’s top data center market by 2030. Though experts suggest that only a fraction of the facilities on the waiting list to connect to the grid will actually be built, its growing backlog of requests is forcing ERCOT to overhaul its processes and experiment with new ideas. CPS Energy’s new service option is a natural response, Ball said. Under its pilot, CPS will provide natural gas for industrial users that bring their own energy generation. In return, data centers and other so-called large loads could connect more quickly to ERCOT’s statewide grid. Ball pitched the behind-the-meter generation pilot to the City Council in early March, saying it would “help exercise someone else’s capital to provide grid flexibility.” “When customers bring their own generation, it does help the grid,” she said in an interview. “We’ve got less demand on the system. During times of tight demand, customers will be able to self-provide their power, which lessens the burden on the rest of the grid.”

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How Republicans gained an edge on the midterm House map over 10 days

Just two weeks ago, Democrats felt increasingly emboldened about taking control of the House in November after seeming to fight the redistricting wars to a draw. But two court rulings — one by the Supreme Court and another by Virginia’s top court — and an aggressive new push by red states to carve up congressional maps have delivered the Republican Party its biggest burst of momentum in many months. Put bluntly, Republicans have roughly 10 more House seats that favor them than they did just 10 days ago, and Democrats are suddenly grappling with a new landscape. “This is now clearly closer than it was just a week and a half ago,” Representative Brendan Boyle, a Pennsylvania Democrat, said of his party’s chances to retake the House. Democrats are still widely seen as favored to win the House this fall. Republicans face a daunting political climate, saddled with President Trump’s sagging approval ratings, high gas prices and an unpopular war with Iran. In special elections and last year’s races for governor, Democratic enthusiasm has swamped Republican turnout.

governor, Democratic enthusiasm has swamped Republican turnout. “I was anticipating about a 15-to-20-seat pickup before the last week and a half,” Mr. Boyle said. “Now I would be anticipating a 10-to-15-seat pickup.” That would be more than enough to wrest the majority from Republicans, who are clinging to a current edge of 217 to 212 seats. And history is not on Republicans’ side: The party in power almost always loses seats in midterm elections. But after the latest map changes, winning the House majority will require Democrats to flip more seats in less hospitable territory. Bullish Republicans feel they are back in the game. “Lord grant me humility,” James Blair, the Republican strategist who is overseeing Mr. Trump’s political operation in the midterms, wrote on X on Friday after Virginia’s top court struck down a recently enacted map meant to give Democrats four extra House seats. One of Speaker Mike Johnson’s senior political aides interrupted the middle of a meeting in Texas, where the Republican leader was on a fund-raising swing, to break the news, according to two people with knowledge of the conversation. Mr. Johnson later celebrated on the phone with Glenn Youngkin, the former Republican governor of Virginia, who had opposed the Democratic effort to redraw the state’s lines.

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Railroad Commission runoff exposes bitter divide in Texas oil industry

For some oilmen, there’s only one thing they need to know about Bo French: He isn’t Jim Wright, the Railroad Commission’s incumbent chairman and French’s competition in a Republican primary runoff later this month. “I can't support Jim Wright, because Jim Wright makes rules that are silly for lots and lots and lots of operators,” said Lance Thomas, manager of Albany-based Stasney Well Service. French’s political campaign may have little to do with oil and gas — he has said far more publicly about Muslims and DEI — but it was an oil and gas policy that helped set the stage for his battle against Wright to lead the state regulatory agency. Wright’s efforts to lead reforms at the commission, which oversees oil and gas extraction in Texas, have not landed well with many small-scale oil companies.

In fact, Stasney is suing the Railroad Commission over a new set of rules about how oil operators manage onsite waste pits. They require permits and, in many cases, adding synthetic liners meant to protect groundwater from drilling waste often containing residual oil, wastewater and radioactive material. volumes of oil and waste that are triggering the need for more regulation. Low-volume wells like theirs aren’t threatening groundwater — at least not in his area, where there is no groundwater to protect, Thomas said. While smaller companies like Stasney are waging war against Wright over “one-size fits all” solutions that threaten their businesses, big oil companies are working with Wright to wage a war of their own. They need a technological breakthrough and a friendly regulator to help them find a new way to dispose of massive volumes of super-salty water that pour from the ground with every barrel of their oil. Their existing method of handling it — injecting it underground — is resulting in a rash of leaking wells, earthquakes and geysers that threaten not only Texas groundwater, but the future of the oil industry.

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State Department reviewing all Mexican consulates in U.S. as tensions grow

The State Department is initiating a review of all 53 Mexican consulates operating in the United States, a U.S. official told CBS News on Thursday, in a move that could lead Secretary of State Marco Rubio to consider ordering the closure of some diplomatic offices. The review comes as bilateral tensions build over security cooperation and cartel violence, and it follows the deaths of two American CIA officers after a counter-narcotics operation in northern Mexico last month. A State Department official said the review is part of a broader effort to align U.S. foreign policy with the Trump administration's priorities.

Dylan Johnson, assistant secretary of state for global public affairs, said the "Department of State is constantly reviewing all aspects of American foreign relations to ensure they are in line with the President's America First foreign policy agenda and advance American interests." Mexico maintains the largest foreign consular network in the United States, with offices that provide documentation and legal aid to millions of Mexican citizens living across the country. Most are concentrated in border states and cities with large Mexican American populations, including California, Texas and Arizona. In recent years, U.S. consulate closures have usually reflected rising tensions with rival countries rather than routine diplomatic changes. In 2020, as relations between Washington and Beijing worsened, the Trump administration ordered China's consulate in Houston to close, citing concerns over espionage and intellectual property theft. In 2017, the U.S. ordered Russia to close its consulate in San Francisco, along with diplomatic facilities in Washington and New York, in response to Moscow expelling American diplomats.

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State Stories

Mihaela Plesa: Texas doesn’t have many real elections anymore. The Supreme Court just made it worse

(Mihaela Plesa represents the 70th district in the Texas House of Representatives.) I represent Texas House District 70, covering much of Plano and parts of Far North Dallas, Richardson and Allen. It’s one of the few truly competitive districts left in Texas. In 2024, my race was decided by 4.44 percentage points, one of the closest Texas House races in the state. I do not see that as a political burden — I see it as a governing responsibility. In a competitive district, you cannot take voters for granted. You cannot only talk to people who already agree with you. You have to show up in schools, chambers of commerce, neighborhood meetings, town halls, community events and living rooms. You have to listen to people who voted for you and people who did not. You have to explain your votes. You have to earn trust over and over again.

That is how representative government is supposed to work. The Supreme Court’s decision in Louisiana v. Callais makes that harder. The court struck down Louisiana’s congressional map as an unconstitutional racial gerrymander and held that the Voting Rights Act did not require the state to create an additional majority-minority district. The ruling does not erase the Voting Rights Act, but it narrows one of the tools communities have used for generations to challenge discriminatory maps and demand fair representation. Texans should care because redistricting decides more than the shape of a district. It decides whether lawmakers have to listen to the full community they represent, or whether they can hide inside districts drawn to protect them. Texas has already seen what happens when competitive districts disappear. In 2024, only nine of 150 Texas House races were decided by less than 10 points. Most Texans now live in districts where the real political fight is not the general election. It is the primary. And when the primary becomes the only election that matters, the legislative process changes. Lawmakers stop asking, “What does my whole district need?” and start asking, “What will keep me safe from a primary challenge?”

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The new North Texas Banking Order

Y’all Street is here. The concrete might still be drying and the steel beams still exposed, but the financial infrastructure is taking shape—fast. Goldman Sachs is building a $700 million, 5,000-employee campus in Uptown as part of its growing Dallas presence. Bank of America is developing a new tower near Klyde Warren Park that will house 1,000 employees. Scotiabank’s new Victory Park office is expected to bring more than 1,000 jobs. And Morgan Stanley is reportedly exploring a 500,000-square-foot lease in Uptown—roughly twice the size of Bank of America’s footprint.

The public markets are here, too. The New York Stock Exchange Texas is open for business, landing early dual listings from companies like AT&T, Vistra Corp., Arcosa, Cinemark, HF Sinclair, and D.R. Horton. Nasdaq launched its own Texas dual-listing program in March with JB Hunt, APA Corp., and Huntington Bancshares. And the Texas Stock Exchange—the upstart that forced Wall Street’s hand to launch the aforementioned markets—plans to begin trading this July. Against that backdrop, Dallas’ banking landscape is consolidating. Over the last year, three of North Texas’ most recognizable banks have been swept into major transactions. Fifth Third Bancorp acquired Comerica in a deal valued at $10.9 billion and Vista Bank and Veritex Bank both merged into larger institutions. Malcolm Holland sold Veritex—the bank he founded in 2010 and grew into a $13 billion-asset institution—to Huntington Bancshares for $1.9 billion. National Bank Holdings acquired John Steinmetz’s Vista Bank, which had $2.5 billion in assets at the time of the deal, for $377.4 million. It’s an era of consolidation that Curt Farmer—former Comerica CEO and now vice chairman of Fifth Third—says he saw coming when the current administration took office. “We perceived a change in regulatory receptivity,” Farmer says. “Interest rates began to stabilize, inflation became more manageable, credit conditions were favorable, and we’ve been in a very benign credit environment. As an $80 billion bank, we had a lot of capabilities, but we didn’t have the scale of some of our competitors.”

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Nvidia, Corning's factory plans could mean thousands of jobs in Austin

The world's most valuable company might bring thousands of jobs to Austin as Nvidia ups its investment in Texas. Artificial intelligence chipmaker Nvidia Corp. and glassmaker Corning Inc. announced plans to build three new plants dedicated to manufacturing light and glass technologies for AI manufacturing in North Carolina and Texas.

The companies, which both have significant business ties to the Austin area, promised to create more than 3,000 jobs at the factories. "(Nvidia's) commitment is directly fueling the expansion of our U.S. manufacturing footprint and creating more than 3,000 new, high-paying jobs for American workers," Corning CEO Wendell Weeks said in the announcement. "This partnership is proof that AI is not just a technology story. It is a manufacturing story, and it is happening here in the United States." It is unclear where in Texas and North Carolina these factories will be built, and both companies declined to specify locations.

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Kaye Stripling, former HISD superintendent, dies at 85

Kaye Stripling, a former Houston ISD's superintendent who was known for her advocacy for teachers, died Saturday at 85. Stripling joined the school district in 1964 at Lee Elementary School as a special education teacher. She taught at Losscan and Atherton elementary schools before serving as principal at Burbank Elementary, Parker Elementary, West University Elementary and Pershing Middle School. She was appointed to various administrative roles before succeeding Superintendent Rod Paige to the district's top position in 2001. Stripling, who lived in the Houston area, received a bachelor's degree from Texas Woman's University in 1962, and earned her master's degree and doctorate in education at the University of Houston, specializing in special education.

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Texas made more complaints about Bad Bunny's Super Bowl halftime show to the FCC than any other state

Texans had more to say than residents of any other state about Super Bowl LX and Bad Bunny's halftime show, according to the Federal Communications Commission — and they said it with great conviction. According to a Dallas Morning News analysis of complaints made to the FCC regarding the broadcast, which the agency released on its website Friday, no state filed more complaints than Texas did, with more than 10% of the 2,157 complaints originating here. "It was a disgrace and an embarrassment for US all," one person wrote from Dallas.

Filing a complaint from Plano with a subject line, "Violent Horror Advertisement During Family Broadcast," another person wrote: "While I do not speak Spanish, how in the world could anyone let Bad Bunny be broadcast, saying the things that he did, without it being censored?" Identifying themselves as a Texan from the city of "none of your business," the author of another complaint emphasized how little of the show they could bring themselves to watch. "so much for an all American sport and entertainment. that was disgraceful, inappropriate and disgusting!!!!" that complainant wrote. "at least the 5 seconds i watched because i was so offended." According to The News' analysis, Fort Worth, Austin and San Antonio led in complaints with eight each of the 226 total people who identified themselves as Texans. Houston came in fourth, with six. Four of the complaints came from Dallas. More than 40% of the Texas complaints — 92 — mentioned Bad Bunny by name. That matched the percentage of total complaints who mentioned him nationally. About 30% used the word "vulgar" and 14% found the performance "disgusting."

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Amanda McAfee: Texas' childcare investments pay off

(Amanda McAfee is President/CEO of the Lubbock Area United Way.) At Lubbock Area United Way, we spend a lot of time listening to South Plains parents — hearing both what’s hard and what’s working for their families. One theme comes up again and again: access to high-quality, affordable childcare can change everything. When parents have reliable childcare — whether that’s a preschool, a church program, a grandparent, or a trusted neighbor running a home-based center — they can show up for work. That might mean putting on a tie, a uniform, or their well-worn work boots. Either way, it’s how parents provide for their families today and build toward a more stable future. And quality childcare doesn’t just matter for parents. It matters just as much for children — the kids who will someday be our doctors, nurses, teachers, police officers, business owners, and community leaders right here in West Texas.

We want those children to walk into their first day of kindergarten confident, curious, and ready to learn — not already playing catch-up. That’s why our local school districts asked United Way’s School Ready 806 Coalition to focus on strategies that help more children in our communities arrive at school truly “kindergarten-ready.” Research shows there are six key areas in which children benefit from strong early experiences between birth and age 4: literacy, language, math, self-care, motor skills, and social-emotional development. Parents are, of course, a child’s very first and most important teacher. But for the many parents who must work to make ends meet, high-quality childcare is also a critical piece of the puzzle. In a quality childcare setting, children gather on the carpet with trained teachers for story time. They practice counting, learn their letters, and figure out how to share and play with others. These everyday moments add up — laying the foundation for success in kindergarten and beyond. Too often, though, quality childcare is simply out of reach. In some cases, it costs more than tuition at Texas Tech. That price reflects a tough reality: childcare requires skilled, hands-on, nurturing professionals doing work that can’t (and probably shouldn’t) be automated

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Waco’s “Baby Whisperer” has her murder conviction reversed again

Marian Fraser, the former Waco day care owner who is serving a fifty-year sentence for allegedly killing a four-month-old with a fatal dose of Benadryl, may get a third trial. On Wednesday, Texas’s Seventh Court of Appeals, in Amarillo, reversed Fraser’s 2023 felony-murder conviction. The court ruled that Fraser was found guilty based in part on evidence obtained through an illegal search warrant. This is the second time the 62-year-old Fraser has had her conviction overturned. She was originally tried for Clara Felton’s death in 2015. A Waco jury found her guilty and sentenced her to fifty years in prison. Two years later, an appellate court reversed that conviction after finding that the judge’s instructions to the jury had been slanted in favor of the prosecution. The McLennan County district attorney put her on trial again in 2023, winning another guilty verdict and another fifty-year sentence.

Prosecutors plan to appeal the Amarillo court’s decision to the Court of Criminal Appeals, Texas’s highest court for criminal matters. “While we are disappointed with the Amarillo Court of Appeals’ ruling, we still firmly believe that Marian Fraser’s conviction should be affirmed,” the DA’s office wrote in a statement provided to Texas Monthly. “We therefore look forward to continuing the appeal by asking the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals to review the case.” The previous reversal survived a similar appeal, and the high court has been consistently skeptical of Fraser’s prosecution for felony murder. Her conviction hinged on whether giving diphenhydramine, the active ingredient in Benadryl, to a child under age two constituted an “act clearly dangerous to human life.” During a hearing last June, several of the judges tore into McLennan County’s appellate lawyer. “I had two small children at one point, and I gave them Benadryl all the time,” said Judge David Newell. “So it’s hard to see why giving Benadryl, in and of itself, would be clearly dangerous to human life.” Because Fraser’s conviction was overturned on procedural grounds, she can be put on trial for a third time. In its statement, the McLennan County DA’s office left no doubt that it intends to do so. “Should justice ultimately require it, we will absolutely try Fraser again for killing Clara Felton. The fight for Baby Clara and her family is ongoing and we will continue using every tool the law provides to hold Fraser accountable.”

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Psychedelic treatments are on the verge of FDA approval. Why Texas is pushing for them, and how Texans could gain access

Psychedelic treatments are moving closer to federal approval, with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration taking steps to fast-track several compounds under review. The agency recently said three companies will receive National Priority Vouchers to speed their psychedelic drugs through the approval process. These include two psilocybin compounds for treatment-resistant depression and major depressive disorder, and methylone, a drug similar to MDMA, for post-traumatic stress disorder. Each previously received Breakthrough Therapy designation, which the FDA awards to therapies for serious conditions that demonstrate a substantial improvement over currently available therapies.

That announcement came one week after President Donald Trump signed a psychedelics executive order, which signaled the federal government’s support for states, including Texas, that are working to create access for psychedelic treatments that show promise for addressing life-threatening conditions, but are currently illegal in the U.S. Psilocybin, MDMA, LSD, 5-MeO-DMT, and ibogaine are among the psychedelic compounds being studied in FDA clinical trials for mental and behavioral health conditions. Many researchers believe that psychedelics promote healing by inducing the brain’s ability to change and form new neural connections. In combination with therapy, they may help people develop new ways of thinking and processing trauma. Lynnette Averill, PhD, told Texas Public Radio that psychedelic-assisted therapy involves one or a few psychedelic experiences which support ongoing therapy, and the effects are felt quickly, within hours to days. Averill, who leads a psilocybin clinical trial at Baylor College of Medicine and the Menninger Clinic, said this differs from daily antidepressants, which generally take weeks or months to help patients feel better, if at all.

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HISD under federal investigation over plans to restructure special education services

The U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights has opened an investigation into Houston ISD to determine whether the district is violating the rights of students with disabilities after it unveiled plans to restructure the way special education services are delivered. This week, after Houston Public Media reported on leaked draft documents outlining their plan, district leaders confirmed they planned to consolidate special education services to certain campuses beginning in 2026-27. The move would require some students to be transferred from their neighborhood school to another school in the district that would be tapped as a hub to provide a variety of special education services.

"Public schools are required – to the maximum extent appropriate — to ensure that children with disabilities are educated alongside their nondisabled peers and to follow specific procedures when making placement decisions about how and where children with disabilities are educated," the education department stated in a Friday news release announcing the investigation. Houston ISD, the largest school district in Texas that has been under state control since 2023, defended its forthcoming changes in a Friday night statement while noting that 15,000 of its more than 21,000 students in special education “are served in inclusive settings.” The district also said that for the roughly 5,000 students “primarily served in self-contained settings, families can expect small class sizes, low adult-to-student ratios to support specialized instruction, and placement with similar-age peers.” HISD added that special education services will be available at more than half of its campuses. “Any review will show that all special education updates for the 2026–27 school year focus on increasing access to services in the least restrictive environment, strengthening systems to improve the quality of instruction, and improving student outcomes,” HISD also said in its statement.

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From banking to conservation, nonprofit leader is celebrated for preserving land in Texas

Anne Brown had tears in her eyes as she recalled when Merrill Gregg’s resume landed on her desk at the Texas Parks and Wildlife Foundation 10 years ago. From working for Goldman Sachs in Hong Kong, Gregg made a life-changing decision to turn to a career in conservation, said Brown, the foundation’s executive director. Merrill committed 110% to making a difference in conserving Texas’ natural land, Brown said. She hopes people understand the magnitude of her dedication. “I’m so proud to call you a colleague and a friend,” Brown said to Gregg. Since joining the state organization in 2016, Gregg went from focusing on major gifts and donations to leading in land conservations, developing conservation finance models and managing the foundation’s investment portfolio.

Gregg’s accomplishments earned her recognition at the Fort World Wild! event Wednesday, hosted and awarded by the Friends of the Fort Worth Nature Center & Refuge. Every year, the nonprofit honors an individual for their work and dedication in urban conservation. As Fort Worth grows, the community’s well-being depends on natural areas to make the city an enjoyable place to live, Gregg said. “I’m so proud to be a Fort Worthian and to be part of this community,” she said. “I’m super excited about what we will continue to accomplish together.” Although Gregg previously worked in banking, a daily routine in nature wasn’t completely new to her. She reminisced on growing up on her family’s farm in Virginia, where she often rode her pony and explored nearby streams. Gregg’s background in finance helped in her transition to protecting natural spaces. She arrived at a time when the foundation was navigating different approaches to funding conservation projects. The 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill prompted the organization to think about how to acquire large sources of funding without added costs — such as interest — while ensuring dollars are allocated across much-needed conservation projects. Since joining the foundation, Gregg helped parks and wildlife officials collect and allocate $10 million in loans to protect 3,500 acres across the state. But her dedication to conservation doesn’t stop there. Gregg made it a goal to give back to Fort Worth in smaller ways.

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‘Liberty or die’: Comal GOP arson suspect indicted by federal grand jury

A federal grand jury indicted a 22-year-old woman Wednesday on a charge of “actual and attempted malicious damage by fire to property involved in interstate or foreign commerce” for allegedly throwing a burning magazine into the Comal County Republican Party’s headquarters on Jan. 14. Grace Carol Brown also faces felony charges of terrorism, arson and burglary of a building in Comal County court. KXAN reached out to Brown’s attorneys Friday afternoon for their comments on the case.

A press release issued Friday by the U.S. Attorney for the Western District of Texas, Justin R. Simmons, says that the building also contained two commercial businesses. These include a storage company and a used car dealer. A redacted version of the indictment, obtained by KXAN through court records, claims that Brown allegedly “displayed antipathy towards the goals and activities of” the Comal County Republican Party and federal immigration enforcement. “This antipathy extended to…. Immigration and Custom Enforcement (ICE) and certain Executive Branch officials, including the President of the United States, whom she referred to as “Enemies of The US Constitution,'” the indictment says. The indictment also claims that Brown allegedly “expressed support” for “anti-government principles espoused by the domestic terrorist organization ‘ANTIFA.'” As to the alleged crime, it accuses Brown of allegedly breaking one of the building’s windows before throwing a backpack and a burning magazine inside the building. According to Simmons’ press release, the backpack “allegedly contained, among other items, one container of ethanol, two containers of gasoline, a lighter and matches.”

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National Stories

The man trying to make Trump’s tariffs go on forever

Jamieson Greer is a trade lawyer. He is a well-respected trade lawyer. He was chosen by President Donald Trump to be the country’s top trade lawyer: the U.S. Trade Representative. He is not a member of a union. He is not a welder. He is not a manufacturer. He is definitely not a salesman. But here he is one cloudy morning on a factory floor in Michigan, in front of an American flag that could hide an elephant, selling the administration’s trade agenda in one of the most important political states in the country with a man hoping to become its next governor. And that man just went soft on the core tenet of Trump’s efforts to reshape global trade. “We don’t want the tariffs to go on forever,” said Rep. John James (R-Mich.). “We want reciprocal tariffs. We want fair trade.”

Greer stares off at a machine in the distance. He’s heard a similar line from tariff-skittish Republicans before — that the tariffs are a tool, a way to get countries to open markets and expand exports, and then they will come down. But those reassurances contradict his daily reality: His boss does want tariffs to go on forever. And he’s made it Greer’s job to ensure they do. Trump has never hidden his love of tariffs. But his second term has seen the so-called “Tariff Man” unleashed, with a trade policy defined by a fire-from-the hip approach that’s upended global markets. He immediately set about imposing tariffs on three of the country’s top trading partners — China, Canada and Mexico — and quickly followed with “Liberation Day,” when he imposed duties on goods from nearly every country in the world in the hopes that it would end the alleged global exploitation of American commerce and mark the beginning of a grand resurgence in domestic manufacturing. He justified those tariffs with the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, which allows the president to regulate trade during a national emergency. The trade deficit between the U.S. and other countries, Trump said, constituted such an emergency. But the law had never been used for that purpose and doesn’t explicitly mention tariffs. In April, the Supreme Court ruled that it couldn’t be used that way at all, striking down the cornerstone of Trump’s economic agenda.

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Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy returns to reality TV roots, sparking criticism and questions

Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy’s new reality show, filmed with his family over the last seven months, has sparked criticism amid high gas prices, in addition to raising ethics questions. Duffy said that costs for the five-part series titled “The Great American Road Trip,” which will air for free on YouTube ahead of America’s 250th birthday, were paid for by a nonprofit, the Great American Road Trip Inc., and that “zero taxpayer dollars were spent on my family.” He said his family did not receive a salary or production royalties. The project’s sponsors, according to its website, include Boeing, Shell, Toyota, United Airlines and Royal Caribbean — all companies that intersect with the Department of Transportation.

“As everyday Americans struggle with the price of gas and raise concerns about airline safety, the Secretary announces that he spent work time going on a road trip that appears to have been funded by the very industries his agency oversees,” Donald K. Sherman, the president of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, said in a statement. This show brings Duffy and his wife, Fox News host Rachel Campos-Duffy, back to their entertainment roots. The pair, who have nine children together, met while filming the MTV reality show “Road Rules: All Stars.” “To love America is to see America,” Duffy says in the trailer that released Friday. “It’s one of the most powerful ways to understand the vast, beautiful, complicated place we call home,” he says over video of destinations spanning from sweeping fields to bustling cities. The Duffy family said they filmed the show one to two days at a time over the course of seven months. Trip activities included running up the Rocky Steps at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, snowmobiling in Montana, and a stop at “The Real World: Boston” house where Duffy first gained reality television fame.

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Trump administration’s new wildfire agency preps for fire season

Across the country, wildland firefighters are staring down what could be one of the most severe fire seasons in recent history. Among those figuring out how to prepare is the U.S. Wildland Fire Service, a brand new agency created by the Trump administration. "We're dry and we're expecting the pace to pick up significantly here any time," said the recently appointed head of that service, Brian Fennessy, in an interview with NPR's All Things Considered host Emily Feng. The agency is a product of an ongoing White House effort to combine all the parts of the federal government that fight fires.

"We're trying to bring on additional aircraft and bring them on early," he said. The agency is also bringing on more fire crews earlier in the year. Some wildfire experts, like Park Williams at the University of California, Los Angeles, say they want the government to do more preventative work that could stop a major fire instead of narrowly focusing on suppressing those that ignite. "If we don't want fires to be growing so large that they have catastrophic consequences for people and ecosystems, then the best tool we have at our disposal is large prescribed fires," Williams said.

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A deadly cruise ship outbreak exposes travel’s blind spot

The chef on the expedition vessel Hondius filmed it all. Tuna steaks sizzling on a flat-top grill. Lobster pulled from volcanic reefs. A crew drawn from nine countries gathered around a table in Ushuaia, Argentina, raising glasses before setting off into the South Atlantic. “Next stop: the deep blue,” Khabir Moraes wrote in a Facebook post. Ten days later, people on that same ship began dying. A hantavirus outbreak tied to the Dutch-flagged vessel has left three passengers dead and five others ill, with cases now spanning continents, including a patient in intensive care in South Africa and another being treated in Switzerland after leaving the voyage earlier. Almost 150 passengers and crew remain isolated on board as the ship sails toward the Canary Islands, where authorities are preparing to screen them and determine when they can disembark.

The outbreak is still being pieced together. But the setting — a small ship moving through some of the most remote, wildlife-rich parts of the planet — is already familiar to epidemiologists. It’s the kind of journey where infections can incubate silently, only to surface mid-voyage, far from hospitals and across multiple jurisdictions. That’s the blind spot: infections that start out of sight and surface too late to be contained in one place. Expedition cruises promise access to places few people ever reach: Antarctica, sub-Antarctic islands, isolated communities scattered across the South Atlantic. They’ve become one of the fastest-growing corners of the travel industry, built on the appeal of proximity to wildlife and landscapes largely untouched by mass tourism. (The number of passengers landing on the Antarctic Peninsula reached almost 80,000 last season, up from about 54,000 before the pandemic, according to industry data.) But those same features can complicate the way diseases are detected and contained. Passengers move through environments where animal-borne pathogens circulate. They spend days or weeks together in close quarters. And by the time symptoms appear, the ship may be thousands of miles from where exposure occurred.

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Passengers begin to disembark cruise ship hit by hantavirus

Passengers are disembarking the cruise ship at the center of the hantavirus outbreak, Spain’s Ministry of Health said, in a carefully managed repatriation operation in Tenerife involving multiple nations. All passengers still aboard the vessel were screened Sunday and did not show symptoms, according to health authorities. Since the vessel departed Argentina last month, the deaths of three people have been linked to hantavirus — a rare disease typically caused by exposure to infected rats’ urine or feces. It remains a low risk to the general public, according to the World Health Organization, which also emphasized how the virus differs from Covid-19. The operation has caused tensions in the Canary Islands, an autonomous community of Spain. The territory’s leader said last week that he opposed the ship docking. Meanwhile, British medics parachuted onto a remote Atlantic island to treat a UK national with suspected hantavirus, who left the ship weeks before the outbreak became clear.

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Trump's Truth Social lays bare narrow obsessions of an extremely online president

On March 1, the day after U.S. forces bombed Iran and began a war that's now more than nine weeks long, President Trump posted 30 times on Truth Social. Just after midnight, he posted about the bombing campaign, including a threat to retaliate if Iran itself retaliated ("THEY BETTER NOT DO THAT"). But he soon had a lot more on his mind; mid-morning, he posted a video portraying Senator Mitch McConnell as the floppy, deceased Bernie from Weekend at Bernie's. He posted a Tiktok video praising his State of the Union – a speech he had given five days prior – then reposted that video, along with a screenshot of a post on the social media site X. Just after noon, he posted an update on the war ("we have destroyed and sunk 9 Iranian Naval Ships, some of them relatively large and important").

Mid-afternoon, he posted a string of Trump-friendly news coverage, including a New York Post article from September 2024 about how Lady Gaga's father endorsed Trump in the presidential race. Shortly thereafter, in the span of five minutes, he posted 10 times, all of them lists of screenshots of praise from X users for his State of the Union address. He later posted a video update about the war in Iran, followed by a video marked as being from an Instagram user called @truthaboutfluoride, purporting to show San Francisco as a run-down city filled with poverty. During his first presidential campaign, Trump's constant stream of seemingly unvetted tweets was a sideshow that quickly became inescapable – the boasts, insults, and lies at times hijacked news cycles. Once he was elected, they presented a new frontier in American politics: a real-time view into a president's mind. Ten years, one Twitter ejection, one Twitter return, and a move to Truth Social later, Trump's posts still make news – like when he announces a war or tries to pick a fight with the pope – but for many have become the background noise of American politics.

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North Korea updates constitution to require automatic nuclear strike if Kim Jong Un is assassinated: report

North Korea has updated its constitution to require a retaliatory nuclear strike if leader Kim Jong Un is assassinated, according to a report. The Telegraph reported the change comes amid heightened global tensions following the killing of Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and other officials during a recent conflict. Khamenei was killed in an Israeli strike in Tehran as part of a coordinated U.S.-Israeli military operation earlier this year, Fox News Digital previously reported. The constitutional revision was approved during a session of North Korea’s Supreme People’s Assembly, which opened March 22 in Pyongyang, the outlet said.

South Korea’s National Intelligence Service (NIS) briefed senior government officials this week on the update, according to the report. The revised policy outlines procedures for retaliatory action if North Korea’s leadership is incapacitated or killed. "If the command-and-control system over the state’s nuclear forces is placed in danger by hostile forces’ attacks … a nuclear strike shall be launched automatically and immediately," the updated provision states. Reuters previously reported that North Korea revised its constitution to define its territory as bordering South Korea and remove references to reunification, reflecting Kim’s push to formally treat the two Koreas as separate states. That marked the first time North Korea included a territorial clause in its constitution. Last month, Kim pledged to further strengthen the country’s nuclear capabilities while maintaining a hard-line stance toward South Korea, which he has called the "most hostile" state.

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Lead Stories

Consumers are ‘running out of money’ and cutting back, CEOs warn

Executives across retail, restaurants and packaged goods are increasingly worried about US shoppers with tighter budgets amid surging gas prices caused by the conflict in the Middle East. “They’re literally running out of money at the end of the month,” Kraft Heinz Co. Chief Executive Officer Steve Cahillane said in an interview this week. “We’re seeing negative cash flows in the lower-income brackets where they’re dipping into savings.” Since the pandemic, Americans have continued to spend at surprising levels despite high inflation, keeping the US economy growing and thwarting recession fears. But rising fuel costs might be too much to overcome. “The war in Iran amplified consumer concerns about the cost of living,” Whirlpool Corp. CEO Marc Bitzer said Thursday on a call with analysts.

The maker of washers and dryers said it’s counting on purchases picking up after a harsh US winter slowed shopping, but the war caused a collapse in consumer sentiment. The company described the resulting 15% hit to industry demand as similar to the global financial crisis in the aughts. In fast food, McDonald’s Corp. CEO Chris Kempczinski said confidence among shoppers isn’t improving and may be getting worse. The company cited “heightened anxiety” and gas prices that disproportionately impact low-income consumers. Sit-down dining is also taking a hit. “Our price-sensitive, more value-oriented guests seem to be staying home a bit more,” Dine Brands Global Inc. CEO John Peyton said on an earnings call this week. The company, which owns the Applebee’s and IHOP chains, said it hasn’t seen a similar pullback in other income levels. Eyewear retailer Warby Parker Inc. said younger shoppers are feeling the pinch from higher-than-usual unemployment and student debt bills. Gas prices, now at $4.56 a gallon on average, are at their highest levels since July 2022, according to data from the American Automobile Association. As shoppers put more of their income toward fuel, they have less money for discretionary spending like eating out. Enlarged tax refunds helped blunt some of the impact, but sentiment has still soured to a record low.

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Mayor John Whitmire unanimously endorsed by Houston police union PAC for reelection

A month after the president of the Houston Police Officers Union implied he wouldn’t support Mayor John Whitmire's reelection bid next year, the union's political action committee unanimously voted to endorse him Thursday. “HPOU stands with Mayor Whitmire because he stands with Houston police officers and the communities we proudly serve,” the union wrote on social media. “He has also shown a willingness to make tough decisions and take on the long-term issues facing our city instead of kicking the can down the road." Neither the union nor the mayor's office immediately responded to requests for comment Thursday afternoon. Whitmire's office has not responded to requests for comment from the Houston Chronicle since August.

Whitmire for decades has been a close ally of the union, which endorsed his initial run for mayor in 2023. Whitmire then negotiated a five-year contract giving police officers raises of 36.5% at a cost to the city of almost $1 billion. The context made HPOU's recent rift with the mayor over the city's work with federal immigration agents notable. Whitmire initially supported an ordinance the council passed last month limiting police cooperation with U.S. Immigration & Customs Enforcement. After the vote, HPOU president Doug Griffith said the union wouldn’t support any council members who voted for the ICE ordinance, and told Houston Public Media "that will include the mayor." The union quickly changed course, however, saying endorsements would be made by its political action committee. Whitmire later pushed the council to amend its ICE ordinance after Gov. Greg Abbott threatened to pull $114 million in public safety grants if the city did not act. The Houston Police Department has now returned to the ICE policy it used last year, before the issue roiled City Hall this spring.

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U.S. intelligence says Iran can outlast Trump’s Hormuz blockade for months

A confidential CIA analysis delivered to administration policymakers this week concludes that Iran can survive the U.S. naval blockade for at least three to four months before facing more severe economic hardship, four people familiar with the document said, a finding that appears to raise new questions about President Donald Trump’s optimism on ending the war. The analysis by the U.S. intelligence community, whose secret assessments on Iran have often been more sober than the administration’s public statements, also found that Tehran retains significant ballistic missile capabilities despite weeks of intense U.S. and Israeli bombardment, three of the people familiar with it said. Iran retains about 75 percent of its prewar inventories of mobile launchers and about 70 percent of its prewar stockpiles of missiles, a U.S. official said. The official said there is evidence that the regime has been able to recover and reopen almost all of its underground storage facilities, repair some damaged missiles and even assemble some new missiles that were nearly complete when the war began.

Trump painted a rosier picture in Oval Office remarks on Wednesday, saying of Iran: “Their missiles are mostly decimated, they have probably 18, 19 percent, but not a lot by comparison to what they had.” Three current and one former U.S. official confirmed the outlines of the intelligence analysis, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss the sensitive matter. Asked for comment, a senior U.S. intelligence official emphasized the blockade’s impact. “The President’s blockade is inflicting real, compounding damage — severing trade, crushing revenue, and accelerating systemic economic collapse. Iran’s military has been badly degraded, its navy destroyed, and its leaders are in hiding,” the official, who was not authorized to speak on the record, said in a statement. “What’s left is the regime’s appetite for civilian suffering — starving its own people to prolong a war it has already lost.” Trump, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and other officials have consistently presented the war as an overwhelming U.S. military victory, despite Iran’s rejection of Washington’s demands that it abandon nuclear enrichment, surrender its uranium stockpiles, reopen the Strait of Hormuz and take other steps.

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Hackers breach Canvas learning platform, exposing data on millions of students and teachers

A cybersecurity attack on the nation's most widely used classroom software has potentially exposed the personal data of millions of students and educators across the country. Instructure, the company that runs the Canvas learning management system used by more than 7,000 universities, K-12 districts and education ministries worldwide, disclosed the breach to affected institutions this week. The company confirmed names, email addresses, student ID numbers and private messages between users had been accessed before the breach was contained. Canvas was offline Thursday evening as the company placed the app in maintenance mode after reports of users encountering issues logging into student ePortfolios. By late Thursday, Instructure said most users should be able to access the app.

Canvas is used by 41% of higher education institutions across North America to deliver courses. Millions of K-12 students rely on it as well. In North Carolina alone, the state Department of Public Instruction has used Canvas across all public K-12 schools since 2015. The criminal extortion group ShinyHunters claimed responsibility for the attack. On a dark web leak site, the group alleged it had stolen more than 3.65 terabytes of data and threatened to release it unless its demands were met. The group said it stole roughly 275 million records tied to students, teachers and staff, and shared a list of 8,809 school districts, universities and online education platforms it claims were affected. ShinyHunters warned that a failure to pay could result in the release of "several billions of private messages among students and teachers." A ransom message on the platform appears to give Infrastructure until May 12 to respond and "negotiate a settlement" before the hackers leak information. The company stated that the affected data might have included full names, email addresses, student ID numbers and messages, but that there is no evidence passwords, dates of birth, government identifiers or financial information were exposed.

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State Stories

Two Texas residents were on cruise ship with hantavirus outbreak, CDC tells state

Two Texas residents were aboard a cruise ship that reported an outbreak of hantavirus — an infection that can rapidly progress and become life-threatening. Texas health officials said Thursday the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention notified the state about the Texas passengers on the MV Hondius. The Texas Department of State Health Services, or DSHS, said the passengers had left the ship and returned to the U.S. before the outbreak was identified. Hantavirus is a “rare but severe disease that can be deadly,” according to WHO. It is typically spread when people have contact with wild rodent urine, droppings and saliva. However, DSHS said in a statement the strain in this outbreak, the Andes virus, can spread from person-to-person “in limited circumstances.” “It typically requires close, prolonged contact with a person who is actively sick with the disease,” the agency said.

“It is not known to spread through casual contact such as shaking hands or being in the same room for a few minutes. There have been no documented cases where a person without symptoms spread it to someone else.” DSHS said public health officials in Texas have reached the two individuals, who report they are not experiencing any symptoms and weren’t in contact with anyone who was sick while on the ship. The state said it will not release additional personal details about the passengers due to privacy concerns. KERA reached out to DSHS to see where in Texas the passengers are but did not immediately receive comment. The agency said the individuals agreed to “monitor themselves for symptoms with daily temperature checks” and reach out to public health officials at any sign of a possible illness. As of May 4, the World Health Organization, or WHO, said seven cases have been identified – two confirmed with lab testing and five suspected – including three deaths, one critically ill patient and three patients reporting “mild symptoms.” WHO noted the initial appearance of symptoms was characterized by “fever, gastrointestinal symptoms, rapid progression to pneumonia, acute respiratory distress syndrome and shock.” The organization also said investigations are ongoing.

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Is Brownsville getting a refinery? America First CEO is confident; industry analyst skeptical

When Donald Trump announced on Truth Social March 10 that Brownsville would be the site of the first U.S. oil refinery to be built in 50 years, it seemed to come out of the blue. But in fact, Port of Brownsville officials have been in communication with the principals behind the proposed America First Refining (AFR) project for about a dozen years, according to Brownsville Navigation District Chairman Steve Guerra. Back in June 2024, AFR founder and CEO John Calce announced that his company (then Element Fuel Holdings) had completed the site preparation and pre-construction work for a large oil refinery at the port. In a statement, he said the company had secured the permits necessary to construct and operate a refinery with a capacity of more than 160,000 BPD, or “approximately 6.7 million gallons, per day of finished gasoline, diesel and jet fuel.”

Reuters reported at the time that Calce had tried before to build a refinery at the port, through start-up firms ARX Energy and Jupiter Brownsville LLC, one such attempt resulting in a bankruptcy filing. Now branded as AFR, the facility is designed to refine U.S. shale crude oil exclusively, which no other domestic refinery is equipped to do, the company said. AFR said the approximately $4 million project has investment from a “global supermajor,” identified by Trump as Reliance Industries, India’s largest private company and owner of the world’s largest oil refinery. The Financial Times reported that Reliance, which has not commented publicly on the deal, is committing a “modest initial outlay” of about $40 million to the project. In a May 5 phone interview with The Brownsville Herald, Calce declined to say how much Reliance is investing, but when asked about the likelihood of AFR actually getting built, said the project is moving forward with much of the pre-construction work already done. “In a lot of ways we’ve already commenced construction, because we’ve spent an extraordinary amount of money on … permitting, design, engineering etc.” he said. “In these kind of projects, so much of what you do in the development piece of it is engineering.”

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House Speaker Mike Johnson raising campaign cash in Dallas

House Speaker Mike Johnson will headline a fundraiser and “fireside chat” Friday in Dallas to ramp up efforts to protect Republican congressional candidates in November. The event, sponsored by Johnson’s Grow the Majority committee, also will feature members of the Texas congressional delegation, including U.S. Rep. Chip Roy of Austin, who is in the GOP runoff May 26 for attorney general. The Dallas fundraiser, part of a two-day North Texas swing by Johnson, comes as Republicans are mobilizing to maintain control of the House and defy the midterm pattern of the president’s party losing seats. President Donald Trump’s poll numbers have sagged this year, and rising living costs could make it harder for Republicans to hold the House.

Texas has a special role in the 2026 midterm races. Last year, Republican lawmakers redrew congressional boundaries at Trump’s request to try to add five GOP seats, sparking redistricting fights in other parts of the country. At least three of the five districts revamped to favor Republicans are competitive, so Johnson and Republicans may be forced to spend national resources to help those candidates. Texas remains a major fundraising base for Republicans, including in Democratic-controlled Dallas County. According to an invitation reviewed by The Dallas Morning News, Friday’s event is hosted by Dallas business leaders and GOP donors, including Kathy and Harlan Crow, Ross Perot Jr. and Catherine “Trinka” Taylor. Contributions range from $25,000 to $250,000.

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Despite anger over bills, Austin considers new contract with Texas Gas Service

The Austin City Council is scheduled to vote Thursday on a plan to continue partnering with Texas Gas Service for another 10 years. That's even though the council and residents have had plenty of complaints about the cost of the service being provided. Two years ago, renewing the contact felt less guaranteed. The relationship between the city and Texas Gas Service, the for-profit utility that provides the city with natural gas, was in a bad place. Repeated rate hikes angered customers, and plans for another increase had City Council members suggesting they had reached a breaking point. They discussed finding another utility to work with when Austin’s contract expired in 2026, or even buying out the local distribution system entirely and creating a public gas service.

“Please, work with the city, our representatives and the outside stakeholders to meet the moment,” Council Member Ryan Alter asked representatives for the utility in 2024, “and not motivate us two years from now to really question whether this is a good partnership.” Two years later, gas bills have kept going up, public anger persists, but a new contract appears inevitable. The question is under what terms. “This [contract] is going to be well discussed before we reach the finish line. And we'll hopefully have a product in place that protects customers and limits these rate increases,” Alter said. The vote Thursday is over a proposed agreement drafted by city staff in negotiations with Texas Gas Service, that would allow the utility to continue as the the primary provider of gas for Austin homes and businesses.

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Casinos are illegal in Texas. So why did Las Vegas Sands post casino software jobs in Dallas?

A year after Las Vegas Sands made an unsuccessful push to include casino gaming in a North Texas mixed-use development, the resort company has posted several jobs based out of Dallas on its website. At least nine Dallas-based jobs had been posted on the Sands website in the last 30 days as of Thursday. Posted roles are for application architects, data engineers, and technology support. One position includes a senior product manager role that leads development of the casino management systems software "from the ground up". A spokesperson with the company said that Sands does "not have any projects being undertaken in Dallas." However, the company has established an office in the area to centralize software development, strengthen operational efficiency, and "innovate at scale."

"DFW was selected for its strong concentration of skilled technology talent, robust infrastructure, and thriving innovation ecosystem supported by leading universities," Sands spokesperson Ron Reese said in an email. "The region’s connectivity across North America, cost-effective operating environment, and business-friendly policies enable sustainable growth and efficient collaboration with partners." Sands proposed rezoning a mixed-use development in Irving last year that would have included casino gaming in its destination resort, pending legalization in Texas. Following strong pushback from Irving residents, Sands took out the casino-related portion of the development plans. Those plans were ultimately approved by the Irving City Council without the casino gaming element. It was not the first time Sands floated the idea of casino gaming in Texas. Las Vegas Sands has lobbied to legalize gambling in Texas for years and formed the Texas Sands PAC in 2022.

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‘It chokes us out’: San Antonio Rodeo bucks county’s ‘alternate vision’ for the East Side

Seven months after voters overwhelmingly approved plans for an expanded rodeo district on the East Side, leaders of the San Antonio Stock Show and Rodeo are accusing Bexar County leaders of going behind their backs to pursue an “alternative vision.” In November, voters approved Propositions A and B to help fund a new Spurs arena downtown, as well as convert the existing Frost Bank Center and Freeman Coliseum grounds into a year-round stock show and rodeo district. Now Cody Davenport, executive director and CEO of the San Antonio Livestock Exhibition, says Bexar County Judge Peter Sakai and county commissioners have been negotiating without them on a mixed-use development that was long expected to accompany the rodeo grounds — but as written, is “fundamentally incompatible” with the plan voters approved.

“It chokes us out,” he said. Davenport played a key role in getting Props A and B over the line in November. But the county appeared to be dragging its feet on his contract, Davenport said, and when multiple people alerted him about movement on this other vision, he sent county leaders a three-page letter expressing his frustration. In it, he vents frustration over the developer’s plans to eliminate parking, saying the rodeo wouldn’t be able to use the $193 million voters approved in Proposition A to expand the rodeo grounds and grow its event calendar. He also suggested the plan was at odds with the rodeo’s prior agreement with the county, which said that development shouldn’t interfere with or restrict rodeo activities. “[County leaders] have been presented with an alternate vision advanced by the Hunt Companies and Lincoln Group that was not presented to voters, not described on the ballot, and not approved by the public,” Davenport wrote.

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San Antonio Mayor Ortiz Jones, council standoff boils over during Project Marvel consultant contract debate

Long-simmering tensions between the mayor, council and city staff again boiled over publicly Thursday, leading Mayor Gina Ortiz Jones to cast the lone vote against the two consultant contracts related to the downtown development Project Marvel. By a 10-1 vote, council members approved two contracts, one to determine costs and the other to lead the multi-million-dollar investment surrounding a Spurs NBA arena in downtown San Antonio. The council was set to hear a briefing by City Manager Erik Walsh on the city’s plan to develop a $3 billion to $4 billion sports and entertainment district near an expanded convention center and anchored by the new arena. It would have been the first full update since January, with 37 detailed presentation slides outlining how the district study and executive program manager consultants were selected.

It also included some updates on progress toward acquiring federal and UTSA-owned properties for the development. But that briefing was pushed off to June after council members joined Councilwoman Phyllis Viagran (D3) in agreeing that such an update should be given during a future B Session of the council, which has more time for such updates. (The previous staff update was provided during B Session on Jan. 14.) Jones again pushed for the update to occur before the vote, saying it was necessary for “transparency.” “I think it’s important that we share the information,” Jones said. “There may be questions about why we would not talk about the overall picture, or taking action on contracts related to the projects.” Councilman Marc Whyte (D10) said the entire council had met with city staff during the past two weeks and had been fully updated on progress with the project.

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Abbott orders North Texas Muslim school to stop offering degrees

Gov. Greg Abbott said Thursday that the Texas American Muslim University at Dallas, a North Texas school that advertises degree programs with Islamic studies courses, must cease operations. The Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board said the school is offering higher education courses and degrees without a proper certificate of authority, violating Texas laws for operating a higher education institution. At Abbott’s direction, the state agency ordered the school, which is based in Richardson, to cease advertising its programs and enrolling students. “Texas will not allow illegal educational institutions to operate in our state,” Abbott wrote Thursday in a post on X. Shahid Bajwa, the school’s founder, said the school was “actively engaging” with state officials to “clarify any misunderstandings and to ensure full compliance with state regulations.”

Bajwa said that the school, which started its first semester in October 2025 with 26 students, was aware of the state’s process for authorization. School leaders are “in the process of seeking the necessary authorizations and accreditation and will not offer degrees until all regulatory approvals are secured,” he said in a statement Thursday evening. The school has not granted degrees, certificates or credentials, he said, adding that it is primarily funded through donations. Abbott’s directive comes as state leaders have increasingly scrutinized Islamic schools and sought to curtail activities hosted by Muslim groups. The state comptroller’s office initially held up dozens of Islamic K-12 schools from enrolling in Texas’ new voucher-like program, with Abbott deeming the schools sites of “radical Islamic indoctrination.” Texas American Muslim University at Dallas, whose website says its “north star” is to “advance Texas,” advertises itself as the first university in the country to offer STEM degree programs with mandatory courses in Islamic studies.

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Roy, Self target anti-drunk driving ‘kill switch’ tech, advocates call fears overblown

Republican U.S. Congressman and Texas Attorney General candidate Chip Roy is attempting to repeal legislation requiring technology in vehicles designed to combat drunk driving. Advocates say it represents a step back. When former President Joe Biden signed the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act into law in 2021, the legislation included the HALT Drunk Driving law. Long sought by anti-drunk-driving advocates, the law sets requirements for new vehicles in the U.S. to be equipped with advanced impaired driving technology that detects impaired drivers and, if necessary, prevents them from driving via a so-called “kill switch.” Roy has added an amendment to the GOP’s upcoming Foreign Intelligence Security Act renewal to repeal the section of the infrastructure bill requiring the technology to be added to all new non-commercial motor vehicles.

Republican Kentucky Rep. Thomas Massie filed a similar amendment in January to prevent funding for the initiative, although 57 fellow GOP representatives joined with Democrats in voting to maintain the requirements. The “kill switch,” Roy argues, is a government overreach that violates U.S. citizens’ civil liberties. “Do you really want to put that kind of data collection mandated inside every car? At what point is there just literally no privacy at all anywhere? A lot of Americans died to protect our Fourth Amendment rights so that we don’t have government looking at our stuff,” Roy said at an April 28. Committee meeting. As set forth in a National Highway Traffic Safety Administration report, the technology will utilize passive, consumer-ready mechanisms to detect impairment in motor vehicles. Breathalyzers and other traditional methods for detecting blood alcohol content do not fall under that definition. Instead, cars would have camera systems and vehicle-based sensors capable of identifying a drunk driver. U.S. Rep Keith Self from Collin County has also voiced opposition to the technology. On Wednesday, Self tweeted, “Imagine a woman fleeing an attacker—and her car won’t start because it thinks she’s impaired. Imagine a farmer injured on the job—his truck won’t start because it thinks he’s drunk.”

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Paxton opens investigations into 29 Texas ISDs over Ten Commandments law

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton is launching investigations into 29 Texas school districts to ensure schools display the Ten Commandments in classrooms in compliance with Texas law. This comes after a federal appeals court's April 21 decision to uphold a contentious Texas law requiring public school districts to display the Ten Commandments in classrooms, setting the stage for a potential Supreme Court fight. "Texas school districts must comply with Texas law by displaying the Ten Commandments and taking a school board vote regarding the implementation of prayer time in schools," said Paxton in a statement. "I will never stop defending our students’ religious freedom and the moral foundation of our nation."

The Texas Ten Commandments law — SB 10 — was passed by the Legislature during the 89th session in 2025 and requires public schools to display donated copies of the Ten Commandments that meet certain specifications. Schools must also comply with SB 11, passed in 2025, which requires school boards to vote on whether to implement a designated time for prayer and the reading of the Bible or other religious texts. According to the Office of the Attorney General, it has demanded that school districts provide proof of a board vote on implementing SB 11. The demands issued to these schools also require them to produce documents regarding the display or lack thereof of the Ten Commandments and their policies regarding SB 10.

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‘In the presence of Jesus:’ Founder of Daystar Television Network dies at 65

Joni Lamb, the founder and president of the Daystar Television Network, has died at age 65, according to a statement from the network. Lamb founded the Christian television network in 1993 with her husband, Marcus, according to WFAA-TV. Its headquarters are located in Bedford. “We know that she is in the presence of Jesus, reunited with Marcus, and receiving her reward for a beautiful life lived in surrender to the Lord,” the statement reads. “She has modeled what it means to be fearless, to be bold, and to stand for righteousness even when it’s unpopular. Her love and compassion for people were unparalleled. She will be so greatly missed.”

Prior to her death, Lamb had been dealing with “serious” health issues that were made worse by a past back injury, according to the statement. Her condition worsened over the last few days despite “the dedicated efforts of her medical team and the prayers of so many around the world.” Lamb spent 40 years “building a ministry that brought the Gospel into millions of homes,” according to the statement. The network will continue programming “uninterrupted” with tributes to air in the coming days, officials said. Lamb met with the network’s board prior to her death to ensure a leadership team was in place that would allow the network to continue.

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Bud Kennedy: Ex-party chair tells Texas Republicans: Unite or expect Senator Talarico

Steve Munisteri of Austin remembers back when young Texans were Republicans. Now, he’s a senior adviser with a warning: Republicans can lose. The party’s former state chairman brought a sobering message to two Fort Worth-area Republican clubs last week: Texas Democrats can elect James Talarico to the U.S. Senate and maybe win more races if Republicans keep bashing each other after the May 29 runoff. In a week when the party’s deep divide was garishly displayed in Texas — for example, state Rep. Jared Patterson of Frisco wrote on X.com that current state party Chairman Abraham George represents the “low-IQ base” after the state party tried to ban some incumbents from the ballot — Munisteri put it bluntly:

“The Democrats are united now. Believe me, nothing unites a losing party more than the hope that they might not be the losing party.” “In 30 of the races [nationally since January 2025] in which a party has flipped a seat from one party to the other, our party is 0-30.” “Is the best way to [win] to be mean to your other Republicans? ... You need their votes. We need everybody’s votes.” “Does anybody this think this state has become more Republican with our population going up about 400,000 [people] a year?” Munisteri advises Gov. Greg Abbott and has worked for U.S. Sen. John Cornyn. He served in the White House from 2017 to 2019 as a deputy assistant during President Donald Trump’s first administration. He comes from the libertarian-minded wing of the party and has also advised U.S. Sen. Rand Paul, a Texan.

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TCU & Baylor aligned on Big 12’s new private equity partner & cash infusion

The Big 12’s future health and stability hinge on its ability to find new partners who believe in the product and want to be affiliated with one of America’s highest-profile college athletic conferences. There is quiet frustration growing among league members that the conference has not landed more lucrative deals to be disbursed among the Big 12 members and adding to their bottom lines. In lieu of those types of potential deals, the league partnered with RedBird Capital to help with cash flow. Yahoo Sports reported on May 1 that the deal provides $12.5 million to the league, and includes a provision where the member schools can receive a credit line of $30 million.

TCU director of athletics Mike Buddie said the university’s athletic department has declined the offer, as has Baylor. “[Baylor is] is supportive of the RedBird partnership and excited about its benefits for the Big 12, but as of now [we] do not have plans to participate in the school-level capital option,” Baylor athletic director Doug McNamee told the Star-Telegram. According to reports from news organizations that cover the schools in local Big 12 markets from Florida to Utah, nearly all of the universities are rejecting this line of credit. They are passing for two reasons. 1. If a member school’s athletic department desperately needs a line of credit, the university can arrange a more favorable one. 2. They don’t want another voice in the room helping to manage the budget in a … cough-cough … “partnership.”

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County Stories

Tarrant faith leaders denounce racial disparity in death penalty cases

Faith leaders and community activists expressed their concerns on Thursday afternoon following a report that said Tarrant County unfairly targets racial and ethnic minorities in death penalty cases while also frequently threatening the death sentence to leverage plea bargains. The report, “An Extreme Outlier: Race and the Death Penalty in Tarrant County, the Third Largest County in Texas,” was published by the Texas Defender Service, which describes itself as “dedicated to ending mass incarceration and excessive punishment in Texas through direct representation, policy reform, and public education.” At a press conference at the Tarrant County Courthouse, the Rev. Ryon Price, the senior pastor of Broadway Baptist Church, said Tarrant County’s pursuit of the death penalty is “shocking in its frequency and absolutely abhorrent in its effect.”

Price says the death penalty is a cruel, unnecessarily vindictive form of punishment, and it disappoints him that Tarrant County leads the charge in the state. “What is obvious from this report is that Tarrant County is consistently and abusively misusing capital case prosecution as a weapon of persecution against the Black and brown community, this must stop,” Price said. “I and other faith leaders here with me today call upon Tarrant County to end its extreme and unjust pursuit of the death penalty, and commit itself to seeking a more reasonable, ethical and equitable measure of justice.” Pamela Young, executive director of United Fort Worth, compared the report to other Tarrant County issues, such as jail deaths, the Commissioners Court redistricting that likely flipped a Democrat’s seat, and voter suppression efforts, such as when commissioners tried to reduce the number of voting locations in 2024. Young called out registered Tarrant County voters, saying no one will come to save them except themselves, and that the best way to do it is by voting.

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National Stories

Campaign staffers tell NPR they make 'thousands' betting on their own candidates

It was a tight race, so a campaign staffer doubted the results of an unreleased poll showing their candidate up — by a lot. The tip about the outside poll didn't match up with the campaign's internal numbers. But accuracy aside, the staffer knew the poll would shake up the prediction markets. One market had their candidate down by double digits. "Myself and others started placing bets before that poll came out," the staffer, who was working on a statewide campaign in the South, told NPR on the condition of anonymity over fear for their future employment. "And then, sure enough as soon as that poll came out, the stock went up and everybody made money." This is one of the first publicly reported instances of a campaign staffer betting and winning thousands on their own candidate on prediction markets — emerging financial exchanges where billions are bet each week on future events like sports, culture and even elections.

The staffer's bet was verified by prediction market data reviewed by NPR. "Because you have all this information and knowledge that isn't publicly available yet, it's almost foolish not to bet on it before it's made public," the staffer said. The staffer said campaign bets by fellow staffers were commonplace in this particular campaign and the ones that followed. In recent weeks, popular prediction market Kalshi has banned and fined a handful of political candidates for betting on themselves. Bets like these raise questions about how campaign operatives can also turn private information into a quick payday amid an unsettled legal landscape. For this campaign staffer, the method was simple. First, they'd receive a tip on an unreleased poll and compare it with the odds on a prediction market, like PredictIt or Polymarket. If the poll reported their candidate had a better chance of winning than the prediction markets, they'd use this edge to buy low-cost odds on their candidate — known as event contracts — before the poll was released. On prediction markets, the price of an event contract often mirrors the market's estimation of the probability of a given outcome — in this case the chance a candidate will win. So a contract selling for 20 cents means the market is pricing a 20% chance of success. Once the poll went public, the prediction market contracts shot up in value. The staffer would then sell their contracts at a higher price and make money. "The most I've ever made is thousands," the staffer said. This sort of election betting "could potentially be a violation" and be subject to a CFTC investigation, said Jeff Le Riche, who worked at the Commodity Futures Trading Commission for 20 years as a trial lawyer focused on insider trading and market manipulation. The agency oversees and regulates prediction markets and allows election betting in some, but not all, cases.

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John Fetterman says he’s not switching parties. Here’s why everyone’s talking about it anyway.

Just as Sen. John Fetterman’s tension with his own party has grown since he began his term in 2023, so have the Pennsylvania Democrat’s unexpected friendships with Republican senators. And as Democrats’ chances of flipping the Senate in November improve, Fetterman’s friends across the aisle have been opening their arms even wider. Pennsylvania GOP Chair Sen. Greg Rothman indicated last month that supporting Fetterman’s reelection wouldn’t be off the table if he switched parties. President Donald Trump asked Sean Hannity to urge Fetterman to become a Republican in exchange for the president’s support, according to the Fox News host. But Fetterman has repeatedly said he doesn’t plan to switch parties, including Thursday in an opinion piece published in the Washington Post, following a new round of speculation.

“Being an independent voice that works with the other side to deliver for Pennsylvanians might put me at odds with the party that I have stayed committed to and have no plans to leave — but I will continue to put the commonwealth and the country first,” Fetterman wrote. “Plus, I’d be a terrible Republican who still votes overwhelmingly with Democrats,” he added. So why is everyone talking about Fetterman switching parties if he keeps saying he won’t, and why does it matter? Even though he votes with his party the majority of the time, Fetterman has had public disagreements with party leaders on a host of high-profile issues, including recent shutdowns, the Iran war, immigration enforcement, and even Trump’s desired White House ballroom. He’s consistently voted for Trump’s cabinet nominees and has criticized members of his party for having “Trump derangement syndrome,” a common Republican attack. And while many Democrats support Israel — including Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and Gov. Josh Shapiro — Fetterman has been particularly vocal in criticizing the party’s progressive wing over its embrace of the Palestinian cause. In Pennsylvania, Fetterman has polled much better among Republicans than members of his own party in recent months — an eye-popping 73% of Republicans approved of his job performance in a February poll, compared with only 22% of Democrats. Progressive groups who once supported his election now routinely stage protests outside his office. He’s also had high turnover on his staff, with some former employees openly opposing him or expressing concerns about his health.

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Thomas Massie is really in danger of losing his seat

Republican Rep. Thomas Massie’s lead in his primary later this month is slipping and he is in genuine danger of losing his Kentucky seat, according to interviews with local GOP officials. Massie — best known for his defiance of President Donald Trump and advocacy for the release of files associated with notorious sex criminal Jeffrey Epstein — is believed to still have a small edge in his race against military veteran Ed Gallrein, they say. But his lead is shrinking under an onslaught of negative ads and steadfast opposition from a bloc of older Republicans who remain fiercely loyal to the president. “I think Ed could win,” said Rich Hidy, chairman of the Campbell County GOP in the commonwealth’s 4th Congressional District, who is neutral in the race. “It’s going to be the closest race that Thomas has faced.”

Republicans in the district broadly share Hidy’s view: Many believed Massie’s lead had already shrunk to the single digits when May began. Massie’s path looks even more complicated this week after primaries in Indiana, where Trump-backed candidates defeated a majority of the Republican incumbents they faced in state Senate elections. Those incumbents had earned Trump’s wrath after voting against his preferred redistricting map. That anger hardly matches the president’s rage at Massie: Trump vowed to defeat Massie last year after the congressman opposed a series of the president’s policy priorities, endorsing Gallrein and dispatching some of his top political lieutenants to ensure the incumbent’s loss. “Hey @RepThomasMassie ….you are next,” former Trump campaign manager Chris LaCivita posted on X on Tuesday, shortly after votes had been tabulated in Indiana.

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Federal and state officials discuss closing Florida’s ‘Alligator Alcatraz’

Florida is in talks with the Trump administration to shut down a high-profile immigration detention center that opened last summer in the Everglades and has cost the state hundreds of millions of dollars to operate, according to a federal official, a former Immigration and Customs Enforcement official, and a person close to the administration of Gov. Ron DeSantis. The shutdown talks are preliminary, the people said. But officials at the Department of Homeland Security have concluded that it is too expensive to keep operating the center, known as Alligator Alcatraz. Homeland security officials have also come to consider the center ineffective, the federal official said. All three people spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal talks.

The DeSantis administration has been spending more than $1 million a day to run the center, which is in a swampy, isolated area between Miami and Naples. Some private vendors hired by the state to operate it have been struggling to front costs, according to the person close to the DeSantis administration. The Department of Homeland Security did not respond to a request for comment before this article was published on Thursday morning. Neither did the Florida Division of Emergency Management, which operates the center, nor Mr. DeSantis’s office. In a statement provided after publication, a homeland security spokesperson said the department “continuously evaluates detention needs and requirements to ensure they meet the latest operational requirements.” What you should know about anonymous sources. The Times makes a careful decision any time it shields the identity of a source. The information the source supplies must be newsworthy, credible and give readers genuine insight.

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Costa Rica’s top newspaper says US revoked visas of its executives, prompting press freedom concerns

The United States has revoked the visas of several board executives at La Nación, one of Costa Rica’s leading media outlets, triggering fresh accusations that the U.S. — in conjunction with the allied Costa Rican government — is stripping visas to punish critics and political opponents. In a statement that ran as the newspaper’s front page on Sunday, the board of directors said that the affected members first learned they had been stripped of their visas to enter the U.S. from reports in pro-government media. La Nación has long been a thorn in the side of outgoing Costa Rican President Rodrigo Chaves, a close ally of U.S. President Donald Trump who has agreed to accept up to 100 third-country deportees a month as part of the Trump administration’s efforts to ramp up deportations.

The newspaper, which Chaves has berated since it published allegations of sexual harassment during his 2022 presidential campaign, said that the U.S. gave no reason for the visa revocations. The U.S. State Department did not respond to a request for comment. “We fully recognize that the United States, like any sovereign state, has the power to determine the terms of entry into its territory,” La Nación said. “However, it is unprecedented in Costa Rica’s recent history for visas to be revoked from members of the board of a general-interest and independent newspaper.” The move appeared to mark the latest instance of the Trump administration deploying immigration restrictions to punish its political foes, and prompted sharp criticism from political opposition and press freedom organizations in Costa Rica, which demanded that Costa Rican and U.S. authorities provide an explanation for what happened. “If this decision is based on their critical stance toward this government, it would be yet another troubling signal for our democratic system,” the organizations said in a statement, adding that failing to provide transparent information would “constitute an unacceptable form of complicity.”

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Inside a MAGA influencer’s turn against the right-wing machine

Few MAGA influencers were as committed to the digital cause as Ashley St. Clair. The 27-year-old former brand ambassador for the late Charlie Kirk’s Turning Point USA published an anti-transgender children’s book, appeared prime-time on Fox News and posted selfies from President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate. On X, where St. Clair has more than 1 million followers, she had become a legend: a young conservative woman fighting back against the perceived liberal excesses of “brain rot” feminism and the “‘woke’ agenda” — a reputation that swelled last year, when she revealed that she had secretly had a child with the platform’s multibillionaire owner, Elon Musk. But in the past few months, St. Clair has become one of the right-wing internet’s most scathing and visible critics.

Many of Trump’s top online cheerleaders are actually just mercenaries of the attention economy, she argues, working to turn political outrage and talking points coordinated with administration officials into paid promotional deals. “There is no free thinking here,” she said in a TikTok video last month about the movement she joined when she was 19. “They are waiting to get marching orders and a direct deposit.” St. Clair’s transformation from a self-described “good little foot soldier” to MAGA turncoat has unspooled in near-daily monologues to more than 77,000 followers on her TikTok feed, where she applies makeup from her New York apartment and claims to expose the secrets of her former allies and the hidden machinery that made them social media stars. Her viral criticism has triggered unease across the online right, where some of her ex-compatriots have argued she is a disgruntled attention-seeker moving onto her next grift. Naomi Seibt, a far-right German activist and influencer, said in an X post that St. Clair is “projecting her guilt and bitterness for a decade of selling out onto us.”

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Lead Stories

World in waiting game over Iran peace proposal response

The United States was waiting on Thursday for Iran to convey its response to the latest American proposal to end the war, after public messages from top-ranking officials on both sides suggested a burst of behind-the-scenes diplomatic activity. Business leaders, consumers, politicians, shipping companies, and many others around the world have also been watching closely for signs of a breakthrough. The conflict, which has dragged on into a third month and prompted Iran and the United States to implement rival blockades around the Strait of Hormuz, has choked off a major oil transit route, wreaking havoc on global supply chains and causing energy prices to spike. Iran’s foreign ministry spokesman, Esmail Baghaei, said late Wednesday that his government was reviewing an American response to a 14-point Iranian proposal to end the war and would give its response to Pakistan, a key mediator. Neither Tehran nor Washington has said what the U.S. response entails.

“The exchange of messages through the Pakistani intermediary is ongoing, and reviews of the exchanged texts are continuing,” Mr. Baghaei told IRIB, Iran’s state broadcaster. Earlier in the day, another Iranian official had dismissed a reported proposal to end the war as a “list of American wishes.” President Trump, after threatening more attacks, said on Wednesday that there had been “very good talks” with Iran, adding: “We’re in good shape, and now we’re doing well, and we have to get what we have to get.” Earlier in the day, Mr. Trump had issued a new ultimatum to Iran, threatening to restart attacks “at a much higher level and intensity” if Iran reneged on apparent concessions. He did not elaborate on what those were. The mixed signals came a day after Mr. Trump abruptly paused a new U.S. military effort to protect ships in the Strait of Hormuz, citing “great progress” in talks with Tehran. The uncertainty did little to ease concerns about the strait, the key oil and gas shipping route that Iranian forces effectively closed in retaliation after the United States and Israel began the war in late February. The waterway is usually a conduit for around a fifth of the world’s oil supplies, and its closure has sent global energy prices on a roller-coaster ride. There was little change in international oil prices on Thursday as investors struggled to parse the conflicting signals. As the shaky cease-fire between the sides continued to hold, a U.S. Navy plane disabled an Iranian-flagged oil tanker that was trying to cross the American blockade on Iranian ports on Wednesday, U.S. Central Command said. The American F/A-18 Super Hornet fired on the ship’s rudder, and the vessel is “no longer transiting to Iran.”

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BlackRock invests $30M in Texas electrician training amidst data center boom

Custom homebuilder Gene Lantrip has a slight problem. He’s got a backload of about 15 house right now, partially due to a recent boom of data centers in the region. “Oracle came in,” he recalled. “The next thing you know, they put out a call for 500 electricians.” Among those electricians were ones who helped put the finishing touches on the homes Lantrip builds. “Local guys right now in Abilene, starting out and make $15 an hour, the good ones make up for $25 an hour,” Lantrip says. He says the data center companies are willing to pay double — and he can’t compete.

“So our electricians, what they started doing was hiring inexperienced young kids and teaching them the trades — on-the-job training,” he said. “My electrician used to have a team of about 12 guys… Now they have one lead guy and about five young kids… When they had 12 guys, they can knock out three houses, but now it takes them all day to do one house.” This comes at a time where the demand for Lantrip’s services are as high as ever. “There’s like 14,000 temporary workers out there working in right now, and they all need a place to stay,” he said. BlackRock, one of the largest private equity firms in the world, faces similar problems. “As the largest investor in infrastructure, we hear in every project, ‘We don’t have enough workers. We can’t find the workers. We’re challenged. We’re going to have delays,” BlackRock CEO Larry Fink said. “When you have delays in your projects, that means it costs more money.”

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Grand Prairie cancels Muslim event after Abbott threatens funding

Grand Prairie canceled a private party for Muslims at a city-owned water park after Texas Gov. Greg Abbott threatened to pull hundreds of thousands of dollars in state funding. The city announced the cancelation Wednesday evening, about seven hours after Abbott issued the ultimatum on social media: Call off the event by May 11 or lose $530,000 in state funds. “That’s religious discrimination,” Abbott wrote on X. “It’s unconstitutional.” In an emailed statement to The Dallas Morning News, Grand Prairie said it canceled the party "after further review and in the best interest" of the city. Epic Waters Indoor Waterpark had planned to host a June 1 celebration for Eid al-Adha, an Islamic holy day that celebrates devotion and sacrifice. But fliers for the event circulated on social media in recent days, prompting a backlash among conservatives and social media influencers.

Abbott pointed to a law he signed last year that targeted the business structure behind The Meadow, a planned Muslim-centric neighborhood about 40 miles northeast of Dallas, previously called Epic City. It is not clear if the law applies to private events at publicly funded facilities. Fliers initially described the event as for "Muslims only," with a modest dress code and private prayer area. Aminah Knight, a Dallas-area mother of six who is hosting the event, said she did not intend to exclude anyone and later revised the flier to say "All are welcome." "As Muslims, we have a modest dress code. Going to a water park can be a challenge," Knight said. "This is a way to have fun and make sure our children and community feel seen." After learning the event was canceled, Knight said she was disappointed but would not give up. She said she plans to host an interfaith cookout this summer to celebrate July 4.

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How the Trump administration became an activist investor

There is free-market capitalism and state capitalism. Now, there’s Trump capitalism. In recent months, the president has extended his hand into American business in unorthodox and, to some corporate leaders, alarming ways—from progressive-style demands to cap credit-card rates to assertive deals grabbing government shares in private companies. Some executives are so worried Trump will ask for a stake in their company that they have prepared for Oval Office meetings by rehearsing what they would say to fend off the president’s advances, lobbyists involved in the preparations said. Others welcome Trump’s attention. United Airlines CEO Scott Kirby appealed to Trump with the idea of creating a “national champion” airline during meetings with Trump and top officials at the White House, people familiar with the discussions said. United asked for regulatory permission to merge with American Airlines, and top Trump aides discussed whether the U.S. should take a stake in what would be one of the biggest airlines in the world, according to people familiar with the meetings.

Trump later said he didn’t support a merger, American Airlines was resistant and United abandoned its bid. The administration talked with Spirit Airlines about providing a loan of up to $500 million in return for warrants that would have given the U.S. a significant stake in the low-cost carrier, The Wall Street Journal reported last month. When the company offered 80% in exchange for the government bailout, Trump suggested 90%, according to people familiar with the matter. But Spirit bondholders didn’t want to subordinate their claims to the federal government, according to a person familiar with the matter. The government pulled out of negotiations, and Spirit shut down Saturday. Administration officials are stoking the president’s instinct to shift more authority over private-sector industries to Trump and his team. The Trump administration has announced direct investment stakes in at least 10 companies, including a 10% equity stake in Intel and a “golden share” of U.S. Steel, which grants the government power to influence company decisions. “We’re seeing the government get more involved in different aspects of the economy, which is a pivot off the more traditional Republican approach of the last century,” said Kelly Ann Shaw, deputy assistant to the president for international economic affairs in Trump’s first term.

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State Stories

KP George trial over alleged fake social media posts pushed back to July

A misdemeanor trial for the suspended Fort Bend County judge has been pushed back, delaying proceedings in a case tied to alleged fake social media posts during an election campaign. The trial for suspended Fort Bend County Judge K.P. George was originally set to begin this morning. However, prosecutors said the case has been reset to July 21 after the state requested the delay and the defense did not oppose it. George is accused of misrepresenting identity as a candidate in a case centered around alleged fake social media posts during his 2022 re-election campaign. The fake Facebook account at the center of the case was under the name “Antonio Scalywag.”

Investigators say that account posted racist comments targeting George during his 2022 re-election campaign — comments his campaign later pointed to publicly as racist attacks against him. According to previous warrant information obtained by KHOU 11, investigators say the “Antonio Scalywag” account was attached to an email account and phone number associated with Taral Patel. Patel worked as a consultant for George’s 2022 re-election campaign. Court documents said George issued a press release claiming he was the target of racist attacks — and investigators say those attacks came from that same fake account. The warrant also pointed to text messages between Patel and a contact saved as K.P. George, including discussions about that press release and screenshots of the racist comments. In one message, Patel allegedly wrote, “I will use fake account to counter them.” Investigators say the contact saved as K.P. George responded, “Thank you.” George has denied wrongdoing. Prosecutors say the case matters because investigators allege the fake posts were part of a broader campaign narrative during George’s 2022 re-election bid.

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Austin boosts public health readiness for FIFA World Cup visitors despite not hosting any official matches

Austin officials are preparing for an increase in visitors because of the 2026 FIFA World Cup, even though Austin will not host matches. The tournament, set for June 11 through July 19, will take place across 16 cities in North America, including Dallas and Houston. In a May 5 memo, Austin Public Health Director Adrienne Sturrup and Austin Emergency Management Director Jim Redick outlined the city’s health and safety preparations. The memo states Austin Emergency Management (AEM) has held three multi-agency coordination meetings to assess how public health could be affected by the additional tourists. Participants included Austin Arts, Culture, Music and Entertainment; Austin FC’s Q2 Stadium; the University of Texas at Austin; and public safety partners such as the Austin Police Department, Austin Fire Department, Austin-Travis County EMS, Austin Public Health, the Texas Department of Public Safety, the Texas Division of Emergency Management and the FBI.

Officials said no specific public safety threats have been identified but they are preparing now for any health issues that could come from increased visitors. Austin Public Health (APH) plans to increase infectious disease surveillance, health care system readiness and environmental health monitoring. The agency also will monitor public health complaints, prepare for visitors who aren't used to extreme heat, and increase communication with doctors and hospitals. While no matches are scheduled in Austin, Q2 Stadium will serve as a base camp for the Saudi Arabia national team. City officials said Saudi Arabia will host events beginning June 1, including an international friendly (an exhibition game) at Q2 Stadium on June 5. Organizers have not yet released which team Saudi Arabia will be playing against. The team previously played at the venue during the 2025 CONCACAF Gold Cup. Saudi Arabia is scheduled to play a World Cup group stage match against Cape Verde on June 26 in Houston.

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Recently proposed data centers raise concerns about water, growth in Hays County

As several data centers have been proposed across Hays County in recent years, local leaders, environmental advocates and industry officials are debating what the rapid expansion of artificial intelligence infrastructure could mean for Central Texas. Right off Francis Harris Lane between San Marcos and New Braunfels, construction is underway on one of the newest data center developments near the Hays County line. Supporters say the facilities are critical to the modern economy, while critics worry about long-term impacts on water resources. “We’re looking at a huge strain on our water resources, both onsite at the data centers as well as at the power production level,” said Virginia Parker, Executive Director of the San Marcos River Foundation.

On Saturday, Hays County Judge Ruben Becerra discussed the topic during a panel at the KUT Festival. “Millions of people’s drinking water is at stake with just a couple of these data centers,” Becerra said. “I support technology, I support AI, but not at the expense of our communities.” Becerra also said county leaders are pushing for more research and planning before additional development moves forward. Industry leaders argue data centers have become a necessary part of everyday life and economic growth. “It’s how we work. It’s how we learn. It’s how we communicate. It’s every telehealth appointment, every electronic health care record, every online purchase, every banking and financial transaction,” said Dan Diorio, Vice President of state policy for the Data Center Coalition. He also argued the U.S. must continue expanding digital infrastructure to remain globally competitive as artificial intelligence technology grows rapidly.

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Sierra Club report: Texas coal plants draining state's shrinking water supply

Texas coal and gas power plants consumed more than 100 billion gallons of water in 2024, according to a new Sierra Club report that calls on state leaders to accelerate the shift to renewable energy amid worsening drought conditions. The report, "Watts Wasting Texas Water," found that coal plants alone used 34 billion gallons of water that year — enough to supply roughly 1 million homes annually, or a city twice the size of Austin. Combined with gas and nuclear plants, total consumption has exceeded 100 billion gallons every year since at least 2015, the report said. Coal and gas plants burn fuel to boil water into steam, which spins turbines to generate electricity. The steam is then cooled and condensed, a process that causes large amounts of water to evaporate. Coal plants in Texas consume up to 672 gallons of water per megawatt-hour of electricity produced, compared with an estimated 6 gallons per megawatt-hour for solar. Wind and solar farms generate electricity without steam or cooling systems, using little to no water.

The Sierra Club found Texas coal plants hold legal rights to consume 116 billion gallons of water annually from the state's rivers, creeks and aquifers. Seven coal plants alone have rights to store 98 billion gallons in private reservoirs. "And even though they got these rights for free, they can sell them for millions of dollars when they're done with them. There is currently nothing in place to require them to return the rights to the state," said Lindsay Mader, report author and Secretary of the Lone Star Chapter of the Sierra Club. The Fayette Power Plant is one example that affects Central Texas. It’s co-owned by the City of Austin and the Lower Colorado River Authority (LCRA) located in Fayette County — which is currently experiencing extreme drought. The two entities hold rights to draw more than 31 billion gallons annually from the Colorado River for that plant alone. “Wealthy utilities and power plants in Texas have long profited from the significant water rights our state government gave to them for free, but it’s past time to stop giving coal and gas everything they want,” said Cyrus Reed, the Legislative Director for the Lone Star Chapter of the Sierra Club.

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Maverick County Judge Ramsey Cantú suspended from role, accused of misconduct and incompetency

Maverick County Judge Ramsey Cantú has been “temporarily suspended” from his role as county judge, according to documents obtained by KSAT Investigates. The order was filed on Monday in Maverick County’s 293rd Judicial District Court.

Cantú is accused of “official misconduct” and “incompetency,” as defined in Section 87.011 of Texas’ Local Government Code. In the order, Cantú will not be exercising “any powers, duties or authority of the office and shall not interfere in any manner with the operations of county government.” He may be subject to permanent removal from the role following a jury trial. Cantú’s order does not offer specific examples of the official misconduct or incompetency allegations he faces. In Cantú’s place, Rolando Jasso was tabbed as Maverick County Judge on an interim basis. Cantú is also in the middle of the Democratic primary runoff for Maverick County judge between he and challenger Gerardo “Jerry” Morales. In March, Morales garnered 49.9% of the vote compared to Cantú’s 28%. Election Day for the primary runoff race is scheduled for May 26.

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Grimes County takes no action on SpaceX tax abatement for proposed $119 billion project

Grimes County commissioners took no action Wednesday on a proposed SpaceX development at Gibbons Creek Reservoir, about 20 miles east of Bryan-College Station. County Judge Joe Fauth said SpaceX is the only company that has submitted anything for the county to consider. He said the project is far from a done deal. “Well, there’s a right place for everything in trying to determine what is the right place for what’s being considered. That’s our job,” Fauth said. “At the end of the day, we will only consider what’s going to be a benefit to the county.”

Fauth said he wants to clear up what kind of project this is, pushing back on the data center label that has been circulating online. “We keep saying data center, but if you look at the announcement that SpaceX made, it’s certainly far more manufacturing than it is data center, okay? So I think that’s one clarification that people need to understand,” Fauth said. A public notice filed by Grimes County describes the proposed development as a semiconductor manufacturing and computing facility with an initial investment of about $55 billion. Total estimates show that number could climb as high as $119 billion. The project is described as a vertically integrated semiconductor manufacturing and advanced computing fabrication facility. Fauth said it could use up to 5,000 acres of land at the reservoir and around 3,000 acres of surface water, with the potential to expand into surrounding areas.

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Tarrant voters say registration removed, questioned. Elections office offers no clarity

The first time Bobby Robinson got kicked off Tarrant County’s voter roll, he thought it was a glitch. That was in November. By early March, Robinson had been kicked off — and added back on — the county’s registry of voters two more times, he said. Today, his voter registration appears active online, but he’s not confident it’ll stay that way when it comes time to cast a ballot. Robinson, 46, has been an active voter in Tarrant County since moving to the area around 2005, according to his county voting record reviewed by the Fort Worth Report. Although the removals didn’t prevent him from voting in recent elections, he worries the repeated mistake could indicate a breach in election integrity and security. “If we were voting for ‘American Idol’ and my vote didn’t get counted, that’s different — but this is about elections,” Robinson said. It’s unclear whether Robinson’s removal was a symptom of issues with the county or state’s software.

Tarrant is an outlier among Texas counties for hiring a third-party vendor last year to help identify ineligible voters on the voter roll, political science experts told the Report. Since contracting the outside vendor, the Tarrant County Elections Office mistakenly flagged at least one other voter’s registration: Fort Worth resident Andrew Sims-Kirkland, 39, who received a mailed notice from the county elections office asking him to confirm he was not dead. Voters across Texas and the country have been mistakenly purged from voter rolls as President Donald Trump’s administration seeks to mass-verify voter citizenship status in an effort to prevent noncitizens from voting illegally. Many states, including Texas, have uploaded their voter rolls to a new federal database that has since been found to incorrectly identify U.S. citizens as noncitizens. Sims-Kirkland said he was able to verify with the elections office that he is alive but worries that other voters could be unknowingly purged from the voter roll, in a year marked by several consequential elections, including the midterms. So far this year, Tarrant County voters have elected a new state senator, flipping the historically GOP Texas Senate District 9 blue in a special election to fill a vacancy; chosen party nominees during the March primaries; and weighed in on local bond propositions and charter amendments in the May 2 local elections.

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Texas Education Agency appoints new leadership to struggling Connally ISD

The Texas Education Agency has appointed a three-member board of managers and new superintendent to oversee Connally Independent School District after two campuses failed to meet state standards for five consecutive years. Commissioner of Education Mike Morath announced the appointments in a letter, effectively suspending the powers of the district's elected board of trustees until further notice. The appointed board members include: Matthew Stufflebeam, recommended as president, Linda Peoples Lindsey, recommended as secretary, and Carla Thomas. All three have ties to the Connally community.

Dr. Josie Gutierrez, former deputy superintendent at Waco ISD with over 30 years in education, was named the new superintendent, replacing Jill Bottelberghe. Gutierrez began working in the position Wednesday under a 21-day interim contract, pending formal approval. The district chose not to appeal the TEA's decision following an informal review in January. A spokesperson told local media that Connally ISD's focus "remains on the diligent implementation of our school improvement initiatives" and providing "a smooth transition for our students, staff, and community." Stufflebeam brings more than 20 years of real estate and business experience. A Texas State University graduate and parent in the district, he previously served as president of the Waco Association of Realtors and taught at McLennan Community College for 11 years. Peoples Lindsey, a 1981 Connally High School graduate, spent 37 years in public education as a teacher, coach and administrator. Her father, Mac Peoples, served as district superintendent beginning in 1974. Thomas, also a Connally ISD alumna, taught in the district for more than a decade and holds degrees from Lamar University. She currently works as a community health coordinator and part-time instructor at McLennan Community College.

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More than $245 million in grant funds jeopardized as Harris County flood projects linger behind schedule

A new Harris County report shows most disaster relief flood bond projects likely won’t meet a fast-approaching funding deadline early next year, jeopardizing more than $245 million. The report was provided to the offices of Harris County commissioners last week after County Judge Lina Hidalgo grilled flood control director Tina Petersen over the status of 28 flood mitigation projects that were delayed after revelations of a multi-million-dollar funding shortfall. The latest hurdle is a time crunch for the flood control district to break ground and complete those projects ahead of the 2027 and 2028 funding deadlines set by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) and the Texas General Land Office.

Six of the 11 disaster relief projects outlined in the flood bond won’t meet a Feb. 2027 funding deadline to complete construction, according to the report. The county has only broken ground so far on four of those disaster relief projects that are on track to meet next year’s funding deadline. The six projects that could miss next year’s deadline — totaling $245.8 million — include channel conveyance improvements in precincts 1 and 2 and stormwater detention basin projects in precincts 2, 3 and 4. Emily Woodell, a spokesperson for the flood control district, said the office has had several conversations with the general land office about a potential extension. “There is a grace period between our current deadline and the ultimate grant deadline to HUD,” Woodell said. “The [general land office] has been clear that they want these dollars to stay in Harris County, as do we.” An extension has not yet been granted, and Petersen previously said the office is awaiting environmental clearances from HUD to proceed with several of the flood projects — which were first established through a $2.5 billion flood bond approved by voters in 2018 after Hurricane Harvey.

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Federal judge weighs citizenship of Austin man deported to Mexico after traffic stop

The federal government on Wednesday said it was still investigating whether an Austin man, who was deported to Mexico after a traffic stop last month, is actually a United States citizen. Brian Jose Morales Garcia, 25, was a passenger in a vehicle that Texas Department of Public Safety troopers pulled over in Fredericksburg on April 3 for an alleged tinted window violation. According to DPS, U.S. Immigration and Enforcement agents later identified Garcia and another passenger as immigrants unlawfully in the country and placed a detainer on them. KXAN reached out to ICE, but so far the agency has not responded to our questions.

Garcia is now suing the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, DPS and the Gillespie County Sheriff’s Office and requesting a federal judge issue a temporary restraining order to allow him to re-enter the U.S. using his birth certificate and prohibit the federal government from deporting him again. In the lawsuit, Garcia’s legal team claims U.S. Border Patrol agents took custody of Garcia despite him repeatedly declaring he was a U.S. citizen born in Denver. The lawsuit claims he was placed on a plane and deported to Mexico four days after the traffic stop, as first reported by the Austin American-Statesman. Garcia’s attorney said in the federal court filing that his birth certificate, U.S. social security card and baptismal papers confirm he was born in the U.S., but those records were at his Austin home at the time of the stop. KXAN reviewed copies of Garcia’s birth certificate provided by his attorney that show he was born in Colorado in 2001.

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Leadership shakeup hits Uhland City Hall after mayor, other officials resign

Residents in the small City of Uhland are facing uncertainty about the future of local leadership after multiple city officials, including Mayor Lacee Duke, resigned in recent days. The departures have sparked questions from community members about who will lead the city moving forward and how those vacancies will be filled. The resignations include Duke, the mayor pro tem, the city attorney and other staff, creating what the city administrator describes as a major transition period for the Hays County community. “I believe it’s a new wind, a new wind of change, and you can feel it right now blow in,” said Yolanda Tobias Romo, who was raised in Uhland.

Romo said she began closely following city developments two years ago because of her family’s ties to the town. “Because I wanted to know what was going on with my community, with my family’s home,” she said. City Administrator Hayden Brodowsky said Texas law lays out how the city can handle multiple vacancies at once. “State law requires that you cannot have two active vacancies at one time,” Brodowsky said. “So the way it works is eight days from the vacancy, the city must either appoint somebody or hold a special election in the future.” The political turmoil follows Duke’s arrest by the Texas Rangers in December. She was charged with allegedly misusing city money connected to the 2024 Uhland Fall Fest. At the time, Duke told KVUE in a statement she is innocent and is “vigorously working” to prove her innocence. Despite the felony charge, Duke remained in office until submitting her resignation on Monday, shortly after Saturday’s local election in which new council members were elected.

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National Stories

Kamala Harris wants the DNC to release its autopsy report of the 2024 campaign

As former Vice President Kamala Harris considers another run for president, she is also signaling that she has no problem with a public airing of what went wrong last time — telling donors she believes the Democratic National Committee should release its buried autopsy of her failed 2024 campaign, according to a person who has heard the conversations. While she indicated to donors that she had no issue with releasing it, Harris has not discussed the postmortem with DNC Chairman Ken Martin and did not know about his decision to keep it under wraps until it happened, this person said. Like most prospective candidates, Harris is staying involved in political affairs. That includes touring the country, giving speeches to state parties, developing the framework for a policy platform and sounding out fellow Democrats about her next chapter.

What’s unique about Harris is that while she tries to orient toward the future, many in her party are actively fighting over whether to keep examining the flaws of her last campaign. Harris has privately sought counsel from allies about her future, and she publicly acknowledged at a National Action Network event in New York last month that she is “thinking about” another bid. Harris lost the electoral vote to Donald Trump in 2024, 312-226, and the popular vote by 1.5 percentage points. The subject of the autopsy’s release has grown into a flash point in the party, and it is dogging Martin, who had promised to conduct a comprehensive review of the defeat and share it with the public. A discussion over the intraparty drama comes as Harris is sounding out friends and party luminaries about what she should do in the run-up to 2028. She recently asked the Rev. Al Sharpton for his advice on her next steps, according to a person familiar with their conversation.

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The RNC’s first big midterms spend is on its ground game

The Republican Party is spending big on its ground game — the party’s first major investment in the run-up to the midterms. The Republican National Committee sent 34 staffers to 17 states last week to run canvassing operations targeting voters who don’t frequently turn out for elections, a voting bloc that helped President Donald Trump win in 2024. The initial spend is “seven figures,” an RNC official told NOTUS. The RNC did not provide its full list of target states, but it will be in battlegrounds including North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Georgia, as well as “places that we don’t traditionally play,” such as Alaska and Maine, the official said. The party is planning to send more staffers in mid-May. “We’re not leaving turnout to chance — we’re building the ground game to win, protect our majorities in the House and Senate, and give President Trump a full four years to deliver,” RNC Chair Joe Gruters said in a statement.

For its part, the DNC in January invested seven figures in a voter registration effort and its largest in-person campaign staff training program to date. It also rolled out a pair of programs in December to staff down-ballot campaigns, committed to making monthly investments into its state parties, and unveiled pilot technologies to aid campaigns. “Democrats have momentum and formidable infrastructure on our side — and no amount of corrupt GOP billionaire cash can change the fact that Trump’s toxic agenda will lead to Republicans getting trounced this November,” said Rosemary Boeglin, the DNC’s communications director. The RNC has a significant fundraising advantage over Democrats right now. It raised $172 million in 2025 and has $95 million cash on hand, compared to the Democratic National Committee’s $145 million raised, $14 million on hand and $17 million in debt. “When people start to ask, where’s the money going? What’s happening? This is the first salvo,” said Zach Parkinson, the RNC’s deputy communications and research director. The RNC spent less in 2025 than any cycle since 2014, with the exception of the 2023-2024 cycle when fundraising was low.

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Kash Patel’s personalized bourbon stash

One of J. Edgar Hoover’s greatest reforms at the FBI was his embrace of fingerprinting. During the 1930s, visitors to the FBI offices in Washington, D.C., received souvenir fingerprint cards featuring his name. The men who succeeded him as FBI director were more discreet and judicious, mindful of the cult of personality that had developed around Hoover. They generally avoided giving out branded swag. But then came Kash Patel. President Trump’s FBI director has a great deal of affection for swag. Merchandise for sale on a website he co-founded—still operating, nearly 15 months into his term—includes beanies ($35), T-shirts ($35), orange camo hoodies ($65), trucker caps ($25), “government gangsters” playing cards (on sale for $10), and a Fight With Kash Punisher scarf ($25).

One thing not for sale is liquor, because liquor is something Patel gives away for free. Last month, I reported that FBI personnel were alarmed by what they said was erratic behavior and excessive drinking by Patel. (The FBI director has denied the allegations and filed a defamation suit against The Atlantic and me.) After my story appeared, I heard from people in Patel’s orbit and people he has met at public functions, who told me that it is not unusual for him to travel with a supply of personalized branded bourbon. The bottles bear the imprint of the Kentucky distillery Woodford Reserve, and are engraved with the words “Kash Patel FBI Director,” as well as a rendering of an FBI shield. Surrounding the shield is a band of text featuring Patel’s director title and his favored spelling of his first name: Ka$h. An eagle holds the shield in its talons, along with the number 9, presumably a reference to Patel’s place in the history of FBI directors. In some cases, the 750-milliliter bottles bear Patel’s signature, with “#9” there as well. One such bottle popped up on an online auction site shortly after my story appeared, and The Atlantic later purchased it. (The person who sold it to us did not want to be named, but said that the bottle was a gift from Patel at an event in Las Vegas.) Patel has given out bottles of his personalized whiskey to FBI staff as well as civilians he encounters in his duties, according to eight people, including current and former FBI and Department of Justice employees and others who are familiar with Patel’s distribution of the bottles. Most of them spoke on the condition of anonymity out of fear of reprisal.

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'A trailblazer, a rabble-rouser, a do-gooder': CNN founder Ted Turner dies at 87

Ted Turner — the bullish founder of CNN and a suite of other cable channels, not to mention a bison steakhouse, a nonprofit designed to prevent the proliferation of nuclear weapons and an international sports competition — died Wednesday at the age of 87. He had announced just before his 80th birthday that he had Lewy Body Dementia, a degenerative disease that causes dementia and muscle failure. Turner never seemed at a loss for brass or chutzpah. "If Alexander the Great could conquer the known world, why couldn't I start CNN?" Turner once told Oprah Winfrey.

He launched the Cable News Network — the nation's first continuous all-news television station — on June 1, 1980 at a converted Jewish country club in Atlanta. The network broadcast news 24/7 from that point on and indeed built a global array of bureaus. Former CNN chief news executive Eason Jordan says Turner took inspiration from 24-hour radio stations that relayed news headlines, and endless sports highlights on ESPN. Turner remained baffled why the broadcast giants — ABC, NBC and CBS — hadn't launched cable stations. "To him it was just the most logical thing in the world and he couldn't understand why nobody else was doing it," Jordan says. "So he was going to do it." Sixteen years later, NBC (in partnership with Microsoft) and Fox would launch sibling cable news channels. Each ultimately found success by embracing strong (though opposing) points of view. Broadcast networks subsequently sought to replicate the original cable ethos with stripped down streaming services.

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Jeffrey Epstein’s purported suicide note is released by federal judge

A federal judge has released a suicide note purportedly written by Jeffrey Epstein that was sealed for years as part of the criminal case of his cellmate. “They investigated me for month — FOUND NOTHING!!!” the note begins, adding that the result was charges going back many years. “It is a treat to be able to choose one’s time to say goodbye,” the note continued. “Watcha want me to do — Bust out cryin!!” the note reads. “NO FUN," it concludes, with those words underlined. “NOT WORTH IT!!” Mr. Epstein’s cellmate, Nicholas Tartaglione, said he discovered the note in July 2019 after Mr. Epstein was found unresponsive with a strip of cloth wrapped around his neck. Mr. Epstein survived that incident, but he was found dead weeks later at age 66 in the now shuttered Metropolitan Correctional Center in Lower Manhattan.

The note was made public on Wednesday by Judge Kenneth M. Karas of Federal District Court in White Plains, N.Y., who oversaw the cellmate’s case. The judge acted after The New York Times petitioned the court last Thursday to unseal the document and published an article in which Mr. Tartaglione described the note and how it came into his possession. The Times has not authenticated the note, which was placed on the court docket Wednesday evening. The note repeats a saying — “bust out cryin” — that Mr. Epstein wrote in emails. It included another phrase — “No fun” — that Mr. Epstein also used in emails, as well as in a separate note found in his jail cell at the time of his death. The document unsealed on Wednesday remained hidden from public view even as the Justice Department released millions of pages of documents related to Mr. Epstein in a move required by a new law. The Times searched those records and did not find a copy of the note. (A spokeswoman from the Justice Department said the agency had never seen it.) The search did turn up a cryptic two-page chronology that described how the note became caught up in Mr. Tartaglione’s complicated legal case. The chronology said that Mr. Tartaglione’s lawyers authenticated the note, though it did not explain how.

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Countries scramble to track passengers of virus-hit cruise ship

Countries worldwide scrambled on Thursday to trace people who had left the cruise ship hit by ?a hantavirus outbreak before it got marooned off the coast of Cape Verde, to prevent further spread of the disease. Three people - a Dutch couple and a German national - died in the outbreak on the MV Hondius. Eight people, including a Swiss citizen, are suspected to have contracted the virus, according to the World Health Organization. The Dutch government has said around 40 ?passengers had disembarked the ship in Santa Helena, where the ship made a stop on its way to Cape Verde - before the ?outbreak was reported.

The whereabouts of many of these passengers is as yet unknown. One of those to disembark was ?the wife of the Dutchman who had died aboard the ship on April 11. She fell sick herself and died before she could reach the ?Netherlands. Dutch airline KLM on Wednesday said it had taken the woman off a plane in Johannesburg on April 25 due to her deteriorating medical condition. According to ?broadcaster RTL, a KLM stewardess who had been in contact with her has now been admitted to a hospital in Amsterdam after showing possible symptoms of a hantavirus infection. The Dutch health ministry did not mention her job or who she may have been in contact with, but did confirm that a Dutch woman has been admitted to hospital and ?will be tested to determine whether she is infected with the hantavirus. A spokesperson for KLM said the company could not "discuss individual cases" due to ?privacy concerns.

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Trump counterterrorism strategy targets ‘violent left-wing extremists’ with ‘transgender ideology’

The Trump team is also looking at how domestic online activities could incite violence, a focus that follows an increase in political violence, such as the multiple attempted assassinations of Trump and the killing of Charlie Kirk. “We see a threat, we will respond to it, and we will crush it, whether it is the cartels, the jihadists, or violent left-wing extremists like antifa and like the transgender killers, the non-binary, the left-wing radicals who killed my friend Charlie Kirk, we will take them on, head on,” senior director for counterterrorism Sebastian Gorka told reporters on a call Wednesday. Gorka stressed that the counterterrorism team is focused on all online groups that are “inciting violence against innocent individuals” on both sides of the aisle.

“It’s also about the ideology, whether it’s against Western Civilization, America, the U.S. Constitution, our friends, our allies, peace in general, you fit under that rubric,” he said. “Our national counterterrorism activities will prioritize the rapid identification and neutralization of violent, secular political groups whose ideology is anti-American, radically pro-gender or anarchist such as antifa, we will use all the tools constitutionally available to us to map them at home, identify their membership, map their ties to international organizations,” Gorka said of the modes the administration will use to target the left-wing groups. The Trump administration formally designated antifa as a terror group in September., Short for anti-fascists, antifa is an umbrella description for far-left-leaning militant groups that resist neo-Nazis and white supremacists at demonstrations and other events.

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Senate GOP fears $1B for White House ballroom represents political landmine

A Republican proposal to spend $1 billion in taxpayer money on security for the White House ballroom has become a political landmine in the Senate debate over funding Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Border Patrol for the next three and a half years. Before the Senate Judiciary Committee released its bill, Republican senators warned that using taxpayer money to pay for the ballroom would be a dumb move in an election year where GOP candidates are already facing headwinds over the issue of affordability. While the legislation clearly states that the money is for security enhancements and may not be spent on “non-security elements” of the construction project, that distinction is being lost in the media headlines and broader debate over the sensitive issue.

Sen. Rick Scott (R-Fla.) says he supports the construction of the White House ballroom, but he wants it paid for by private donations, which President Trump originally pledged when he tore down the historic East Wing. “If the White House and Secret Service believe that they need money for construction beyond these private funds they’ve raised, I’m willing to hear them out. There are plenty of things that we can cut to pay for it, like wasteful earmarks or all the fraud we’re uncovering in states like California and Minnesota,” Scott said in a statement. Scott said he doesn’t question the importance of the construction project but noted it’s “already being funded by private donations.” Brian Darling, a GOP strategist and former Senate aide, said Scott and other Republican senators would be wise to pump the brakes on the proposal to spend $1 billion in taxpayer money on the ballroom — even if it’s dedicated to security enhancements. “The fact that it’s linked to the ballroom makes it controversial,” he said. “Congress might give them the money, but it’s an unnecessary controversy because the way it was marketed [as] basically a billion-dollar ballroom.”

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Lead Stories

Trump-backed challengers defeat Indiana senators who blocked redistricting push

Indiana Senate Republicans who opposed congressional redistricting were largely defeated during Tuesday's primary election, with only one race so far called for an incumbent after President Donald Trump's call to oust them. The results come after months of political threats, and an estimated $9 million in spending to back primary challengers against the incumbents. The incumbents' losses show Trump's continued strength in the state. In a statement, U.S. Sen. Jim Banks (R-Ind) said the wins should send a message. "Everyone in Indiana politics should have learned an important lesson today: President Trump is the single most popular Republican among Hoosier voters," Banks said in a statement. "Indiana is a conservative state, and we deserve conservatives in our State Senate who have a pulse on Republican voters."

Trump's push to redistrict was part of a nationwide effort to win more seats in Congress by redrawing state maps across the country, part of a move to keep Republican control of the U.S. House. In Indiana, Republicans currently hold seven of the nine U.S. House seats. The proposed redistricted map targeted the two remaining Democratic strongholds to be more favorable to the GOP. In November, Trump vowed that any Republican who voted against redrawing the state's congressional boundaries, "potentially having an impact on America itself, should be PRIMARIED." In spite of Trump's threats, Indiana Senate Republicans rebuffed him, siding with Senate Democrats to kill the redistricting bill 31-19. The reverberation of that Indiana vote was felt for months and played out on primary election day in Indiana. It kicked off a flurry of campaign donations, national endorsements, and door-knocking led by various political groups aligned with the President — attracting national attention and boosting money spent on Indiana races. Trump posted his support on social media for primary candidates opposing incumbent Republicans on Election Day, saying "There are eight Great Patriots running against long seated RINOS - Let's see how those RINOS do tonight!"

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U.S. Ambassador to Italy Fertitta pumped millions into gambling stocks

The United States’ ambassador to Italy just made a massive personal gamble on casinos. Billionaire diplomat Tilman Fertitta, who owns the NBA’s Houston Rockets and dozens of restaurants and hotels, has purchased at least $113 million in Caesars Entertainment since November, new federal financial documents reviewed by NOTUS indicate. Fertitta in February also purchased between $1 million and $5 million worth of Penn National Gaming stock, according to the documents, which Fertitta signed, certified and submitted to the Office of Government Ethics between November and March. Together, the stock purchases could be worth as much as $420 million; the exact value is unclear because executive branch officials are only required to disclose the broad ranges that their stock trades fall into.

Fertitta’s purchases coincide with reports that his holding company, Fertitta Entertainment, was attempting to buy Caesars Entertainment, which counts numerous casinos, hotels, restaurants and sportsbook operations among its holdings. Fertitta Entertainment already owns Golden Nugget Hotel and Casinos. The gambling industry is under increasing political scrutiny, with Congress actively considering legislation that could affect sports betting, prediction markets and gambling more generally. The State Department acknowledged questions from NOTUS but did not otherwise respond. The U.S. Embassy in Italy did not respond to requests for comment. Steven Scheinthal, Fertitta Entertainment’s vice president, general counsel and board member, told NOTUS in an email that Fertitta “has no day-to-day control over decisions made to run his companies or assets” and that “officers overseeing both his companies and personal assets made the decision to engage in certain stock trades for business reasons, including the belief that certain equities were undervalued.”

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Michael Morris steps back into transportation job after judge’s ruling

Michael Morris will resume his role as North Texas transportation director after a state district judge issued a temporary injunction Tuesday that his firing last week was unconstitutional. Morris returned to his job at the North Central Texas Council of Governments office in Arlington Tuesday afternoon, said Rick Bailey, chair of the Regional Transportation Council. “I’m elated that Michael Morris is going to be joining us as soon as today,” Bailey, a Johnson County commissioner, told the Fort Worth Report Tuesday afternoon. State District Judge John Chupp of Tarrant County’s 141st District Court issued a temporary injunction in favor of Morris’ employment after a lawsuit was filed April 6 in Denton County to stop a job search to replace the director.

Morris, 70, could not be immediately reached for comment Tuesday. He was fired April 28 by council of governments CEO Todd Little, weeks before the FIFA World Cup games in Arlington start in June. A temporary restraining order protecting Morris’ job was lifted, resulting in his firing. Last week, the Regional Transportation Council decided during an emergency meeting to allocate $5 million for legal expenses as it joined a lawsuit filed by Denton County officials over hiring decisions. The suit was moved to Tarrant County this week. RTC members said the suit’s intention is to clarify the Metropolitan Planning Organization structure in North Texas. The transportation council is an independent policy body composed of 45 elected and appointed officials who would have the ability to hire and fire transportation department staffers, instead of the council of governments as Little maintained. Through a spokesperson, Little declined an interview request. Previously, he told the Fort Worth Report that he required all council of government department heads to file succession plans for the future. In a statement Tuesday, the council of government acknowledged that Morris was “reinstated” to his job in compliance with the temporary injunction.

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Charles Perry: Paxton’s persecution: Texas faithful can’t ignore what’s happening in Senate race

Texans love to say, “As Texas goes, so goes America.” I would argue that what happens in Texas affects the world. In many ways, that has been true in the fight for religious liberty for the last 70 years. A new battle over religious liberty is brewing in the race to represent Texas in the U.S. Senate. And so far, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton and his team are on the wrong side of it. Just a few days ago, Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) released a list of five highly respected faith leaders from across Texas who now make up the senator’s Faith Advisory Council. Cornyn’s opponent in the Republican primary, Paxton, and his team have chosen to respond to this announcement by attacking its pastors, including Dr. Jack Graham of Prestonwood Baptist Church in Plano, who used to be Paxton’s own pastor. In what universe did Paxton and his team believe this was the morally or politically correct response?

For a Republican candidate to engage in an all-out assault on conservative pastors and faith leaders is repugnant. It is also a sign of a desperate candidate and campaign resorting to desperate measures. Instead of seeking to destroy faith leaders associated with Cornyn, wouldn’t it make more sense for Paxton to simply produce his own list of pastors whom he goes to for advice? We all need wise counselors in our lives. But it is also incumbent on those in positions of leadership to heed the wise counsel they receive. By now, the list of Paxton’s indiscretions is increasingly public and tragically long. If Paxton has not been in recent communication with as many Christian leaders as he once was, now would be the perfect time to renew those relationships. Ronald Reagan once told a gathering of pastors in Dallas in 1984, “Without God, democracy will not and cannot long endure.” I couldn’t agree more. Texas needs more of God in the public square. Not less. I applaud President Donald Trump for finally setting religious voices on equal footing with the rest of the country via the new IRS ruling lifting restrictions on religious leaders weighing in on political matters. I applaud Cornyn for responding to the new IRS rules by ushering godly voices into the public square. And I especially applaud Dr. Graham of Prestonwood, Max Lucado of Oak Hills Church in San Antonio, Dr. Robert Jeffress of First Baptist Church Dallas, Dr. Gus Reyes, board member of the National Hispanic Christian Leadership Conference, and Dr. Phil Schubert, President of Abilene Christian University, for showing courage and taking action.

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State Stories

Paxton’s fundraising struggles in Texas underscore deep rift in G.O.P.

Ken Paxton, the firebrand Texas attorney general, said last year that he thought he would need about $20 million to unseat Senator John Cornyn. So far, Mr. Paxton is far short of his mark. Many of the wealthy donors who bankrolled his political career in Texas have decided to watch from the sidelines during the U.S. Senate race, according to an analysis of state and federal campaign finance data by The New York Times. Several businessmen who spent millions on Mr. Paxton’s campaigns for state attorney general have not given to either his Senate campaign or a political action committee backing his run, including a former top donor who gave far more to Mr. Cornyn. Perhaps most strikingly, the billionaire West Texas oilmen and far-right kingmakers who have long supported Mr. Paxton have spent little on his Senate run. Mr. Paxton’s fund-raising struggles underscore the deep rift in the Republican Party between its more business-oriented conservatives, who prefer Mr. Cornyn, and the hard-right base that embraces Mr. Paxton’s pugnacious politics.

His strong position in the race, despite a large fund-raising disadvantage, also reveals the limits of campaign spending in an election where the candidates are so well-known to voters, and where each has used his office to garner headlines for free. The runoff is May 26. Recent polls have shown Mr. Paxton with a lead or neck-and-neck with Mr. Cornyn. But Democrats, who see Mr. Paxton as a weaker candidate in a general election, may find that if he becomes the nominee, conservative campaign money will come rushing his way. One prominent Texas donor, Alex Fairly, said what was most important to him was beating the Democratic nominee, James Talarico — not who wins the primary. “It’s more a matter of saving my bullets for the general,” Mr. Fairly, an Amarillo businessman, said in an interview. “Winning in November is more important.” Mr. Fairly gave $7,000 to Mr. Paxton’s Senate campaign — far less than the $300,000 he has contributed to Mr. Paxton’s state campaigns since 2021. In the race so far, Mr. Cornyn has significantly outspent Mr. Paxton, and still had $11 million in his campaign and committee accounts as of the latest filling — three times as much as Mr. Paxton had on hand. In total, Mr. Paxton has raised only around $13.5 million between his campaign and the committee supporting him. Mr. Paxton’s campaign declined to comment. But on the campaign trail, he has presented his fund-raising gap as a strength.

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Lt. Gov., House Speaker lean on state agency for relief as Texas camps struggle to meet safety requirements

Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick and House Speaker Dustin Burrows support allowing camps to operate during the 2026 season even if they have not installed fiber-optic internet. They released a joint statement Tuesday, as hundreds of camps in Texas remain in limbo with pending license applications in front of the Department of State Health Services. DSHS has issued just nine licenses ahead of the 2026 summer camp season. State lawmakers passed strict new regulations for camps during a special legislative session in 2025, after 27 campers and counselors died at Camp Mystic in Kerr County. The law requires camps to install fiber, which some operators say is not possible in their remote areas. Burrows and Patrick said they recognize means other than fiber can provide reliable, redundant internet access, which would “satisfy the purpose and spirit of the law.”

In the statement, they said they support the Department of State Health Services licensing camps for the 2026 season “if they have submitted a sufficient emergency action plan, meet all other safety requirements, and maintain a reliable communication system capable of operating during an emergency.” It is not the first time for lawmakers to lean on DSHS to consider leniency on the fiber requirement. Two authors of the legislation, state Sen. Charles Perry and state Rep. Drew Darby, sent a letter to the agency in October asking for implementation of that part of the law to be delayed until 2027. But the agency did not offer leniency. WFAA asked DSHS if the statement from Burrows and Patrick will make an impact, but at publication time, the agency had not yet responded. DSHS previously told WFAA youth camps can continue to operate while their application status is pending.

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Houston hospital system sues insurer over unpaid medical bills

Harris County taxpayers could be forced to cover millions of dollars of unpaid medical bills if an insurance company does not reimburse Harris Health for those services, the health system says in a federal lawsuit. The lawsuit accuses Wellpoint Texas of underpaying or refusing to pay thousands of medical bills for patients with Medicare Advantage plans offered by the insurer, formerly known as Amerigroup Texas. Harris Health is a public safety-net health system with a large portion of its operations supported by taxes, so the burden of unpaid and underpaid medical claims would ultimately be shifted to Harris County taxpayers, according to the lawsuit. The case was initially filed earlier this year in state district court in Harris County, but a judge recently granted Wellpoint Texas’ request to move the case to federal court.

The lawsuit is playing out at a time when hospitals are facing numerous financial challenges, including rising healthcare costs and Medicaid policy changes included in the sweeping tax breaks and spending cuts bill that President Donald Trump signed into law last year. Spokespersons for Harris Health and Wellpoint Texas, a subsidiary of the Indiana-based insurance company Elevance Health, both declined to comment on the lawsuit because the case is ongoing. IntegraNet Health and Van Lang IPA, a pair of entities that Wellpoint tasked with administering its Medicare Advantage plans in Texas, are also named as defendants. The lawsuit also accuses Wellpoint of pocketing federal funds it receives for enrolling Medicare Advantage beneficiaries and shifting costs to Harris Health. Private insurance companies offer Medicare Advantage plans as alternatives to Medicare, and the federal government provides fixed monthly payments to insurers that administer those plans.

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Texas space industry growth driven by private companies, Dallas Fed says

Texas’ commercial space industry is gaining momentum, building on decades of aerospace activity while positioning itself as a growing hub for private-sector space exploration, according to a new analysis from the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas. The industry, once dominated by government programs, has evolved into a mix of public and private activity, with Texas emerging as a key player. Anchored by NASA Johnson Space Center in Houston, the state has long served as the command center for U.S. human spaceflight, directing missions since 1965 and training astronauts for decades. Private enterprise has expanded that legacy. Companies such as SpaceX, Blue Origin, Firefly Aerospace, Axiom Space, and Intuitive Machines now operate in Texas, pursuing projects ranging from rocket launches to satellite communications and lunar missions.

The shift toward commercialization began in the early 1980s, when federal policy changes opened the door for private companies to launch spacecraft without exclusive government contracts. Advances in technology — including lightweight materials, improved propulsion systems and 3D manufacturing — have since made private space ventures more financially viable. Texas has benefited from that transition. The state’s aerospace and defense sector employs roughly 170,000 workers and has grown 18% since 1990, even as national employment in the industry declined slightly. The broader ecosystem — including engineering talent from the oil and gas industry, a relatively light regulatory environment and favorable geography — has helped attract and sustain space-related businesses. Geography, in particular, plays a significant role. Launch sites closer to the equator require less fuel to reach orbit, and Texas offers access to the Gulf Coast and wide expanses of sparsely populated land, allowing for safer launch trajectories.

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Pearland's first Democratic mayor in decades: 'People see me for who I am, not for the party'

Pearland's new mayor, Quentin Wiltz, won a close election on Saturday, but his victory has sparked heated debate on social media. Wiltz said he knows there is a divide in Pearland, but added it's a chasm he hopes to bridge when he becomes the city's next mayor. He recognized the historic nature of his win: he will be Pearland's first Black mayor and the first Democrat in decades. "This election was important because the mayor's race is at large. So every person who showed up mattered," Wiltz told ABC13. "My message hasn't changed. It's always, will, and continues to be about the people. The people that I serve, the people that I know, the people that I meet. Because that's what I think public office is about."

Wiltz won the election by 263 votes out of 11,743 cast. He is hopeful about the growing city's future despite its infrastructure and budget challenges, and he wants to hear from residents. "You matter and your input matters," he said. "And you mean something, and you should be included in this process because this is your city. " Among those posting, Precinct 3 Constable Buck Stevens, who wrote: "I will be going through the list of nonvoters to see who really doesn't care how our communities move forward." After backlash, Stevens told ABC13 he posted as a citizen, not as an elected official. He clarified in a follow-up post that he had used the wrong words. The posts have been removed, but in a statement to ABC13, Stevens wrote: "As a citizen, I exercised my First Amendment right with free speech about my opinion related to the lack of engagement of voters. My sincerest intent was to understand if there is a way to get more voters out to the polls, by using public data, nothing more. The post had nothing to do with, and I would never include or jeopardize my office, my official position, or Brazoria County in any way." Wiltz said he is aware of the online comments but has not read them, adding that he wants to move past them and help govern. "People see me for who I am, not for the party," Wiltz said. "And if you expand that across Texas, I think you'll find that Texans believe that everywhere. We are who we are in our communities. We exist outside of parties. The parties are just a platform for us. " Wiltz takes office next week.

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Austin’s “most valuable IHOP” sells at auction after Nate Paul’s long fight to retain it

Natin “Nate” Paul’s battle to keep a valuable piece of property on the edge of the high-rise-strewn Rainey Street has ended, as the lot at 707 E. Cesar Chavez was auctioned off Tuesday on the steps of the Travis County Courthouse. Only three groups competed for the foreclosed property in a slow, low-volume auction that drew more than 100 bids over two hours. Most of the bidding came from Cesar Rainey LLC, which held the defaulted note, and the eventual winner, Austin-based real estate investment firm Travis County Exchange Corp. The largely undeveloped site, which hosts only an IHOP along Interstate 35, was valued at $27 million by the county appraisal district but sold for just over $12.7 million.

Paul’s World Class Holdings initially took out a $2 million loan on the property in 2017. The troubled real estate investment firm defaulted on the loan in 2021. For the past year Paul has struggled to hang on to the site through a series of court room maneuvers, including a bankruptcy that was later dismissed for being filed in “bad faith.” He has accused the lienholder, Cesar Rainey Street LLC, which purchased the loan from the original lender, of stonewalling him by failing to provide a final payoff amount, denying him the opportunity to purchase the note outright. That number was disclosed as more than $5.1 million in court documents. It was also the opening bid Tuesday. The claims were repeated as recently as Monday, when a company called Yarrington Exit — managed by Austin real estate investor Jimmy Nassour — asked a state district court for a temporary restraining order, saying it was trying to purchase the property from Paul but that lienholders were intentionally preventing the sale to “capture the substantial excess equity.” Yarrington Exit alleged in court filings that Cesar Rainey hoped to capture the building at auction as a credit purchase, for the amount of the existing loan. Cesar Rainey LLC increased the amount of sale by more than $5 million over dozens of bids.

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New Braunfels mayoral race headed to runoff after legal review cites state constitution

The mayoral race in New Braunfels will go to a runoff after city officials reversed course and said the city’s charter conflicts with the Texas Constitution, according to a statement from the city. The city initially said Michael French, a former council member, had won the race with a plurality of the vote over incumbent Mayor Neal Linnartz. But officials later determined that state law requires a majority for offices with terms longer than two years. The mayor’s term in New Braunfels is three years. The issue emerged after the May 2 election, when results showed French leading and the city initially declared him the winner. Linnartz publicly conceded. Unofficial results show French received the most votes with 3,667, or about 49%. Linnartz followed with roughly 38%. Two other candidates split the remaining votes.

Because no candidate reached a majority, the top two vote-getters will now advance to a runoff. City officials said the determination followed notice from outside legal counsel about the conflict between local and state law. Under the Texas Constitution, state law supersedes city charter provisions when they are in conflict. City Attorney Valeria Acevedo said the situation required further legal review before moving forward. “This situation stems from a conflict between our City Charter and the Texas Constitution,” Acevedo said in the city’s statement. “The Constitution clearly requires a majority vote for offices with terms longer than two years.” She said once the issue was fully analyzed, it became clear a runoff election was legally required. The city said it understands the confusion and concern this may cause for voters and plans to seek additional review from an outside attorney to confirm the interpretation. New Braunfels officials will now work with county election authorities to schedule the runoff, and details on timing and voting will be announced once finalized, according to the city.

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Dell looks to ditch Delaware, move its incorporation to Texas

Dell Technologies Inc. is looking to move its incorporation to Texas adding to a list of tech companies that have uprooted their legal home from Delaware. According to a press release, the company's governing board recommended that it move its incorporation to the Lone Star state, where the bulk of its workforce and leadership currently reside. The company was founded in Austin, Texas. Stockholders of the company will be asked to approve the redomestication at its June 25 shareholders meeting. The press release announcing the recommendation cites the company's footprint and roots in Texas and not any legal gripes about the First State. Texas has been making a push to recruit companies to reincorporate there through reforms to its corporate laws and its business courts that legal experts say weaken guardrails against company mismanagement and dilute shareholders' rights.

This is happening as criticisms of Delaware's courts by the likes of Elon Musk have continued. In recent years, a few dozen billion-dollar, largely founder-led companies have pulled their legal home from the First State, citing gripes about litigation in Delaware. A company's redomestication is essentially a paperwork move that puts it under another state's corporate law. These companies have little to no actual employment footprint in Delaware, but they contribute to the suite of fees and taxes known as the state's corporate franchise that brings in about $1.8 billion annually, funding about a third of state government operations. The criticisms and concerns about potential flight of corporate charters have led to a series of highly controversial legislative reforms to corporate law in Delaware that state leaders say are necessary to keep businesses, but shareholder groups said erode the role of the courts in policing company mismanagement. And while losing a big, multi-billion-dollar company like Dell may make headlines, its financial impact on state coffers is limited, as the fees and taxes individual companies face are capped at $250,000. Delaware Online/The News Journal has asked Delaware's Secretary of State Charuni Patibanda-Sanchez, who oversees the franchise, as well as Gov. Matt Meyer, for comment on Dell's potential relocation.

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‘Classic unfunded mandate’: San Antonio school districts reveal costs of new seat belt requirements

Local school districts say it’s not “financially feasible” to install three-point seat belts on all school buses, even though the state expects them to by the 2029-30 school year. “This is a classic, classic unfunded mandate,” said John Craft, superintendent for Northside Independent School District. “If there is such a thing, this is textbook definition.” Passed last year, Senate Bill 546 builds on school bus safety requirements by requiring that all buses have three-point seat belts, regardless of the year they were made. Before that, only buses made after 2018 were required to have the safety belts. Currently, districts have bus fleets with a patchwork of seat belt types, operating buses with three-point belts, two-point belts and some with no seat belts. Seat belts drew lawmakers’ attention again after a 2024 collision between a concrete truck and a school bus from the Hays Consolidated Independent School District resulted in the death of a 5-year-old student. The school bus didn’t have seat belts.

SB 546 doesn’t provide any state funding, requiring school districts to report what kind of seat belts buses currently have, how much it would cost them to be in compliance and whether they can actually afford it. Districts are expected to turn in those reports to the Texas Education Agency by the end of May, and officials are hoping lawmakers either create a funding source or change the law. “We hope, which isn’t a really good strategy, we hope that the data reveals that the Legislature needs to invest,” said Don Jurek, director of transportation at East Central ISD, when presenting the district’s seat belt report at a board meeting in February. Most San Antonio-area districts have already presented seat belt reports to the public, and none have said it’s feasible to be compliant with SB 546 by 2029 with their current budgets. They are proposing longer phased plans to replace or retrofit buses. Retrofitting carries a heavy price tag, ranging from hundreds of thousands of dollars in smaller districts to several million dollars in larger districts.

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Dozens of Central Texas residents file suit against SpaceX alleging ‘terrestrial bombardment’

Almost 80 Central Texas residents who allege their homes have been damaged by SpaceX’s “daily barrage of terrestrial bombardment” are suing Elon Musk’s aerospace company in McGregor. The 77 plaintiffs, residents of McGregor, Moody, Crawford and Oglesby, collectively are seeking more than $1 million in damages in their lawsuit, filed Friday in Waco’s 414th State District Court. The lawsuit alleges gross negligence and trespass and claims that regular rocket testing by SpaceX“ continues to physically, intentionally, and voluntarily cause massive airborne acoustic pressure waves and ground-borne seismic shockwaves to physically enter and invade Plaintiffs’ properties.”

SpaceX did not respond to an email seeking comment on the lawsuit, which was filed the same week as a federal lawsuit in the U.S. Southern District of Texas in which 80 South Texas residents claim their homes were damaged by “massive” sonic booms from the SpaceX facility in South Texas. Both lawsuits were filed by the Martinez and Tijerina law firm in Brownsville. “Plaintiffs are innocent bystanders caught in the blast radius of SpaceX’s industrial ambitions,” the lawsuit alleges. “…The continuous shaking and acoustic resonance have caused severe, escalating property damage across these communities.” The plaintiffs’ homes are “literally cracking under the pressure, suffering from fractured foundations, differential settlement and compromised structural integrity” due to the rocket tests, the lawsuit claims.

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Inside the plan to save downtown Dallas

For decades, downtown Dallas measured success in square feet: another tower, another headquarters, another skyline-defining deal. That logic produced Bank of America Plaza, Fountain Place, Renaissance Tower, and more—and created a central business district designed for an office market that no longer exists. Forty years later, many of those towers sit half-empty. The 18 largest buildings hold 8 million square feet of empty space. The overall vacancy rate is approaching 30 percent—among the highest of any major U.S. city center. “Most of those buildings are owned by lenders,” says longtime developer and investor Ray Washburne. “They’re basically zombie buildings.” As business leaders, investors, and developers begin to sketch plans to revive downtown, they won’t start with those skyscrapers. Not even close. Instead, a new consensus is emerging—downtown’s future will be decided at the street level.

The downtown Dallas we studied for this feature is framed by a “loop” of four major roadways that separate the central business district from surrounding neighborhoods. These include I-35E to the west, I-30 to the south, I-345 to the east, and Woodall Rodgers Freeway to the north. Can the city stitch together the myriad districts it already has—including the Arts District, Farmers Market, West End, and East Quarter—with housing, hotels, schools, parks, retail, and safer streets? Can the $3.5 billion convention center become a true anchor rather than an island on the southern edge? Will the city finally decide the future of City Hall—potentially replacing it with a mixed-use district and a new Mavericks arena, as team owner Patrick Dumont has envisioned? Or will Dallas miss a once-in-a-generation opportunity to reshape its core? For decades, the city’s downtown operated on a simple thesis: recruit corporate headquarters, fill towers with employees, and let restaurants, hotels, and retail follow. And for a while, it worked. “What an extraordinary 20-year run Dallas has had,” says Ross Perot Jr. “If you compare the Dallas of 20 years ago to the Dallas we have today, it really is an economic development miracle.”

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City Stories

New Caney is expanding with thousands of homes, new health district

Two master-planned communities are expanding in New Caney as developers tap into growing demand for housing and healthcare in the area northeast of Houston. The projects are expected to add thousands of single-family homes, along with a 328-acre healthcare district in Valley Ranch. While New Caney had about 37,600 residents in 2024, that represents an 80% increase from a decade earlier, according to the latest estimates from the U.S. Census Bureau. Expanding housing developments will draw more residents to the area as developers bet on the future of this Montgomery County suburb. Here are two projects driving that momentum.

Valley Ranch, a 1,400-acre master-planned community at the junction of the Grand Parkway and Interstate 69, is already home to about 7,000 residents, but new projects there will accelerate its growth. This week, Valley Ranch’s developer, the Signorelli Company, announced the groundbreaking of Azalea District, a 328-acre mixed-use district planned within Valley Ranch along Azalea Boulevard east of Interstate 69. Elsewhere in Valley Ranch, the Signorelli Company expects to break ground on an 188-acre retail center, called Marketplace, this summer. The East Montgomery County Improvement District is also set to open its new convention center in Valley Ranch this summer, according to Signorelli. East of Valley Ranch near the Grand Parkway and Plum Grove Road, a nature-focused 1,373-acre community called the Trails is opening its second phase with hundreds of homes and additional amenities. Austin-based developer Castle Hill Partners is planning to build 2,000 homes in the Trails, alongside 600 acres of wooded land for trail and outdoor recreation. Tiffany McMillan, vice president at Castle Hill Partners, said the developer was drawn to the area’s proximity to the Grand Parkway and the Lake Houston Wilderness Park. The Trails second phase includes 344 homes priced from the “upper $200,000s” to the “upper $500,000s.” Homes range from 1,400 square feet to 3,900 square feet. Construction is also underway on a 5-acre amenity campus opening later this year with a clubhouse, pools, playground and event spaces.

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National Stories

The antiabortion movement is turning on Trump

The antiabortion lobby expected to be more triumphant by now: A conservative Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, Republicans control both chambers of Congress, and the self-styled “most pro-life president in history” again occupies the Oval Office. But abortions are up in the years after the overturning of Roe, and the antiabortion lobby has a new locus for blame. “Trump is the problem. The president is the problem,” Marjorie Dannenfelser, the influential president of Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America, said in an interview with The Wall Street Journal. The ubiquity of abortion pills during the second Trump administration has led antiabortion advocates to decry the president’s appointees, including Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Food and Drug Administration Commissioner Marty Makary, and promise cash and political firepower to politicians who oppose the drugs.

Dannenfelser’s assessment for supporters packed into a glitzy neoclassical auditorium in downtown Washington for the group’s spring gala Wednesday was dire: If Republicans don’t abandon Trump’s strategy of letting states decide abortion law, “then the movement as we know it is finished.” Now, Dannenfelser’s group is preparing to spend $160 million in the coming midterms and the 2028 presidential primary. The hurdle for candidates looking to tap in to that support: They must commit, Dannenfelser said, “to pro-life action at the national level.” Leaders in the antiabortion movement are quick to credit Trump for nominating the Supreme Court justices who overturned Roe, but their frustration has been building for months. They hoped that the administration would roll back Biden-era rules allowing the abortion pill, mifepristone, to be prescribed online and shipped through the mail. The regulations have allowed clinicians in states with liberal abortion laws, such as New York, to prescribe and send pills to women in states with strict abortion bans, such as Mississippi.

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White House insists Iran war is over, even while missiles fly

When the cease-fire in the war with Iran went into effect a month ago, President Trump was pretty direct that if the Iranians failed to end their nuclear program, or to reopen the Strait of Hormuz, the bombers would be back in the air. “If there’s no deal, fighting resumes,” he said, making it very clear this was just a pause. But it turns out, according to Secretary of State Marco Rubio, that the war actually ended at some point after the cease-fire took hold, or so he told reporters at a news conference at the White House on Tuesday. “The Operation Epic Fury is concluded,” he said. “We achieved the objective of that operation.” The effort to reopen the strait, Mr. Rubio said, is entirely a defensive and humanitarian operation that would result in direct military exchanges with the Iranians only if U.S. ships came under fire.

Later on Tuesday, Mr. Trump announced that he was pausing even that effort — which was only one day old, and had succeeded in getting just a few ships freed — “for a short period of time,” citing what he said was “great progress” toward an agreement with Iran. But he kept the American blockade in place, part of a strategy of maximum economic pressure. Still, Mr. Trump’s suspension of the effort to guide ships out of the strait seemed to contradict the administration’s stated position that it was intolerable for Iran to block an international waterway, and that only the United States had the ability to force it open again. For the White House, the insistence that the war was over was the latest rhetorical leap in an effort to put a war that has created the greatest political crisis of Mr. Trump’s presidency in the rearview mirror. But the mere proclamation does not make it true. Missiles were still flying. Both sides insist they control traffic in the waterway.

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Obama, Colbert gush over Zohran Mamdani as they discuss Democratic Party's future

Former President Barack Obama and outgoing "Late Show" host Stephen Colbert took turns singing the praises of New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani during their interview Tuesday night. During a prerecorded interview that aired Tuesday from the Obama Presidential Center in Chicago, Colbert spoke with Obama about the direction of the Democratic Party, specifically regarding the ongoing rift between the liberal and the progressive wings of the party. "So you have great leaders. You have people like (Virginia Governor) Abigail Spanberger and (New Jersey Governor) Mikie Sherrill, very centrist. But then you have further left, like AOC and Zohran Mamdani," Colbert said, sparking cheers from his audience after name-dropping the self-described democratic socialists. "What direction do you think would be best for this party, to actually achieve change?" Colbert asked.

Obama shrugged off concerns that there was a true divide between both wings of the Democratic Party. "I'm not so worried about this so-called rift between the left and liberals, as you described it," Obama told Colbert. "Because I think that within the Democratic Party and I would argue a bunch of independents and even some Republicans as well, there's an overarching belief in equality, fairness, if you work then you should be able to make a living wage and support a family and retire with dignity... There are a bunch of things that we agree on. And it's really more of a question of, what are the specific things that we have to do." "You look at somebody like Mamdani, who I think is an extraordinary talent," he continued. "He wants people to be able to afford housing in New York. Well, you know, I would assume liberals in New York want the same thing. And so I don't worry as much about some of these issues within the Democratic Party. I'm more interested in for Democrats is — do you know to just talk to regular people like we're not in a college seminar, right? You know, can you talk plain English to folks about-" "I think that's one of the powers that Mamdani has," Colbert interjected. "That's correct," Obama said. "Not only does he talk like a normal person, but he lives a normal life, but also, he names what is obviously wrong," Colbert continued. "Yes!" Obama exclaimed. "And not have a bunch of gobbledygook around it... Just talk like normal people talk."

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Democrat Chedrick Greene’s win in Michigan state Senate election gives the party another over-performance

Michigan Democrats on Tuesday won a special election for a state Senate seat in another party over-performance after the district was almost evenly divided in the last presidential election. Democratic firefighter Chedrick Greene defeated GOP lawyer Jason Tunney for a seat to determine whether Democrats would retain control of the state Senate. With an estimated 93% of votes in, Greene led Tunney by 19 points. Michigan was one of the hardest-fought states in the presidential election and remains a top battleground in the midterms, home to competitive Senate and governor’s races. Former Vice President Kamala Harris carried the state Senate district by less than 1 percentage point in 2024.

Greene’s victory was the most recent example of Democrats exceeding their 2024 margins in special elections across the country, a trend that has them feeling upbeat about their chances in the midterms. “We delivered this decisive victory by listening and speaking to the things keeping everyday people up at night — worries about affordability, safety, and freedom,” Greene said in his victory speech. Tunney conceded the special election and said in a statement that it was “only the halfway point,” alluding to the fact that he and Greene could meet again in the November election. The candidates in Tuesday’s contest were vying to fill a seat that has been vacant since its former occupant, now-Rep. Kristen McDonald Rivet, gave it up to enter Congress in January 2025. She campaigned with Greene, as did Democratic Gov. Gretchen Whitmer. Greene ran on his background as a Marine veteran and fire captain, promising to lower the cost of living. One of his ads depicted him putting out a Dumpster fire tagged with the labels “higher rents,” “job loss” and “price gouging.”

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Ohio set for marquee matchups for US Senate, governor in the fall

Tuesday’s primary in Ohio set up two marquee matchups in November — a U.S. Senate race that will help determine control of the chamber and a governor’s race in which Democrats see their best chance of victory in two decades. Another stunningly expensive Senate race — the state’s third in four years — is expected as Republicans try to hold their majority during a difficult midterm cycle. Former Sen. Sherrod Brown easily defeated a challenger in the Democratic primary and will now attempt to unseat Republican Sen. Jon Husted. Democrats are counting on Brown’s previous popularity with voters to flip the seat, even as the Senate Leadership Fund — a top GOP super PAC — has pledged $79 million to defend Husted. Brown, who served three Senate terms before losing a bitter reelection bid in 2024, pledged at his victory party to fight for working-class Ohioans.

“No one in the Senate is standing up to these corporations who raise your prices and who game the system,” Brown said as attendees booed. He continued, “Ohioans don’t have anyone fighting for you, until November.” Husted, who did not hold an election night party, was unopposed in his primary, a special election to fill the remainder of the six-year Senate term that Vice President JD Vance won in 2022. In a statement earlier in the day, Husted said Brown has no room to talk about failures in Washington. “Over the next six months, Ohioans will hear a lot from Sherrod Brown about his so-called solutions,” Husted said. “The truth is, after 32 years in Washington, he created the very problems he now blames others for. His record is indefensible.” In the governor’s race, biotech billionaire Vivek Ramaswamy clinched the Republican nomination over internet personality Casey Putsch to face Dr. Amy Acton, the COVID-era health director, this fall. Acton was unopposed in the Democratic primary.

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High gas prices wreak havoc on America’s army of supercommuters

Nicole Smith fills the gas tank of her 2021 Jeep Compass three times a week to keep up with her long commute, 50 miles each way, three times a week, from her Fredericksburg, Va., home to a graduate program in the nation’s capital. Smith, 35, and her husband moved there from a town closer to Washington, D.C., in 2023 for more-affordable housing. Now she is being stung by higher gasoline prices, with fill-ups costing about $200 more each month compared with earlier this year. “One of the biggest things that I have been forgoing is just less fun activities, less weekends out, less traveling,” said Smith, who is retired from the D.C. Army National Guard and studying public health. She and her husband live off his Army paycheck and her disability benefits.

“It’s mostly frustrating because you go from one month budgeting for a certain amount, and the next month it’s another amount,” said Smith, who can spend up to two hours fighting traffic in each one-way commute. The ranks of America’s marathon commuters have grown since the pandemic, with many workers moving farther away from city centers for cheaper housing and more space. The work-from-home era, meanwhile, has shifted to more of a full-time and hybrid-schedule mix. These days so-called supercommuters, often defined as people who travel 90 minutes or more each way to work, are paying an especially heavy price if they have to drive. Commuters who drive a new vehicle with average fuel economy 75 miles each way, every weekday, could spend roughly $500 a month to keep their tanks filled just for commutes at today’s prices, if they stay elevated. Add in the extra amount in high-cost states like California and more miles, and expenses balloon from there.

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House Democrats’ primary endorsements divide the party

When Jordan Wood, a progressive running for an open congressional seat in Maine, woke up on Monday morning, his husband looked at him as if someone had just died. No one had. But while he was sleeping, Mr. Wood had missed some jarring news: An official from the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee had left a voice mail message with the heads-up that the group would be announcing within hours that it was endorsing Joe Baldacci, a state senator and one of his primary opponents, in the race for Maine’s Second Congressional District. “I’m in total shock,” Mr. Wood, who has raised more money than Mr. Baldacci but is trailing in some public polls, said in an interview. “They were pretty clear with me that they had no plans to weigh in on this primary.”

Mr. Wood’s was one of eight primaries in critical and competitive districts across the country where House Democrats’ campaign arm announced this week that it was getting involved to boost a candidate as part of its “red to blue” program, a sign of the party’s growing confidence that it is on track to win control of the House in November. Four of them were contested primaries, in which the D.C.C.C. chose one Democratic candidate over others. Such endorsements, which typically translate into major fund-raising boosts, are not atypical. But this year, they have bitterly divided Democrats, who are feuding openly over the choices in a sign of deeper rifts about the party’s tactics and future. Some Democrats, including prominent members of Congress, are accusing the campaign committee of being undemocratic in trying to influence the selection of candidates in contested primaries before voters have had their say. The intervention is drawing unfavorable comparisons to the 2024 election cycle, when some Democrats felt the party had anointed Vice President Kamala Harris as the presidential nominee instead of allowing a competitive process to play out following President Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s abrupt and late exit from the race.

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Lead Stories

Trump’s retribution? What to watch in Tuesday’s elections in Indiana, Ohio and Michigan

President Donald Trump’s campaign to politically punish Republicans who stand in his way moves through Indiana on Tuesday, when seven state senators face Trump-backed primary challengers. An effort pushed by U.S. President Donald Trump last November to redraw Indiana’s congressional map failed. With the recent Supreme Court decision limiting the Voting Rights Act, some fear it could happen again. (AP video: Obed Lamy) In neighboring Ohio, primaries for U.S. Senate and governor will lock in the candidates for two major races with national implications. And in Michigan, voters in a bellwether district will fill a vacancy in the state Senate, a race with implications for the balance of power in a battleground state. Here’s what to watch for.

Trump is taking aim at seven Republican state senators in Indiana who opposed his plan to redraw congressional district boundaries to help the party gain seats in the U.S. House. Groups allied with the president have spent millions on advertising, an extraordinary flood of cash and attention into races that are typically low profile. The races are a test of Trump’s enduring grip over his party as Republicans grow increasingly anxious about the midterm elections in November. The results will signal to Republicans everywhere about how big a price they’ll pay with their voters if they distance themselves from Trump even as his popularity fades. And it will show the president whether he can still credibly threaten consequences for Republicans who cross him. The Trump-targeted state senators all represent districts he carried in 2024, mostly by 20 percentage points or more. The key races to watch are districts 1, 11, 19, 21, 23, 38 and 41.

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Morris ouster signals battle for transportation policy in North Texas

Visions of the future of North Texas -- and how to engineer it from wishful thinking into reality -- are hatched in a large conference room about 100 yards from Six Flags over Texas in Arlington. It is where bureaucrats make decisions that impact the everyday lives of more than 8.3 million North Texans, who are mostly unaware of the proceedings. Article continues below this ad And it is where the region’s power brokers take high-stakes positions over how to spend billions of the public’s money. And where one man — for 36 years — led so many deals that they have become impossible to count. Michael Morris, as transportation director for the North Central Texas Council of Governments, has been the ultimate persuader.

How do you put a tolled highway in north Dallas without enraging the owners of high-rises in the way? Bore underground tunnels. How do you find cash to finish the Margaret Hunt Hill Bridge when money is strangled by red tape? You depend on your local allies — the city of Dallas and private donors — to help foot the bill. But at the April 30 regularly scheduled meeting of the Regional Transportation Council, a 45-member group of elected officials from all over North Texas in charge of setting policy for the Council of Governments, Morris was not there. He was not seated in his swivel chair at the head of the meeting. Two days prior, Morris had been shown the door by the Council of Government’s Executive Director Todd Little in what past and current members of the Regional Transportation Council say was a strategic and unlawful coup to take control of the heart and soul of transportation policy in North Texas. Up until now, Morris was its heart and soul. But now, without Morris, the future direction of the transportation arm of the Council of Governments is up in the air. Morris may have left an indelible mark on North Texas’ highways, bus routes, commuter rail and air travel, but he also took positions that made him a polarizing figure and drew a fair share of criticism.

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DeSantis signs Florida redistricting map, drawing quick legal challenge

Gov. Ron DeSantis on Monday signed into law the congressional map his office created. Within hours, opponents filed a lawsuit. DeSantis’ plan could add four more seats for the Republican Party. It also threatens to dismantle Florida’s Fair Districts Amendment, a voter-approved part of the constitution adopted in 2010. “Signed, Sealed, and Delivered,” DeSantis said on social media, attaching a photo of the new districts. The governor’s signature comes one week after his office first unveiled its proposal. Fox News received an exclusive, red-and-blue party-coded map before lawmakers did. Lawmakers approved the governor’s proposal after two days of a redistricting-focused special session. Democrats decried what they said was a violation of Florida’s constitution and a ploy to appease President Donald Trump, who has pushed red states to redraw their maps to keep GOP control of Congress.

Florida now joins the about half-dozen states that have redrawn their maps after Trump’s push, either in favor of Republicans or in favor of Democrats. No Republicans other than the bill sponsors in the House and Senate spoke out in support of DeSantis’ proposal during the special session. Five Republicans voted against the plan. DeSantis’ signature puts the new districts in place for the 2026 midterms. But a lawsuit filed Monday by the Equal Ground Education Fund and a group of 18 Florida voters asks the court to strike the map down. Six plaintiffs are from Tampa Bay, two are from Central Florida and 10 are from South Florida. The plaintiffs, who filed in Leon County court, are represented by the Elias Law Group, a Democrat-aligned firm that focuses on election law. The group’s lawsuit focuses on Florida’s Fair Districts Amendment, which prohibits lawmakers from creating a map that favors a certain political party. The group is accusing Florida of drawing an explicitly partisan map in violation of the state constitution. “When the time came to present his proposed map ... the Governor left no room for doubt as to its purpose,” the lawsuit said, pointing to the plan’s release on Fox News.

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Inside the quiet Republican effort to flip Fetterman

It’s a few days after the election this November, and the results have become clear: Democrats have netted the four seats they need to claim a Senate majority. But then there’s a disturbance in the force: Senate Republicans and President Donald Trump persuade Sen. John Fetterman (D-Pa.) to switch parties or at least become an independent to ensure Republicans retain power in the chamber. It’s a scenario that’s becoming less fantastical by the day. The political environment is curdling for Republicans, and the quiet campaign to lure Fetterman across the aisle is underway. Trump has made the sell, offering his patented total and complete endorsement plus a financial windfall to the Pennsylvanian. A handful of Senate Republicans are also gently feeling out Fetterman and responding to his concerns over the prospect of defecting from the Democratic Party, multiple high-level GOP officials tell me.

If Fetterman does flip, according to officials who were given anonymity to talk about sensitive matters, it will be thanks in large part to his deepening friendship with a pair of senators and their high-profile spouses: Sen. Dave McCormick (R-Pa.), and his wife Dina, and Sen. Katie Britt (R-Ala.), and her husband, Wesley. But the first-term Democrat — who’s infuriated his party with his harder line on immigration and staunch support for Israel, Trump nominees, government funding bills and most recently the president’s ballroom — isn’t yet persuaded. “I’m not changing,” Fetterman told me in an interview Friday when I asked if he was ruling out both becoming a Republican or turning independent. “I’m a Democrat, and I’m staying one. “ Yet, at least in private, he’s not totally rejecting dropping his “D.” When one senior Republican recently brought up the idea of becoming an independent to Fetterman, he absorbed the suggestion and didn’t embrace or reject the overture, according to a GOP official familiar with the conversation. In our interview, Fetterman said bluntly: “I’d be a shitty Republican.”

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State Stories

Houston Texans, Rodeo commit to Harris County for stadium plans

Team owner Cal McNair said the Houston Texans and the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo have decided to make things work in Harris County. Team president Mike Tomon said the Texans have not ruled out building a new stadium within the park but are focusing on renovating Reliant Stadium, which is said to be significantly behind on needed maintenance. “What we’ve talked to the Rodeo (about) is we’re going to make it work, and so we’ll figure out a way to make it work and have everybody a winner in this thing,” McNair said Monday at the team's annual charity golf event, which raised more than $565,000.

In February 2025, the Texans began negotiating a new lease with Harris County and the Rodeo. The current lease expires in 2032. At the time, the Texans said they wanted to remain in the greater Houston area but not necessarily in Harris County. But McNair’s latest comments represent a significant shift in their line of thinking. Whereas other nearby counties were thought to be viable candidates to potentially house a new stadium for the Texans and Rodeo, if it came to that, Harris County is now the sole focus. “The reason we feel that way is if you take a step back and you look at Reliant Park, the attributes of it, you have 350 continuous acres on major arteries with (Interstate) 610, and soon to be the third-largest city in the United States,” Tomon said. “That is pretty special. So when we think about our partnership with the Rodeo, we’re both aligned on we’ll do everything we can to make it work on that specific site because we really think that can be transformative for the city of Houston.” The facilities the Rodeo uses are also in need of renovations. Reliant Park is owned by the county, which leases the facilities to the Texans and the Rodeo. As part of the current lease agreement, the county is responsible for the facilities within the park and their upkeep. But the county is behind on those maintenance needs.

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The long, bitter fight to get ICE out of Dallas

Last November, Azael Alvarez was driving around a neighborhood in southeastern Dallas when he noticed what appeared to be a group of masked Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers surrounding a car at a gas station. Alvarez, an organizer with the group El Movimiento DFW (Dallas–Fort Worth), had been heavily involved in the fight against ICE in the city since the start of the second Trump administration. As soon as he saw the masked agents, Alvarez pulled into the station and began recording the interaction. He noticed that a group of Dallas Police Department (DPD) officers was also present. When Alvarez asked the officers if they could verify that the masked men were from ICE, they said, “We don’t know [who they are] either.” As the suspected ICE agents detained at least one person, Alvarez asked the agents if they had a warrant, while DPD officers stood by watching. As police were driving off, an officer shouted, “Get a job!” in his direction. The incident came in the midst of an ongoing debate about the relationship between local Dallas law enforcement and ICE.

For the better part of a year, organizers, residents, and elected officials have called on the city’s leadership for accountability, transparency, and action in the face of the Trump administration’s pervasive mass-deportation drive. The debate reached a fever pitch less than three weeks before the gas station incident, when Eric Johnson, the Republican mayor of Dallas, ordered a special meeting of two city hall committees to discuss whether the DPD should enter into an official agreement with ICE, under a federal program known as 287(g). (Johnson, whose lax approach to his job led the The Dallas Morning News to dub him “the mayor of Somewhere Else,” didn’t show up to the meeting.) Across the country, local governments are increasingly leveraging their autonomy to curb ICE’s reach. In Chicago, Mayor Brandon Johnson issued a directive ordering city officials to investigate and potentially prosecute federal agents. Los Angeles’s mayor barred the use of city-owned properties as “a staging area, processing location, or operations base for immigration enforcement.” But in Texas, where the state legislature is dominated by right-wing politicians who threaten lawfare against cities that decrease their police budgets or adopt “sanctuary” statutes, local governments face challenges to establish policies protecting their immigrant communities against ICE, even if they are largely symbolic. Texas’s 2017 anti-sanctuary law prevents local governments from creating policy that “prohibits or discourages the enforcement of immigration laws” and requires them to honor ICE detainers placed on immigrants in local jails.

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Alex Jones' Infowars site has finally shut down — for now

"There's a war on for your mind." That's what Austin-based conspiracy theorist Alex Jones told his listeners, readers and acolytes for decades. Now, it seems that war is over. Jones' Infowars platform shut down quietly over the weekend after a court-appointed receiver refused to continue paying for the outlet's operating expenses. The same weekend, The Onion launched its Infowars-branded satirical takedown of Jones as his bankruptcy case lingers in state court. Families of the Sandy Hook school shooting successfully sued Jones for defamation in Texas and Connecticut courts, forcing him to pay nearly $1.5 billion in damages. But, so far, plaintiffs' attorneys say Jones has managed to dodge paying anything to Sandy Hook families.

The Onion tried in 2023 to take over the site, only for a court to block it. Last month, the satirical publication announced it had a plan to acquire Infowars again, only for a court to side with Jones and stall that takeover. Last week, Mark Bankston, an attorney for plaintiffs, said the yearslong slog in courts has been frustrating for Sandy Hook families. "Everything should be done," Bankston said. "It's a frustrating element in this country that the legal system in general is much too friendly to individuals with wealth who want to seek to avoid paying that wealth to people that they've injured. That's a big problem in this country, and it's not isolated to Alex Jones." Over the weekend, Jones launched a new endeavor, the Alex Jones Network, continuing his controversial brand of broadcasting under that banner. Jones said he did not own the network, but that he was news director, telling his legal foes to "piss up a rope." "The Onion failed to get Infowars for the second time in a year and a half, but the receiver told us to get out of the building by midnight on the 30th," Jones said. "So they're turning the place off."

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As DART loses Highland Park, leaders say future lies in growth

After walking away from a suburban mutiny with one less member city, Dallas Area Rapid Transit leaders laid out goals not just for working with remaining cities on improvements, but for expanding service. On Saturday, Highland Park became the first DART member city in almost 40 years to vote to leave the agency. The town’s voters overwhelmingly chose to cut ties with DART, after its leaders criticized the high cost of a one-cent sales tax they said does not match the value of services in its borders. Still, DART emerged victorious on election day in Addison and University Park, where residents voted to continue their membership. Plano, Irving and Farmers Branch had dropped their election plans months before.

At a news conference Monday, DART Board Chair Randall Bryant said governance and funding challenges “drove our 40-plus year partnership to its near breaking point” this year, despite the agency surviving rounds of withdrawal elections throughout its history. The agency’s focus is now on following through on proposed changes to overcome those challenges, plans that convinced three cities to cancel elections. Ultimately, the board chair said his goal is to see DART expand to meet growing transportation needs that roads alone cannot fulfill. “Even in the midst of ending transit services in our second smallest city in the days to come, we must continue to look beyond our current boundaries,” Bryant said, including north to McKinney, and in the southern sector. “That’s where the future of DART lies.” Member cities will have the opportunity to call an election on DART next in 2032. Over the next six years, the agency will seek to change its governance structure and funding model in the state Legislature.

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AT&T's multibillion-dollar HQ with 'mini Reunion Tower' moves forward

Plans for AT&T’s new multibillion-dollar headquarters in Plano — complete with a 280-foot structure that one official called a “mini Reunion Tower” — got key approval from the city’s Planning and Zoning Commission on Monday night. Commissioners unanimously recommended approval for four items tied to the telecom giant’s new 54-acre campus at 5400 Legacy Drive and adjacent sites. The Plano City Council will get the final say. Preliminary site plans show there will be 2.3 million square feet of building space. The office campus will also include a daycare center, a pedestrian bridge, ¾ of an acre of public green space, and the tower. The southern half of the site will include parking garages. The tower may not exceed 280 feet.

The tallest building, excluding the tower, will be 8 stories. The 280-foot tower will feature AT&T’s logo and include an enclosed communications antenna. City codes prevent the tower from flashing, strobing or displaying other related light effects between 10 p.m. and 6 a.m. The structure must still be approved by the Federal Aviation Administration, city planners said. The tower will be set back 320 feet from nearby residential structures, and any major changes would require the approval of the Planning and Zoning Commission. Plano planning commissioner Ban Alali said the structure resembles a miniature version of Dallas’ 561-foot Reunion Tower. The company announced earlier this year it planned to move its global headquarters out of downtown Dallas. AT&T’s lease at the 37-story Whitacre Tower at 208 S. Akard St. runs through Dec. 31, 2031. Two of the requests were filed by Dallas-based investment firm NexPoint. The group owns the 54-acre site. The firm requested to rezone 1.4 acres of the site as a planned development — which was required because the tower will also function as a communications antenna.

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TEA finds HISD did not violate parental rights at Bellaire HS

The Texas Education Agency did not find any wrongdoing at the district level in an investigation ordered by Gov. Greg Abbott into whether Houston ISD employees at Bellaire High School violated parents’ rights, records show. In March 2025, Abbott said he asked the TEA to investigate whether employees at Bellaire High School had engaged in misconduct or whether the school had violated any state policies after a local Moms for Liberty chapter alleged that teachers had been “socially transitioning” a student.

In a viral video, Denise Bell, the chair of the Harris County chapter of Moms for Liberty, said during an HISD school board meeting last year that an anonymous HISD mother was “shocked” to learn that teachers at Bellaire had been calling their child by a different name and pronouns. The TEA investigated whether the district had violated parents’ rights under the Texas Education Code, which states that parents are entitled to full information about the school activities of their child. It also notes that any attempt by an employee to encourage a child to withhold information from their parents is grounds for discipline. In a March letter to state-appointed Superintendent Mike Miles and board president Ric Campo, the TEA said the investigation had closed in October and there would be no further investigative actions. “Based on the available evidence, the investigation did not result in a finding of district-level wrongdoing or identify violations of provisions of the Texas Education Code in effect during the period under review,” Richard Segovia, the TEA’s Division Director of Special Investigations, wrote. The TEA released the letter to Miles and Campo this week after the Chronicle requested it through public records. The TEA and HISD did not respond to requests for comment.

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Christian Menefee and Al Green, rivals in TX-18, align on aim of strengthening voting rights

U.S. Reps. Christian Menefee and Al Green are vying for the same seat in the Democratic primary runoff election for Texas’ 18th Congressional District. But the two Houston-based lawmakers are on the same page when it comes to backing new voting rights legislation, in the wake of the Supreme Court's decision last week to gut a key provision of the Voting Rights Act. The Supreme Court ruled last Wednesday, in Louisiana v. Callais, that Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act — the provision that allowed enforcement of the act — didn’t bar states from using non-racial factors when drawing maps, including to achieve partisan advantage. The immediate effect was to strike down a congressional district Louisiana had created as an African American opportunity seat. Justice Samuel Alito, writing for the court's conservative majority, called the district an "unconstitutional racial gerrymander."

Menefee, speaking with Houston Public Media, called for Congress to pass a national ban on partisan gerrymandering. "Because of the court decision," Menefee said, "that can be used as subterfuge as an excuse where you can take a racist map, put some lipstick on it and call it a partisan gerrymandering instead of racial gerrymandering. And so we have to ban partisan gerrymandering as quickly as possible." Menefee said there was effectively no chance that Congress would pass new voting rights legislation as long as Republicans are in charge. He said that made it even more important for Democrats to prioritize strengthening voting rights the next time they return to power. "I think it is a stain on the Democratic Party that we weren’t able to pass voting rights legislation when Kyrsten Sinema (I-AZ) and Joe Manchin (I-WV) held it up the last time that we had a majority in the Senate," Menefee said. "But it is going to be incumbent upon us that next time we get the majority that we do whatever is necessary — I don’t care if it means suspending the filibuster — do whatever we can to make sure that we have fair access to the ballot box so that we can continue this pursuit of a true multiracial multicultural democracy."

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Magnolia mayor faces third federal lawsuit related to assault, retaliation allegations

A third federal lawsuit has now been filed against the mayor of Magnolia, further intensifying a growing legal and political crisis that has unfolded over the past several weeks. The newest lawsuit comes from the city’s former administrator, who alleges he was fired in retaliation for speaking out about claims that Mayor Matthew Dantzer assaulted and sexually harassed City Secretary Christian Gable during a work trip. The filing accuses city leadership of punishing him for raising concerns tied to the same allegations that are now at the center of both criminal charges and multiple civil cases.

With three federal lawsuits now filed, a criminal case underway, and a new mayor preparing to take office, Magnolia faces a complex and uncertain path forward. This latest case marks the third federal lawsuit connected to Dantzer in just over a month. Gable and former Human Resources Director Kristy Powell previously filed federal lawsuits alleging sexual harassment, retaliation, and failures by the city to properly investigate claims. Both women say they faced consequences after reporting alleged misconduct. Gable has publicly described what she says was a pattern of inappropriate and escalating behavior that began after she started working at City Hall. She alleges repeated sexualized comments, including being referred to as the mayor’s “sexitary,” and claims the situation escalated during an October work conference in Fort Worth. According to Gable, the mayor allegedly attempted to pull down her pants in public and later grabbed her by the throat, pinning her against a structure outside a hotel while she was five months pregnant. She says surveillance video reviewed later by investigators captured the incident. The allegations prompted an investigation by the Texas Rangers, which ultimately led to Dantzer’s indictment on charges including aggravated assault of a pregnant person and official oppression. He was arrested on a Tarrant County warrant and later released on bond. Dantzer has denied all allegations through his attorney, stating he maintains his innocence and intends to defend himself through the legal process.

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Austin police response times lag amid chronic staffing shortage

Last month, Austinites and officials alike heaped praise on the Austin Police Department after officers responded to a mass shooting on West Sixth Street in 57 seconds and took down the gunman minutes later. The praise for the speedy response was rare for the Austin Police Department, which has struggled for years with slow response times and regularly faces online criticism and complaints. The rapid intervention also raised a question: Is the Police Department getting faster? An American-Statesman analysis of median response times over the past decade shows that the swift reaction to the Buford’s Bar shooting was an outlier. Since 2017, response times – while seeing some improvement in the last year under Police Chief Lisa Davis – have lagged even as 911 call volumes have decreased.

The findings are reflected in public complaints. Since the city’s police oversight agency began categorizing grievances in 2022, the most common type has been “no assistance,” which includes slow responses and alleged no-shows. “It’s a large problem for APD,” Nelly Ramirez, a member of the city’s Public Safety Commission, said in an interview. “We’ve all been in a situation where we see a group of officers sitting around in their cars and we think: What are they doing? Why aren’t they responding to calls?” The Police Department also faces constant criticism on sites like Reddit, where users on the Austin forum regularly accuse police of being "useless" and “quiet quitting.” “I for one am grateful for APDs quiet quitting bc my vehicle tags are 3 years expired,” one user quipped in a post that racked up more than 400 comments. In a recent interview, Davis flatly denied such accusations while also acknowledging slow response times as a problem and emphasizing her department’s chronic, yearslong struggle with understaffing. She also pointed to response time improvements during her 18-month tenure. “No one is quiet-quitting here,” Davis told the Statesman. “It is just the opposite.”

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Matthew J. DeSarno: John Cornyn faces the ultimate test

(Matthew J. DeSarno is a retired FBI special agent in charge of the Dallas Field Office, with a career spanning the Army, the private sector and more than two decades in federal law enforcement.) Ken Paxton is unfit for the United States Senate. The Texas attorney general is ethically compromised, legally entangled and openly opportunistic. His rise is not about leadership. It is about loyalty — to power, not principle. With Texas Republicans now facing a choice between accommodation, scandal and integrity, this Senate race has become a test of political character. But the harder truth is this: Sen. John Cornyn is not being challenged because he stood up to President Donald Trump. He is being challenged because he didn’t. For years, Cornyn’s brand has been competence and restraint — the adult in the room, a steady hand when others chased headlines. That image carried weight because people believed that when it mattered, Cornyn would act. When it mattered, he didn’t.

When the Constitution was tested, Cornyn stayed quiet. When the party drifted toward grievance and personal loyalty, Cornyn adjusted instead of confronting it. When nominees appeared before the committees he serves, who were plainly unqualified or openly partisan, Cornyn allowed the process to move forward as if norms still applied. They don’t. I raised concerns with Cornyn's staff about Kash Patel — not casually, but repeatedly and with specificity. Cornyn’s staff acknowledged those concerns. In my view, those concerns should have raised serious questions about his qualifications, his independence and his approach to the FBI — treating it not as an institution to protect, but as a tool to use. And yet, when Patel sat before the Senate Intelligence Committee, of which Cornyn is a member, there was no meaningful challenge. No sustained questioning. No effort to force clarity on the record. The hearing proceeded as if this were routine. It wasn’t. It was a turning point.

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Criminal allegations against Travis County District Attorney and top staff dismissed

Criminal allegations against Travis County District Attorney Jose Garza and top staff members were dismissed in court on Monday. Travis County Judge Karen Sage threw out two motions that alleged misconduct and violations of due process in connection with a 2020 police use-of-force case. Doug O’Connell is the attorney representing APD Officer Chance Bretches. O'Connell alleges that the DA’s Office withheld favorable evidence in the case against the officer.

O’Connell claimed that Garza and his staff hid evidence and held secret meetings with city leaders about the 2020 Black Lives Matter demonstrations. He alleged they discussed whether the City of Austin, rather than an individual officer such as Bretches, was liable for injuries to protesters during the demonstrations. In this scenario, the city itself would be an “alternate suspect” in the case. “The court is not convinced by the 'alternative suspect' theory. That theory would say it was not your client; it was the city. I think in this case it cannot really just be the city without your client, so I am not really interested in that theory,” said Judge Karen Sage, Travis County 299th Criminal District Court. Sage says that she is interested in seeing an exact timeline of who knew what and when. This is relevant to accusations that Bretches used expired bean bag rounds during the protest that did not work as intended.

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‘All hat and no cattle’: Dallas City Council pushes back on mayor’s criticism of city spending

A day after Dallas Mayor Eric Johnson slammed the City Council for approving “bloated” budgets amid escalating costs and a $33 million financial shortfall halfway through the year, three council members said the mayor hasn’t backed up his words with proposed solutions. Council member Laura Cadena said everyone agrees the city needs to live within its means. But the mayor’s email did not offer any cuts of his own in the “already bare bone budget.” “It’s easy to write a bunch of fiscal statements with zero plan to back it up,” Cadena said. “Here in Texas, we call that ‘all hat and no cattle.’ ”

Last month, City Manager Kimberly Bizor Tolbert imposed hiring freezes, halted overtime and banned unnecessary spending. Johnson criticized the council, saying the belt-tightening should be a “wake-up call” for the council’s resistance to aggressive cuts. “Council members will pay lip service to fiscal responsibility, but when it comes time to vote, few are willing to follow through. Each has favored projects and programs to which they will tolerate no reductions,” Johnson said in his weekly newsletter. Johnson urged council members to identify programs to cut alongside those they want to preserve. He said resistance to cuts makes it difficult to follow through, pointing to the library system. The council recently approved four branch closures but later decided to keep all of them open. Council members say their projects are often bundled with other tiers of work and disrupting one could have a ripple effect on others. Cadena said she’s meeting with residents and community groups to learn their priorities. Council member Adam Bazaldua said he hoped the mayor “is just as enthusiastic on cuts being made to the unnecessary amount of security detail, he has ballooned his budget to include.”

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How Johnny Garcia rose from sheriff’s deputy to a high-profile congressional candidate

TX35 hopeful Johnny Garcia hasn’t even secured his party’s nomination yet, but national Democrats are already listing him among their top candidates to take back seats in the U.S. House this year. The 39-year-old Westside native has spent nearly his entire career at the Bexar County Sheriff’s Office, rising from jail guard to the SWAT team and later serving as the sheriff’s communications director. Though his campaign launch in the new 35th Congressional District surprised some local political watchers, national Democratic Party leaders say he’s exactly what they needed to put a tough seat in play. This week Garcia was added to the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee’s (DCCC) red-to-blue program, an elite group of 20 candidates believed to have the best chance of flipping seats either currently held by a Republican or — in light of many redrawn congressional maps — drawn to favor one.

The designation means he’ll get additional strategic guidance, staff resources, candidate trainings and fundraising support for a race that Democratic super PACs are already reserving ads for this fall. That’s after he was already a personal guest of the Democratic National Committee chair at a national fundraiser earlier this year, and benefitted from hundreds of thousands of dollars in TV ads boosting him through a four-way primary. “Johnny Garcia has dedicated his career to investing in San Antonio, and is ready to answer the call to serve his community in Congress,” U.S. Rep. Suzan DelBene (D-Washington), who chairs the DCCC, said in a statement Monday. “Texans are eager to elect a leader that will put the needs of hardworking families first, and Garcia is ready to step up to the plate.” First, Garcia must still get through a May 26 Democratic primary runoff — which is not a given. In a district that was dramatically redrawn for the 2026 midterm, both parties wound up with crowded fields full of little-known candidates. And despite spending less than $5,000 on her campaign, housing activist Maureen Galindo finished first in Democrats’ race, taking 29% in the first round, to Garcia’s 27%.

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City Stories

City of Frisco launches on-demand rideshare service

The city of Frisco is launching a new pilot rideshare service in partnership with the Denton County Transportation Authority aimed at helping residents and visitors get around the central part of the city during the work week. Starting May 5, the new program, GoZone, is available to help people get to work, school, or run errands. This pilot promotes ridesharing at a very reasonable cost,” Frisco Director of Engineering Services Jason Brodigan said in a statement. “But what makes microtransit so successful is the fact it gets people from where they are to where they want to go.” GoZone will operate between 6 a.m. until 6 p.m. Monday through Friday with rides at a distance-dependent cost between $3 and $5 per person. Rides can be secured through the DCTA GoZone app, which will show "Frisco's service" starting at 6 a.m. on Tuesday.

“When people think about public transit, often times they think about a bus or train,” DCTA CEO Paul Cristina said in a statement. “But what makes microtransit so successful is the fact it gets people from where they are to where they want to go.” The 'Zone' for transportation through the service borders Eldorado Parkway to the north, as well as Hillcrest Road on the east, FM 423 on the west and Main Street and SH 121 on its southernmost boundary. The city says the service also connects to the Northwest Plano Park and Ride. “Once you call for the ride on the app, the ride will show up within 20 – 30 minutes,” Cristina said. “Other people may already be in the van, and you may stop at those riders’ destinations. But your ride will take no more than 30 minutes.” According to the city, riders may have to walk short distances to pre-set pickup points, which are placed to make rides more available and optimize routing. “DCTA has been a great partner,” Frisco Mayor Jeff Cheney said in a statement. “This is a program we hope to learn from and expand in the future. It’s going to be an incredible transportation resource for our residents and visitors.”

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National Stories

Data centers used to be a prize. States are having second thoughts.

Politicians used to compete to lure data centers to their states. They’re starting to reconsider. Tempted by promises of more jobs, tax revenue and the chance to be on the cutting edge of technology, more than three dozen states rolled out the red carpet for data centers in the form of tax breaks and other financial incentives. But now a growing number of states are tempering their enthusiasm. Of the 38 states that currently offer incentives to the data center industry, at least 28 of them have weighed legislation this year to end or shrink those benefits, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures, a nonpartisan research group.

The turnabout speaks to the rapidly shifting politics surrounding data centers, as well as the real-world impacts of their construction. North Carolina Gov. Josh Stein (D) has pointed out that sales tax exemptions for data centers — which include exemptions for electricity costs — cost the state up to $57 million every year. “Do we really want to subsidize data center’s consumption of energy and electricity when they make everyone else’s power bills go up?” Stein said in remarks early last month. “It doesn’t make much sense to me.” Last week, Democratic lawmakers in the North Carolina Legislature introduced a bill that would regulate data centers and repeal some tax credits. Officials in other states have pursued similar ideas. Washington state this year nixed a policy that let data center operators avoid sales taxes for replacement equipment. Minnesota last year scrapped tax exemptions for electricity costs. Nationwide, lawmakers have introduced hundreds of bills that would rein in the data center industry. Some would force companies to pay more for electricity. Others would impose energy requirements or set other strict regulations.

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The secret team blowing up Ford’s assembly line to make a $30,000 electric truck

A crew of engineers slipped past the empty security gate at a Ford Motor truck plant outside Detroit just after 3 a.m. The factory lines were still at that hour—but that was the point. The crew was there to test a section of a new pickup that few at the company knew even existed. Ford’s secret project had an ambitious goal: to figure out how to make electric vehicles in the U.S. that could compete with the Chinese models clobbering competitors globally. The secret is now out as Ford races toward building its first model, a new truck it says will be nearly as fast as a Mustang, travel around 300 miles on a single charge and feature in-car technology to compete with Tesla and China. It’s aiming for a 2027 launch and a price tag of around $30,000, the cost of a Toyota Camry.

Getting there means tearing up a century of manufacturing practices in a notoriously hidebound industry. At stake for Ford is securing a future beyond the gas-guzzling pickups and SUVs that have long defined its bottom line. The project had been kept quiet from its 2022 start, led by veterans from Tesla and Apple who worked on designs out of a California office. Ford eventually brought in some of its own employees to help execute the vision. The process was filled with misunderstandings and distrust as the techie outsiders worked to win over the risk-averse industry veterans. To build these new EVs, the company must use fewer people and simpler parts, and dismantle decades of engineering inertia. Chief Executive Jim Farley is calling it Ford’s new “Model T moment.” Rival automakers say overcoming China on EVs can’t be done, given their advantages: extensive government backing, low-cost labor and a massive head start. Whether Ford’s bet big will work may come down to how well Detroit and Silicon Valley can work together. Traditional automakers have sometimes tried to infuse outsider know-how into their operations, with often bleak results, from abandoned robotaxi projects to costly, unpopular EVs.

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AP, Washington Post, Reuters and Minnesota Star Tribune among Pulitzer winners for 2025 work

The Washington Post won the Pulitzer Prize for public service for scrutinizing the Trump administration’s sweeping, choppy overhaul of federal agencies, and The Associated Press won the award Monday for international reporting about surveillance. In a year when several prize-winning projects zoomed in on the Trump presidency, the Post’s coverage illuminated the administration’s fast-moving, sometimes opaque drive to reshape the national government and what the cuts and changes meant for individual Americans. The Miami Herald’s Julie K. Brown was given a special citation for her reporting, nearly a decade ago, that drew attention to Jeffrey Epstein ’s abuses. The New York Times won three of the coveted prizes, the Post and Reuters each won two, and less widely known outlets ranging from The Connecticut Mirror to the podcast “Pablo Torre Finds Out” also were recognized in a challenging year for American journalism.

“This is always a day of celebration in our communities, but perhaps never more so than today as we face tremendous political and economic pressures,” prize administrator Marjorie Miller said in a livestream announcement. In the last few months, the Post cut a third of its staff, CBS News announced it would shutter its nearly century-old radio service, The AP offered buyouts to over 120 journalists and some regional newspapers also publicly struggled. CBS parent Paramount’s acquisition of CNN has raised questions about what’s next for those networks. Meanwhile, President Donald Trump continued to bash, and sometimes sue, outlets whose coverage he finds objectionable. Spanning three years, thousands of pages of documents and numerous interviews, the AP project found that American companies help lay the foundations of the Chinese government’s system for monitoring and policing its citizens. “This was sweeping and deeply impactful reporting, the kind of work that highlights the unique strengths of AP’s global, multiformat newsroom,” executive editor Julie Pace said in an email to staffers. She is among the Pulitzer Board’s new members.

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Senate Republicans seek $1 billion for White House ballroom security

Senate Republicans want to provide U.S. Secret Service $1 billion for “security adjustments and upgrades” related to the construction of President Donald Trump’s planned White House ballroom. The use of public funds would be limited to building “above-ground and below-ground security elements” only, according to the text of a reconciliation package released by Sen. Chuck Grassley, the chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee. It also includes $30.7 billion for Immigration and Customs Enforcement and $3.5 billion for Customs and Border Protection. “Republicans won’t allow our country to be dragged backwards by Democrats’ radical, anti-law enforcement agenda,” Grassley said in a statement Monday. “The Senate Judiciary Committee is taking action to help provide certainty for federal law enforcement and safer streets for American families. We will work to ensure this critical funding gets signed into law without unnecessary delay.”

The committee is expected to mark up the bill next week before sending it to the full chamber, where it will likely pass via a simple-majority vote. The Trump administration has repeatedly insisted that construction of a new 90,000 square foot White House ballroom, which is to occupy the space of the former East Wing building that was demolished by Trump last year, would be financed by private donations and not cost taxpayers money. It is estimated to cost $400 million. “It’s not going to cost taxpayers a dime,” White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said last year. The plans for the new “East Wing Modernization Project” include offices, a theater and military infrastructure, including a new underground bunker. A federal appeals court has allowed construction to proceed while legal challenges continue. “The military is building a big complex under the ballroom, which has come out recently because of a stupid lawsuit that was filed,” Trump told reporters in March, adding that the ballroom “essentially becomes a shed for what’s being built under.” The text of the reconciliation bill does include a limitation on the use of the $1 billion: “None of the funds made available under this section may be used for non-security elements of the East Wing Modernization Project.”

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Supreme Court voting rights ruling set to reshape local power from statehouses to school boards

The U.S. Supreme Court’s new decision gutting a key provision of the federal Voting Rights Act clears the way for state officials to drastically reshape not only Congress but also state legislatures, county commissions, city councils and even local school boards. The ruling, released last week in a case called Louisiana v. Callais, dismantled some of the final guardrails protecting the electoral power of Black, Hispanic and other racial minority voters that had been enshrined in the Voting Rights Act, a landmark 1965 federal civil rights law that bars racial discrimination in voting access. The 6-3 decision all but nullifies a provision called Section 2 that required states to draw electoral maps to give racial minority voters the opportunity to elect their chosen candidates.

And while intense national attention on the case’s fallout has focused on the U.S. House as the 2026 midterm congressional elections loom, the new ruling also applies to state legislative districts and maps for county or municipal elections. Those localized changes are just hovering further down the road. “While everyone has been focusing on what this means for the power in Congress, there’s a whole other sector of power that it changes,” said Davante Lewis, an elected member of the Louisiana Public Service Commission and one of the litigants in a case that pushed Louisiana to create the congressional maps that were eventually struck down in the Callais ruling. “This is a decision on who gets to serve on a school board, who gets to serve on a city council, who gets representation in the judiciary,” Lewis said. Electoral maps are typically redrawn every 10 years after a census, but the Trump administration has encouraged Republican-led states to redraw districts to favor the GOP, a controversial move that has prompted some Democratic-led states to retaliate with gerrymandering of their own.

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Secret Service says suspect opened fire on them and was shot in exchange near Washington Monument

A man spotted carrying a gun in the vicinity of the White House by plainclothes officers and agents was shot by law enforcement Monday after he opened fire on them near the Washington Monument, the Secret Service said. Secret Service Deputy Director Matt Quinn said plainclothes agents spotted the man around 3:30 p.m. in the area near the White House complex and saw the imprint of the weapon on him. The agents followed him briefly and contacted the uniformed officers. The unidentified man attempted to flee when uniformed officers with the Secret Service approached him. Quinn said the man fired at the officers, who returned fire. The alleged gunman was transported to a local hospital. Quinn said he had no information on the suspect’s condition.

Quinn said emergency personnel also transported a minor who was shot but not seriously injured. Quinn said he could not say definitively that the bystander, who also was taken to a hospital, was struck by shots from the suspect’s gun. “We’ll let the doctors figure that out,” he said, though he noted that “investigators believe he was struck by the suspect.” Quinn said the Washington, D.C., police would investigate the officer-involved shooting. The Secret Service encouraged people to avoid the area as emergency crews responded to the shooting not far from the White House, where President Donald Trump was holding a small business event. The White House was briefly locked down as authorities investigated the incident. The Secret Service ushered journalists who were outside into the briefing room, and Trump continued his event without interruption. The incident drew a large police presence, coming just over a week after a gunman tried to storm the White House Correspondents’ Association dinner with guns and knives. Cole Tomas Allen has been charged in that incident, in which a Secret Service officer was shot, although he was wearing body armor and was not seriously injured. Quinn said it was not known yet whether the Monday incident was related to Trump. “I’m not going to guess on that,” Quinn said. “Whether or not it was directed to the president or not, I don’t know, but we will find out.”

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Rubio expects 'frank' meeting with pope as Trump takes fresh potshots at Leo

U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio expects a "frank" meeting with Pope Leo during a visit to the Vatican this week, the U.S. ambassador said ?on Tuesday, after President Donald Trump took a fresh pot-shot at the pope for criticising the ?U.S. war in Iran. "Nations have disagreements, and I think one of the ways that you work through those is ... through fraternity and ?authentic dialogue," said Brian Burch, the U.S. ambassador to the Holy See. "I think the Secretary is coming here in that spirit," Burch told journalists. "To have a frank conversation about U.S. policy, to engage in dialogue." Trump has repeatedly disparaged the first U.S.-born pope in recent weeks, drawing a backlash from Christian leaders across the political spectrum.

In his latest comments, ?Trump told right-wing radio talk show ?host Hugh Hewitt that "the Pope would rather talk about the fact that it’s okay for Iran to have a nuclear weapon, and I don’t think that’s very good. "I think ?he’s endangering a lot of Catholics and a lot of people. But I guess if it’s up to the Pope, he thinks it’s just fine for Iran to have a nuclear weapon," Trump said. Leo has never said Iran should have ?nuclear ?weapons, but has opposed the war which Trump says is ?aimed at ending Iran's nuclear programme. Rubio is ?a Catholic, as is Vice President JD Vance. The two met Leo a year ago after attending his inaugural mass, the Trump administration's only previous known cabinet-level meetings with the pope. Burch was asked after an event hosted by his embassy at Rome's Gregorian University on Tuesday if Rubio was hoping to repair the relationship between Trump and Leo. "I don't accept the idea that somehow there's some deep rift," the ambassador responded. Rubio is coming, ?Burch said, so that the U.S. and the Vatican can "better ?understand each other, and to work through, if there are differences, ?certainly to talk through that." Rubio is also set ?to meet in Rome on Friday with Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, who defended ?the Pope. Her defense minister has said the ?war in Iran puts U.S. ?leadership at risk. Leo, who marks his first year as leader of the 1.4-billion-member Catholic Church on Friday, maintained a relatively low profile on the global stage in the first months of his papacy but has ?emerged in recent weeks as a ?firm critic of the U.S.-Israeli war on Iran. The pope has also sharply criticised the Trump ?administration's hard-line anti-immigration policies and called for dialogue between the U.S. and Catholic-majority Cuba to prevent violence.

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Copyright May 12, 2026, Harvey Kronberg, www.quorumreport.com, All rights are reserved