Lead Stories

Texas Democrats seek unity at state convention without Jasmine Crocket

Texas Democrats will gather next week in Corpus Christi, seeking to project unity and build momentum behind state Rep. James Talarico's Senate campaign. One of the party's most recognizable stars won't be there. U.S. Rep. Jasmine Crockett of Dallas, who lost a hard-fought Senate primary to Talarico in March, told The Dallas Morning News she does not plan to attend the state convention and instead is focusing on helping down-ballot candidates across the country. Crockett also said she’s not sure whether Democrats, particularly Black voters, have united fully behind Talarico and the rest of the ticket. She said the lack of a Black nominee for major statewide office could dampen enthusiasm among some voters.

“I've not heard a bunch of kumbaya,” she said. “People don't seem to be convinced at this point, but there's a lot of time between now and November.” Asked whether she would actively support Talarico's campaign, Crockett said: “I have no idea. I am more focused on down-ballot races in general.” Crockett’s absence from the convention reflects a lingering divide between her and Talarico, who served together in the Texas House and became rivals during the hotly contested Senate race. He faces Republican Ken Paxton in November. She said she received what she described as an “afterthought invite” on June 8 from Talarico, based on the preview message on her cell phone. “I had a missed call that I've not returned, nor have I listened to the message from Talarico,” Crockett told The News. “It seemed like an afterthought invite. I can't say for sure, because I haven't listened to it.” According to Talarico’s campaign, he called Crockett and left a message suggesting she make the keynote speech at the convention. In a statement to The News, Talarico said that “Texans are coming together…to do something extraordinary.”

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Hormuz relief may not ease the economic toll that's already 'baked in,' analysts warn

Early signs that the Strait of Hormuz is reopening have eased the most acute threat to global energy supplies, but economic damages from the nearly four months of war will take months to unwind, analysts warned. The U.S. and Iran signed a memorandum Thursday to open the Strait of Hormuz, ending a war that has upended global energy supply chains, pushed inflation higher and dented the outlook for growth. But even if shipping through the strait normalizes, higher inflation has already been largely “baked in” across many economies, Simon MacAdam, deputy chief global economist at Capital Economics, said in a note this week.

“It can take many months for higher energy and fertiliser prices to be passed along food supply chains to end-consumers,” MacAdam said. Prices of natural gas piped to households typically lag the upstream market by around three months, he said. Oil prices retreated to around $80 a barrel on Friday, down from a peak of $118 in March when the war was at its height. Goldman Sachs cut its oil price forecast Tuesday, projecting Brent to average $80 in late 2026 and $75 in 2027, citing a faster-than-expected recovery in Persian Gulf crude flows. Higher energy costs and upstream supply disruptions would take longer to feed through to the downstream food and energy sectors. A backlog of vessels waiting to transit the Strait of Hormuz could further delay a full recovery in freight flows. The World Bank, which last week lowered its global economic growth forecast to 2.5%, the slowest pace since the pandemic, expects global inflation to climb to 4% this year, up from 3.3% in 2025, even if disruptions to oil flows ease in the coming weeks. Fertilizer prices could jump as much as 38% this year as supply disruptions and shortages of key inputs from the Gulf ripple through agricultural markets, it said.

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Report heading to Texas leaders cites Camp Mystic emergency planning failures before 2025 flood

No written emergency plans. Stalled evacuations. Chaotic incident management and re-unification efforts. Those were some of the main findings included in a new investigative report on Camp Mystic’s response to last year’s historic July Fourth flood that killed 25 of its campers and two counselors. The 115-page document, which was adopted Thursday by a special joint committee in the Texas Legislature, paints a troubling picture of Camp Mystic’s preparedness prior to the flood. “This report represents months of careful work by the Senate and House General Investigative Committees to establish a complete and factual record of the events surrounding this tragedy, honor the memories of those that were lost, and identify lessons that can help prevent future loss of life,” said state Sen. Pete Flores (R-Pleasanton), a committee chair.

More than 130 people were killed in the July Fourth floods. The majority of those deaths took place in Kerr County in the Texas Hill Country, where Camp Mystic is one of many popular summer camps lining the banks of the Guadalupe River. Now, lawmakers say the report’s findings will be used to guide policy changes for the Texas Legislature to take up when they reconvene in 2027. This move comes after state lawmakers passed a package of bills during a special session last year aimed at improving youth camp safety and boosting the state’s emergency preparedness and response planning. State Sen. Charles Perry (R-San Angelo), told the panel on Thursday that he believes a good portion of the issues cited in the new report on Camp Mystic were already addressed by that legislation, and that he believes only a few tweaks are needed going forward. “What I don't want to do is have to effectively bring back the hurt that comes with these conversations if we've already addressed it the way it needs to be addressed — to the legislature's credit,” said Perry. The report was created by Casey Garrett and Judge Michael Massengale, investigators hired by the legislature to look into the flood and its response — including what went wrong at Camp Mystic.

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Paxton breaks with Texas GOP’s anti-IVF platform, saying he supports the procedure

Attorney General and Republican U.S. Senate nominee Ken Paxton broke with his state party’s opposition to in-vitro fertilization Thursday, calling himself a “strong supporter” of the fertility treatment. “Strong families are the foundation of a strong nation,” Paxton said in a statement shared exclusively with The Texas Tribune. “Every child is a blessing, and every family hoping to welcome a child deserves support and compassion. I am a strong supporter of IVF and pro-family policies that help Americans experience the wonders of parenthood.” Paxton’s support puts him in the same camp as President Donald Trump, but on the opposite side of the issue as the Republican Party of Texas. The state party, in a platform and legislative priorities adopted last weekend at its Houston convention, called on lawmakers to “protect fetal life from destructive practices, such as IVF and commercial surrogacy.”

Another plank of the state GOP platform states that the party opposes “public funding for procedures that destroy embryonic life, including IVF”, and called for regulation to prevent “embryo discarding, eugenic practices and commodification of human life.” But Paxton’s campaign said he would work to safeguard IVF if elected to the U.S. Senate. The Republican nominee supports the IVF Protection Act, a bill from Sens. Katie Britt, R-Alabama, and Ted Cruz, R-Texas, to bar Medicaid funding for any state that bans IVF. Paxton will cosponsor the bill if elected. Paxton had taken heat from Democratic nominee James Talarico’s campaign over the Texas GOP’s stated opposition to IVF. Polling on IVF finds the treatment to be highly popular; a 2024 Pew Research Center survey found 70% of Americans say access to IVF is a good thing, while only 8% say it’s bad. But while high-level Republicans, including President Donald Trump, are supportive of IVF, the treatment is divisive among conservative activists and abortion opponents. The fertility treatment was thrust into the political spotlight in 2024 when the Alabama Supreme Court ruled that frozen embryos are children, under a state law extending rights to “unborn children,” and that fertility clinics could be found liable for wrongful death if embryos are destroyed. The ruling immediately chilled IVF access in the state, with several providers pausing treatments. Top Republicans came out in support of IVF, including then-candidate Trump, and Alabama’s Republican Legislature quickly passed a law shielding IVF providers and patients from civil and criminal liability for embryo destruction, allowing the state’s clinics to resume fertility treatments.

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State Stories

Public Utility Commission of Texas finalizes new data center standards

The Public Utility Commission of Texas on Thursday approved stricter standards for data centers looking to connect to the state's power grid — the final step in the development of new regulations meant to weed out speculative projects. The Electric Reliability Council of Texas, or ERCOT, which operates the state's main power grid, approved the new standards earlier this month, before passing them onto the Public Utility Commission for final approval. When large energy consumers want to join the state's power grid, ERCOT will now evaluate them in a group study, rather than individually. ERCOT says it will notify applicants for the first study, known as “Batch Zero,” in August.

The study will prioritize projects that are further along in the development process, and require large energy users to post a financial security equal to $50,000 per megawatt of the proposed project in order to be included. "This new process represents a fundamental shift in how ERCOT manages the significant growth of large load interconnection, providing a structured, transparent path forward that protects reliability for Texans while supporting the state’s continued economic growth," ERCOT President and CEO Pablo Vegas said in a news release. Data centers and other large energy consumers looking to connect to the grid are requesting five times the amount of power used to power the entire state during record-breaking demand. ERCOT is trying to figure out which data centers are actually ready to build in Texas — and what infrastructure will be needed to connect them to the power grid. Bryan Clark, a partner at the global energy firm Bracewell LLP, said unprecedented economic growth has created a need for Texas to build more transmission infrastructure — such as power lines and transformers. "I think it’s both organic to the data center industry but also just unprecedented economic growth in Texas," he said. Jared Berg, another partner at Bracewell, said the state's clear standards are part of the reason data centers are flocking to Texas. "Why is there so much industrial load that’s attracted to the state?" he said. "It’s because we have that inclination to set the rules of the road and make it clear so that companies know how to operate and the right way to operate."

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Supreme Court sides with Texas marijuana user who was barred from owning guns

The Supreme Court on Thursday unanimously limited the use of a gun law used to prosecute President Biden's son Hunter. The case, however, did not affect Biden, who was pardoned by his father. The case was brought by a Ali Hemani, a Texas resident who admitted to FBI agents that he used pot several times a week at the same time that he owned a legally purchased gun. He was soon indicted under the federal Gun Control Act, which makes it a crime punishable by up to 15 years in prison for an individual to use illegal drugs and to have even a legally purchased gun. While it is the same law used to prosecute Hunter Biden, the Supreme Court's decision was sufficiently narrow that it may not insulate from prosecution those who, like Biden, use more serious drugs, and own a gun.

In explaining the decision, Justice Neil Gorsuch stressed that the ruling was extremely limited, in part because marijuana use has become so ubiquitous, widely accepted and is now legal to one degree or another in 40 states. Indeed, as Gorsuch observed, the federal government itself has reclassified many marijuana products from a schedule one, high-potential-for-abuse category, down to a schedule 3 drug. Therefore, said Gorsuch, the only thing before the court is the government's "ambitious theory" that could "could automatically strip Mr. Hemani of his Second Amendment right to own a gun because he uses marijuana a few times week." The court's answer was basically, no you can't do that. The decision was unanimous, though several justices filed concurring opinions. So, was this a big win for gun rights advocates? "It's a good question" said Stephen Stamboulieh, a lawyer for Gun Owners of America. "I think it's a pretty significant win when we have basically the entire court saying that a federal statute can't go as far as it tried to go." Eric Ruben, a law professor at Southern Methodist University had a different take. "I think the outcome of this case was based on the view that most Americans may hold, which is that weed is the new booze. The narrowness of Thursday's ruling, plus the fact that a total of five justices filed concurring opinions that spelled out different approaches, is a reflection of the many divisions among the justices on the subject of guns and gun regulations. In 2022 the court's conservative majority declared for the first time that in order for a gun law or gun regulation to be constitutional, it had to be analogous to laws at the nation's founding in the 1700s and early 1800s. Since then, however, lower court judges, and the Supreme Court itself, have struggled with how to apply such a rigid rule.

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Texas version of Epstein files? Talarico targets Paxton over child sex abuse deal

James Talarico is deeming a child sex offender’s plea deal the Texas version of the Epstein files. And he wants everything that led to the bargain from the Texas attorney general’s office released to the public. State Rep. Talarico, the Democratic nominee for U.S. Senate, is running against Republican Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton in a race that’s garnering nationwide (and White House) attention. On Thursday, Talarico is calling for Paxton’s office to release “the Hoffman files.” Here’s what you need to know.

Former Waco attorney Adam Hoffman, 49, was arrested in June 2022 and charged with continuous sexual abuse of a young child after a friend of his son’s told authorities that he had been abused since he was about 7 years old. Hoffman initially faced between 25 years to life in prison on the first-degree felony charge. The McLennan district attorney recused himself in the case, which is why the Attorney General’s Office took over. The victim testified when the case went to trial, but it ended with a hung jury. The victim, now 14, didn’t want to testify again in an effort not to be re-traumatized, according to Paxton’s office. In March, Paxton’s office offered Hoffman a plea deal that included reduced charges and 30 days in jail if he pleaded guilty. Before the bargain, Hoffman was facing a life sentence without parole. Talarico called it an “Epstein-style sweetheart deal.” Hoffman pleaded guilty on April 16 to reduced charges of indecent assault and displaying harmful materials to a minor, Class A misdemeanors that could lead to up to a year in jail. The judge in the case extended the jail time to 60 days. On day 29 in the McLennan County Jail, Hoffman was released for good behavior. The jail often grants similar “two-for-one” deals when inmates exhibit good behavior, according to KWTX-TV in Waco. After moving to Omaha with his wife, Hoffman was required to register as a sex offender in his home county of Sarpy County. Because of the plea deal, Hoffman was not required to register in Texas. At a press conference, Talarico said no matter a person’s political leaning, anyone can agree that child molesters must be brought to justice. “So today I am calling on Ken Paxton to release the Hoffman files, all text messages, all emails, all documents, all internal memos relating to the Adam Kaufman case,” Talarico said at a press conference in Waco. “Those documents need to be made public immediately, so Texans can get answers about this corrupt deal.”

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Records challenge UT Austin’s allegations against former KUT leader Debbie Hiott

Earlier this week, the University of Texas at Austin fired KUT Public Media’s General Manager Debbie Hiott, marking an extraordinary and unprecedented intervention in the governance of the public radio station that has been housed at UT for decades. The move has reverberated across journalism and higher education circles, with many asking the same questions: Was this really about a dispute over the planning of a KUT event on campus, as the university claims? Is Austin’s NPR station being deliberately targeted amid explicit attacks on public media and attempts to reshape higher education institutions across Texas? Hiott’s termination letter simply cites her “oversight and management of planning for the KUT festival” as reason for her firing. The letter also appears to reference the fact that she publicly denied allegations by UT that the station had engaged in “insufficient planning” related to the event.

But in an interview with KUT, Hiott said her firing was a symptom of “pettiness” within the university and that its current leaders don’t “have any sense of accountability or concern” for the station’s audience. University leadership has changed in recent years as Texas Republicans exert more influence on the state’s flagship public school. “I was just holding out hope that they would let it all die down, because the station never did anything wrong. I never did anything wrong,” Hiott said. “They're just angry because they looked stupid through it all — the whole festival back-and-forth.” In a text message on Monday, UT Austin spokesman Mike Rosen said “the university does not comment on personnel matters.” University officials also did not respond to a detailed request for comment. KUT and its sister music station, KUTX, are editorially independent from the university. While they are based at UT's Moody College, they are funded by community and business donations, rather than tuition or state taxpayer dollars. Last month, KUT requested records of communications between UT Austin officials and KUT staff and festival planners in an attempt to square the two competing narratives. The university asked for $536 for the records but has yet to provide them.

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Debate over sterilized screwworm flies plays out in Texas Capitol

Texas lawmakers heard competing approaches Thursday for how to combat the New World screwworm, as federal officials defended the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s current eradication strategy while private sectors urged the state to invest in alternative sterile fly production methods. Sterile flies are used to disrupt the reproduction cycle of the screwworm. The hearing, chaired by state Rep. Ryan Guillen, R – Rio Grande City, comes as Texas and federal officials continue responding to recent New World screwworm detections in the state.

Nathan Moses-Gonzales, CEO of M3 Agriculture Technologies, testified that Texas should consider investing in modular insect-rearing facilities that use x-ray technology to sterilize flies, arguing the approach could quickly expand the supply of sterile insects used to suppress screwworm populations. Moses-Gonzales told lawmakers his company is seeking roughly $4 million from Texas to partner with the University of Veracruz in Mexico and help produce additional sterile flies while larger federal facilities come online. Moses-Gonzales told lawmakers he could produce 100 million sterile flies per week in a year. The USDA is currently building a $619 million facility on 19 acres of land at Moore Air Base in South Texas that will be capable of producing up to 300 million sterile flies per week. But it could take years for the facility to reach that level of output. “We see ourselves as partners with and enabling USDA to have this capacity as a bridge until Moore Airfield comes online,” Moses-Gonzales said. He described the proposal as a short-term way to boost production capacity and support broader eradication efforts. Federal officials, however, cautioned against adopting x-ray sterilization before additional research is completed.

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Rep. David Cook backs residents fighting Tarrant County wastewater facility

At a public meeting at the Forest Hill Civic and Convention Center on Thursday night, residents from the southern edge of Tarrant County urged the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ) to reconsider permitting a wastewater treatment facility that would discharge treated wastewater into a creek already being monitored for high levels of the bacteria E. coli. During public comments and an informal question-and-answer session, several of the approximately 200 in attendance, many wearing red in a show of solidarity, voiced concerns about effects on the environment and people’s health. State Rep. David Cook — who requested the public meeting at the behest of some of his constituents — addressed the TCEQ staffers present and asked the agency to reject the wastewater permit application, raising questions about whether the applicants had followed proper protocol.

This fight began more than a year ago when Greg Coontz, a Burleson attorney, and his sister, Cathy Frederick, a Burleson real estate agent, applied for a TCEQ permit for a domestic wastewater treatment facility. According to application documents, the facility would be built on land Coontz and Frederick own at the corner of FM 1187 and Bill Levey Road near Burleson. It would handle wastewater for a planned mobile home community on the site, discharging treated wastewater into a normally dry creek bed that runs into Village Creek, which in turn feeds into Lake Arlington. Since 2010, TCEQ has categorized Village Creek as impaired because of its high E. coli concentrations. When asked whether the wastewater treatment plant could worsen that, a TCEQ spokesman told the Star-Telegram it would not. “The permit and proposed facility are designed to provide adequate treatment to protect the stream from bacterial loads,” the spokesman wrote in a statement.

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Dallas nabs defense lawyer discount to fight Paxton gun suits

An acclaimed Texas trial lawyer with a long record of supporting Democratic candidates is charging half his hourly rate to help Dallas thwart Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton‘s (R) push for guns in more public spaces. High stakes litigator Jeff Tillotson represents the city in a trio of firearms lawsuits from Paxton’s office over whether the lessor of government property for a private event can deny access to patrons legally carrying a gun. Dallas, thus far, is getting favorable rulings in all three suits. In an interview with Bloomberg Law, Tillotson said he bills a typical client at an hourly rate of about $2,000. According to a contract reviewed by Bloomberg Law obtained through public records, he’s charging the city just $895 per hour in one of the cases.

“They have many, many fine lawyers in the city’s office so the fact they’d give me the opportunity to work on this is an honor,” Tillotson said. Dallas declined to release invoice statements from his firm, Tillotson Patton, showing how much it’s spending in legal fees to defend the gun restrictions. The city is on the hook directly for one case and for the other two could recoup expenses from private organizations whose firearms bans drew the suits. The final resolutions will be felt not only in Dallas but throughout the deeply-red state where the legislature has passed some of the most firearms-friendly laws in the country. People in Texas can carry a handgun openly in libraries, recreation centers, the Texas State Capitol, and government buildings except for when a meeting is happening. Paxton, a right-wing champion of firearms protections, argues Dallas must also allow them in public spaces that are leased by a private entity, because the city can’t confer authority to a third party to ban them that itself lacks.

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Brazoria County hires Houston attorney after deputy fatally shoots Mendoza Jr.

Brazoria County hired a Houston attorney as legal counsel in a dispute over the deputy-involved shooting that killed a Texas State University student in Lake Jackson earlier this month. Norman Giles, a civil rights and police defense litigation attorney for the nationwide law firm Lewis Brisbois, told the Chronicle he will represent Brazoria County as it grapples with the fallout of the shooting. A Brazoria County sheriff's deputy shot and killed 18-year-old John Mendoza Jr. in his father's garage after a failed traffic stop turned into a slow pursuit in the early morning hours of June 1.

Another Houston attorney, Charles Adams, represents Mendoza Jr.'s family. He said Mendoza Jr. and his three friends were unarmed and had their hands up at the time of the shooting. The sheriff's office has not said what prompted the traffic stop, but Adams said the young men were hanging out, playing basketball and walking a park track before the deputy began trailing them. Brazoria County Sheriff Bo Stallman has since fired former Deputy Kevin Tippit, and the Texas Rangers opened an investigation into the shooting with the Brazoria County District Attorney's Office. Neither office has released its findings, and Tippit has not been formally charged with any wrongdoing.

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Harris County set to name Marcus Stuckett as new chief of Flood Control District

The Harris County Commissioners Court appears set to name a longtime employee as executive director of the Flood Control District on Thursday, two weeks after Tina Petersen resigned amid concerns about the handling of a federal grant program. According to documents provided by the agency, commissioners plan to name Marcus Stuckett to be the post at their next meeting June 25. Stuckett has worked for the Flood Control District since 2015, most recently as director of engineering, according to his LinkedIn profile. Tina Petersen stepped down June 11 after commissioners had discussed her job performance in closed sessions. Criticism over Petersen's performance emerged after commissioners learned this year that the city was at risk of losing hundreds of millions of dollars in federal Hurricane Harvey recovery aid due to projects expected to miss spending deadlines. Petersen said she "plan(s) to continue to be available to implement a transition plan."

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Ed Longanecker: Fifty years of permitting dysfunction may finally be coming to an end

(Ed Longanecker is president of the Texas Independent Producers and Royalty Owners Association.) For decades, the American oil and gas industry has watched viable infrastructure projects collapse under the weight of a federal permitting system that was never designed to deliver timely decisions. Projects with strong economics, willing investors, and genuine public need have spent five, six, or ten years waiting for federal approvals before a shovel touched the ground. That is now changing, through a convergence of executive action, landmark legislation, and agency reform that together constitute the most significant overhaul of energy permitting in a generation. On January 20, 2025, President Trump signed EO 14156 declaring a National Energy Emergency under the National Emergencies Act and EO 14154 titled “Unleashing American Energy,” directing all agencies to identify and eliminate regulations imposing undue burdens on domestic energy development.

U.S. Secretary of Energy Chris Wright followed on February 5, 2025 with a secretarial order directing the Department of Energy to prioritize more efficient permitting for energy infrastructure. The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) issued Order No. 908 on June 30, 2025, authorizing reliance on environmental reviews completed by other agencies and eliminating redundant parallel reviews. On October 7, 2025, FERC permanently rescinded Section 157.23, which had barred natural gas pipeline companies from proceeding with construction while rehearing requests were pending. Executive orders are reversible, which is why the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, signed last July 4, represented a more durable development. The OBBBA capped Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) reviews at 150 pages and two years and created a fast-track mechanism under which a project sponsor pays a fee equal to 125% of anticipated preparation costs and receives a completed environmental assessment within 180 days or a full EIS within one year. It replaced the presidential permit requirement for cross-border energy infrastructure with a Certificate of Crossing issued by FERC or DOE, removing the State Department and White House from a process subject to political manipulation, as demonstrated by the Biden administration’s cancellation of the Keystone XL permit. The Interior Department was ordered to mandate a minimum of 30 oil and gas lease sales in the Gulf of America through 2040, restart Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) lease sales, and the OBBBA raised the Gulf of Mexico Energy Security Act (GOMESA) revenue-sharing cap from $500 million to $650 million annually through 2034, benefiting Texas and three other Gulf-producing states.

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USDA moves Rural Development roles to new D-FW hub

The U.S. Department of Agriculture is moving some roles from the Washington, D.C.-area to D-FW, the federal agency announced Wednesday. The roles fall under the umbrella of the USDA’s Rural Development arm, which offers various loan and grant programs designed to help rural Americans with housing, infrastructure, healthcare and other needs. The bureaucratic operation oversees a loan portfolio of more than $200 billion and counts several thousand employees in Washington, D.C. and hundreds of offices around the country, including one in McKinney that’s responsible for programs in Collin, Cooke, Dallas, Denton, Fannin, Grayson, Hunt, Kaufman, Palo Pinto, Parker, Rockwall and Tarrant counties.

The USDA is relocating some positions from the D.C.-area to D-FW to create a new “operational hub” that will support loan and grant processing and program management, according to a news release. The agency is also creating a new hub in St. Louis as part of the same initiative. Further details about the relocation, including how many roles are being moved and whether the operation will be based at the existing McKinney office, were not immediately clear. A representative for the USDA did not immediately respond to questions from The Dallas Morning News about the move on Wednesday. While the relocation comes as part of a broad effort by the Trump Administration to reduce the federal government’s footprint in Washington — as a candidate in 2024 Trump said he wanted to move 100,000, or roughly one in three, federal jobs out of the capital, expanding on a similar initiative from his first term — USDA executives this week framed the moves to D-FW and St. Louis as an effort to more efficiently serve rural communities. “When rural communities collaborate with USDA they deserve a streamlined experience,” Stephen Vaden, Deputy Secretary of Agriculture, said in a statement. “This reorganization injects new attention to our systems and processes that will eliminate unnecessary layers of bureaucracy, improve our ability to engage with our customers and conduct responsible oversight of federal investments.” The USDA, an agency now led by the Glen Rose-native Brooke Rollins, announced last year that it would undergo a broad restructuring that included vacating a Maryland research center and moving more than half of its nearly 5,000 Washington-based employees to five hubs around the country, prompting criticism from a major federal employee union. The agency's Rural Development division has around 3,000 total employees nationwide, less than half of its total staff in 2005, according to the National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition, an advocacy group. Last year, the division lost around 1,500 employees — including over 30% of its staff in Texas — from DOGE-related reductions, according to the group.

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The World Cup in Arlington is imperfectly perfect

The World Cup being played in Arlington is, in a word, unnatural. It is unnatural—and sometimes a little jarring—to witness such an overt melding of old-world soccer rituals and American stadium sports schlock, like a fusion restaurant getting very extra about Philly cheesesteak eggrolls. Because there’s no preparing a seasoned watcher of both European soccer and American stadium sports for the mashup of the English national team and the Chicago Bulls’ entrance theme. Or an overly peppy PA announcer barking out “let’s see who’s cheering on Croatia!!” by way of introducing fans clad in the country’s traditional red-and-white checkered kits. Same goes for the traditional unfurling of flags, the captain’s handshake at midfield, and the pre-match team photos all playing out beneath the JerryTron. And a hydration break sponsored by Powerade, featuring a performance by the Dallas Cowboys’ drum line and dancers.

Our touches are as manufactured in this sport as theirs are organic, which isn’t a matter of laziness versus this just being what America has to contribute to a sport still relatively new in these parts. (That, and a place of employment for Croatia’s Petar Musa, who plays his club matches for FC Dallas.) You can be cynical about that if you’d like. Chances are the fans in attendance yesterday afternoon would pay you no mind. Because North Texas is now two for two in its group stage matches, after the late drama from Sunday’s Netherlands-Japan tilt was bettered by England and Croatia providing arguably the match—and inarguably the half—of the tournament thus far. That was to be expected from two of the top 10 teams in the world, each of which skews ambitious in its play. Something would have had to go especially wrong for Harry Kane to stay silent in front of net and Jude Bellingham to be muted in the midfield. England is a team with so much leftover ammunition that Bukayo Saka, one of the pillars of Arsenal’s English Premier League title team, had to come off the bench. Regrettably, something did go wrong for Croatia, when the legendary Luka Modric was subbed off in the 57th minute because his 40-year-old legs lacked the juice to keep up with England’s pace and power. But the team that punched higher above its weight than any other in Europe over the past decade landed a couple of haymakers to make this a spectacle.

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Scores fall ill at Texas Air Force base after Hegseth makes flu vaccine optional

A major flu outbreak has sickened nearly 160 troops at Lackland Air Force Base in Texas less than two months after Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth announced that U.S. troops would no longer be required to be vaccinated for the flu, defense officials said. The outbreak at the base in San Antonio raced through an Air Force Basic Military Training wing, where new recruits sleep on bunk beds in open bays and share meals at large communal tables. A trainee in his sixth week of basic training died after falling ill on Friday and being taken to Brooke Army Medical Center, the Air Force said in a news release. It was not immediately clear whether the death of the trainee, Keon McDaniel, was related to the flu outbreak. A comprehensive medical review into his death is underway to determine the cause, according to the Air Force.

In the weeks since Mr. Hegseth’s vaccine policy took effect on April 21, only about 40 percent of Air Force trainees have opted to take the vaccine, which had long been mandatory, an Air Force official said. In the aftermath of the outbreak, the Air Force issued an exception to the voluntary vaccine policy, requiring that all recruits at Lackland get flu shots — part of a broader effort to stem the virus’s spread. Sign up to get Maggie Haberman's articles emailed to you. Maggie Haberman is a White House correspondent reporting on President Trump. Mr. Hegseth cast his decision to make the flu vaccine optional as a matter of religious freedom and medical autonomy. “Under the disastrous Biden administration, this Pentagon waged an unrelenting war on our warriors on many fronts, including when it came to denying them simple medical autonomy and the freedom to express their religious convictions,” he said in a video announcing his decision in April. He described the longstanding flu vaccine requirement as an “absurd, overreaching” mandate that had served to “weaken our warfighting capabilities.” At the time, many lawmakers, including some prominent Republicans, expressed puzzlement and dismay at Mr. Hegseth’s decision.

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National Stories

California labor union could scale back billionaire tax proposal

A labor union behind a controversial tax on California billionaires significantly scaled back its proposal a day after it qualified for the November ballot, but the offer Thursday wasn’t enough to get the governor on board. The proposal from the Service Employees International Union Healthcare Workers West to impose a one-time, 5% tax on individuals whose net worth exceeds $1 billion faces staunch pushback from a wide swath of critics, including Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom. The union said Thursday that it would abandon the 5% tax proposal if Newsom would join them in supporting a 2% levy. The updated proposal would instead have to be passed by the Legislature, given a June 25 deadline for the measure to qualify for the ballot. Tara Gallegos, a spokesperson for Newsom, said scaling it back doesn’t change its “fundamental flaws that harm working Californians.”

“The Governor supports making the wealthiest Americans pay their fair share, but this poorly designed state-only measure will defund teachers, schools, clinics, and public safety,” she said in a statement. The tax, to be paid by those living in the state as of Jan. 1, 2026, is meant to generate $100 billion in revenue, mainly to counter federal cuts to healthcare for low-income people with some money going to food assistance and education programs. “A 2% one-time tax on that accumulated wealth is modest by any objective measure especially if it means keeping emergency rooms open and saving patient lives,” backers wrote in a letter to Newsom. Secretary of State Shirley Weber, a Democrat, said Wednesday night that petitioners collected more than the roughly 875,000 signatures needed to place the original proposal before voters. States have been debating how to respond to the major tax breaks and spending cuts legislation President Donald Trump signed last year. The proposal has already divided Democrats and major labor unions and triggered an expensive campaign to defeat it. The proposed tax is backed by prominent progressives including Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders.

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Meta lobbies Congress for protection from child-harm lawsuits

Meta Platforms has lobbied the U.S. Congress for legal immunity from child-harm claims tied to social media products such as Instagram, as it faces thousands of lawsuits from young users and their families, according to ?a source familiar with the matter and proposed legislative language reviewed by Reuters. If adopted by lawmakers and passed into law ?as part of the Kids Online Safety Act (KOSA) under consideration in the U.S. Senate, such a provision could undermine thousands of lawsuits against Meta and other online platforms over ?harms to children. Meta and Google's YouTube face a combined $6 million in damages after they lost the first case at trial early this year. While legislators have given no indication of adopting the language, the lobbying effort shows the kind of legal protections Meta is seeking amid the biggest attempt to regulate online platforms in the U.S. since the 1990s.

The proposed language reviewed by Reuters would make online companies "immune from suit or liability under state law ?with respect to all claims for loss caused by, ?arising out of, relating to, or resulting from the safety or privacy of individuals under the age of eighteen online or otherwise related to the provisions" of KOSA. The provision appears alongside language that would preempt state ?laws on children's online safety and privacy. Asked about the lobbying effort and the proposed language, Meta spokesperson Stephanie Otway said the provision "does not extinguish existing lawsuits, nor does it represent blanket immunity." "Instead, it establishes uniform national standards for online youth safety, ensuring these critical issues are governed by comprehensive federal legislation, ?not plaintiffs' ?lawyers or patchwork state legislation," she said.

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Rebel lawmaker’s election win clears path to oust U.K.’s Starmer

British politics is set for a fresh bout of chaos after Labour politician Andy Burnham won a special district election, allowing him to enter Parliament and launch a leadership challenge against the deeply unpopular Prime Minister Keir Starmer. Burnham, the 56-year-old mayor of Manchester, was elected by a comfortable margin in voting Thursday to represent the district of Makerfield in northern England, defeating a candidate from the anti-immigration party Reform UK. By entering Parliament, Burnham can now attempt to unseat Starmer as Labour leader and prime minister, raising the prospect that the U.K. could get its sixth prime minister in seven years, a period of unprecedented turmoil in one of the world’s oldest and most stable democracies.

“Everyone knows that politics isn’t working, everyone can feel that the country isn’t where it should be,” Burnham said during a victory speech. “Tonight could, just could, be the turning point.” Starmer, who took Labour into power with a big majority just two years ago, is under pressure from his own lawmakers as his party trails Reform in the polls. Many Labour lawmakers fear losing their jobs in the next general election in 2029 and think swapping out Starmer gives them the best chance of survival. Speaking on Friday, Starmer said he won’t quit and would face down any leadership challenge. He added that now wasn’t the time for a change of prime minister. “I don’t think that is a good thing for the country, to plunge us into chaos,” he said. It is unclear when Burnham will formally launch his leadership challenge, or if Labour ministers will rise up en masse to try to topple the prime minister. Starmer, a former prosecutor turned politician, is likely to come under growing pressure in coming days from lawmakers and some of his own cabinet members to step down and avoid a drawn-out leadership fight.

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Firm tied to Trump donor got no-bid contract to clean reflecting pool

A business tied to a longtime supporter of President Trump was given a no-bid contract to install a water-purification system in the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool earlier this spring. Now that work is coming under scrutiny after algae blooms have come back and turned the iconic pool in Washington a vibrant shade of green rather than the American-flag blue Mr. Trump says he chose. The contract shows that the National Park Service bypassed the competitive-bidding process that is typically required, and gave a $1.7 million contract to the firm, Greenwater Services of Brookfield, Ohio.

Federal contracting records show that firm’s ultimate owner is the J.J. Cafaro Investment Trust, led by John J. Cafaro, a donor to Mr. Trump and a neighbor to Mar-a-Lago, the president’s private club in Florida. The water treatment company also listed Mr. Cafaro’s Palm Beach mansion as its address in Florida corporate records, and listed his investment trust’s phone number and email in Ohio lobbying records. Mr. Cafaro, a longtime Republican donor whom Mr. Trump has described as a “fantastic man,” was once involved in a high-profile bribery scandal. He has also donated to Democrats in the past, and his daughter Capri Cafaro served in the Ohio State Senate as a Democrat from 2007 to 2016. On Thursday, when a photographer for The New York Times visited the pool, about half of its water remained green, as workers sought to vacuum out algae. Workers have also added hydrogen peroxide to the water in recent days in an attempt to kill the algae, the Interior Department said in an email to The Times.

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Senate targets Hegseth’s travel in standoff over apparent Iran school attack, boat strikes

Frustrated senators are threatening to withhold 75 percent of Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s travel budget unless the Pentagon provides Congress with answers about an apparent U.S. strike on a girls school in Iran and the military’s ongoing attacks targeting alleged drug smuggling boats in Latin America. The proposal is tucked into an early version of the Senate’s 2027 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), sprawling, must-pass legislation that sets Defense Department priorities. It reflects the growing bipartisan frustration over the Pentagon’s refusal to comply with congressional requests. The Pentagon said it would not comment on pending legislation. For months lawmakers have sought the complete, unedited video of the first, and highly controversial, boat strike in which the U.S. military killed two survivors of an initial attack that mostly destroyed the vessel.

Since that episode in early September, U.S. forces have killed more than 200 people in strikes on small boats in the Caribbean Sea and eastern Pacific Ocean. The Republican-led Senate Armed Services Committee advanced the bill by a vote of 18-9 last week and has since made the legislation public. The committee is seeking unedited footage of every boat strike in waters around Latin America. Lawmakers have also sought information on the military’s investigation into how a girls school in Iran was apparently targeted by a Navy Tomahawk missile on Feb. 28, during the war’s initial hours. The strike, for which the U.S. government has not publicly accepted blame amid an ongoing investigation, killed more than 170 people, most of them children, Iranian officials have said. No one has yet been held accountable for those deaths. The investigation is being conducted by U.S. Central Command.

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Israeli military strikes in southern Lebanon in intense fighting as US-Iran talks postponed

Israel’s military struck targets throughout southern Lebanon overnight into Friday and Hezbollah reported intense fighting in the area, threatening the nascent agreement between Iran and the United States to end their war. Lebanese media reported at least 18 people killed in the strikes, and Israel said four soldiers died. The conflict between Israel and Iran-backed Hezbollah is the most precarious part of the Iran deal. Neither Israel nor the militant group signed the agreement — but it is supposed to end their fighting, and Iran has signaled its willingness to risk renewed war in the region for the sake of its interests in Lebanon and its most important regional ally. Iranian officials didn’t travel as planned to Switzerland for talks on Friday with the United States, in part over the fighting, a regional official said. U.S. Vice President JD Vance also called off his trip, and mediators are now scrambling to reschedule the meetings, which were supposed to begin addressing how to restrict Iran’s nuclear program — the core issue over which Israel and the U.S. went to war on Feb. 28.

The talks are also supposed to bring about a permanent end to the conflict. The interim deal has already reopened the Strait of Hormuz to international shipping, after Iranian attacks and threats all but stopped the flow of oil and natural gas through the waterway. That caused energy prices to skyrocket far beyond the region, and President Donald Trump said he signed the agreement to avoid “economic catastrophe” in the U.S. The Israeli military said strikes were ongoing on Friday after four of its soldiers, including a lieutenant colonel, were killed in an attack on a tank in a village near the southern Lebanese city of Nabatiyeh. An explosive drone attack wounded another five, it added. Israel then launched multiple strikes against “Hezbollah infrastructure sites” in Nabatiyeh and other areas, according to a military statement, which accused the militant group of “blatant ceasefire violations.” Later, the military said it also struck targets in the Beqaa Valley in eastern Lebanon, with Lebanese media saying the village of Douris was hit. “Israel will not tolerate attacks on our soldiers or on our territory, and it will exact a very heavy price from Hezbollah for these attacks,” Netanyahu said in a statement Friday.

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Everyone in Trump’s Cabinet is eating sauerkraut

A new diet is sweeping through President Trump’s cabinet—and it involves heaping portions of sauerkraut. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy and Vice President JD Vance have all embraced the diet, drawn by the promise of slimmer waistlines and glowing skin. They all apparently have determined the health benefits outweigh the slightly sulfurous odors that have been the cause of some domestic friction. “Within 30 days I lost 20 pounds,” Kennedy said at an event in Michigan this week. “JD Vance is also on the diet and you can see how different he looks.” The diet is the brainchild of Dr. Sean O’Mara, who advises his high-profile patients to eat fermented foods such as sauerkraut and kimchi, alongside grass-fed steak—and to abstain from alcohol and sugary food.

O’Mara says the diet leads to a reduction in visceral fat, which wraps around organs, as well as a more robust microbiome, which can help with digestion. Kennedy, 72, was the first to convert. Lutnick, 64, and Duffy, 54, followed suit. Vance, 41, committed to the diet for Lent earlier this year, and has stuck with it. “I tend to like to work with older people because the ROI is so much greater…. it’s like taking over a sinking ship, a company that is headed to bankruptcy,” O’Mara said. He declined to discuss his patients, citing privacy concerns. But people familiar with the matter said Kennedy, Lutnick and Duffy have all seen O’Mara. Kennedy began the diet about a year ago after meeting with O’Mara. Though he is sometimes turned off by the tangy and pungent taste of sauerkraut, he found the diet helped him shed fat, and reduced aches and pains. He also credits it with eliminating the atrial fibrillations he had been experiencing. The Trump administration officials on the diet have been known to trade tips when they are gathered at the White House. Online commentators recently remarked that Vance was looking thin in a photo posted earlier this month.

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Kash Patel accused of directing $1m to ‘slush fund’ to pay bonuses to loyalist agents

Kash Patel, the FBI director, has been accused of directing more than $1m in taxpayer-funded bonus payments to a small circle of loyalist agents as part of a “personal slush fund” that may have violated federal law. Representative Jamie Raskin of Maryland, the ranking member of the House of Representatives judiciary committee, alleged Patel had authorized substantial recurring payments to agents in his inner circle and security detail. According to information received by the House judiciary minority committee, some agents received payments of nearly $8,000 every two weeks, despite already earning at the federal salary ceiling. While the exact total received by each individual remains unclear, the committee says it can confirm a number of agents received at least five such payments in consecutive pay periods, amounting to close to $40,000 per person.

The pace of disbursements was so rapid, the committee says, that FBI reserve accounts set aside for bonus payments were drained dry, causing some payments to bounce back from exhausted funds. “Why are these agents receiving extra pay simply for doing their jobs?” Raskin wrote in a 15 June letter to the FBI director. “Are they, in fact, collecting bonus compensation for engaging in actions outside of their duties and outside of the law?” He added: “We write to find out precisely how much slush fund largess you have put on the American taxpayer’s tab.” The FBI did not respond to a request for comment. As the minority, Democrats have no authority to compel the bureau to hand over documents, though they would gain that power if they retake the House in November’s midterm elections, as some forecasts suggest they may. The main beneficiaries, according to Raskin, were agents serving on Patel’s “director’s advisory team”. The unit was created in 2025 and tasked with examining internal documents and government materials to expose and discredit federal law enforcement officials who had investigated Trump and his allies.

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Lead Stories

Austin tech leader Joshua Baer, founder of Capital Factory, dies in plane crash in Laredo

Capital Factory founder Joshua Baer was killed in a plane crash on his way back to Austin from a vacation in Mexico late Tuesday night. The news was first reported by the Austin American-Statesman. Tech leaders and politicians, including U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz, Congressman Lloyd Doggett and Congressman John Carter, expressed condolences in posts on social media. "Josh has been one of the most significant figures driving innovation and entrepreneurship across America," Cruz said. "In Texas, he made our state a global leader. His impact was incalculable." The private plane crash happened on Loop 20 in Laredo, a few miles south of the city's airport. Video posted by the Laredo Police Department shows firefighters spraying the plane, which came to rest on a highway barrier after hitting a car.

Baer founded Capital Factory, a tech investment company based in Austin, in 2009. Baer is the entrepreneur in residence for the Department of Computer Science at the University of Texas at Austin, according to his UT bio page, which says he lives in Austin with his wife and three children. Baer was also a speaker at the KUT Festival in May on a panel about AI in Austin. Six people were inside the plane, said investigator Jose Baeza with LPD at a news conference posted online. First responders took them out of the aircraft, but Baer did not survive. The five others on the plane, as well as the driver of the car that was hit on the highway, were taken to local hospitals and are in stable condition, said Gilberto Sanchez, the director of Laredo International Airport. Five officers were taken to the hospital for smoke inhalation and the plane crash caused road closures in the area.

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Trump reviews slowed screwworm response, former officials say

The Trump administration’s sweeping federal spending reviews slowed government efforts to contain the New World screwworm, according to three former Agriculture Department officials and a fourth person with knowledge of the matter. USDA reviews held up funding for the construction of one facility that is crucial to slowing the flesh-eating pest’s threat to the U.S. cattle supply, according to the three former officials, who like the fourth person were granted anonymity to discuss internal decision-making. A $100 million research initiative designed to create new tools to slow the screwworm’s advance was also delayed, two of the former officials said. Skepticism from the White House budget office meanwhile delayed plans for a second facility at a Texas air base, said two of the former officials and the person with knowledge of the matter.

“That sense of urgency wasn’t there,” said one of the former officials. “Even though screwworm was given a high priority, it did not help us get things done faster.” Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins has told Senate lawmakers that staff cuts had no effect on the government’s response and that President Donald Trump approved new spending to combat the screwworm early in 2025. She has repeatedly blamed former President Joe Biden’s administration for a faulty response to the threat and insists the screwworm would have arrived in the country sooner were it not for the Trump administration’s approach. “Since the initial few months of the second Trump administration, USDA has moved at lightning speed to obtain any and all necessary funding and approvals to fight New World screwworm,” USDA spokesperson Michael Abboud said in a statement. “We have aggressively moved dollars and project timelines at a pace unprecedented for [the] U.S. government, as expected of us by President Trump.” New presidents frequently review spending approved by their predecessors, but the Trump administration did not act quickly on the recommendations of career USDA staffers who sought to convey the seriousness of a potential outbreak, according to two of the former officials.

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US and Iran presidents sign ceasefire agreement, but Trump says he could still resume attacks

The U.S. and Iran released the text of an interim agreement their presidents have signed to end their war on Wednesday, with U.S. President Donald Trump threatening to resume attacks and kill Iranian officials if they failed to honour their ?commitments. Trump, attending the G7 with other leaders in France, also withdrew at least one of his stated rationales for attacking Iran in the first place, saying it would be "unfair" for Tehran not to have ballistic missiles, having previously ?vowed to obliterate them. "We're going to bomb the hell out of them if they violate the agreement," Trump said of Iran at a press conference. "I don't want them to. I want them to honor the agreement." He also called Iranians "smart people" as U.S. and Iranian negotiators work on a permanent truce over the coming 60 days, which Trump said he hoped would usher in peace in the Middle East and lower oil prices.

Earlier, he had said: "If I don't like it, if they don't behave, we'll go right back to dropping bombs right smack in the middle of their head, OK?" Iran's leaders did not address the new threats while celebrating the ?moment, releasing photographs of what is believed to be the first agreement signed by both a U.S. and Iranian president since the Islamic Republic's founding in 1979. "Everything we sought to achieve through military action, we obtained several times over through negotiation; it ?was not even comparable," Iran's lead negotiator Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf told state television about the agreement, which includes the unfreezing of billions of dollars in Iranian assets. The U.S. and Israel launched the war on Iran ?on February 28, assassinating the 86-year-old Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and military leaders on the first day. It quickly spiralled into a regional conflict that has killed more than 7,000 people, mostly in Iran and Lebanon; driven up energy prices; renewed inflationary pressures and sparked concerns about a ?major food supply crisis in developing countries.

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Apple price increases ‘unavoidable,’ Tim Cook says

Apple plans to raise prices on its products to offset the surging costs of memory and storage chips, Chief Executive Tim Cook said in an exclusive interview with The Wall Street Journal. “Unfortunately, price increases are unavoidable,” he said. “We’re doing our best to mitigate the huge increases that are being passed to us, and we’ve been trying to shield our customers from the increases, but the situation has become unsustainable.” Cook declined to offer details on the timing or scale of the planned price increases, nor which products would be affected. Apple’s next major product launch is likely to be in September when it releases the iPhone 18 lineup, expected to include a new foldable iPhone. Price increases, especially for Macs and iPads, could come sooner. Apple raised the starting price of the Mac Mini last month in between launch events.

Skyrocketing demand for memory and storage chips from artificial-intelligence companies has pushed up their cost so much that Apple would have to raise device prices substantially to maintain its profit margins. Passing the higher cost on to consumers while maintaining its profit margin would add about $270 to the price of the next iPhone Pro model, estimates research firm TechInsights. Chips for memory and storage are key components inside most computing devices, including smartphones, laptops, game consoles, medical equipment and even cars. But now AI servers are gobbling up rapidly increasing volumes of those chips, so even a company as rich and powerful as Apple is struggling to secure supply. Since last year, when Google, Microsoft, Meta and Amazon began announcing big increases in their capital spending budgets, the prices for memory and storage chips have both quadrupled. TechInsights expects both prices to continue increasing into 2027. Memory, also called DRAM, and storage, also called NAND, are like elements of a mid-20th-century office: The memory is a desk that holds all the papers a worker needs to perform a task, while storage is the filing cabinet that holds everything else. Smartphones use DRAM memory to run apps currently in use; they use NAND storage to file away photos and videos, for example.

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State Stories

40+ Texas lawmakers back effort to pause major transmission lines

A coalition of Texas lawmakers (including nine state senators and 34 state representatives) are backing a legal motion against a controversial transmission line project. On Monday, State Representative Brad Buckley announced the legislators had signed an amicus brief asking to delay decisions related to proposed 765kV transmission lines, including projects like the Bell County East to Big Hill line. The brief also asks for the Public Utility Commission of Texas (PUC) to stop evaluating projects on a case-by-case basis for now and to determine if the lines are needed at all. “The motion is intended to seek limited relief and would allow more time for route studies, environmental reviews, landowner concerns, or other project-specific issues,” a statement from Buckley’s office said.

The Bell County East to Big Hill 765-kV transmission project, proposed by Oncor and the Lower Colorado River Authority, is designed to move power across Texas and strengthen the state grid as demand rises from population growth, data centers and industrial expansion. However, the proposed routes for the three transmission lines have seen significant pushback. “It’s going to traverse our property, not along the property lines, but right through the middle, about 150 feet from our front door,” said Burnet County resident Jan Rose. “It’s heartbreaking when you think about it,” said Rose, whose home sits up on a hill overlooking the valley to the north. “Every morning when you come out here, those power lines are going to be right in your focal point.” “The burden of this falls disproportionately on rural landowners,” Buckley said in the release. In March, the utilities filed plans with the Public Utility Commission of Texas that included 122 potential route options. Last week, administrative judges heard testimony from landowners about the proposed routes.

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Talarico courted Silicon Valley donors in multi-day Bay Area trip

James Talarico has campaigned against the influence of billionaires in politics. Yet facing a must-win Senate race that could shatter spending records in one of the country’s biggest states, he’s turning to wealthy tech donors for help. Talarico attended at least four Bay Area fundraisers with prominent Democratic Party donors with ties to the tech industry in mid-April, according to copies of the invitations obtained by POLITICO, one donor and one Democratic aide with knowledge of the gatherings. They were granted anonymity to discuss private events. Talarico has vowed not to accept any corporate PAC money and backed a ban on super PACs as his race against Republican Ken Paxton accelerates toward what could be one of the most expensive Senate races in U.S. history and will determine the balance of power in Washington. Donations from the fundraisers, which have not been previously reported, were accepted on behalf of Talarico’s campaign committee, not any super PAC.

Two super PACs, Moment of Truth PAC and Lone Star Rising PAC, have collectively pledged to spend big for Talarico. He also previously accepted PAC money in his last campaign for the state legislature. At the time, a spokesperson told POLITICO that Talarico would not “unilaterally disarm and let Texas Republicans play by different rules” while he pushed for stricter campaign finance legislation. Federal law prohibits the groups from coordinating directly with the campaign. “We already know who we’re running against: The billionaire megadonors and their corrupt political system,” Talarico said in his primary night victory speech in March. Talarico’s campaign pointed to his public comments supporting stricter campaign finance regulations. “James is the only candidate who’s outlined a comprehensive agenda to ban super PACs, ban corporate PACs, ban congressional stock trading and tax billionaires so we can fix this broken, corrupt political system,” Talarico spokesperson JT Ennis said in a statement to POLITICO. “If anyone supports taxing billionaires more and limiting big money’s influence on our politics, they’re welcome to help defeat politicians like Ken Paxton, who rake in millions of dollars from special interests then enrich wealthy donors while working Texans struggle.”

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Houston bayous spared from significant flooding amid bouts of heavy rain, tropical storm

The Houston area appears to have dodged a bullet in terms of severe and widespread flooding. Tropical Storm Arthur and the heavy rainfall that preceded it largely spared the network of waterways that honeycombs the region. Rainy weather in the region had largely subsided by Wednesday afternoon. Galveston remained under a coastal flooding advisory through Wednesday night, but a tropical storm warning was scrapped as Arthur dissipated several hours after forming along the Texas coast.

"The bayous and creeks have done really well with this event," said Jeff Lindner, meteorologist with the Harris County Flood Control District. "The breaks in the rainfall, so we get a couple hours of heavy rainfall and then we get 10, 12, 14 hours of a break, and that’s really saved us throughout this event, and so that’s given the bayous and creeks time to drain off the water before the next round comes in." Lindner said what made the difference was that, while regions to the north of Houston saw heavy rainfall, Montgomery and San Jacinto counties were mostly spared the worst effects. A 15-year-old boy drowned Tuesday evening in a flooded retention pond in Montgomery County. "That can come down the San Jacinto River and those watersheds and impact Harris County," Lindner said. Lindner said the main danger for the region in the immediate future will come not from flooding but from intense heat and humidity as temperatures soar back into the 90s as early as Thursday. The National Weather Service has issued a heat advisory for the Houston and Galveston region that will be in effect from 11 a.m. Thursday until 10 p.m. Friday. "The next four or five days is going to be the first taste of some really humid and hot conditions here," Lindner said, "so we need to really stress those heat precautions. Drink plenty of water. Take breaks in AC if you can."

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Houston developer and homebuilder Vincent Kickerillo dies at 97

Vincent Kickerillo, a prolific real estate developer responsible for shaping much of west Houston, died June 7 at 97. Across his nearly 70-year career, his company developed more than 22,000 lots and built 16,500 homes. He transformed forested land into suburban-style homes along Memorial Drive, and established master-planned communities such as Keilliwood and Nottingham Country in Katy as well as Lakes of Parkway near the Energy Corridor. He was known for large, traditional brick houses with cedar-shingle roofs, fireplaces and open floor plans, many of which still stand today.

“Vincent Kickerillo’s impact on the homebuilding industry and community development in our region cannot be overstated,” Aimee Bertrand, executive director and CEO of the Greater Houston Home Builders Association. “Generations of Houston builders and developers owe their careers and countless opportunities to Mr. Kickerillo.” Long before he and his wife, Mary, became familiar faces in Houston’s high-society circles, Kickerillo came from humble beginnings. The son of an Italian immigrant and sharecropper, Kickerillo was the youngest of 14 children in a low-income family in Bryan. He moved to Houston without his parents at 13, worked for Hughes Tool Co. and joined the Merchant Marines at 16, an experience his daughter said taught him the discipline he carried throughout his life. After at least 12 years as a merchant mariner, Kickerillo used earnings he won playing poker to start building houses. When he was unhappy with a builder’s work on his own Memorial Drive home, he took over construction himself. He liked the process so much he started his own company in 1957.

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With gas tax holiday, are Texas Dems pushing ‘irresponsible’ policy for political gain?

President Donald Trump’s poorly planned war with Iran has paralyzed global shipping routes and spiked the average price of gas by about $1 per gallon nationwide. For three months, Americans have struggled to rationalize both the conflict and the painful prices at the pump, as many work several jobs and side hustles to survive the current affordability crisis. Meanwhile, Trump’s flagrant lack of concern has smashed his purported “America First” promise into bits—and Texas Democrats are scrambling to pick up the pieces. They’ve started with the cost of gas, one of the most salient barometers for the sitting president’s economic stewardship. On April 21, Texas’ Democratic Senate candidate James Talarico stood in a rainy gas station parking lot and, in his usual practiced cadence, proposed a suspension of the federal gas tax, which currently amounts to 18.4 cents per gallon on gasoline and 24.4 cents per gallon on diesel. “Americans in the last election voted for two things: to end the forever wars and to make life more affordable,” Talarico said in his address. “But the people in power have done the exact opposite.”

It’s a rather stark departure from the standard Democratic Party line, one that several other party members—in Texas and in Washington—have also rallied behind, including gubernatorial candidate Gina Hinojosa and agriculture commissioner candidate Clayton Tucker. Both Democrats and Republicans in Congress have also embraced the idea to satisfy voters on pocketbook issues. Still, several other Dems in Congress have lined up in opposition. Longtime critics of the gas tax holiday measure say that the idea amounts to scrounging for quarters in a junk drawer rather than focusing on the root cause of inflationary policies; they warn that a gas tax suspension could drastically defund public roadways and education in the long term. For years, the standard Democratic position on the federal gas tax has been to maintain (or even increase) the tax rate as a means to both shore up the infrastructure fund and curb car travel—one of the largest sources of greenhouse gas emissions. But populist “affordability” politics are in vogue for the out-of-power left as many average Americans face dire financial circumstances. Climate policy, which was all the rage for Democrats just five or six years ago, has now been sidelined as a toxic turnoff. The federal gas tax generates over $20 billion in annual revenue for the Highway Trust Fund, which covers the cost of construction and repair for highways, bridges, and mass transit. (The Texas state gas tax is a flat 20 cents per gallon for regular and diesel, which generates over $3.5 billion annually for the State Highway Fund and the Available School Fund.) A federal suspension for just five months could lead to a $17 billion deficit for the Highway Trust Fund, according to the Bipartisan Policy Center.

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‘We didn’t have a lot of deer’: Screwworm threat revives old fears in South Texas

A South Texas veterinarian says older generations remember when screwworm infestations took a toll on local deer populations. Now, wildlife officials are working to keep the parasite from spreading again and threatening Texas’ $10 billion hunting industry. State officials are asking Texans to help protect the state’s white-tailed deer population from the spread of New World screwworm, a flesh-eating parasite spread by flies. Texas is home to more than 5 million white-tailed deer, including some of the largest bucks in the country. The herd attracts hunters and wildlife enthusiasts from across the state and beyond. Deer are among the wildlife vulnerable to screwworm infestations.

Dr. Gaylon Wilmeth-Burleson, a veterinarian in Dilley, said older generations of South Texans still remember the parasite’s impact on wildlife before it was eradicated from the United States. “My dad can tell me stories about, you know, when he was a kid, we didn’t have a lot of deer down here anymore because of screw worm infestations,” Wilmeth-Burleson told TPR’s The Source. The timing is particularly concerning because South Texas is in the middle of fawning season, when newborn deer are especially vulnerable to infestation. “We are in the meat of the season,” Wilmeth-Burleson said. “Fawns in South Texas are born mid June through the end of July. Most of our fawns in this part of the world are June, so we are right smack dab in baby time for our deer.” Wilmeth-Burleson said newborn fawns can become infected through their navels, much like newborn calves.

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Hundreds of new river barriers arrive at the border

Nearly 300 giant cylindrical foam-filled buoys have been placed on the banks of the Rio Grande in the South Texas town of Eagle Pass, ready to be put in the international river. Frontera Foundation co-director Amerika Garcia-Grewal tells Border Report that the buoys arrived last week at the 47-acre Shelby Park, which is owned by the City of Eagle Pass and sits across the border from Piedras Negras, Mexico.

Garcia-Grewal was able to get into the park and she took exclusive and up-close photos of the buoys, which the federal government is placing up and down the Rio Grande in South Texas. She says she is concerned about access to the park and destruction to the land. The Trump administration says the buoys — which measure 12 to 15 feet each in length, and 4 to 5 feet in diameter — will help prevent illegal immigration from Mexico. The devices are part of the agency’s “Smart Wall” system, which includes 536 miles planned of waterborne barrier flotation devices put in the Rio Grande, according to U.S. Customs and Border Protection. As of June 10, CBP reports that 15 miles of waterborne barrier has been put in the river, and 112 miles of the buoys are under construction.

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Uber plans Houston robotaxi service launch in 2027

Houston's growing robotaxi market will gain another competitor in mid-2027 as Uber, Nuro and Lucid plan to launch their own service. Andrew Chapin, chief operating officer at Nuro, said in a Wednesday announcement that Houston's large, varied metro area will allow Nuro to test its autonomous driving system across different types of roads and operating conditions. “We're excited to help bring this robotaxi service to the city through our partnership with Uber and Lucid,” he said.

Lucid, a technology company, is manufacturing cars for the robotaxi service. Nuro, a company developing autonomous driving technology, is testing the self-driving system in cars with human monitors behind the wheel. Once the service officially launches, it will be made available through the rideshare company Uber. Nearly 100 vehicles will operate in Texas and California, running 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Uber has secured a 50,000-square-foot depot facility and dedicated charging pitstop in Houston to support fleet operations. The robotaxis’ self-driving systems include cameras, lidar and radar. According to Nuro, the tests will consist of simulations, closed-course testing and supervised public-road testing. The companies said they plan to expand the robotaxis service to dozens of additional markets in the coming years. The San Francisco service plans to launch later this year.

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Why The New York Times is expanding in Texas

For many people, Texas brings to mind politics and barbecue. “People know it as a big, red state,” said Fernando Alfonso III, The New York Times’s first Texas-based editor and the leader of a new team of reporters and editors in the state, which has been in the works since last year. But, he added, “it’s also a cultural force, from Beyoncé’s ‘Cowboy Carter’ fueling a Western-fashion revival, to shows like ‘Landman,’ to the endless fascination with Texas cuisine.” The new hub of Times journalists aims to capture all of that and more in its reporting. In its first six months, the team of five has covered the aftermath of the deadly flooding at Camp Mystic last summer, explored why so many people in San Antonio are still living in poverty despite the city’s booming economy, and followed a family of children who had to raise one another after their parents were taken by ICE.

Over two interviews, Mr. Alfonso, who lives in the Houston suburb of Bellaire and joined The Times in December from The Houston Chronicle, shared more about why The Times is prioritizing Texas, how reporters navigate perceptions that The Times doesn’t understand the state and what story lines the nation should be watching. These are edited excerpts from the conversations. Why does The Times need a Texas hub? It’s a big state, an economic powerhouse, a cultural force; the stories out of Texas have been of great interest to the national New York Times audience. So the idea of creating a Texas hub is to use the state as a way to explain the phenomena to come or that are already happening across the country through different societal lenses, whether that’s business, culture, religion or, of course, politics. Texas looms large in American culture and politics. But there are distinct communities with particular approaches to civic life. How are we approaching those? It starts with just being there. You have to put in real time in a community before you can understand how it sees itself, which is often entirely different from how outsiders do. Texas is full of places and groups that are talked about constantly and understood almost never: Muslim families up in North Texas. Vietnamese communities down along the Gulf. Ranching families out near the border. And the suburbs that keep sprawling outward, reshaped by people moving from all over the country. What we’re after is how people here actually take part in civic life, where they find community, which institutions they trust, what they make of all the change around them. If living in Texas has taught me one thing, it’s that a lot of these communities don’t fit the boxes people outside the state like to reach for. The more time you spend with folks, the more tangled the story becomes — and a lot more interesting. How do you navigate perceptions that The Times doesn’t really understand Texas? I try to spend less time trying to persuade people that The Times isn’t what they think it is and far more trying to demonstrate how we work: the questions we ask, how we listen, how we verify information, why we call people back. We try to get it right. I also try to meet people where they are and take their opinions seriously. At my former newspaper, we had a longtime reader who frequently emailed me and other newsroom leaders with a barrage of criticisms. Some were justified. Many were not. I took it upon myself to meet him for coffee. We had a fairly intense but measured conversation about our coverage, the state of conservatism in Texas and the role of journalism. There was an understanding that we weren’t going to see eye to eye on everything. But there was enough shared experience that we walked away with a deeper respect for one another.

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Former San Antonio cop who fed homeless man feces-filled sandwich gets big promotion

The former San Antonio police officer accused of feeding a homeless man a sandwich stuffed with dog feces is now the chief of police of the small South Texas town of Benavides. One-time SAPD officer Matthew Luckhurst was appointed top cop in the town of about 1,100 people on June 1, Benavides City Clerk Tiffany Bazan told the Current. Benevides City Council discussed and voted on appointing Luckhurst as the town’s new chief of police on April 30, public records show. Prior to his promotion, Luckhurst worked as one of the two officers in town and earned a School-Based Law Enforcement Officer license in April 2024, public records show.

Luckhurst was terminated from the San Antonio Police Department in 2020 following two poop-related incidents. In 2016, SAPD investigators accused Luckhurst of giving a homeless man a sandwich filled with dog shit while on patrol. A month later, Luckhurst found himself in another stinky situation over allegations he took a dump in a SAPD women’s restroom without flushing and rubbed a “brown substance with the consistency of tapioca” on the toilet seat after a female officer asked for the facilities to be kept clean. Although Luckhurst avoided being fired over the first incident on a technicality, SAPD canned the officer in 2020 over the second. Luckhurst subsequently found employment with the Floresville Police Department before being fired in 2022 amid public uproar over reporting on his rehiring in the Alamo City bedroom community. Benavides Mayor Ramiro Saenz was unavailable for immediate comment on Luckhurst’s promotion. However, Benavides’ prior police chief, Andre Hines, previously told the Current that Luckhurst met employment standards upon his hiring. “As required by the State of Texas, we have to do a background check,” Hines said. “And so when [Luckhurst] was applying for employment here with the City of Benevides, we request all information from these previous agencies that he has worked for.”

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Texas Comptroller greenlights all 8 Terafab tax break applications: Here’s what that means

The Texas Comptroller’s Office has issued formal recommendations to approve all eight tax incentive applications tied to the proposed TeraFab semiconductor manufacturing facility near Gibbons Creek Reservoir in Grimes County, clearing a major hurdle for what could be the largest industrial investment in Texas history. The recommendations, signed by Deputy Comptroller Lisa Craven and dated June 15, cover applications filed by TeraFab AI, LLC — a special-purpose entity linked to SpaceX — with both Iola ISD and Anderson-Shiro CISD. But the Comptroller’s approval is not the end of the road.

Both Iola and Anderson-Shiro CISD received four applications for TeraFab, each with four phases. Each phase covers a separate piece of land with its own 10-year tax incentive period. The combined proposed investments could be as high as $119 billion, among the highest manufacturing investments in U.S. history. But it’s important to note that phases 2, 3, and 4 aren’t guaranteed. SpaceX’s own filings state that after completing each phase, the company will “determine whether to proceed with constructing the future phases.” The $119 billion figure — and the full job and tax projections — only materialize if all four phases are built in both districts. School property taxes are split into two buckets: maintenance and operations (M&O) and interest and sinking (I&S). M&O covers day-to-day costs like teacher salaries and utility bills. I&S covers repayments on voter-approved bonds used for things like new buildings and school buses. Under the JETI program, SpaceX would only pay M&O taxes on half of TeraFab’s appraised value for 10 years per phase — a significant discount on what would otherwise be one of the largest property tax bills in Texas history. The school district doesn’t simply absorb that loss: Texas’s school finance system is designed so the state sends additional funding to districts when their local tax base is reduced by incentive deals like this. In theory, the district gets made whole.

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Will SpaceX fortunes trickle down to this Texas town?

Many of the tech bros who swing by Found Fine Art in Bastrop, Texas, are smitten with “Schoolgirl Witchblade,” a bronze statuette of a manga-style character with pigtails, a barely there bodice and a clawed hand ready for a supernatural brawl (price: $3,200). The preference seems on brand. These bros work for SpaceX, the reusable rocket and internet satellite megacorporation led by Elon Musk, who created a sexy, pigtailed, manga-style digital girlfriend for premium users of his Grok chatbot. “They ask a lot about these,” said Alexandria Lagos, a gallery sales associate, pointing to “Schoolgirl” and similar works. “Though I haven’t seen anyone buy one.” That could change. On Friday, SpaceX raised $75 billion in the largest initial public offering in history. The company employs 1,600 people near Bastrop, which means that a sizable chunk of the town’s 14,000 residents just got rich, or at least richer. On Thursday, the gallery’s owner, Jamie Howard, wore a look of subdued delight, as if she were waiting for a piñata to get whacked and the candy to drop on the floor.

“I definitely have clients who plan to celebrate by investing in various things,” she said with a smile. “Once they cash out their shares there is going to be some delightful fallout around here.” The bounty has been five years in the making. Mr. Musk started buying land in Bastrop and Travis Counties, near Austin, in 2021, using about a dozen different private companies to snap up more than 1,000 acres. His tunneling enterprise, the Boring Company, opened here first, and Starlink, part of SpaceX, opened an operational plant two years later. The companies — plus X and a fledging residential community — form a compound on about 600 acres 10 miles northwest of downtown Bastrop, known to locals as “Elon Land.” Soon after the stock market closed on Friday, Elon Land was briefly a scene of pure jubilation. Ten SpaceX employees, dressed in jeans and black T-shirts with YOLO printed on them in large letters, gathered to celebrate at the Boring Bodega, a warehouse-size convenience store, bar and hair salon next to the Boring Company and across the street from SpaceX.

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Tropical Storm Arthur dissipates after forming along Texas coast

Tropical Storm Arthur formed Wednesday morning and dissipated several hours later after making landfall on the Texas coast. The first named storm of the Atlantic hurricane season brought gusty winds and some coastal flooding to the Galveston area and was expected to lead to rainy weather and potential flooding in the southeastern U.S. during the following days, according to the National Hurricane Center. Tropical storm warnings, which had been issued for Galveston and other coastal areas between Sargent, Texas, and Morgan City, Louisiana, were canceled Wednesday night. Galveston remained under a coastal flooding advisory until early Thursday morning, according to the National Weather Service.

Although the storm deteriorated after moving inland, Arthur was “expected to produce rainfall totals of 5 to 10 inches, with isolated higher totals near 20 inches, through early Friday” along the upper Texas and Louisiana coasts and potentially in Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia and Florida, the National Hurricane Center wrote in a Wednesday night advisory. “This could generate dangerous to life-threatening flash flooding,” the advisory stated. Before Arthur formed and moved toward the Galveston area, local officials asked residents to stay aware by watching for weather alerts and flooding in the area. "If you can’t see the road, don’t drive through it. It’s not a time to try to gauge the depth of the water with your car or truck," Galveston County Judge Mark Henry said Tuesday. "If you can’t see the road, turn around, don’t drown, find another route." A flood watch for the Houston and Galveston areas, which had been set to expire Wednesday night, was called off earlier by the National Weather Service. A flood watch means conditions are favorable for possible flooding. A flood warning means flooding is imminent or underway.

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County Stories

A 2nd man dies in Tarrant County Jail custody in as many days

A second man died this week at the Tarrant County Jail, according to the Tarrant County Sheriff's Office Wednesday. A 40-year-old man on Tuesday was kneeling next to his bed and failed to respond to verbal greetings from a detention officer during a routine cell check, the sheriff's office said in a press release. The officer then entered the cell after receiving no response and saw the unidentified man was having a "medical emergency," according to the press release. The man was transported to John Peter Smith Hospital, where he was pronounced dead. “Many individuals entering our facility arrive with significant, long-term health issues related to substance abuse or other medical conditions," the sheriff's office said in a press release.

"Our staff works diligently to identify medical and mental-health concerns through our screening process the moment someone comes into our custody. However, even with these efforts, we cannot compel individuals to follow the medical guidance provided by the doctors and nurses from John Peter Smith Hospital." The man was arrested by Fort Worth Police on a possession of marijuana less than two ounces charge. He was booked into the Tarrant County Jail Sunday. The sheriff's office said the man refused to cooperate or consent to a medical screening, which is conducted on all inmates after being booked. Another man, James Johnson, died while in custody at the county jail Monday under similar circumstances. Johnson experienced a medical emergency in his cell and also refused a medical screening, the sheriff's office claimed. Tuesday's death marks the third this year at Tarrant County Jail.

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City Stories

San Antonio inches closer to buying property for Spurs arena as it prepares to talk with team owners

The city is closing in on plans to acquire the property formerly occupied by the Institute of Texan Cultures (ITC) for the planned Spurs arena. That announcement, and the pending acquisition of one of two federal buildings at Hemisfair, were part of a delayed progress update Wednesday on the $4 billion proposed downtown sports and entertainment mecca. The update came following a fiery discussion in May and a rush to vote last fall. The latest council discussion was more measured with city staff laying out various development milestones and council advocating for affordable housing, small business involvement and mobility and accessibility issues.

Council members also said they’re eager to see the planned online dashboard, under development by the executive program manager Accenture. The public dashboard is expected in early 2027 and will track the various studies, construction and costs on the project known as Project Marvel. Last August, the council voted 7-4 to approve the framework for a $489 million city contribution to the arena anchoring the sweeping sports and entertainment district, and Bexar County voters followed it up by approving another $311 million on the Nov. 4 ballot. But the dazzling vision for the district has continued to shift since it’s gone from concept in November 2024 to actual implementation this year. Gone are plans for a new convention center hotel and hospitality school in place of a water chilling plant, and a land bridge connecting the East Side to downtown, while other pieces of the plan, like the former courthouse-turned-concert venue, have been put on pause. Moving forward at full speed are proposals for a new Spurs arena in place of the demolished ITC and an expanded Henry B. González Convention Center.

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Dallas convention center delayed until 2030

Dallas officials say a dispute over plans to redesign the Kay Bailey Hutchison Convention Center has delayed its opening until 2030, forcing the city to relocate events expected at the facility. The $3.8 billion project has now been delayed twice, and some City Council members have raised concerns about the city’s management of one downtown's most ambitious redevelopment efforts. City Manager Kimberly Bizor Tolbert sent a memo to council members Tuesday night flagging the latest delay. She said recent discussions about roads around the center, including at a committee meeting Monday, prompted staff to delay the planned closure of Jefferson Boulevard while city leaders consider whether to redesign portions of the project.

The setback raises the stakes in an increasingly contentious debate over the project's future, with city officials warning that continued disruptions could cost Dallas convention business and undermine years of planning for a redevelopment expected to reshape downtown. Any delays beyond December 2030 could cost the city $1.4 million a month in lost tax revenue, according to Visit Dallas, the nonprofit responsible for marketing the city. Continued uncertainty and delays to the project give convention hotspots like Houston, Nashville and Denver a chance to snatch business from Dallas, the promotional group said in a recent report. Visit Dallas has asked the City Council to finalize a deadline for the opening – and stick to it – to prevent a further hit to the city’s reputation. The new convention center was originally expected to open in 2028 but that date was pushed back to late 2029, causing the relocation of some events. The latest delay will force nine conventions to move and a loss of about 30 conventions the city was about to book, Visit Dallas CEO Craig Davis said Wednesday.

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National Stories

Georgia Republicans backtrack on redistricting plans

Georgia lawmakers will not redraw the state’s political maps this month after GOP Gov. Brian Kemp called them into a special session to do so. Following a major Supreme Court ruling on redistricting this spring, Kemp asked the Republican-led Legislature to consider new congressional and state legislative lines ahead of the 2028 election, since the 2026 election is already underway. But on Wednesday afternoon, state Republican legislative leaders said they did not have enough time to take up redistricting in the current special session. “When the House learned that it was placed on the call for a special session, we knew it was not the right path forward for our state at this time. We believe that it is important to do things the Georgia way — responsibly, transparently and with ample opportunity for public input,” House Speaker Jon Burns said at a news conference at the state Capitol flanked by colleagues.

Still, Republican leaders suggested they could revisit the issue ahead of the 2028 election cycle. “Because any changes to our current congressional or legislative districts would not go into effect until 2028, we believe it is prudent to take the appropriate and necessary time to do this important duty the right way and not to rush through it,” said Republican state Senate President Pro Tempore Larry Walker III. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported Tuesday that some Republicans feared a redistricting push months out from competitive Senate and governor’s races could backfire and mobilize Democrats in the battleground state. Democrats celebrated as Republicans shelved their redistricting plans. “Republicans thought they could get away with drawing racist, rigged maps without a fight. Today, thanks to the people showing up and showing out, we won. Racist, rigged maps are dead for now,” state House Minority Leader Carolyn Hugley and Senate Minority Leader Harold Jones II said in a joint statement. “Fight now, vote Republicans out in November, and stop these racist, rigged maps for good.”

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Pentagon chief lashes out at NATO allies and announces a review of US forces in Europe

U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth lashed out at NATO allies on Thursday, announcing a six-month Pentagon review of American forces in Europe whose outcome will depend on how fast the Europeans take responsibility for their own security. “This will be a real review. It will be designed to ensure that NATO is moving fast and irreversibly toward Europe leading, stepping up to take primary responsibility for the defense of Europe,” he told his NATO counterparts in Brussels. Hegseth lambasted European allies for failing to provide U.S. forces access to bases in Europe to launch attacks on Iran, calling it “shameful.”

“These allies, they put America’s sons and daughters, our sons and daughters, at risk by denying them the predictable access, basing and overflight that never should have been in question at all,” he said. Taking the microphone at the top of the meeting, Hegseth also railed against migration and gender equality policies in Europe, in remarks reminiscent to those of Vice President JD Vance in February last year that angered many Europeans. “Instead of tanks and fighters and air defenses, the focus has been on gender equity and climate change and defense austerity. Europe’s borders flew wide open, welfare states expanded, defense budgets cratered. Along with Europe’s belief in itself and its civilization,” Hegseth said. Hegseth’s comments largely mischaracterized European policies today. On defense, European allies and Canada have launched an unprecedented effort to boost defense spending and expand their armed forces. NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte noted on Thursday that they spent $90 billion more on defense last year, a 20% increase over 2024. And while Europe accepted large numbers of migrants and asylum seekers more than a decade ago, most countries have tightened their borders since. The Trump administration now wants a reboot of the 32-nation organization to turn it into a “NATO 3.0” capable of deterring any threat, Hegseth said. Hegseth’s remarks came a few weeks after the United States told its allies that it would no longer supply certain warships and aircraft if one of them comes under attack. European allies and Canada are trying to work out how to plug the gaps.

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Trump’s surprise DNI announcement leaves Senate Republicans reeling

President Donald Trump torched the Senate’s chances of expeditiously confirming Jay Clayton to become the next director of national intelligence on Wednesday, effectively grinding the chamber to a halt as members try to pick up the pieces following the presidential blockade. Senate Republicans had been confident they would be able to quickly confirm Clayton’s nomination this week. That move would have killed two birds with one stone — denying Bill Pulte from becoming acting DNI on Friday and potentially allowing them to reauthorize Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. Those hopes were dashed in the wee hours of Wednesday morning with the president tying both items to unmovable business, leaving members fuming.

“There’s some frustration,” Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) said of the mood of the conference after members convened for lunch. “702 is going to stay dark, and that’s a danger to the country during the World Cup. We have a lot of people here from around the world, and where we’ve got regimes like the Iranian regime mad at us.” “We’ve basically blinded our intelligence community,” Cornyn said, noting that 60% of the president’s daily brief, a summary of current national security threats, emanates from intelligence gathered via the spy powers. Both Democrats and Republicans raised concerns about Pulte’s credentials for the acting DNI post, and there appeared to be bipartisan support to confirm Clayton as soon as this week. Republicans have grown increasingly bothered by recent maneuvers from Trump, with a number of them coming at inopportune times. Those continued with Wednesday’s social media post that came just hours before Clayton was set to appear before the Senate Intelligence Committee in the afternoon.

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RFK Jr. orders American exposed to Hantavirus to stay quarantined against medical advice

Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. ordered an American passenger exposed to hantavirus on a cruise ship to remain in quarantine Monday against her will and despite expert advice. Kennedy said the passenger, Angela Perryman, needed to remain isolated even though a review from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said she should be allowed to quarantine at home in Florida, according to his order viewed by The Wall Street Journal. Perryman, 47, was one of more than a dozen Americans exposed to hantavirus aboard a cruise ship earlier this spring. The group had initially been placed at a Nebraska quarantine unit. The World Health Organization had recommended people with high-risk exposure undergo quarantine at home or in a facility for 42 days “as a precautionary measure” because of the long incubation period of the virus.

In a phone interview, Perryman said Kennedy’s quarantine order, slipped under her door Monday, was “ridiculous.” “I’m in a room 23, 24 hours a day,” she said. “It does not serve public health.” She said her quarantine was set to end on Sunday after 42 days. She expected some of the nine others in quarantine with her to head home this week. She said she believed Kennedy’s order was retaliation for speaking out against the quarantine measures. “I’m the only one here involuntarily,” she said. Courtney Spencer, a spokeswoman for the Department of Health and Human Services, said, “In the absence of proper home monitoring by state authorities, the administration’s quarantine order is necessary to ensure both Ms. Perryman’s and her community’s wellbeing.” Representatives for the White House didn’t respond to a request for comment. Hantavirus, a disease carried by rodents, typically doesn’t spread between humans. The Andes strain, which has left three people dead amid this outbreak, is the exception, but the CDC has maintained that the overall risk to the American public remains extremely low.

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Kevin Warsh’s first interest rates decision: Keep things steady

The Federal Reserve’s new chair, under immense pressure from President Donald Trump to lower interest rates, is keeping rates steady for now. It was the first test of Kevin Warsh’s commitment to maintaining the independence of the central bank as Trump continues to call for sweeping rate cuts. The Federal Open Market Committee maintained rates at 3.5 to 3.75% on Wednesday, citing economic uncertainty in the Middle East and high inflation. All twelve members, including Warsh, voted to hold rates. “Economic activity is expanding at a solid pace despite elevated uncertainty that owes, in part, to the conflict in the Middle East. Productivity growth and capital investment are strong. Job gains have kept pace with the workforce, and the unemployment rate has changed little.” the committee wrote in a statement.

The committee also removed the easing bias, language that indicates the committee seeks to lower rates in its next meeting. Warsh has said the Fed should reel in its communications to the public about its policymaking, with Fed governors making fewer public appearances and the central bank releasing fewer economic forecasts, including “dot plot” projections. That easing language was absent from the Fed’s statement on Wednesday. Warsh’s calls to limit the Fed’s public communications rankled some on Capitol Hill. “I don’t know if I agree with Kevin on that, but he deserves to try it his way, and it may work better,” Sen. John Kennedy (R-Louisiana) said on Tuesday. “I’m very uneasy when the head of any government agency says they would like less transparency into their actions and thinking,” said Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Massachusetts), who has accused Warsh of serving as Trump’s “sock puppet.” Economists widely expected the committee to cut the easing bias and maintain rates, as the Iran war supercharged inflation and Trump’s fluctuating tariff rates raised prices for consumers. The Trump administration has argued that oil prices will plummet when the Strait of Hormuz reopens, following the pending U.S. peace deal with Iran, but economists predict high prices for food and consumer goods will linger for months.

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World Cup fans share videos of them trying American good. They’re a hit.

On Shaun Alexander’s recent trip to the United States, he checked off some of the classic American pastimes from his bucket list: Catch a baseball game at Fenway Park in Boston, see live music in New York, visit the Alamo and try barbecue in Texas. But he also had an unusual goal: Alexander wanted to visit Bass Pro Shops in every state he passed through. “It’s just unbelievable,” said Alexander, 38, from Edinburgh. “It’s like a theme park and a museum all wrapped into, you know, a big retail store.” He is an avid fisherman, he said, but it was about much more than that. There was a model humpback whale on the roof of a location in Foxborough, Mass., that he compared to “the size of a whale that we have in one of our biggest museums in the U.K.” He added that it was “the type of thing that could really only exist in America.”

Like many World Cup visitors, Alexander is going off the beaten path while he follows his team. Whether it’s because of the downtime between games, the routes between stadiums or the steep prices of hotels, many are getting out of big cities or taking road trips. Their itineraries may include the more traditional Statue of Liberty or the Hollywood Walk of Fame. But as millions of Americans follow along on social media, buoyed by the videos romanticizing daily life in their towns, the soccer tourists are also marveling over the everything-in-one Southern gas station chain Buc-ee’s, as well as combing through grocery store shelves and picking up Italian heroes at the local deli. “I’ve been coming to America since I was a kid, but we’re visiting places that I’ve never been,” said Sammie Bell, 30, from Hertfordshire, England, whose trip included stops in Dallas, Fort Worth and Tampa, Fla. She regarded not only the stadiums as highlights, but also the wildlife. The lizards she saw in Florida, she said, were “the animals we’d see in a zoo in England.” Alexander, who has come to be known online as Scottish Shaun, highlighted the ice machines. “In Europe, you have to fight for your ice.” For Elsa Thora, 24, who is from Stockholm, it was the fire trucks: “They’re shiny, they look really cool — just like in the movies.”

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Trump-endorsed pastor suspends Oklahoma House campaign after texting scandal

Jackson Lahmeyer, an Oklahoma Republican congressional candidate endorsed by President Donald Trump, has suspended his campaign one day after advancing to a runoff, saying he did not want to be a “distraction” amid questions about the nature of his relationship with a former staffer. Lahmeyer, a megachurch pastor who is married with five children, has been mired in scandal since the Daily Mail published text messages, days before the primary, between him and a woman who formerly served as his campaign fundraiser that suggested an inappropriate relationship. In a statement Monday, Lahmeyer admitted to “crossing a boundary line through text messaging” with his former staffer but otherwise dismissed what he called a “distorted story from a British Tabloid.”

In Tuesday’s Republican primary, Lahmeyer received 26 percent of the vote, coming in second to Oklahoma state Rep. Mark Tedford, who got 32 percent. The two were set to advance to a runoff when Lahmeyer abruptly announced he was leaving the race. “After prayerful consideration with my wife, Kendra, and my team over the last twenty four hours, I’ve made the difficult decision to suspend my campaign for Congress,” Lahmeyer said in a statement Wednesday. “I do not want to be a distraction to my family, my church, and the great people of Oklahoma’s 1st Congressional District, who deserve a strong conservative voice representing them in Washington,” he added. Last month, President Donald Trump endorsed Lahmeyer from a crowded field of nearly a dozen candidates hoping to succeed Rep. Kevin Hern (R), who is running for Senate. At the time, the president described Lahmeyer — who founded Pastors for Trump — as “a very successful Pastor, Businessman, and Civic Leader” who had his “Complete and Total Endorsement.”

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State Farm’s AI plan for sales agents sparks uproar. ‘A real slap in the face.’

State Farm rolled out the red carpet for its army of sales agents at a Las Vegas convention last month. Thousands who flew into Sin City on the insurer’s dime were treated to a Pink concert, a Jimmy Fallon-led singalong and selfies with the “Jake from State Farm” actor. Then Jon Farney, State Farm’s chief executive, took to the Allegiant Stadium stage and dropped a bombshell. Farney, a 33-year State Farm veteran, told his sales force he was ripping up their existing contracts. Any agent who wants to stay past 2027 will have to sign up to a new compensation deal and sales targets. “State Farm needs to change,” he said, according to a video of the event reviewed by The Wall Street Journal.

A big driver of that change: AI. The rapidly evolving technology is shaking up the industry’s decades-old sales model, paving the way for faster, cheaper, more targeted transactions. Apps and bots are reinventing how people want to buy products like insurance. Agents’ responses to the changes lighted up Facebook, Reddit and Instagram. “A lot of folks are really mad,” one commented. “Take it or leave. A real slap in the face.” The initiatives appear to be a response to State Farm’s eroding status in the industry. The insurer was this year usurped as the nation’s biggest personal auto insurer by Progressive, losing a throne it had held since World War II, according to S&P. The fast-growing Progressive sells over half its personal auto policies direct to consumers, using AI and tech to keep costs low, analysts said. State Farm, by contrast, is “the Goliath among agent-sold auto insurance,” said Michael Zaremski, an insurance analyst at BMO Capital Markets. Founded 104 years ago by an Illinois farmer turned insurance agent, State Farm grew to the nation’s biggest home and auto insurer on the back of a sprawling sales network.

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Lead Stories

Data center boom tests Republicans’ hold on rural Texas

The Democrat running for Texas agriculture commissioner won a boost from an unexpected source last week: The Republican he’s trying to replace. Sid Miller, the outgoing commissioner, appeared at a packed campaign event in Matagorda County for Clayton Tucker and told the crowd he agrees with the Democrat on many things — but especially Tucker's calls for a statewide moratorium on data centers. “It's not a Republican issue, it's not a Democrat issue,” Miller told the crowd. “This is one of those red, white, and blue issues about protecting our community.” Texas is on track to be the world’s largest data center hub in just a couple of years. Most Republican state leaders, including Gov. Greg Abbott, have wholeheartedly embraced the rush as a boon for the state’s economy.

But there’s a growing backlash from the rural Texans they have long counted as their strongest supporters, as the centers that suck up huge amounts of power and water crop up next to farms, schools and hospitals. At last week’s GOP convention in Houston, activists worked reforms aimed at slowing the data center boom into the party’s legislative priorities. The agriculture commissioner race could prove a key test of just how much the issue will scramble typical partisan politics. Tucker is building his entire campaign around the brewing panic, with stickers featuring his name alongside the slogan: “stop AI data centers.” On a Thursday night, at least 100 people crammed into a small building on the Matagorda County Fair Grounds to hear from Tucker, a political newcomer and rancher from Lampasas, and Miller, a hard right Republican backed by President Donald Trump. Some in the crowd asked how they could put the brakes on data center construction. One woman asked Miller directly if they should vote for Democrats if Republicans won’t take action. “You know, basically what she's asking is, ‘Should we vote on the issues that count towards us?’” Miller, who lost the GOP primary in March, said to the crowd. “And I would say, ‘Vote your conscience. Vote who you think represents you the best.’”

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Trump delays nomination for intel director, citing frustration over spying tool and voter ID bill

President Donald Trump said Wednesday that he was delaying Jay Clayton’s nomination to lead the U.S. intelligence community, citing his frustration over a lapsed surveillance tool and a voter ID bill that currently lacks enough support for passage. In a lengthy overnight post to Truth Social, Trump said that he was canceling a confirmation hearing for Clayton to be his director of national intelligence, which was planned for Wednesday. He issued the post while keeping world leaders waiting for nearly an hour on the final day of the Group of Seven summit in Evian-les-Bains, France. Trump accused Democrats of reneging on a deal to renew a powerful surveillance tool backed by national security hawks, which had lapsed due to bipartisan concerns over Trump’s initial pick for the role, Bill Pulte, who has no national security background.

The president added another condition: linking his approval of the surveillance program to the passage of a bill requiring people to provide proof of citizenship to register to vote and to show ID at the polls. Trump also said he does not want to take Clayton out of his current role as U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York before his replacement, former federal prosecutor and Trump personal lawyer Jamie McDonald, is approved. The nomination of Clayton had been fast-tracked because of the lapse of the key spying program — Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, or FISA. “The Republicans agreed with Dumocrats to remove very fair, and talented, William Pulte, from serving as Acting DNI in return for getting FISA approved by the Dumocrats. However, the Republicans moved so fast with the hearings of the Great Jay Clayton, current U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York, that Pulte would be gone before the Dumocrats would vote on FISA. Now, the Dumocrats are saying they will vote against FISA — So, the Republicans wound up having fulfilled their commitment, but Dumocrats broke the Deal,” Trump said.

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USDA invests $105M in projects to combat New World screwworm threat

The U.S. Department of Agriculture announced Tuesday it will invest more than $100 million in new projects aimed at strengthening the nation’s response to the New World screwworm, a parasitic pest that poses risks to livestock and wildlife. The agency said about $105 million will fund 40 projects designed to improve detection, control and eradication efforts, as part of a broader federal initiative to combat the parasite. Officials said the funding stems from the USDA’s “Grand Challenge” launched earlier this year, which called for innovative solutions from government, academic and private partners to address the threat.

“We launched the Grand Challenge expecting bold, innovative, and science-backed ideas to fight New World screwworm, and the proposals delivered just that,” U.S. Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins said in a statement. The selected projects were chosen from more than 200 applications and focus on improving several key areas, including increasing sterile fly production, developing better detection tools and advancing treatments to reduce the impact on animals. The USDA said additional efforts are already underway, including research at Texas A&M and the University of Florida exploring new ways to sterilize screwworm flies without traditional radiation methods. The new investments are intended to strengthen rapid response capabilities and reinforce ongoing programs such as surveillance, cross-border coordination and sterile insect release strategies, according to the release.

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US set to offer Iran broad financial gains in peace deal

Iran is set to receive broad financial incentives as part of its agreement with the US, including the right to sell oil immediately, tap a $300 billion development fund and get eventual access to its frozen assets, according to a final draft of the deal. While the contours of the memorandum of understanding have been circulating for days, the latest document — a copy of which was seen by Bloomberg News — offers the most complete accounting yet of the economic boost Iran is set to receive for ending its chokehold on the Strait of Hormuz and reiterating its commitment never to seek a nuclear weapon. The two sides agreed to the deal on Sunday and plan to formally sign it on June 19 in Switzerland, clearing the way for 60 days of talks intended to end the war for good and put strict new limits on Iran’s nuclear program. Neither side has formally released the text but the US has begun circulating it with allied nations at the Group of Seven summit in France, a person familiar with the matter said.

Another person familiar with its contents, who asked not to be identified discussing private deliberations, said technical details were still being worked out. That suggested precise language may still change before the signing. Under its terms, the US Treasury Department “will issue waivers for exports of Iranian crude oil, petrochemical products and their derivatives” immediately after the memorandum is signed. The US will lift its naval blockade and the two countries will work to ensure that traffic in the Strait of Hormuz returns to its prewar level within 30 days. According to the draft document, the US and its regional partners would create a plan to rehabilitate Iran and allow for its economic development, with financing of at least $300 billion. It is vague on the release of Iran’s frozen assets, saying the US undertakes that those funds “will be released and made fully available” without setting a timeline. Asked for comment, a US official declined to discuss the specifics of the draft but said Iran can only get the benefits of the deal if it meets its commitments. Those include never getting a nuclear weapon, neutralizing its enriched material and allowing free navigation in the strait. Trump had earlier denied that the US would pay Iran $300 billion. The draft says only that the US and its partners would ensure financing of that amount. The agreement offers a mix of immediate and eventual incentives for Iran while committing it never to seek a nuclear weapon. The country has long insisted it doesn’t want the atomic bomb and had committed not to seek one as part of the Obama-era Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action.

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State Stories

Fired KUT leader calls successor Gerald Johnson a 'smart leader' and 'ethical person'

The University of Texas at Austin has announced Gerald Johnson as the interim general manager of KUT Public Media, a day after firing former General Manager Debbie Hiott following a major dispute over the KUT Festival. Johnson is the executive director for innovation and partnerships at the Moody College of Communication. He is also the former director of Texas Student Media, which includes The Daily Texan, and has worked with KUT and Hiott on revenue operations for the stations. He previously managed advertising and revenue at the Houston Chronicle. "His depth of understanding of media operations, sales and marketing will ensure the continued success of the organization during this transition," said Anita L. Vangelisti, the interim dean of the Moody College of Communication, in an email announcing the appointment on Tuesday.

The Moody College houses KUT and KUTX, and staff are university employees. The newsroom is editorially independent from UT. Vangelisti and Johnson spoke to KUT staff at an in-person meeting Tuesday about the transition. Vangelisti said firing Hiott was her decision, and that officials plan to launch a search for a new general manager as soon as possible. Johnson said he only plans to serve as interim general manager for three months, but may stay longer if needed to lead the hiring of a permanent leader. Johnson said he wasn't involved in firing Hiott and declined to comment on whether he agreed with the decision. He said he's close friends with Hiott and spoke with her Monday. When asked for comment on the hire, Hiott called Johnson a "smart leader and an ethical person." "As long as no one interferes with him, he should be a good steward for the stations," she said in a text message. Johnson said he doesn't see KUT's work changing as a result of the transition.

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Houston forecast calls for up to 6 more inches of rain

Monday’s heavy rain was only the beginning of a potentially dangerous stretch of weather for the Houston metro area. The concern is not whether it will rain, but how much. Another 4 to 6 inches of rain could fall across parts of Southeast Texas through Thursday as a slow-moving area of low pressure develops near the Texas coast, increasing the risk of flash flooding and flooded roads. The National Hurricane Center is also monitoring the system for possible tropical development, though the flooding threat exists whether it becomes a tropical cyclone or not. Monday offered an early glimpse of what this week’s weather pattern could do. Most of Harris County received an inch to 3 inches of rain, while parts of central Houston picked up 3 to 5 inches. Those amounts are expected to be only a fraction of what some locations could receive by the end of the week.

Some spots could pick up more than half a foot of more rainfall through Thursday, especially where thunderstorms repeatedly track over the same areas. Confidence is growing that parts of Southeast Texas will receive significant rainfall, according to forecast models, but uncertainty remains over exactly where the highest totals will occur. The heaviest rainfall could develop on the eastern side of the low pressure system, meaning even small shifts in its eventual track could dramatically change which communities see the greatest flooding threat. For now, confidence is higher in the likelihood of heavy rainfall somewhere in the region than in identifying exactly where the worst flooding will occur.

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Despite gains, Austin ISD takeover looms as key middle schools post low STAAR results

Three Austin school district middle schools at the center of the district’s fight to avoid a state takeover posted modest gains on this year’s state exams, but passing rates remained critically low, signaling the campuses could be headed toward a fifth consecutive failing state accountability rating. Burnet, Dobie and Webb middle schools improved across math and reading during the 2025-26 school year, but the overwhelming majority of students still did not meet grade-level standards, according to preliminary STAAR results released Tuesday by the Texas Education Agency. In math, just under 10% of students passed math at Dobie and Webb middle schools, with Burnet at 15% of students passing. In reading, students who met or exceeded grade level expectations reached nearly 19% at Burnet, 26% at Dobie and 15.5% at Webb. The stakes are unusually high for Austin ISD.

The three campuses are one failing state accountability rating away from triggering a state intervention, and possibly a state takeover, of the district, with STAAR performance carrying significant weight in those ratings. Based on the preliminary results, the campuses could receive that fifth failing mark when official grades are doled out in August, opening the door for a state intervention as early as this fall. Across Austin ISD, middle school students showed improvement in both math and reading, with districtwide rates for Grade 6 through 8 rising from the previous year. Statewide, results showed similar gains, including growth in seventh and eighth grade reading and eighth grade math. The early STAAR results showed mixed outcomes across Austin ISD elementary and middle school campuses, reflecting uneven academic recovery as the district works to raise achievement and avoid deeper state intervention. The district’s passing math rates for Grades 6-8 saw a 4 percentage point jump, with a 2 percentage point increase in students passing reading. Still, an estimated 60% of Austin’s students Grades 6-8 have yet to meet expectations in math and just over 40% of those students have yet to meet expectations in reading. In elementary, Grades 3-5 rose 2 percentage points in students passing reading and a 4 percentage point increment in students passing math. Statewide, Texas elementary and middle school students showed little movement in reading, while math and social studies rates improved.

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KP George trial: Suspended Fort Bend County judge sentenced to 5 years probation, 180 days in jail in money laundering case

Suspended Fort Bend County Judge KP George has been sentenced to five years' probation and 180 days in the county jail after being convicted of money laundering. In March, George was convicted of stealing from his donors by making two transfers totaling more than $46,000 from his campaign account to his personal account. It was decided then that a judge would determine his sentence on June 16. Days before the sentencing, George's defense team requested to delay the hearing until George's other case. George faces misdemeanor charges tied to fake racism social media posts, prosecutors said he was involved with prior to his 2022 re-election. That trial is scheduled for July. Prosecutors requested that the judge deny George's request and move forward with the felony sentencing.

On Tuesday, George's sentencing hearing began, and 458th District Judge Maggie Jaramillo made no mention of the delay request. The district attorney's office told ABC13 that George's team dropped the motion. During opening remarks, prosecutors told Judge Jaramillo that George should be treated differently with a sentence because they said, as a politician, he broke the public's trust. If probation is granted, the DA's office said that, as a condition of probation, a substantial amount of jail time should be served. George's defense team asked for community supervision, arguing that given George has no criminal history, and has already been severely punished with the loss of his political position. George elected to have the presiding judge set the sentence.

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Rural North Texas counties trying to regulate data centers face legal threats

Tensions flared at a recent public meeting in Hood County that devolved into a shouting match between county attorney Matthew Mills and residents who oppose data centers. "How much did y'all get paid?" asked a resident. "Not a dime," Mills said. "You're accusing people of being crooks!" That day commissioners were voting to approve another data center project called Comanche Circle without conditions after the developer threatened to sue. Mills told KERA many residents want to stop the industry from moving in — but commissioners are only upholding the law to avoid legal action. “There is a sense, I think, of ‘we can't keep doing this, and we got to pick our battles here,’” Mills said. There are at least nine proposed projects in Hood and nearby Somervell counties, which have a combined population of about 80,000 people.

Concerned residents say the projects could raise their electricity bills, use up water resources and ruin tourism for nearby Dinosaur Valley State Park. "I would be able to see the entire Comanche Circle project from my backyard," said Joanne Carcamo, who lives in Somervell County and spoke at the meeting. Carcamo co-founded the advocacy group Protect the Paluxy, which opposes data center construction in the region. "There really are no studies on these impacts and [I hope] that they set some parameters to limit these developers from building these things in rural areas and next to state parks," Carcamo said. "We spend so much money as a state on our parks and they bring in so much money, you know, and tourism, it would just be devastating." As rural leaders try to slow or regulate the influx of new data centers, some companies are using lawsuits to push developments forward in Texas and across the nation. In Michigan, a town faced legal pressure from a developer after leaders voted to limit data center construction. The town settled, allowing the facility to be built. In Hill County, south of Fort Worth, commissioners rescinded a moratorium on data center construction after a company sued for $100 million dollars, arguing the county didn’t have the legal authority to impose the ban.

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State probing SAISD leader for alleged failure to report misconduct

The Texas Education Agency is investigating outgoing San Antonio Independent School District Superintendent Jaime Aquino’s educator certificate over allegations that he failed to report misconduct related to child endangerment to the agency. It’s not clear when TEA’s Educator Investigations Division began looking into Aquino. The probe escalated from a preliminary review to a formal investigation this month. “TEA can confirm an open investigation concerning an alleged failure to report misconduct to the agency,” spokesperson Jake Kobersky said in an email Tuesday. “The individual was notified of the investigation, and their online certification was flagged as under investigation on June 7th, 2026.”

Kobersky declined to comment further, citing the active investigation. San Antonio ISD said it is cooperating with the agency and has properly reported the incident being investigated. Both TEA and the district declined to provide additional details about the misconduct the agency is investigating as unreported. “We have shared documentation with TEA to demonstrate the district had followed through on appropriate reporting at the time of the incident,” SAISD spokesperson Laura Short said. “We understand that once TEA evaluates this documentation, it will clear the review.” She added that the incident was reported to Child Protective Services by the district and that SAISD has “the documentation to confirm.” “If TEA agrees with this documentation, the case will be resolved,” she said. Short said the district was unaware its leader was under investigation until this week.

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Cannabis advocates tour Capitol, prepare for 2027 session

Cannabis advocates gathered at the Texas Capitol Tuesday afternoon as they prepare for the 90th Texas Legislature and ongoing debates over the future of hemp-derived THC products in the state. The event, announced by the Texas Cannabis Collective via Instagram, featured a Capitol tour designed to familiarize attendees with the legislative process and encourage political engagement ahead of the next legislative session in January. THC debates rose in Texas during the 89th Legislature, when lawmakers approved a bill that would have significantly restricted consumable hemp products containing THC. Gov. Greg Abbott ultimately vetoed the measure and called for a regulatory approach instead, while court battles over state hemp rules continue.

“There’s a lot of this back-and-forth litigation that’s happening that’s impacting people’s lives,” said executive director Austin Zamhariri. “We wanted to coalesce the group, show up to the Capitol, take a tour from a cannabis advocate standpoint and get people motivated ahead of elections.” The Texas Cannabis Collective says the Capitol tour is intended to help supporters build relationships, learn more about the legislative process and develop strategies for future advocacy efforts as lawmakers prepare to return to Austin in 2027. Sarah Todd, a longtime cannabis policy advocate, said she attended to network with other advocates and push for changes to state law. Todd said one of the biggest misconceptions lawmakers have about the hemp industry is that businesses oppose regulation. “That was a lot of the messaging last year, that we were selling things that were unlabeled, untested and marketing to children, which is not true,” Todd said. “Everyone is happy to comply to continue operating our business.” The Texas Cannabis Collective says it hopes to build momentum ahead of the next legislative session, when lawmakers are expected to revisit hemp and cannabis-related policies.

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Austin robotaxi crash reports rise for Waymo, Tesla, Avride

Waymo, an industry leader in autonomous vehicles, has now reported more than 100 crashes in Austin, where it operates hundreds of vehicles. The AV arm of Google parent company Alphabet, Waymo reported 11 Austin crashes to federal regulators in May, raising its total in the city to 103 since June 2025. Tesla reported one additional crash in Austin, bringing its citywide total to 18 among a fleet of 69 vehicles across Texas. Avride, which has 317 vehicles in the state, reported three new Austin crashes, raising its city total to 23. Zoox, owned by Amazon, remained at one reported crash in Austin. None of the companies responded to requests for comment.

Several of the crashes occurred while the autonomous vehicles were stopped, a point Tesla CEO Elon Musk noted in a post on X. The reports highlight instances of robotaxis navigating situations involving weather, human traffic direction and road work. In one case, Waymo reported that one of its vehicles was traveling west when it approached an intersection where police officers were directing traffic. The Waymo stopped, then proceeded into the intersection after traffic cleared. A passenger car traveling south entered the intersection at the direction of an officer, according to the report. Waymo said its vehicle slowed to yield before the front left side of the passenger car made contact with the front right side of the Waymo. Both vehicles were damaged, and the report mentions that a vehicle was towed but doesn't specify which one. The crash is being investigated by the Austin Police Department. Avride reported another crash in which one of its vehicles slowed to a stop as a traffic light changed. A passenger car behind it tried to stop but hydroplaned on the wet road and hit the rear of the Avride vehicle. Both vehicles were damaged, but no injuries were reported.

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Dallas city employees pen letter about City Hall

About 30 minutes ago, an open letter to Mayor Eric Johnson and the Dallas City Council arrived in my inbox from “hundreds of current and former City of Dallas employees.” They’re asking the body to vote to restore City Hall. The group says the I.M. Pei-designed, Brutalist building has been “a pillar of strength when we felt anything but,” and that it is a place where they made “lifelong friendships,” including some who met their spouses there. “Perhaps many of us have taken her for granted, not realizing a day would come in our lifetimes that she might be gone,” the letter continues. “As employees, we have seen first hand the many battles trying to make Dallas into something. Something better. Every one of those battles was driven by someone promising us more. For many of those — but not all — they put down roots, they invested in our community. They became part of us.”

“We keep reading in the news you are doing this for us, yet we’ve never been asked,” the letter says. “What we are asking of you is to lead our city in a plan to restore both downtown and Dallas City Hall, and not abandon who we are. To seek our opinions about how best to restore and beautify this irreplaceable space. We are asking you to choose Dallas, our Dallas.” As we reported last week, not even a full 24 hours after the Dallas City Council voted to hold off on any other City Hall moves until the end of August, Mayor Eric Johnson posted a special-called meeting for tomorrow. It begins at 8 a.m., which means it could start at 8 a.m., 8:30 a.m., 8:45 a.m., or even 9:01 a.m. The agenda has two items. Between the two, the Council is asked to approve $3 million to allow City Manager Kimberly Bizor Tolbert to begin “pre-acquisition” work to find four locations for a new City Hall, as well as four locations for housing the city’s 911, 311, and emergency operations. If you are feeling some kind of way about the matter, the deadline to register to speak is 5 p.m. today. You can do so here. Some tips: You’re going to want to register to speak on an agenda item – Item 1 is moving City Hall, item 2 is moving 911, etc. Come equipped with two versions of what you want to say: the 3-minute version and a 1-minute version in case the mayor opts to reduce the time limit because of the number of speakers. Consider going with a friend so you can tag team in and out for restroom breaks or to run for a snack if the meeting runs long. (No food in the City Council chambers, you’ll need to keep those in your car.) So far, there are 29 people registered to speak, but that number will likely grow.

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Dallas Council Members question legality of last week’s City Hall vote

During last week’s special-called City Council meeting about City Hall (not to be confused with this week’s special-called meeting about City Hall), the motion the Council ultimately voted on may run afoul of a temporary restraining order that limited the open portion of the meeting to one item, two council members say. Last week’s meeting was limited to two items slated for a closed session discussion and a vote on whether to repair and preserve City Hall after two council members—Adam Bazaldua and Paula Blackmon—were successful in obtaining a temporary restraining order preventing the body from voting on whether to allow city staff to begin the advance work on moving city operations out of City Hall. Judge Eric Moyé found that the other items on the agenda were not transparent enough to satisfy the Texas Open Meetings Act (T.O.M.A.) and that if the council voted on those items, the “public’s right to transparent and lawful decision-making will have been violated.”

In the end, the Council voted down a measure to repair and restore City Hall, and instead voted 9-6 to direct City Manager Kimberly Bizor Tolbert to explore options for a sale and the costs associated with leasing or purchasing a new home for City Hall and come back at the end of August, when the Council would again take up the matter. That directive is what has landed Tolbert, City Secretary Bilierae Johnson, and Councilmember Chad West, who made the motion, in potentially hot water. Blackmon and Bazaldua have asked Moyé to issue a show-cause order, which could require all three to appear before the court to explain why they should not be held in constructive contempt. (Johnson and Tolbert are named as defendants; West is named later in the filing.) Moyé is due to hear arguments on an injunction related to last week’s meeting on Thursday afternoon. The Council will meet at 8 a.m. tomorrow to vote on whether to spend $3 million to allow advance work on identifying potential locations (four for City Hall and four for emergency operations and 911) to move to. But that wasn’t the only legal document to arrive at the City Attorney’s Office on Tuesday. The attorneys for Save Dallas City Hall warned the city that documents and videos related to three meetings were removed from the city’s website.

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Wealthy businesswoman and wife of judge who spent COVID money on Mercedes-Benz avoids prison

A wealthy businesswoman who submitted fraudulent loan applications during the pandemic avoided prison Tuesday. Sandra Pope Solis, 61, of Rancho Viejo collected $206,000 from the Paycheck Protection Program and the Economic Injury Disaster Loan program during the pandemic — and spent the money on a Mercedes-Benz. “It wasn’t her idea,” said attorney David Lindenmuth of McAllen, who represented Pope. “But she participated in it. And she benefitted from it.”

She and her husband, La Feria Municipal Judge William L. Pope, live in a home worth more than $1 million, according to information published by the Cameron County Appraisal District. Pope had a net worth of more than $5 million in 2026, according to the motion filed by federal prosecutors, which included more than $400,000 in cash and more than $2 million in a retirement account. Pope owned two businesses, Along Came Sandra and Designs By Sandra, which planned special events. In 2020, when COVID-19 struck the United States, the federal government spent billions to keep small businesses afloat. The government encouraged businesses to apply for the Economic Injury Disaster Loan program, which provided working capital, and Paycheck Protection Program, which covered payroll costs. Pope submitted an Economic Injury Disaster Loan application in December 2020 for Along Came Sandra, according to the indictment against her. The U.S. Small Business Administration sent her $140,300. In May 2021, she applied for a Paycheck Protection Program loan to cover the payroll at Designs by Sandra. The government sent her another $65,700. Pope spent the money on personal expenses, according to documents filed in the case, including a 2020 Mercedes-Benz G550. A grand jury indicted Pope on two counts of wire fraud. She pleaded guilty in April 2026.

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Houston attorney Dan Cogdell says he didn't anticipate reaction to Talarico endorsement

Houston Attorney Dan Cogdell says he did not anticipate the amount of attention he would receive for endorsing a candidate in the US Senate race in Texas. Cogdell was Ken Paxton's criminal defense attorney for years, and he successfully represented him as part of a team of lawyers in his impeachment trial. But he publicly endorsed Paxton's opponent in the U.S. Senate race, James Talarico. "It wasn't so much a decision against Paxton as it was for Talarico," Cogdell told ABC13. "I never knew anybody would care about me as much as they apparently have. It's a shock to me that anybody gives a damn. I was taken aback by that. And I don't know whether to be impressed or annoyed with how much attention it's gotten. But it is what it is." Paxton's campaign told ABC13 of Cogdell, "He's a Democrat. Least surprising thing that has happened."

Cogdell said his choice was not about party. "I don't really consider myself a Democrat or a Republican," Cogdell said. "I'm a moderate. I have raised far more money for Republican candidates and donated far more money for Republican candidates than I have Democrats, so I don't really care about the label. I'm a criminal defense lawyer. If I cared what people thought about me, I chose the wrong gig." State Representative Ann Johnson faced off against Cogdell when she helped the Texas House prosecute its impeachment case against Paxton in 2023. Paxton was acquitted of all charges. "I'm not surprised that it made news," Johnson said. "There are two people that probably know him best. His wife and his longtime criminal defense lawyer, and both of them have walked away from him, effectively." Ultimately, though, do endorsements matter? ABC13 spoke with SMU political science professor Cal Jillson. "It's like fundraising. You need enough money to make your case, you'd rather have endorsements than not have them, but they're not going to win you the election," Jillson said. "So this is a story that you and I are interested in, and following a little bit, but for most voters, it will not penetrate."

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Flight delays reported at Bush, Hobby airports as rain moves inland

Heavy storms trained over parts of Houston, especially north Harris County, on Tuesday, causing airport flight delays. George Bush Intercontinental Airport was reporting 75 delayed flights as of 11 a.m. A tropical disturbance in South Texas strengthened into Potential Tropical Cyclone One on Tuesday as it headed toward the northwestern Gulf of Mexico. As of 10 a.m., the system was centered about 65 miles southwest of Corpus Christi with maximum sustained winds of 30 mph, according to newsroom meteorologist Justin Ballard. Airport officials urged travelers to check with their airlines for delays and arrive early due to the weather. Delays at William P. Hobby Airport were about 15 to 30 minutes, according to the Houston Airport System.

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National Stories

Pentagon used Elon Musk’s Grok AI to fire 2,000 missiles at Iran, official says

Donald Trump’s administration turned to Elon Musk’s Grok chatbot to launch thousands of missiles in Iran, according to a top defense official. In a sworn statement defending the trillionaire from a lawsuit alleging xAI data centers are illegally polluting Black communities, the Pentagon’s artificial intelligence chief said the chatbot’s continued operation is “a matter of paramount national security” — and was used to fire more than “2,000 munitions at 2,000 distinct targets within 96 hours.” Grok, a generative artificial intelligence chatbot developed by xAI, is among four AI models “currently capable of supporting national security applications,” according to Cameron Stanley, the Pentagon’s chief digital and artificial intelligence officer.

The chatbot is also one of three products “equipped to support mission-critical operations” in top secret settings, Stanley wrote. The filing appears to be the first explicit admission from an administration official that the government is using Musk’s AI to bomb Iran, joining several other AI systems that have come under intense scrutiny after U.S.-led attacks killed hundreds of civilians, including children. U.S. military investigators believe American forces were likely responsible for a strike on an Iranian girl’s school in Minab that killed at least 175 people, mostly children, in what analysts and human rights officials believe is the deadliest incident for civilian casualties since the U.S. and Israeli forces began attacking the country in February. Outside analysts have suggested that the Pentagon’s AI-driven targeting — in addition to human error that failed to check whether target maps were up to date — may have played a role in the bombing. The targets for Operation Epic Fury were identified with the aid of the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency’s Maven Smart System, which uses AI to lay out data on a dashboard to support officials in their decision-making.

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Americans agree that childcare is expensive. Democrats are running on it.

Three top Senate Democrats are accusing the Trump administration and Republicans of “taking a wrecking ball” to childcare programs, highlighting the issue in a midterm year where many Democrats are running on inflation and the high cost of living. Childcare costs have skyrocketed in recent decades, outpacing inflation. There’s bipartisan consensus on the crisis: an Associated Press-NORC poll from last year found that 76 percent of Americans, including over 70 percent of independents and Republicans, view the cost of childcare as “a major problem.” Democrats have long highlighted the issue, but many Republican politicians also agree there’s a problem — if not on the solutions to it.

Republicans, who largely oppose major new spending on social programs, control the White House and both chambers of Congress, meaning that Democratic-controlled states and cities like New York City and New Mexico have been taking the lead on major investments aimed at making childcare more accessible. Now, in a new report, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and two fellow Senate Democrats are accusing the GOP of having “inflamed the childcare crisis.” The report on childcare from Schumer and Democratic Sens. Patty Murray of Washington and Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, released Tuesday and shared first with The 19th, is the latest in a series of reports highlighting what Schumer says are the Trump administration’s “broken promises” in areas including healthcare, housing and energy affordability. Even as childcare costs rise for families, wages for childcare providers remain low and draw fewer workers, creating a shortage of childcare slots and leaving many providers in a precarious position, especially since the funds Congress passed to stabilize the childcare industry during the COVID-19 pandemic have run out.

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Takeaways from primaries in Georgia, Alabama and Oklahoma

President Donald Trump had mixed results with his endorsements for key races Tuesday in Georgia, where he was dealt a rare blow when his preferred candidate did not make it out of the Republican runoff for governor. Trump’s gubernatorial pick, Georgia Lt. Gov. Burt Jones, who was also backed by the current governor, Republican Brian Kemp, lost to billionaire health executive Rick Jackson. But in another marquee race, a last-gasp endorsement from the president helped Rep. Mike Collins secure the Republican nomination for a pivotal Senate seat. In November, Collins will compete with Democratic Sen. Jon Ossoff in a contest that is vital for control of the chamber. The president’s support has carried immense weight in Republican primaries across the country this year, even as his standing with the broader public declines.

The Georgia governor’s race, however, is the second big primary this month where the president’s candidate suffered a loss. In Iowa, Trump’s pick for governor, Rep. Randy Feenstra, lost to businessman Zach Lahn. On Tuesday, the president’s endorsement in the Oklahoma governor’s race was not enough for his candidate to avoid a runoff. A streak of Trump losses could undercut his strong grip on the GOP that has defined the last decade of Republican politics. But he remains a powerful force, as evidenced by races in Kentucky, Louisiana and Texas, where his preferred candidates ousted incumbents this year, and several races Tuesday where they also won. The U.S. congressman defeated Derek Dooley, a former football coach who Kemp recruited to run for Senate. Trump endorsed Collins on Sunday, casting him as the most loyal and MAGA-aligned candidate. Trump specifically praised Collins for his support of an aggressive immigration crackdown, and he ridiculed Dooley for not amplifying his false claims that he won the 2020 election — a factor on which the president has hung previous endorsements. Collins has boosted GOP election-denial claims and has said that the rioters who stormed the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021 — some of whom attacked law enforcement officers and threatened lawmakers — were “peaceful,” calling them “political prisoners.” Jackson’s victory Tuesday was a defeat for Trump and Kemp, both of whom endorsed Jones. The race to succeed Kemp, who is term-limited, elicited a crowded field of candidates, including Georgia’s secretary of state and attorney general. In May, Jones and Jackson finished atop the field with 38 percent and 34 percent of the vote, respectively.

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Democratic Socialist takes substantial early lead in D.C. mayoral primary

Janeese Lewis George took an early and sizable lead in D.C.’s Democratic mayoral primary on Tuesday based on preliminary vote tallies, though the Associated Press had not projected a winner in the race as of early Wednesday. The latest update from the city’s elections board — which captured the first choice of voters among ballots cast in person Tuesday and in early voting, as well as from mail-in ballots received before Election Day — put Lewis George ahead of fellow front-runner Kenyan R. McDuffie by double digits. Lewis George was leading in every ward except Ward 3, the city’s wealthiest ward, with about two-thirds of the vote counted.

If her lead holds, a Lewis George victory would make her the first democratic socialist to win a mayoral race in the nation’s capital, marking a stark political shift after more than a decade with centrist Muriel E. Bowser (D) at the helm. The vast majority of District voters are Democrats, making the primary the election of consequence for the city. “What seemed like a distant dream not long ago is already history unfolding before our eyes,” Lewis George, who represents Ward 4 on the D.C. Council, told a crowd of supporters at the Howard Theatre late Tuesday. “This moment is for those who refuse to surrender their hope in a government that works for all of us.” Initial results began streaming in late Tuesday, after delays because of long lines at several polling sites. Election officials had warned that the city may not learn the winners in key races for days — a product of the way the city’s new ranked-choice voting would combine with the popularity of voting by mail.

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Judge who attended Fani Willis event exits election records case

A federal judge who was disciplined after an investigation found that she had sex with a police officer in her chambers and attended a partisan event, then lied when confronted with the allegations, has recused herself in a fight over Georgia election records after the U.S. Department of Justice raised questions about her ability to be impartial. The Justice Department sought to remove U.S. District Judge Eleanor Ross from the case, citing her reported attendance at an event for Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis, who prosecuted President Donald Trump. Ross on Tuesday filed an order recusing herself, writing that she was doing so “out of an abundance of caution for the potential perception of bias.”

The Justice Department had sued Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger seeking an unredacted statewide voter list, and Ross was presiding over that case. “Both the Trump administration’s present and Willis’s past efforts have become heavily polarized,” Ross wrote, explaining that she “cannot discount” that an objective observer might interpret her attendance at an event sponsored by Willis’ campaign as support for the district attorney’s position, even if she only went to see former colleagues. Ross received a “private reprimand” after a court investigation found that she had sex in the courthouse with a high-ranking uniformed police officer within earshot of staff, attended a partisan event and then initially lied to deny the allegations. The investigation report says Ross went to an event hosted by a district attorney’s campaign. The judge said the district attorney had been a friend since 1999 and acknowledged having gone to the a private mixer held on the sidelines of the event to visit with former colleagues in the district attorney’s office. Ross previously worked in the Fulton County District Attorney’s Office and overlapped there with Willis there before Willis was district attorney. Willis in August 2023 obtained an indictment against Trump and 18 others, accusing them of participating in a wide-ranging scheme to overturn Georgia’s 2020 election results. That case was ultimately dismissed in November.

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Democrats prep for shrinking Southern delegations

House Democrats face a conundrum — they are optimistic about retaking the majority in the midterms, but with redistricting reshuffling the map it means Southern lawmakers’ power will be greatly diminished. Bracing for the loss of some of their colleagues, Black Democrats from the South are appealing to leadership to help the region maintain power and influence in the caucus, even if its numbers shrink. Rep. Bennie Thompson, the only Democrat in the Mississippi delegation, dodged a potential forced retirement last month when Mississippi Gov. Tate Reeves canceled a special legislative session meant to redraw the state’s maps in Republicans’ favor. But legislators Republicans have suggested they’ll draw out Thompson’s 2nd Congressional District, eventually.

“I think there ought to be some consideration for the South. If not, that means that the area with the most African Americans in the United States will have the least amount of African American representation in Congress,” he added. Members across the caucus are already thinking about how Democratic leadership can address the issue. Delegations from Louisiana, Florida, Tennessee and Alabama are all at risk of having fewer Black Democrats in the next Congress after the Supreme Court’s ruling in Louisiana v Callais . The loss of those seats means House Democrats could have to adjust how they distribute committee assignments in 2027. “If they don’t do a realignment, that means we’re even worse off,” Thompson, who has served as the top Democrat on the House Homeland Security Committee since 2005, told NOTUS about how the caucus spreads out powerful committee gavels and slots. Democrats currently separate all 50 states and the territories into 12 regions. Southern states are divided across three of those regions. Internally, the regions are critical to how Democrats wield power and move up into more influential posts. Each region elects a member to the Democratic Steering and Policy Committee, which decides committee assignments. Those elected regional members are often the first to make the case for lawmakers to leadership for plum assignments.

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Trump’s ‘American Flag Blue’ reflecting pool is green with algae

President Donald Trump’s nearly $15 million directive to ensure the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool glistens a pristine, deep, “American flag blue” has hit a snag: The water is green. Now refilled after a weeks-long project to paint the bottom of the pool, an algal bloom has coated the basin with a layer of gunk thick enough to write in. On Tuesday, crews were working to get the reflecting pool back to reflecting. National Park Service staff poured hydrogen peroxide into one corner of the pool — the chemical can be temporarily “pretty effective” at killing off bacteria, according to Hans W. Paerl, a marine and environmental science professor at University of North Carolina Chapel-Hill. Later in the day, that area of the pool was noticeably a milky blue.

Multiple staff could be seen wading through the shallow water, clearing the bottom of the pool inch by inch. Two NPS crewmembers told NOTUS that they were vacuuming the algae from the bottom of the pool. NPS and the Department of Interior did not respond to an emailed question from NOTUS about whether or not they planned to clean the whole pool that way. Also on Tuesday, a contractor was injecting ozone — which is highly effective at killing algal blooms — directly into the water from equipment parked on the edge of the pool. That process has been ongoing for several days. Renovating the reflecting pool was one of Trump’s “beautification initiatives” ahead of celebrations for America’s 250th birthday. Trump’s critics attacked the project as a desecration of a national monument — and a symbol of Trump wasting taxpayer dollars on his own aesthetic preferences. One D.C. nonprofit unsuccessfully attempted to stop the renovations with a lawsuit. When the painting was done, Trump championed the pool as an early success of his plans for the city — one that includes a giant Arc de Triomphe-esque archway and gold-guilded horse statues.

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Cigars, a canceled Lacrosse season and the scandals rocking a Massachusetts town

The boys gathered on an Ipswich, Mass., beach to celebrate their high-school graduation, some with medals draped over their black gowns. Jutting from each mouth: cigars that may or may not have been real. The photos taken under cloudy skies June 7 mirrored those snapped all around the country lately. But in this coastal enclave dubbed America’s Best-Preserved Puritan Town, those snapshots have lit a burning debate. What’s beyond dispute: Six of the grads were on Ipswich High School’s lacrosse team, and administrators suspended all six from a playoff game two days later for violating state athletic association rules against tobacco use. The team ultimately voted to forfeit the contest—and just like that, their championship run went up in smoke.

Now, this hamlet of 14,000 north of Boston is in a fierce debate over whether the penalty matched the foul. It has grown into a saga featuring a “CSI-level investigation” at a local grocery store, and a heated showdown involving two dads in the principal’s office—captured on a police body camera. “Come on, how many times you’ve been pulled over and a cop has said, ‘Ahh, go ahead?’ ” said Marc Randazza, a lawyer representing one of the suspended students and his father. “There is always discretion, right?” To Ipswich resident Heidi Garofalo, though, the line was clear. “Kids have to learn the consequences when they do something wrong,” she said. “You have to abide by the rules. It just takes one slip [to] ruin everything.” The road to the suspensions began a day after graduation, when local school officials and the Massachusetts Interscholastic Athletic Association received two photos from the beach celebration, according to a statement from Ipswich’s school superintendent and the high-school principal. One photo showed the boys with “full length cigars with the cigar bands visible,” it said. The second showed the cigars “smoked down significantly; a cloud of smoke surrounding one of the students; and a torch type lighter visible in the hand of another of the students.”

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Lead Stories

Dangerous flooding unfolds across Texas as heavy rain drenches state

rain drenched communities from the Hill Country to the Gulf Coast, prompting flash flood warnings, water rescues and widespread concerns about additional rainfall through midweek. As of Monday afternoon, flood watches remained in effect across much of the state, including through Monday evening in Dallas-Fort Worth, through Tuesday evening in the Austin–San Antonio corridor and through Thursday morning in the Houston area. Throughout the early Monday morning hours, heavy overnight rain flooded roads and low-lying areas across Central Texas, where some locations received 3 to 4 inches of rain since midnight, according to the Lower Colorado River Authority. In Austin, emergency crews conducted at least one water rescue after a vehicle became stranded in floodwaters. The Texas Department of Public Safety also reported multiple water rescues south of Waco late Sunday.

Similar rainfall totals were reported in the San Antonio area, where forecasters warned rainfall rates could exceed 2 to 3 inches per hour. The greatest flooding threat may come Monday night into Tuesday as additional storms move through the region, forecasters said. As the week progresses, the storm system is expected to shift toward Southeast Texas, where organizers closed Houston’s FIFA World Cup Fan Festival on Monday because of flood concerns. NWS meteorologist Cody Lindsey said tropical moisture moving north from Mexico is expected to combine with the south-moving storm system over the Houston region, bringing several days of heavy rain and an increased risk of flooding. “We could see rainfall rates in excess of two inches per hour,” Lindsey told Houston Public Media on Monday. Emergency officials throughout the state have urged Texans to closely monitor weather alerts and avoid driving through flooded roads. The National Weather Service continued to emphasize its longstanding warning: “Turn Around, Don’t Drown.”

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World’s biggest fortunes soar by record $336 billion in one day

By almost any measure, Monday June 15 was a superlative day for the world's wealthiest. At the close of trading in New York, the 500 richest people on the globe had added $336 billion to their fortunes, the biggest haul ever recorded in a single day, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. That brought their collective net worth to a record $13.3 trillion. Elon Musk, the world's first trillionaire, extended his lead over the group with his net worth rising more than 10% to $1.27 trillion. And the dozen people at the bottom of the list — the least wealthy of the world's superrich — each stood at $7.9 billion, the highest-ever bar to enter the index.

Markets were buoyant going into Monday after the US and Iran reached an interim deal to reopen the Strait of Hormuz. Space Exploration Technologies Corp. had just made a blockbuster debut the previous week as a public company. The optimism pushed the Dow Jones Industrial Average to a record while the Nasdaq 100 and the MSCI World Index both ended near their all-time highs. SpaceX was the wealth rally's biggest driver as retail traders poured in to snap up shares. Its market value surged 20%. That helped to add $164 billion to Musk's net worth — nearly equal to the combined gain of the other 499 people on Bloomberg's index and one of the biggest one-day increases ever recorded. Musk's fortune has for years illustrated the gaping wealth inequality between the world's rich elite and everyone else. It's now also become an example of a growing gap among ranks of the ultrawealthy. The top 50 now control $6.5 trillion, nearly as much as the $6.8 trillion held by bottom 450, the index shows.

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As screwworm spreads, USDA faces potential sterile fly shortage

After spending the morning testifying before Congress, U.S. Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins flew to South Texas to assure ranchers and local officials that the government was moving quickly to combat the New World screwworm outbreak. “We’re going to beat this," she said, standing before television cameras on a ranch Friday. "We beat it before, and we’re going to beat it again.” So far, authorities have relied on sterile screwworm flies grown in a Panamaian lab to mate with the wild population to slow the spread. But it will be years before the U.S. Department of Agriculture has the additional capacity it says it needs to fully eradicate the flesh-eating parasite here, leading to a blame game between members of the Trump and Biden administrations, who each say the other has not been quick enough to react.

The months ahead are likely to prove critical. If the screwworm outbreak in Texas expands rapidly, authorities’ ability to control its spread with sterile flies could soon be overwhelmed, said Phillip Kaufman, an entomologist at Texas A&M University who is working with the U.S.Department of Agriculture. “So long as people keep reporting, we currently have the capacity for fly production to come in and do the sterile releases over their areas, which will knock the population down,” he said. “The risk is that the Texas outbreak reaches a level the USDA simply doesn’t have enough sterile flies.” For decades, a roadless 50-mile wide stretch of jungle connecting Panama to South America, known as the Darien Gap, had been considered the barrier for a parasite that had devastated cattle herds in Texas and the southwestern United States in the 1960s and 70s. U.S. and Panamanian authorities would regularly release sterile screwworm flies into the jungle to keep the wild population at bay. But in 2023, they reported a sudden surge in the screwworm population, and from there, the pest began a steady northward march through Central America and Mexico. The first U.S. case was identified in South Texas earlier this month, and since then, the USDA has confirmed 11 more infections across calves, goats and a dog.

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Chair Harris warns against rushing data center legislation, suggests foreign influence in part pushing resistance

State Rep. Cody Harris, R-Palestine, says Texas can support responsible growth while safeguarding natural resources. Harris, chairman of the Texas House Committee on Natural Resources, will hold a hearing June 24 to examine data center water usage. He discussed the issue in an interview with Blake Holland for East Texas Politics on East Texas Now. When asked about possible legislative solutions, Harris said the focus should be on responsible resource use. “I think that’s really where it comes down to making sure that they’re utilizing the natural resources responsibly and not harming their neighbor by pumping too much water, using too much water that is a detriment to the community that they’re surrounding and to other property owners,” Harris said. “I think noise control as well. You know, there have been reports of some data centers being very, very loud. Well, there should be some guardrails around that as well to where you’re not a nuisance to your neighbor down the road.”

Harris said he believes the country is in a race when it comes to data centers. “If they aren’t built in the United States, then China is 100% going to build them,” Harris said. “Because until you and I and all of our friends and neighbors stop taking pictures on our iPhone and storing that on the cloud or using AI or Googling things on the internet, and watching streaming services, data centers are going to be built either here or there.” When asked by Blake Holland whether the situation warrants a special session being called by the governor to address immediate threats, Harris said only the governor can make that decision. “I do think until we understand fully what’s going on and dive into it. If we get to a special session, let’s say the governor called one next week and we got to Austin, there’d be a whole lot of ideas. It’d be a lot of knee-jerk reactions,” Harris said. “And I don’t think that is the prudent way to go about creating new state law. I think we really need to take the time to dive into it to figure out what’s actually happening.” Harris said opposition to data center development may be influenced by foreign interests. “Let’s keep in mind that if you rewind the clock about 10 or 15 years ago, maybe I have the dates for the time frame wrong, but there was a big push to be in opposition of fracking in the oil and gas industry. And we soon discovered that whole initiative of being against fracking was being pushed by China,” Harris said. “And now there’s evidence and report to suggest that the push to be against data center development in the United States and in Texas is also being funded and pushed by China.”

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State Stories

New World screwworm infestations rise to 12 as parasite spreads in Texas

The number of confirmed New World screwworm infestations in the United States has risen to 12, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, as state and federal officials continue efforts to contain the flesh-eating parasite. Eleven infestations have been confirmed in Texas and one in New Mexico. The latest Texas case was identified in a sheep in Sutton County, about 135 miles northwest of San Antonio. The detection adds to growing concerns that the parasite is spreading beyond South Texas and into other parts of the state. Screwworm was eradicated from the United States in the 1960s before reappearing in Texas this month after spreading north through Mexico from Central America.

New World screwworm is the larval stage of a parasitic fly that attacks warm-blooded animals, including cattle, sheep, goats, wildlife, pets and, in rare cases, humans. Unlike many fly larvae that feed on dead tissue, screwworm larvae feed on living flesh. The outbreak has raised concerns across Texas’ livestock industry. Texas leads the nation in cattle production, and agricultural officials have warned that a widespread infestation could have significant economic consequences. Adult flies lay eggs in open wounds or body openings of animals. After hatching, the larvae burrow into tissue, creating painful wounds that can become severe or even fatal if left untreated. The parasite poses a potentially significant threat to Texas livestock producers and wildlife populations. State and federal officials have responded with surveillance, testing and the release of millions of sterile male screwworm flies. Because female screwworm flies generally mate only once, breeding with a sterile male prevents reproduction and helps suppress the population. Gov. Greg Abbott has issued a disaster declaration covering all 254 Texas counties as state and federal officials work to contain the outbreak. Livestock owners are being urged to inspect animals regularly and immediately report suspected infestations to veterinarians or animal health authorities. Early detection and treatment are considered critical to preventing further spread. Officials emphasize that properly handled meat remains safe to eat and that screwworm does not spread through meat products.

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Gov. Abbott issues disaster declaration for 101 Texas counties, including Travis, Bastrop and Burnet

Gov. Greg Abbott issued a disaster declaration Monday covering 101 Texas counties as severe storms that began Sunday continue to threaten the state with heavy rainfall, flash flooding, hazardous wind gusts, large hail, and tornado threats. The declaration is designed to give local officials and communities access to the full range of state resources and support. Additional counties may be added as conditions warrant. Abbott addressed the ongoing threat in a statement Monday. "Texas is prepared to respond to the severe weather threats that continue to move across our state," Abbott said.

"Because of the impact caused by ongoing storms and flood risks, I have issued a disaster declaration for 101 Texas counties to ensure that local officials and communities have access to the full range of state resources and support. Texans should heed the guidance of state and local officials and take all necessary precautions to stay safe during this severe weather." The declaration covers counites including Harris, Fort Bend, Montgomery, Galveston, Brazoria, Chambers, Liberty, Waller, Austin, Colorado, Wharton, Matagorda, Walker, San Jacinto, Polk, Trinity, Grimes, Washington, and Brazos. Earlier Monday, Abbott directed the Texas Division of Emergency Management to activate additional state emergency response resources and implement 24-hour operations at the Texas State Emergency Operations Center. Last week, the governor had already directed TDEM to activate state emergency response resources ahead of the anticipated flood threat.

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UT Austin leadership fires KUT General Manager Debbie Hiott

The University of Texas at Austin fired KUT Public Media General Manager Debbie Hiott on Monday afternoon, following a heated dispute over the public radio station’s inaugural festival. The surprise move marks an unprecedented intervention in the governance of Austin’s NPR station at a time when public radio stations across the country are dealing with mounting financial and political pressures. Congress slashed federal funding to public media last year at the urging of President Donald Trump, and the landscape has also been shifting dramatically at public universities where many of the newsrooms are based. That includes KUT, which has operated out of UT Austin for decades. Texas’ Republican leaders have gotten far more involved in the running of the state’s flagship public university in recent years, most recently by initiating a major academic restructuring effort that targeted various gender and ethnic studies programs.

In a phone interview shortly after she was fired, Hiott blasted the university for terminating her and called for a change in KUT’s ownership structure. UT Austin holds the broadcast license for KUT and its sister music station, KUTX, and it employs the station’s staff. “It’s a clear sign that a community asset as important as KUT should not be in the hands of an institution that doesn't have any sense of accountability or concern for the community,” Hiott said, referring to the university’s current leadership. “My hope would be that the university would relinquish the licenses to the community.” KUT and KUTX are editorially independent from UT. They are funded by community and business donations, rather than state taxpayer dollars or student tuition. In a text message, UT spokesman Mike Rosen said that “the university does not comment on employment matters.” An email announcing Hiott’s departure from the interim dean of the Moody College of Communication, the university department that houses KUT and KUTX, also did not provide a reason for her termination. “I am writing to inform you that Debbie Hiott is no longer serving as general manager of KUT/KUTX, effective immediately,” the dean, Anita L. Vangelisti, wrote in an email to the station’s staff, adding that an interim successor for Hiott could be named as soon as Tuesday.

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Body cam shows DPS trooper used encryption app in Austin student’s immigration arrest

A Texas Department of Public Safety trooper used an encrypted messaging app to communicate with what appears to be federal immigration agents during a traffic stop that led to the detention of an Austin Independent School District student, body worn camera video shows. The video obtained by KXAN shows the early morning May 1 traffic stop of high school senior Luis Fernando Cabrera Chavarria. The 18-year-old varsity soccer player was pulled over for alleged expired vehicle registration and later detained at the Karnes County Immigration and Processing Center before being released on a federal court order last week. His arrest and detention, just weeks ahead of his high school graduation, prompted U.S. Congressman Greg Casar, D-Austin, to publicly call for his release.

The body camera video shows the trooper initially informed Cabrera he would receive a ticket for driving without a license. The teen said he only had his school identification card. The trooper is seen minutes later in his vehicle taking a picture of Cabrera’s school ID card and sending it through the encrypted messaging app Signal. The response to the trooper’s message and photo was an image and a message that read “detain.” The trooper responded to the message with his location and within minutes a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent arrived. Signal is an end-to-end encrypted private messaging platform that allows only the sender and the recipient the ability to read messages. The application allows users to set a timer for when to delete new messages, as soon as 30 seconds after they have been seen. Multiple news outlets nationwide have reported in recent years on transparency concerns surrounding government and law enforcement agencies’ and officials’ use of Signal when communicating about matters of public interest. KXAN has requested copies of the Signal communication sent during the traffic stop.

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After threats, lawsuits and chaos, Brendan Sorsby and Texas Tech going their separate ways

After a seven-day battle that spanned multiple courtrooms, Brendan Sorsby has decided that he will not play college football this season at Texas Tech. The decision comes on the same day that the Big 12 filed a lawsuit in a Texas federal court that was aimed at being provided the power to sanction Texas Tech for playing the quarterback this season, even with the NCAA ruling him ineligible to play. Over the past three months, Sorsby had been embroiled in an NCAA investigation tied to thousands of bets placed during his college career, with a number of them coming while he was on the roster at Indiana. These bets were flagged by law enforcement officials, who then turned them over to the NCAA.

During these last few weeks, Sorsby filed a lawsuit against the NCAA in Lubbock district court, where an injunction was granted that would have allowed him to suit up this season for the Red Raiders. Then came the backlash from across college athletics, with the Big 12 conference searching for ways in which it could possibly punish Texas Tech. That lawsuit from Sorsby is expected to be dropped on Tuesday morning, sources tell OutKick. The school will also continue to support the quarterback in his battle off the field with an addiction to gambling. Also, Texas Tech officials are not going to be seeking a return of money already paid to Sorsby, with sources noting that the quarterback had already taken home a significant amount of earnings. Board of Regents chair, Cody Campbell, released a statement on Monday night, confirming these details. "Texas Tech will not seek return of any amounts already paid to Brendan through his NIL agreements with the University," Campbell noted.

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Galveston runoff elections decided, clearing way for Discovery Sands hearing

The final two members on Galveston's City Council were decided Saturday night in the city's runoff election. Sharon B. Lewis will continue serving as the District 1 council member, and Michael Niebuhr will take over as the District 5 council member. The elected council members now face a looming conversation at the next city council meeting about a proposed development called Discovery Sands that has sparked controversy on the island.

Lewis received 58.9% of the 338 votes cast, while her opponent, Gerald Wilson, received 41.1% of the votes, according to results released by the Galveston County Clerk's Office. Michael Niebuhr garnered 56.8% of the 803 votes cast against District 5 incumbent and challenger Beau Rawlins, who received 43.2% of the votes. Runoffs for the District 1 and 5 council seats ended up being a deciding factor in the delay of the controversial Discovery Sands development discussion. A Galveston City Council hearing on the proposed development was delayed until the end of June after residents raised concerns about Galveston city council members taking up the item before the entire newly elected city council was seated. Now that runoffs are over, a hearing on the Discovery Sands proposal will come back to the table at the city council’s June 25 meeting, according to Galveston Mayor John Paul Listowski. Niebuhr said he plans to hit the ground running and speak with the developer for Discovery Sands, Jeffory Blackard of Blackard Companies, ahead of the council meeting to get a better sense of how the plan could be a benefit to Galveston.

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Bexar County elects LGBTQ+ advocate to serve on Texas GOP’s executive committee

At a state GOP convention where the LGBTQ+ community has long been under attack, San Antonians bucked the trend this weekend. Delegates from Texas’ 26th state Senate District, which encompasses much of the blue city’s urban core, elected attorney Justin Nichols to serve as one of their two representatives body that governs the Republican Party of Texas. Nichols filed some of the earliest complaints under the city’s 2013 nondiscrimination ordinance — earning him the designation of one of San Antonio’s most influential gay leaders by Out in SA magazine. In the past, his law firm has advertised services to help transgender clients obtain a legal name change and gender marker correction.

More recently, Nichols represented The Texas Conservative Liberty Forum — a GOP group that wants the party to be more inclusive of different races, religions and sexuality — on a joint lawsuit with LGBTQ+ advocacy groups suing to stop the removal of a rainbow crosswalk and installation of a rainbow sidewalk without a public vote. The 64-member State Republican Executive Committee (SREC) is tasked with holding elected officials accountable to the party’s policy platform, which includes condemning homosexuality and opposing “all efforts to validate transgender identity and ideology.” Delegates from each of Texas’ 31 state Senate districts get to elect one man and one woman to the SREC. Nichols earned 39 votes — beating out longtime conservative activist and City Hall gadfly Jack M. Finger, who took 17. Asked about the historic nature of his candidacy, Nichols said Monday that he didn’t think his sexuality factored into delegates’ calculus. “I think that they selected me because of what I’ve done, not necessarily some factor of who I am,” he said. He’s been a GOP precinct chair for 16 years, and currently serves as the general counsel and parliamentarian for the Republican Party of Bexar County. At 42-years old, he’s also relatively young compared to the rest of the SREC, if not the youngest. “For me this isn’t a story of ‘a first,'” Nichols told the Report. “I think this is a story about new blood and the new voice coming into a party that I think needs it.”

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El Paso ISD board votes to lay off 55 employees under financial exigency

Fifty-five El Paso Independent School District employees are losing their jobs after the board of trustees took a series of votes Monday to terminate their contracts for the 2026-27 school year. The vote was the final step needed to lay off dozens of employees, including teachers, instructional coaches and social workers, who received notices last week informing them their positions were identified for elimination as part of a reduction in force. “Today is just one of the most difficult days we’ll ever have as trustees,” board President Leah Hanany said during a news conference after the meeting. “We know that what we’re doing is making a very concerted and valiant, to be frank, effort to align our budget to what needs of kids are in the classrooms. This board has been so committed to doing that work.”

Hanany said other at-will positions that don’t require contracts may still be cut by the district’s administration without going to the board for a vote, but did not say how many could be impacted or when the decision will be made. Superintendent Brian Lusk said the district has been working to reduce the number of employees affected by the layoff, and will try to find jobs for those who were. “I can tell you without question that the team has worked extremely hard to find the best fit for all team members who may be in this position, as we’ve been going through this financial exigency process,” Lusk said during the meeting. The affected employees include 42 teachers and 13 support staff, ranging from instructional coaches to social workers. District leaders voted to eliminate over 90 employees last week and initially estimated they would need to cut 400 jobs. The votes were grouped by job title and location and were part of a cost-cutting plan approved by the board June 4, which included declaring financial exigency. The declaration allows the district to terminate employee contracts in the middle of their term to reduce payroll expenses by $40 million from 2025-26 levels.

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Trial date scheduled for former Uvalde ISD police chief

A trial date has been set for former Uvalde school district police Chief Pete Arredondo, according to a Uvalde County court official. Arredondo is scheduled to stand trial on Feb. 22, 2027, though it remains unclear where the proceedings will take place. His attorneys have previously argued that he cannot receive a fair trial in Uvalde County. Arredondo led the Uvalde Consolidated Independent School District Police Department when a gunman entered Robb Elementary School on May 24, 2022, killing 19 children and two teachers. The gunman remained barricaded inside adjoining classrooms for 77 minutes before officers fatally shot him.

In the aftermath of the shooting, Arredondo was indicted on 10 counts of abandoning or endangering a child. Prosecutors allege he failed to act as the gunman carried out the attack inside two fourth-grade classrooms. Arredondo faced widespread criticism for not ordering officers to breach the classrooms sooner and confront the gunman, a tactic that is standard in active-shooter responses. In January, a Nueces County jury in Corpus Christi acquitted the only other Uvalde ISD police officer charged in the shooting, Adrian Gonzales, of 29 counts of abandoning or endangering a child. Arredondo and Gonzales were among the first officers to arrive at Robb Elementary School. They are the only two law enforcement officers among the roughly 380 responders to face criminal charges in connection with the shooting.

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Life on the edge of Musk's Starbase brings fortunes and fractures

The last time SpaceX launched a rocket in South Texas, charter boat captain Eddie Reyes was bobbing in a pontoon boat less than 2 miles from the pad with a group of paying passengers. A blast of flames erupted and shockwaves rattled the boat while the rocket climbed into the sky. The arrival of SpaceX has brought good business to Reyes and his family. Since the establishment of Starbase, Elon Musk's company town, his charter boat business has picked up ?as space fans flock to the area for a glimpse of launches. Reyes' nephew works at SpaceX as a welder, driving a Tesla Cybertruck. But the same rockets Reyes sees lifting his family's fortunes are also shaking his mother's home. Shockwaves from launches are cracking the ceiling, ?loosening window seals and sinking the foundation. She's among dozens of residents now suing Musk's company for damage.

"You can't stop progress," Reyes said. Many of the people in the Rio Grande Valley region surrounding Starbase – the company town centered around SpaceX's rocket operations – have arrived at a similar conclusion. They're willing to ride the wave of Musk's interplanetary ambitions and accept the consequences that come with ?it. While SpaceX's rapid expansion is bringing jobs, visitors and global attention, it is also fueling lawsuits, environmental concerns and a growing divide among the 1.4 million residents of the Rio Grande Valley. After SpaceX's record-setting $1.75 trillion IPO on Friday – which will raise $75 billion partly to scale Starship from intermittent test launches to potentially weekly flights – the pressures facing residents around Starbase are set to intensify. "This company is literally shaking the earth," said Tino Villarreal, city commissioner of Brownsville, a city of 185,000 people that borders Starbase. "By the amount of workforce it wants to produce, by the actual wavelengths that are shaking our soil." SpaceX declined to comment for this story.

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Austin ISD's $181 million budget crisis was years in the making

When Rachel Preston became a teacher more than a decade ago, she fell in love with helping Austin students learn French. “Sometimes, I get to see the kids go from zero to conversant, almost fluent in the language,” said Preston, who teaches at the Liberal Arts and Science Academy, or LASA. “They’re growing the whole time they’re in your class. You just get to see them succeed.” The school district is far from alone in its financial woes. School systems across Texas have laid off staff and scaled back student programming to grapple with multimillion-dollar deficits as the costs grew. However, no other Texas school system faces a deficit of such scale.

AISD’s shortfall dwarfs those of any other urban-area district in Texas and represents nearly 20% of Austin ISD’s operating budget. Trustees will debate the budget at a meeting Thursday and must approve it by the end of June. The $181 million deficit cannot be explained by state funding issues alone. A Statesman analysis found that district leaders spent years delaying difficult decisions as enrollment plummeted — preserving staffing levels, operating dozens of under-enrolled campuses and maintaining programs that became increasingly expensive to sustain. Over the years, Travis County’s growing property values helped soften the impact of declining enrollment in the short term. But Austin ISD remained vulnerable to financial pressures when inflation, state mandates and student enrollment declines intensified budget issues. Although academic failings at a single campus can trigger a state takeover, Education Commissioner Mike Morath has said he also considers a district’s fiscal health when deciding whether to remove elected trustees from power.

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Corpus Christi community organizers file Fair Water Amendment to be placed on November ballot

A coalition of community organizations has submitted more than 12,000 signatures to the city of Corpus Christi in an effort to place the proposed Fair Water Amendment on the November ballot. Supporters of the amendment say it would require large-volume industrial water users to pay drought surcharges, while city officials say the current system helps fund long-term water supply projects. On Monday, organizers delivered the signatures to the City Secretary's Office, where they will now undergo a verification process. Dr. Isabel Araiza, Founder of For the Greater Good, led the group into City Hall to formally submit the petition.

"Our city's water policy right now is very imbalanced, and this is an opportunity for us to make our water policy a little bit better by ending industry's drought exemption surcharge fee," Araiza said. The proposal targets the city's Drought Surcharge Exemption Fee program, which was created in 2018. Under the voluntary program, large-volume industrial customers pay 31 cents per 1,000 gallons of water to help fund drought-proof water supply projects. In exchange, participating customers are exempt from certain drought allocation surcharges. "If they actually paid the drought surcharge, they would be paying over a million dollars, in some cases over $2 million every single month," Araiza said. Nick Winkelmann, Chief Operating Officer of Corpus Christi Water, said the program provides a significant source of funding for the city's water supply efforts. "We collect approximately $6 million dollars a year," Winkelmann said. "And it is utilized for our water supply projects." Without the program, Winkelmann said some of those costs would likely fall on ratepayers.

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National Stories

Israel is alarmed by Trump’s deal with Iran

President Trump’s deal to wind down the war with Iran set off alarm bells in Israel, where top officials are wrestling with the consequences of easing the pressure on Tehran and the risks of opening a rift with the U.S. over the war with Hezbollah in Lebanon. The tension has been heightened by the lack of certainty about what exactly Trump has agreed to in the deal, which is expected to be signed later this week. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was urgently trying to set up a meeting with the president to sort out the competing issues, a person familiar with the matter said. An Israeli strike on Beirut over the weekend in response to Hezbollah attacks on Israel almost derailed the agreement and set off a last-minute scramble by the White House and mediators to keep the deal on track.

Trump criticized the strike in an interview with The Wall Street Journal and said on social media that Israel had to stop its attacks across Lebanon. That was at odds with a U.S.-brokered ceasefire agreement earlier in June that only required Israel to end the fighting if Hezbollah also stopped. Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said the U.S. was on the hook to end Israel’s attacks and aggression in Lebanon, state media reported. Defying those claims, Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz said the military would hold its so-called security zone in Lebanon indefinitely, saying it was needed to protect communities in northern Israel. He also said Israel would act independently to stop Iran from getting nuclear weapons if necessary. At a news conference Monday, Netanyahu declined to criticize the emerging U.S.-Iran deal and said his country’s war aims in Iran had largely been achieved. He said Iran’s war-production capacity had been damaged, its economy was in tatters, and its nuclear program set back. “People ask what we have achieved, and the answer is: we have pushed away the immediate threat of annihilation,” Netanyahu said. “The struggle is not over and done. We will need to continue to stand guard and defend ourselves as necessary.”

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Senate Republicans won't back Iran deal without details

Senate Republicans were noncommittal on backing President Donald Trump’s emerging deal with Iran, saying they are awaiting more information about the accord that is set to reopen the Strait of Hormuz and extend the ceasefire for 60 days. The president was quick to tout the agreement on Sunday, with administration officials claiming it would force Iran to abandon its nuclear ambitions. However, details were scarce, with Vice President JD Vance saying in an interview with CNN that the preliminary deal is “a very general document” roughly a page and a half long. The lack of specifics kept many lawmakers from weighing in on Monday. “It’s hard to know based on the media descriptions and social media, so I think I’ll wait to see what it says,” Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) told reporters. “It’d be good to see it, so we’d know what’s in it.” Some Senate Republican defense hawks are already expressing concern about Iran’s truthworthiness and believe Congress needs to weigh in.

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-South Carolina) told reporters that the law requires Congress to vote on any deal involving Iran’s nuclear program, adding that he’s doubtful Iran will agree to the terms being touted by the administration. “If you can get what the president and vice president have outlined, that would be a deal we can all live with, that would be a good deal,” Graham said. “Count me skeptical that Iran will ever go there, but time will tell.” Graham added that he would need Iran to be “out of the enrichment business” before he would vote for a final agreement, saying that step would differentiate the compromise from the Obama-era Iran deal. “What I envision is no enrichment,” Graham said. “They destroy their enrichment facilities, and I don’t care if we say 15 years from now we can revisit it, but they need to be out of the enrichment business for 15 years.” Sen. James Lankford (R-Oklahoma) told reporters on Monday that he would also like to see Congress vote on the deal. “If it’s a good deal, we want to be able to resolve it,” Lankford said. “We’ve got to have a vote to solidify it long term.” However, that feeling was not universal, with some Republicans indicating that a vote down the road is an open question.

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Gavin Newsom says Justice Department is investigating him and his wife

California Gov. Gavin Newsom said Monday that the Justice Department was investigating him and his wife, accusing President Trump of urging the probe to get back at a political enemy. Newsom, a Democrat, said in a social-media video that federal agents had been questioning family, friends and former aides in recent days, “digging through years and years of random documents.” “Donald Trump isn’t just coming after me because of my mean tweets,” Newsom said in the video. “He’s coming after me because I’m considering running for president.” Newsom didn’t elaborate further on the nature of the investigation but alleged that Trump was trying to get to him by going after his wife. Siebel Newsom is a documentary filmmaker and founder of The Representation Project, an advocacy group that uses film to challenge gender stereotypes.

Federal prosecutors in California are conducting several interviews related to the governor, including one examining Siebel Newsom and her taxes and another into his former chief of staff, a person familiar with the matter said. The probes have been going on since at least 2025 and were started by federal law-enforcement officials in California—not political appointees in Washington—after witnesses there came forward with information, the person said. The Federal Bureau of Investigation declined to comment. The U.S. attorney’s office in Sacramento didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment. Agents from the FBI and the Internal Revenue Service last week began approaching more than a dozen people in the governor’s orbit, aides to Newsom said. They asked about a wide range of topics that dated back five or six years, including the governor’s family and Siebel Newsom’s business interests. Some questions were about specific transactions from bank or credit card statements that would only be accessible through a subpoena of a financial institution, they said. A Newsom aide said the governor’s office wasn’t aware of any subpoenas for records directed to Newsom or his wife, or of any target letter notifying Newsom or Siebel Newsom that they were the subjects of a criminal investigation.

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How Kratom, an addictive gas station drug, found allies in Trump’s Cabinet

For years, federal health officials have warned about the risks associated with a supplement derived from the leaves of kratom trees that adherents say can kill pain or boost energy. Sold in gas stations across America, kratom has been linked to liver toxicity, seizures and thousands of deaths. Powerful figures close to President Trump, including Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin, pushed to downplay those concerns. Mr. Mullin, until recently a Republican senator from Oklahoma, played a key role in a sprawling influence campaign spearheaded by the kratom industry that courted Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Vice President JD Vance, among others in the Trump administration, an investigation by The New York Times found. Only when he was nominated by Mr. Trump in March to lead the Homeland Security Department did it become clear that Mr. Mullin had a financial connection to the supplement. In a disclosure statement, he listed an investment worth as much as $1 million in a kratom company, Botanic Tonics, that could benefit from the changes he has sought.

The company’s founder, Jerry W. Ross — who had been an energy executive in Mr. Mullin’s home state before pleading guilty to a financial crime — is a leading player in the influence campaign that was devised to benefit kratom at the expense of its rivals in the marketplace. The kratom campaign underscores how corporations in the growing wellness industry can gain traction in Mr. Trump’s government by casting risky products as aligned with the administration’s Make America Healthy Again, or MAHA, agenda championed by Mr. Kennedy, who has sometimes prioritized unproven remedies over science. In July, while still a senator, Mr. Mullin showed up at a Food and Drug Administration news conference and endorsed proposed federal restrictions on more powerful synthetic supplements that compete with kratom for shelf space. In explaining his position, Mr. Mullin pointed to a history of addiction in his family, though health experts say kratom products have also been shown to be addictive. His disclosure form did not indicate when he acquired his stake in Botanic Tonics, but he has not filed paperwork to indicate that he has divested from it. The Homeland Security Department did not answer questions about the investment. In a statement, the department said that Mr. Mullin “follows all ethics and conflict of interest standards and has not lobbied for any individual or company.” The restrictions that Mr. Mullin supported on the synthetic products would have been a boon to Mr. Ross’s company and others in the kratom industry, which market their supplements as safer and more natural. The kratom companies used donations and lobbyists to push for the crackdown.

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Justice Department decision to allow Paramount deal surprised staff investigators

The Justice Department’s senior leadership closed an investigation of Paramount’s bid for Warner Bros. Discovery before career staffers who were concerned about the acquisition had an opportunity to object, according to people familiar with the matter. A team of career lawyers who had spent months scrutinizing the deal were leaning toward recommending a lawsuit challenging it on the grounds that the combination of the two movie studios would be anticompetitive and violate antitrust law, the people said. The staff investigators hadn’t yet made a final recommendation—a typical step in the deal-review process—and were told Friday that the department would close the investigation, effectively clearing the deal at the federal level, some of the people said.

The Justice Department’s senior leaders believed that Paramount Chief Executive Officer David Ellison, son of Trump ally Larry Ellison, persuasively addressed many of the staff’s questions about the deal during a two-hour interview last month, according to people familiar with their thinking. Among staffers’ questions was how the combined company could meet its commitment to make 30 theatrical releases a year, given its increased debt load. The senior leaders allowed the inquiries but believed Paramount’s debt wasn’t a reason to challenge the merger, the people familiar with their thinking said. No one on the investigative team spoke up to leadership voicing support for filing a lawsuit, they said. “The Antitrust Division conducted a thorough investigation to assess whether the proposed transaction would harm competition,” a Justice Department spokeswoman said. “The investigatory record indicated that the transaction will increase competition across the media and entertainment ecosystem, benefiting American consumers and workers.” Justice Department decision makers often follow staff recommendations on mergers, but there are times when the two camps disagree.

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Only 1 Dan Sullivan will appear on Alaska’s ballot

GOP Sen. Dan Sullivan won’t face a same-name challenger after all. Alaska’s top elections official said Monday that Dan J. Sullivan was ineligible to appear on the August primary ballot for the state’s critical Senate race after determining his candidacy was “not filed in good faith” but instead “with the purpose of confusing or misleading the electorate.” Director of Elections Carol Beecher’s decision is a massive relief for the national GOP apparatus, which had accused Dan J. Sullivan of attempting to deceive voters by appearing on the ballot with the same name and party affiliation as the incumbent — and of working with an operative who previously backed former Rep. Mary Peltola to try to rig the Senate race in the Democrat’s favor.

Peltola’s campaign had previously denied any involvement with either Sullivans’ bids and did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Monday. Dan S. Sullivan, the incumbent senator, immediately took a victory lap on Monday. “Every Alaskan has the right to a free and fair election, free from deception and gamesmanship. We thank Lieutenant Governor [Nancy] Dahlstrom for upholding that right and for ensuring Alaskans can choose their next senator without a sham candidate whose primary purpose was to confuse Alaskan voters, treat Alaskans with contempt, and rig the election for Peltola,” Billy Mackey, Sullivan’s campaign manager, said in a statement. Dan J. Sullivan has 30 days to appeal. He did not immediately respond to a request for comment Monday, but he posted on social media Sunday that he “met the qualification” and had entered the race “because I am unhappy with the 12 year record of the current Senator and I feel we need a change.” He would have to work fast; Beecher noted in her letter that ballots are printed on June 28 — less than two weeks away.

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Records reveal $600M estimate for Trump’s ballroom project, with half from taxpayers

Five months after the demolition of the White House’s East Wing, President Donald Trump claimed that the project to construct a massive ballroom and a bunker in its place would cost up to $400 million and that private donors would pay for all of it. “This is taxpayer-free. We have no taxpayer putting up 10 cents,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office on March 31, describing the project as including bomb shelters and major medical facilities. But a detailed project summary prepared for the White House by the contractor more than three weeks before Trump’s comments estimated the total construction cost at $600 million — with more than half coming from taxpayers, according to a copy of the contractor estimate obtained by The Washington Post.

By the time Trump made his comments in March, the federal government had already approved more than a dozen payments to the contractor overseeing the work, Clark Construction, totaling tens of millions of dollars in public funds, according to a log of the contractor’s invoices obtained by The Post. Since first announcing the East Wing project last July, Trump has repeatedly said that the price tag would not exceed $400 million and that private donations routed through a nonprofit would cover its entire cost. At other times, he has said that the Secret Service and the military would contribute security enhancements, without elaborating on the price of those upgrades. Multiple project summaries provided to the White House by Clark Construction show that internal cost estimates have been significantly higher than administration officials have acknowledged in public comments or court filings. They also show that the work was projected to rely heavily on taxpayer dollars from the moment it was announced. The White House did not answer questions about the internal cost estimates or taxpayer funding.

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Fox is buying Roku. It’s a big bet on making streaming free.

Media giant Fox Corp. on Monday announced a deal to buy streaming and smart-TV company Roku for $22 billion in a cash-and-stock transaction. It’s a deal that will plunge Fox deeper into the streaming wars as a major player in free, ad-supported streaming at a time when large streamers such as Netflix, Disney+ and Hulu have pivoted away from offering only subscription plans and have begun providing ad-supported subscription options. Fox’s move into the streaming era has been slow but deliberate . The company sold its television and film studio, then called 21st Century Fox, to Disney for $71 billion in 2019, and announced a pivot to live news and sports. In 2020, Fox spent $440 million buying Tubi, a free, ad-supported streaming service with a devoted fan base. This new deal would put Tubi and the Roku Channel, Roku’s own free-to-stream, ad-supported offering, under one roof.

In a statement Monday, Fox’s executive chair and CEO, Lachlan Murdoch, called the deal a “defining moment” for the company and a logical move after a decade of focusing on streaming. “Today, we take the next step,” he wrote, “bringing together the most valuable live content portfolio in video consumption with the preeminent streaming platform through which America watches it.” Roku’s chairman and CEO, Anthony Wood, said that Roku reaches 100 million households around the world and that the sale to Fox will allow the company to “accelerate our vision, scale faster and innovate more aggressively for viewers, partners and advertisers.” The deal would further consolidate the news, entertainment and streaming industries, announced just days after the Justice Department approved Paramount Skydance’s $110 billion acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery. That combination will put streaming services HBO Max and Paramount+ under one roof, along with two Hollywood studios, and news networks CBS News and CNN.

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Lead Stories

Iran, US agree to halt war and reopen Hormuz, sending oil prices tumbling

U.S. and ?Iranian officials said they had reached an agreement to end their war and reopen the Strait of Hormuz, a preliminary pact that sent oil prices falling but leaves the fate of Tehran's ?nuclear program to further negotiations. While still a framework, the deal marked the biggest breakthrough towards resolving the conflict that has killed thousands and upended energy markets since it began with joint U.S.-Israeli strikes on Iran in February. "The Deal with the Islamic Republic of Iran is now complete," U.S. President Donald Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform at around 5:30 p.m. in Washington (2130 GMT) on Sunday. His post came shortly after Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, whose country has served as a mediator, announced a deal had been struck early on Monday ?local time.

The memorandum of understanding is scheduled to be officially signed on Friday in Switzerland. The precise terms were not immediately known. Sharif said in a post on X that the pact called for "the immediate and ?permanent termination of military operations on all fronts, including in Lebanon." Lebanon has suffered the deadliest spillover of the conflict, with thousands of people killed ?and some 1.2 million people uprooted by an Israeli offensive against the Iran-backed Hezbollah group, which opened fire on Israel in support of Tehran on March 2. The country has been a sticking point in negotiations, with Israel and ?Hezbollah ignoring calls from Trump and others to stop their attacks on each other in recent weeks. The secretariat of Iran's Supreme National Security Council said war and military operations on all fronts, including Lebanon, would end permanently starting on ?Monday night. Iran's Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi said there must be a complete halt to Israeli attacks against Lebanon and wrote on Telegram that the U.S. bears responsibility for implementing the framework deal.

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Southeast Texas placed under flood watch through Wednesday

A flood watch has been issued for much of Southeast Texas, including the Houston metro area, as multiple rounds of heavy rain and thunderstorms are expected to move across the region through Wednesday morning. The flood watch was issued late Sunday morning as a slow-moving weather pattern sets up across Southeast Texas, bringing repeated rounds of showers and thunderstorms capable of producing several inches of rain. Rainfall totals of 2 to 4 inches are expected through Wednesday morning, though isolated locations could receive 6 to 8 inches where storms repeatedly track over the same areas. Rainfall rates could reach 2 to 4 inches per hour at times, raising the risk of street flooding and quickly rising water in low-lying areas.

The watch covers more than two dozen counties across Southeast Texas, including Harris, Fort Bend, Montgomery, Brazoria, Galveston, Chambers, Liberty, Waller, Austin, Washington, Wharton, Colorado, Grimes, Madison, Walker, San Jacinto, Polk and Trinity counties. Coastal communities from the Bolivar Peninsula to Matagorda Bay are also included in the watch area. The heaviest rainfall is expected in areas where thunderstorms repeatedly move over the same locations. Those heavier bands could overwhelm drainage systems, especially in urban neighborhoods and areas that typically flood during intense downpours. Even areas that receive lower rainfall totals could see brief flooding if rain falls quickly enough to outpace drainage. Excessive runoff could trigger flooding along rivers, creeks, streams and bayous across Southeast Texas. Low-lying roads, underpasses and other flood-prone locations could also experience high water as heavier rain bands develop. Drivers should avoid flooded roadways and never attempt to cross water-covered streets. The flood watch remains in effect through Wednesday morning.

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Oil executives are sounding the alarm over dwindling stockpiles

President Trump’s deal with Iran is set to reopen the Strait of Hormuz, but how quickly it can arrest a steep decline in oil stockpiles will determine the trajectory of energy prices in the coming weeks. For more than 15 weeks, the U.S. and other countries around the world have had to dip into oil tanks, salt caverns and strategic reserves to make up for the millions of barrels of oil trapped behind the strait. Now, the stocks are nearing critical levels, and energy executives say without an influx of more oil, prices will have to surge to stop the run on supplies. Mike Wirth, chief executive of Chevron has repeatedly warned on television that the supply crunch will soon manifest itself around the world. Neil Chapman, the No. 2 at Exxon Mobil has said the U.S. is approaching “unheard-of inventory levels.” Other executives, such as Wil VanLoh, of Quantum Capital Group, say “it’s going to get ugly.”

“The world has never had to destroy 10 million barrels a day of oil demand,” VanLoh added, referring to the crude production not making it to global markets. Relief could be on the way. The U.S. and Iran agreed Sunday to a deal—set to be signed Friday in Switzerland—that would quickly reopen the strait, through which 20% of the world’s petroleum typically passes. But even if that deal holds, it would likely take months for the oil market to return to normal. Since late March, the U.S. has drawn about 66 million barrels of oil from its Strategic Petroleum Reserve, a system of salt caverns on the Gulf Coast that was created in 1975 after the Arab oil embargo. The Trump administration authorized the release of 172 million barrels—and if drawdowns continue at the current pace, that allotment could dry up in early September. The current release—if fully exhausted—is set to bring inventories down to 243 million barrels, a historically low level. Drawing further from the stocks after that would limit the U.S.’s ability to respond to new oil disruptions on the world’s stage, or natural disasters such as hurricanes that can damage fuel supply chains. The SPR peaked at more than 700 million barrels in 2009.

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One year of Mayor Jones: Narrow accomplishments, a lot of pushback

From the outside looking in, Gina Ortiz Jones is a mayor on the move. She’s in Taiwan, trying to convince company executives to open shop in San Antonio. She’s being interviewed on the nationally distributed radio program 1A about how cities can use artificial intelligence to improve basic services, which she spoke about at a conference in Madrid. She’s at center stage at events across San Antonio. Jones is beaming in photos posted on her official social media accounts. She’s shaking hands, fist bumping and hugging everyday San Antonians who are grinning or laughing, matching their mayor’s energy. It’s a curated and polished look at her administration — which, by most accounts, has struggled since her swearing-in a year ago. Inside City Hall, Jones has made little effort to build relationships with City Council members, who are key to turning her vision for the city into policy.

Indeed, friction between the mayor and the 10-member council came to a head in February, when the council censured Jones for what they described as her “unacceptable” conduct. As part of the censure, the council required Jones to undergo leadership training. Jones has also struggled to retain staff, many of whom abruptly resigned, leaving key positions unfilled. That’s one reason business and civic leaders continue to privately question whether Jones can effectively lead the city. Since she took office on June 18, Jones has devoted time and energy to actions that excite her grassroots, Democratic supporters — many of whom have cheered her since she first ran for Congress in 2018 — but that have only remote chances of success. That includes asking Republican Gov. Greg Abbott to reverse himself and allow the state to join a federal summer lunch program for low-income kids, and writing to the Department of Homeland Security asking it to scrap a planned immigration detention center on the East Side. Neither Abbott nor homeland security leaders were likely to respond positively to the mayor’s publicly released letters. Jones’ policy agenda includes increasing affordable housing, expanding access to early childhood education, promoting economic development and improving infrastructure, such as flood prevention and mitigation projects.

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State Stories

Houston airports anticipate 4.5 million travelers for World Cup

The Houston Airport System is already experiencing the start of an influx of international passengers. On Monday, the airport system said in a press release that it expects 4.5 million travelers at both the Bush Intercontinental and Hobby airports from mid-June to early July. AAA corporate spokesperson Daniel Armbruster told Houston Public Media that he recommends Houstonians consider the major sporting event's impact on air travel ahead of time. "If you're trying to plan a last-minute trip, that's going to be really tough," Armbruster said. "A lot of flights are full and sold out. So, it's really important if you have a vacation coming up within the next month or two that you go ahead and lock down all of your plans."

Armbruster suggests that any Houstonians planning on flying in the near future should arrive at the airport two to three hours before boarding the plane, avoid checking any luggage and keep any documentation on their persons at all times. Armbruster also said to expect increased wait times when reaching security checkpoints. "It's so important that you plan ahead, and of course whether or not you're traveling to a host city or you're going to be in a host city, it's very important to just make sure that safety comes first," Armbruster said. The airports include options such as TSA PreCheck, Touchless ID, CLEAR and CLEAR+ e-gates for departing travelers looking to reach their gate quicker than the standard screening line. In a pre-recorded video, Houston Airport System Director Jim Szczesniak said that the airports will not implement any major changes to the security process during the World Cup. "We've been working with CBP and TSA leading up to this to make sure that we can give the traveler the normal kind of experience that we'd expect," Szczesniak said. "It's still going to be normal summer busyness, and again, we're not changing our standards. We want people to get through the lines as quickly as they normally do."

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Last year, a Corpus Christi cryptomine guzzled over 11 million gallons. Now, its water usage is being kept secret.

The drought-stricken City of Corpus Christi is withholding how much water a controversial cryptocurrency mine is siphoning away from surrounding residents. The Texas Observer reported on the facility’s water burden last year in a series examining the cryptomine and artificial intelligence data center boom unfolding across the state. From May to August last year, the Bitcoin mine consumed 11,563,000 gallons, according to water utility records that the Observer previously obtained via a local resident’s public information request. Together, the records pointed to an average of about 127,500 gallons a day, well over the 100,000-gallons daily rate that the city uses to label a “high-volume user.” Moreover, records obtained last year showed the city already added a new 4-inch water pipe to the site to help the mine cool its computing hardware with a technique known as liquid immersion.

City Council member Roland Barrera, in whose district the mine is located, said city staff told him the mine is still guzzling about 100,000 gallons a day, or about 3 million gallons a month. Other industrial users, like the city’s petrochemical refineries, use as much as 90 million gallons monthly. But now, as Corpus Christi faces an ever-deepening water crisis, in response to the Observer’s public information request, the city is refusing to release the latest 2026 records of the mine’s water usage. The city is appealing the Observer’s request for those records to the Texas Office of the Attorney General, citing a section of the Texas Utilities Code that allows nondisclosure of an individual customer’s account. That’s a change from just last year, when the city provided water-usage records. In February, the city also refused to provide information on commercial car wash water use in response to a request made by KRIS 6, a local TV station covering the water crisis. The attorney general upheld the city’s decision in that case to withhold the information based on its use of an advanced metering system for the business, something the city didn’t specify was at issue for the cryptomine. Instead, the city argued that it needs written consent from the mine’s operators to disclose the information, citing a statute originally designed to protect residents’ privacy that has since been applied to industrial commercial accounts. The attorney general now has 45 business days to affirm or reject the city’s decision to withhold the records. City Council member Sylvia Campos was outraged to learn the city was withholding water usage records. “Oh my God, that pisses me off,” she told the Observer. “This is public information. This is water.”

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'Cruel and archaic': Texas GOP's convention elephant draws scrutiny beyond viral moment

The 8,600-pound elephant in a feathered headpiece that paraded through the Texas GOP convention brought a grand finale to Gov. Greg Abbott’s speech, but the animal’s backstory is less uplifting. Paige came to the convention Friday from Trunks and Humps near Houston, one of only half a dozen traveling elephant menageries remaining in the United States. The business run by Bill Swain has federal Animal Welfare Act violations going back decades for risking human and animal safety, including in December when a woman was kicked in the head by a camel at a church nativity event.

A 2004 undercover investigation by Animal Defenders International identified Swain’s son as the man pulling an elephant to the ground with a sharp bullhook and kicking her in the face – and beating other elephants with a golf club and electric prod. By bringing an elephant to their Houston convention, Texas Republicans elevated the party's longtime symbol. But it renewed scrutiny of a long-fading practice condemned by animal welfare advocates for cruelty inflicted on one of the world’s most intelligent animals. A viral moment came Friday when Paige paused on the convention center floor and urinated in front of GOP delegates and guests, drawing widespread banter across social media. Video shows a handler pushing Paige along by poking her in her front left leg mid-stream with a bullhook, a steel-tipped rod used to force elephants into submission. The tool, painful enough to bring a four-ton elephant to her knees, is one reason why 12 states and hundreds of jurisdictions have banned elephant performances and other traveling animal acts amid growing public opposition to cruelty inflicted on exotic animals in entertainment.

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Moving out of Dallas City Hall is on this week’s City Council agenda

Late Thursday night, Dallas Mayor Eric Johnson signaled just how serious he is about leaving the City Hall building behind. The mayor has called for a special meeting of the Dallas City Council to convene Wednesday to deliberate on next steps in abandoning the I.M. Pei-designed facility. A public notice of the agenda shows the horseshoe will gather at 8 a.m. on June 17 and vote on two resolutions that authorize the city manager to “negotiate and execute pre-acquisition agreements” with up to four sites for a new City Hall building and a new 911 call center. Up to $3 million may be used to conduct “due diligence for the sites,” or to reimburse property owners for delivering the relevant information on matters such as “terms, responsibilities, and cost sharing between the property owners and the City of Dallas.”

The agenda item is a dramatic step toward departing the 48-year-old building on Marilla Street, which is reportedly in need of up to a billion-dollars in investments to address years of deferred maintenance. On Wednesday, the council formally voted not to fund those repairs in a 9-6 split. Johnson led the majority of council members, which included Council members Chad West, Zarin Gracey, Maxie Johnson, Jaime Resendez, Gay Donnell Willis, Kathy Stewart, Lori Blair and Jesse Moreno. Council members Adam Bazaldua, Paula Blackmon, Cara Mendelsohn, Bill Roth, Laura Cadena and Paul Ridley have stood staunchly opposed to any talk of selling or redeveloping City Hall. In a statement, Johnson lauded the decision as a step that will save a significant amount of taxpayer dollars from being flushed into the “obsolete building.” “The City Council was also briefed on several occasions in executive session about potential new locations for City Hall, and it is overwhelmingly clear that relocation will be not only a far more prudent use of taxpayer dollars but will also be a better long-term solution for our government, city employees and all Dallasites,” Johnson said. “Instead of delivering the Dallas taxpayers a billion-dollar invoice for a dilapidated government office building that is impeding the growth of a large section of our urban core, the City Council took an important step toward realizing my vision of a downtown teeming with life, with community and with social and economic activity.”

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U.S. Congressman sends stern message to Texas Tech, TX AG

If there’s one controversy that has united the college football world, it is the bizarre handling of Texas Tech Red Raiders quarterback Brendan Sorsby. In an unprecedented and baffling decision, a Texas court granted Sorsby an injunction that makes him eligible for the 2026 season because the trial date falls after the season concludes. The ruling has sparked widespread criticism from fans, media members, and even politicians. After the Big 12 met to consider sanctions against Texas Tech, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton threatened to sue the conference for antitrust violations. One U.S. congressman publicly pushed back. Representative Hakeem Jeffries took to social media with a sharp message aimed at Paxton and Texas Tech.

“So let me get this straight. The corrupt, impeached and criminally-indicted Texas Attorney General is vouching for the integrity of the Texas Tech football program,” Jeffries wrote on X. “Maybe they should find a better character witness.” Jeffries joins a growing group of voices criticizing the stance taken by Texas Tech officials and supporters. Outside of those closely tied to the university, few appear to believe Sorsby should play college football in 2026. Critics are not blaming Texas Tech for supporting its player. They are criticizing the school for pushing to play him and threatening legal action against those who disagree. The injunction has drawn intense scrutiny, particularly because of reported involvement from influential Texas Tech athletic boosters. It remains unclear what action the Big 12 will ultimately take. Several programs outside the conference have reportedly paused future scheduling discussions with Texas Tech or canceled planned games altogether. Additional meetings involving conference leadership and key decision-makers are expected next week. For many across college football, the conclusion seems straightforward: Sorsby should not be on the field. He violated established gambling bylaws, and precedent suggests a significant punishment should follow. The larger controversy now centers on how a judge agreed to grant an injunction that effectively bypasses those established rules.

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Lockheed Martin union workers ratify new contract

Union workers who assemble F-35 aircraft at Fort Worth-based Lockheed Martin Aeronautics Co. voted Sunday to ratify a new contract. About 4,000 members of International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers District 776 approved the new contract that includes wage increases between 4% and 6%, increased vacation time, and no mandatory overtime schedules. The contract includes a $6,000 bonus and improvements to retirement benefits. The agreement also covers IAM Union members at Edwards Air Force Base in California and Naval Air Station Patuxent River in Maryland. Contract negotiations have continued since mid-March. The new agreement starts June 15 and is in effect through June 18, 2030, according to a news release.

Union officials said members fought hard for a worthy contract. “Our members made it clear what the purpose and goal for these negotiations were,” said Doyle Huddleston, IAM’s District 776 directing business representative. “No takeaways and make improvements on the top issues. We did what our members asked us to do, and they made the decision with their votes.” Jody Bennett, IAM general vice president, said Lockheed Martin offered an agreement to keep the company thriving. “Our membership made their wishes clear from the start,” Bennett said in a statement. “The negotiating committee took those wishes to heart and worked to bring a solid proposal to the membership for consideration. Today, the membership voted to accept.” Last month, Lockheed Martin Aeronautics received an $879 million order from U.S. defense officials. The order is one of four major defense contracts — totaling more than $1 billion — awarded to the company or its parent Lockheed Martin Corp. in late May, months after U.S. and Israeli forces launched an attack on Iran on Feb. 28. The F-35 program supports more than 254,000 jobs through 1,800 suppliers across 48 states and Puerto Rico.

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Contractor says 525-acre data center won't create noise issues, researcher urges public scrutiny

Questions remain about water use, power demand and economic impacts as Florida-based contractor Hut 8 moves forward with its proposed Beacon Point data center campus in Nueces County. Now, a researcher who studied communities living near large concentrations of data centers says another issue should be part of the conversation: noise. Beacon Point is a planned 525-acre artificial intelligence data center campus near Robstown. Earlier this year, Hut 8 announced a 15-year lease agreement valued at $9.8 billion for the project's first phase, making it one of the largest developments proposed for the Coastal Bend. Hut 8 maintains that noise from the facility should not be a significant issue for nearby residents.

"We take any kind of concerns or issues regarding sound very seriously, and we're ensuring that any building that we are doing is going to be up to all applicable standards and regulations, so that there's minimal noise disruption for residents nearby," Hailey Miller, Hut 8's senior director of regulatory and government affairs, told 3NEWS in a June 3 interview. Still, Neha Gour, a Ph.D. candidate at George Mason University and lead author of a recent peer-reviewed study examining the impacts of data center development in Virginia, said communities should understand the potential effects of facilities that operate around the clock. "Residents living near some of these facilities have reported concerns about persistent low-frequency humming sound, which is generated by cooling and mechanical systems because these facilities are currently operating 24/7," Gour told 3NEWS. "Even moderate noise levels can become a concern for nearby communities over time." According to Gour, that constant operation is unlikely to change anytime soon. "Every time we send an email, the email goes to a data center somewhere in the world and actually goes back to the person who the email was supposed to be sent," she said. "Because of the urgency of our reliance on the internet today, we can't afford to not have data centers operate 24/7."

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What Knicks' Jalen Brunson, Karl-Anthony Towns had to say about Spurs after winning NBA title

Jalen Brunson and the New York Knicks had plenty of praise for the Spurs after winning the NBA Finals in a hard-fought five games for their first title since 1973. "That's a hell of a group," Brunson said after pumping in 45 points to lead the Knicks to a 94-90 victory Saturday night at the Frost Bank Center. "That's a well-coached (team)," he added. "The culture they have is clearly evident. And so a lot of respect to them and what they brought to the table. I'm just happy we were able to find ways to win four games." New York center Karl-Anthony Towns, who had 10 rebounds but just two points in a foul-plagued performance in Game 5, joined the Finals MVP in tipping his hat to Victor Wembanyama and the Spurs.

"He's going to be something special for a lot of years to come," Towns said of Wembanyama. "Once-in-a-generation athlete. Shout out to the Spurs, too. They're the real deal." Towns also singled out Spurs rookie guard Dylan Harper, who had a team-high 25 points to go with five rebounds, four assists and a block in 31 minutes off the bench. "Shout out to Jersey's own, Dylan Harper; he's the real deal," Towns said of the 20-year-old New Jersey native the Spurs selected second overall out of Rutgers last June. The Spurs, likewise, had plenty of praise for the veteran, tough-minded Knicks. "That was a good team," Spurs forward Julian Champagnie said. "I mean, we lost. Super tough. That’s a credit to them. They’ve got a great superstar in Jalen Brunson that gets the job done. OG Anunoby. Guys who get it done. Credit to them. We’ll be back again next year."

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Harris County judge absent from court for most of 2026

A Democratic judge without a Republican challenger in November has been absent from her family law court for most of 2026, according to Harris County records. This year, Judge Angela Graves-Harrington used her county-issued badge to swipe into the civil courthouse or any other county building on 13 weekdays — including just once in April, according to badge swipe data through May 13 obtained through an open-records request by the Houston Chronicle. Outside of court, she has made public appearances in her capacity as judge. But her presence in the 246th District Court, which handles divorce, child custody and other family proceedings, has been sporadic since around the time of her husband's death in October 2025. Her absence has continued as recently as May.

Graves-Harrington, whose annual salary consists of $192,500 in state funds and an additional $25,000 from the county, attributed her absence to “medical leave” and declined to elaborate in a brief phone call. She's still collecting a paycheck, according to Texas Comptroller officials. Amanda Cain, a spokesperson for the Administrative Office of the Harris County District Courts, declined to comment on the judge's "personal health matters" or when she would return to the bench. The badge swipes from Harris County Universal Services show the number of times Graves-Harrington entered a county building. The time and location of the badge swipes were redacted. She had last used her badge on May 3 — a Sunday — when Universal Services pulled her records for the Chronicle. Concerns about her infrequent attendance in the civil courthouse escalated on June 1 when an administrative judge, Susan Brown, ordered Graves-Harrington's cases to be transferred to other family courts and to block her court from receiving new cases until further notice. Brown, a governor appointee for the Eleventh Administrative Judicial Region of Texas, did not explain in her order why the transfer of cases was necessary.

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Knicks fans say they were assaulted at River Walk hotel after Game 5 of NBA Finals

Fans who were visiting San Antonio for the NBA Finals on Saturday says he was assaulted by two people wearing Spurs gear at a River Walk hotel. A spokesperson for Hotel Valencia Riverwalk confirmed to KSAT on Sunday that two people allegedly assaulted a guest returning from the Spurs-Knicks NBA Finals game. The alleged assault happened around 12:30 a.m. Sunday at Hotel Valencia Riverwalk at 150 East Houston Street. The victim told KSAT he and his father were wearing Knicks jerseys as they were returning to the hotel from the Spurs-Knicks game when they were assaulted. The spokesperson said the guest was allegedly assaulted by two people driving by.

Authorities responded to the scene, and a police report was filed, the spokesperson said. The guest was taken to a local hospital for treatment and has since been released, according to the spokesperson. Recently, videos circulating on social media have shown Spurs fans were attacked in New York following the team’s Game 3 win. In other cases caught on camera, there have been verbal conflicts. A 17-year-old was also assaulted during celebrations outside Madison Square Garden after the Knicks’ Game 4 victory. The teenager suffered a seizure and was in a coma following the assault. The teen was approached by a group of people and engaged in an argument over the Knicks, the New York City Police Department told KSAT, though it was unable to confirm what was said between the people involved. During the Spurs-Knicks Game 5 on Saturday, a woman was also hospitalized with critical injuries after a shooting downtown. However, it is unclear if the shooting is related to Sunday’s assault. Additional information was not immediately available. KSAT has reached out to the San Antonio Police Department for more information in connection with Sunday’s assault.

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10 D-FW hospitals face federal price transparency complaints

In the last two months, the Trump administration has warned over 500 U.S. hospitals that their price transparency isn’t up to snuff, The Associated Press reported. Ten of them are in Dallas-Fort Worth. But representatives for some of the affected hospitals said their complaints reflected technical issues, not a failure to make pricing data available to patients. Multiple said the issue had already been resolved. Each of the 519 hospitals on the list, published this week by The Associated Press, either received a letter of warning from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services or was asked to submit a strategy for improving how accessible their price information is to consumers, known as a corrective action plan. Failure to comply could result in penalties of just over $2 million per year for each hospital.

Of the 10 D-FW hospitals on the list, six were issued warnings: Carrollton Regional Medical Center, Hickory Trail Hospital in DeSoto, Parkland Memorial Hospital in Dallas, Texas Surgical Hospital in Plano, University Behavioral Health of Denton, and USMD Hospital at Arlington. The remaining four were asked to submit corrective action plans, indicating the government believes they committed a more serious violation: Acute Rehabilitation Hospital of Plano, JPS Health Network — Trinity Springs North in Fort Worth, Perimeter Behavioral Hospital of Arlington, and White Rock Medical Center in Dallas. Parkland’s violation turned out to be a formatting error in its document upload process. The issue was corrected as of Thursday, according to a letter to the CMS from Parkland’s chief compliance and ethics officer.

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Harris County expands subsidies for ‘boutique’ police program

Harris County commissioners have approved a policy that could increase county subsidies for the controversial “contract deputy” program, which lets neighborhoods cover most of the cost of hiring a deputy to patrol their areas, with all county taxpayers covering the rest. The county’s eight elected constables and county leaders have been in a delicate standoff over the program since last year, when Republican lawmakers passed a bill last year stripping the commissioners’ authority to approve the contracts.The program is popular in contract areas, but critics say it ties up some 1,200 deputies handling mostly mundane calls in typically wealthy, low-crime neighborhoods. Most of the contracts have neighborhoods pay 70% of the cost while the county covers 30%, with the expectation that deputies spend 30% of their time outside the contract area — though county officials do not verify that.

But the new law in theory meant constables — or the sheriff, who handles about a third of the contracts — could unilaterally decide the terms of each contract. County officials said it would kill the budget. On its face, the new policy approved Thursday caps the county subsidy only slightly higher than the typical arrangement, at 35%. But given the new state law, the measure is essentially a handshake deal, not an enforceable policy, and will only hold as long as officials adhere to the terms. And the subsidy is, in fact, far higher than 35%. This is partly because the contract rates don’t account for county administrative expenses such as legal counsel, information technology or human resources. Officials have said in the past that including these costs would increase contract patrol rates by 11%. The county also has raised all deputies’ pay 32% since last year, but has so far passed on only 8% of that increase to contract patrol neighborhoods, whose rates are driven primarily by deputies’ salaries. Commissioners were concerned that passing the full cost of the raises on to contract areas would lead to mass cancellations, forcing the county to fully foot the bill for all of the affected deputies or risk violating a Texas law prohibiting big cities and counties from “defunding” law enforcement.

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National Stories

Mitch McConnell hospitalized with mystery ailment

Sen. Mitch McConnell was admitted to the hospital on Sunday morning, his spokesperson said, without revealing the Kentucky Republican’s condition or prognosis. “He is receiving excellent care,” Stephanie Penn, a spokesperson for McConnell’s office told NOTUS. It is unclear where the senator was hospitalized or how long he is expected to remain there. The Senate is scheduled to be in session on Monday, and it remains unclear whether the hospitalization will force McConnell to miss any official business. McConnell is chair of the Senate Appropriations subcommittee on defense, which is currently tasked with approving funding for President Donald Trump’s ongoing war with Iran.

McConnell, 84, has served in the chamber for over 41 years, making him the second-longest serving senator behind Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), who has a tenure of over 45 years. McConnell has experienced several concerning episodes during press conferences in recent years. In August 2023, McConnell paused for over 30 seconds at an event in Covington, Kentucky, when he was asked if he was considering running for Senate in 2026. McConnell also froze for around 20 seconds before being escorted away by his fellow Republican senators at a press conference on Capitol Hill one month earlier. As a survivor of childhood polio, McConnell has struggled with mobility as a result of the lingering effects of the disease — causing him to fall and occasionally use a wheelchair.

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Blood, sweat and corporate sponsors: Trump hosts White House cage fight

President Trump hosted a cage match at the White House on Sunday, turning the historic South Lawn into a sporting arena where fighters pummeled each other, surrounded by paid advertisements and thousands of fans. The unprecedented event used some of the most iconic symbols of American power—the U.S. military, the White House and the Lincoln Memorial—to promote the Ultimate Fighting Championship, a company that stands to profit from the fight’s far-reaching exposure. Critics decried the event as gruesome and unbecoming. But the crowd—a mix of military service members, administration officials and Trump allies—reveled in the unabashed masculinity of the scene, cheering on fighters as they bloodied each other’s faces and invoking patriotic chants.

Taken together, the spectacle symbolized the style of politics Trump has brought to Washington, breaking norms and snubbing elite sensibilities. After delivering a flurry of strikes that lead to a knockout, middleweight fighter Bo Nickal credited Trump for having “the balls” to put on the show. Another fighter, Diego Lopes, leapt to the top of the cage after a win, facing the White House with arms spread wide, the audience erupting. Some winced later in the night when heavyweight Josh Hokit made a crass remark in a post-fight interview with podcaster Joe Rogan, a longtime UFC announcer. “Lastly, Michelle Obama is a man,” Hokit said, referring to the former first lady. “Am I right, America?” After winning his fight, Hokit, wearing an American-flag bandana and sunglasses, presented Trump with his gold-chain necklace. The fights took place in an octagon-shaped ring surrounded by a metal cage. Towering overhead was a 92-foot-tall, 600-ton steel arch called “the claw.” Trump had a front-row seat for the action, sitting next to first lady Melania Trump and UFC Chief Executive Dana White, a close ally. Meta Platforms CEO Mark Zuckerberg, Paramount CEO David Ellison, Republican lawmakers and members of the president’s family were also in the crowd.

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Trump at 80: A president ‘really uncomfortable’ with aging

He stays up late, phoning lawyers and lawmakers, while posting up to 150 times a night on Truth Social. His mornings involve calls with world leaders about the war in the Middle East, or talks with landscapers about replanting a bothersome tree. When he arrives in the Oval Office, his unstructured days unfold like a time-lapse video, with people zipping around him as he stays seated at the center of the frame. As President Trump turns 80 on Sunday, he is so intent on projecting an image of relentless energy that he has installed a massive, mixed martial arts octagon on the South Lawn to mark the occasion. After watching the fight, Mr. Trump will depart Washington in the middle of the night and cross an ocean for a diplomatic summit in France. It is a schedule that seems devised to ward off questions about age and stamina as he begins his ninth decade. But even for a president known for imposing his own reality on every situation, Mr. Trump is facing scrutiny over his age that has grown more intense with each passing year. A Reuters/Ipsos poll taken in February showed that nearly six in 10 Americans think Mr. Trump is growing more erratic.

On Monday, Mr. Trump appeared to doze off during a New York Knicks game at Madison Square Garden. That episode prompted such intense speculation that James Dolan, a prominent ally and the team’s owner, felt compelled to weigh in publicly, saying the president “was very much awake.” On June 4, during an hourlong appearance in the Oval Office, Mr. Trump leaned to the side in his chair, closing his eyes for a few seconds as Lee Zeldin, the administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, spoke about the importance of coal. Earlier this month, legions of online observers speculated, as they had before, that Mr. Trump was ailing when his public schedule contained no public events for nearly a week, a streak that began just after a physical exam at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center. Three days after that evaluation was completed, the president’s physician, Dr. Sean P. Barbabella, declared in a summary that the 79-year-old Mr. Trump “remains in excellent health, demonstrating strong cardiac, pulmonary, neurological and overall physical function.” So the oldest president ever to be inaugurated and his advisers spend a lot of time hitting back at people who have drawn a different set of conclusions about his health based on what they believe they can plainly see. This week, senior White House officials, speaking on the condition of anonymity to talk about Mr. Trump’s health, said that when the president appears to slump or lean over at his desk in the Oval Office, as he did during an event earlier this month, he is doing it to lean closer to better hear someone speaking. (He leaned away from Mr. Zeldin and closed his eyes during the event on June 4th.)

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Venezuelans sour on Donald Trump

President Donald Trump has said Venezuelans are “dancing in the streets” because of the money entering the oil-rich country since this year’s ousting of Nicolás Maduro. Many Venezuelans are not so sure. Polls show that the US president’s star, which soared after the January military operation to capture Maduro, has started to wane among Venezuelans frustrated with the slow pace of change. A survey by Meganálisis last month found that Trump’s approval rating had dropped from 75 points in March to 47 points in April, while an Atlas Intel and Bloomberg poll found it fell from 53 per cent in February to 45 per cent in May. Trump said on Wednesday that Venezuela “has become a happy country” but Carlos Salazar, co-ordinator of a coalition of trade unions, said: “Here in Venezuela, we have to tell President Trump that nobody is happy.”

Hours after Maduro’s arrest, the Trump administration backed his deputy Delcy Rodríguez to shepherd through reforms to open up the country’s vast oil and mineral reserves to private investment. During pro-democracy marches in Caracas in February, some demonstrators waved banners thanking Trump. In return, Washington has begun unwinding sanctions and allowing Venezuela to sell its crude at market prices via US-based intermediaries. But beyond the release of about 600 political prisoners and an increased tolerance for public demonstrations, many Venezuelans say they are yet to see material change in a country where annual inflation is running above 600 per cent. Oil production has started to take off, and executives have flown around the country in the hope of signing deals, but many ordinary Venezuelans have yet to see living standards improve. “There have been no economic improvements in the country,” said Oscar Montero, a taxi driver in Caracas. “Even if more money has come in from oil revenues, it hasn’t reached us.”

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DNI Tulsi Gabbard ends her tenure spreading a bioweapons conspiracy

Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard is promoting a long-disproven conspiracy theory about the U.S. secretly supporting bioweapons manufacturing in Ukraine, just before she leaves her post at the end of the month. In a video posted on X by her official government account, Tulsi echoed claims that have previously been circulated in Russian propaganda to support Russian military action in Ukraine — and by followers of the QAnon movement as evidence of the “deep state.” “Until now, evidence regarding the full existence and funding of these laboratories had been knowingly withheld from you, the American people,” Gabbard said in the video, in which she announced the release of documents she claimed supported the theory that the U.S. had secretly funded bioweapons manufacturing in Ukraine.

“This release today breaks new ground as the information surrounding the existence, history, locations and funding of these U.S.-funded bio labs has been intentionally covered up by very powerful people who falsely claimed that these bio labs didn’t exist, that they accuse anyone who says otherwise to be foreign assets and traitors to America,” Gabbard continued. But the documents released by her office — a total of four pages — appear to rehash already publicly available information about U.S.–supported research facilities in Ukraine. The first page of the release, which focuses on the Institute of Experimental and Clinical Veterinary Medicine in Kharkiv, even states that the facility’s funding from the Department of Defense was previously public information. Much of the information contained in the release appears to be drawn from information publicly available on the website of the U.S. Embassy in Ukraine, on a page about the Biological Threat Reduction Program — a long-running U.S. funded program that was created to “reduce legacy threats from nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons left in the Soviet Union’s successor states, including Russia,” according to a 2022 DOD fact sheet.

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Kennedy Center exterior remains covered after Trump’s name is removed

Large striped tarps remained on the Kennedy Center’s exterior Sunday, prompting confusion and frustration from some visitors who arrived to the renowned arts venue to see President Donald Trump’s name removed. Stephen Caken, a New York resident visiting Washington, DC, for an internship, told CNN he was puzzled why the tarp was still up after the president’s name had been removed on Saturday in compliance with a federal judge’s order. “It seems like they’re trying to just kind of take away attention from this whole charade,” Caken said. Much of the exterior portion of the building where the metal letters marking Trump’s name were installed in December was covered Sunday afternoon, preventing many from viewing what remains. John Mathew Smith, a Maryland resident who made the trip to the Kennedy Center, argued that Trump was “trying to weaken America’s symbols.”

“To me, he’s trying to deface America’s symbols before he starts finishing defacing the country itself,” Smith said. Tim Terpstra, a Washington resident who lives nearby, arrived at the center for the second time this weekend, hoping that the tarps had been removed. “It would be nice to be able to see to make sure that it is down, and no vestiges of what was up there still remain,” he said. CNN has reached out to the Kennedy Center for comment about why the tarp is still up. The removal occurred after an appeals court declined to pause a ruling from US District Judge Christopher Cooper that found the venue acted unlawfully when it added Trump’s name to the building, part of the president’s effort to remake the nation’s capital. The installation of Trump’s name to the building, which was named for assassinated President John F. Kennedy, struck a deep symbolic chord among residents who’ve cherished the center, which has long served as a cultural hub in the deep-blue city. The center took steps last week to reverse the change in some places but kept the president’s name on the building as it sought to stave off compliance with Cooper’s ruling.

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Kevin Warsh wants the Fed to stop explaining everything

Kevin Warsh boiled down his advice for the Federal Reserve before an audience of investors last year. “Stop talking so much,” he said. “More thinking, less talking.” For more than a decade, Warsh has argued that the Fed should say less. How much a central bank reveals about its thinking shapes mortgage rates, markets and the cost of borrowing for everyone. Wall Street will parse Wednesday’s meeting, his first as Fed chairman, for any sign of where he’ll take it. As a Fed governor through the 2008-09 crisis, Warsh had a front-row seat watching Ben Bernanke pioneer two of the central bank’s biggest innovations this century—a far larger holding of bonds and a more systematic practice of explaining its moves. Bernanke was extending a shift Alan Greenspan began in the 1990s, when the Fed first started announcing its rate decisions and signaling where they might head.

Warsh quit in 2011 after souring on the bond buying and has spent the years since arguing the Fed took both innovations too far. Now that he’s in charge, the question is whether he proceeds as a revolutionary, a diplomat or both. Whatever Warsh hoped to do on interest rates will have to wait. Inflation is running hot after the war in Iran sent up energy prices. The conversation at the Fed has shifted toward hikes, not cuts. It would be a near-impossible setup for a new chairman to override, even if he wished to. That leaves two ambitious projects, which are moving at different speeds. Shrinking the bondholdings could take years, and communications is where he can move first. Being fenced in on rates, with no fight to wage there, frees him to spend his energy on it. In Warsh’s view, the central bank has buried itself in its own communication. It produces forecasts that markets fixate on and that box the committee in. Officials give speeches or interviews on every side of every question. Warsh wants the Fed to say less and let markets do more of the work. With no action expected on rates on Wednesday, the attention will be on him: Will he submit a forecast for rate projections he disdains? How much will he say at a press conference he’d rather not hold?

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Germany's big win shows pros and cons of expanded World Cup

Curaçao played the David role well for a while in their 7-1 loss to mighty Germany. Livano Comenencia scored a historic goal -- the first World Cup goal ever for the smallest nation to qualify -- and Curaçao briefly gave Germany reason to doubt themselves and remember the recent World Cup group-stage failures of 2018 and 2022. The Goliaths kept their heads, however, and eventually established harsh control in front of a crowd of 68,021. Nico Schlotterbeck's 38th-minute header from a corner put them ahead for good, and a deluge followed all the way through Kai Havertz's second goal in the 88th minute. "After the game there was a song, 'The Train Has No Brakes' ('Der Zug hat keine Bremse')," Germany head coach Julian Nagelsmann said. "We tried to do that to move on, move on, move on with no brakes."

Comenencia's early equalizer gave Germany a chance to prove their resilience. "[Curaçao] got the equalizer with I think the first shot on our goal, and then it was interesting to see how we can deal with that," Nagelsmann said. "We tried to find our lucky moments in the offense, tried to score more goals, and then we had a very important set piece to get the lead again." A number of German players put together stat lines worthy of man-of-the-match honors. Havertz scored near the end of each half, knocking in a penalty to make it 3-1 in the first half, then finishing the scoring on a breakaway in the 88th minute. Meanwhile, Felix Nmecha scored the opening goal and drew the penalty converted by Havertz. He put three shots on target, completed 36 of 38 passes and made three tackles. Facing criticism from German legends such as Thomas Müller and Jurgen Klopp for recent form concerns, Jamal Musiala was at his best, scoring a goal early in the second half, creating a pair of chances, winning nine of 14 ground duels, drawing a pair of fouls and even completing three tackles as Germany snuffed out most of Curaçao's counterattacking attempts after the 20th minute. "I thought he played very well," Nagelsmann said. "He had several promising moments that were blocked, but he kept trying, was constantly available, and scored after halftime with an excellent run and finish."

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Lead Stories

US and Iran inch closer to deal, Trump says Sunday but timing is unclear

U.S. and Pakistani leaders forecast a Sunday signing of a long-elusive framework agreement to end months of fighting between the United ?States and Iran, but Tehran cast doubt over the timing and hardline protesters in Iran voiced opposition. Qatari negotiators flew to Tehran on Sunday morning as part of an effort to finalise the agreement, a source with knowledge of the situation told Reuters. U.S. President Donald Trump posted that the deal with Iran was scheduled to be signed on Sunday, his 80th birthday. Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif said Islamabad was preparing for an electronic signing, to be followed by technical-level talks in the coming week.

But Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Esmaeil Baghaei, speaking ?before Trump's post, was quoted by state media as saying on Saturday it would "not be tomorrow" but could happen "in the coming days." Iran's Fars news agency, citing an informed source, said on Sunday Tehran has ?not yet taken a final decision on the framework agreement, with reviews of its political, legal and technical aspects ongoing at expert and decision-making levels. A senior Iranian ?official told Reuters that, under the terms of the draft deal, the U.S. would agree to release $25 billion of frozen Iranian assets, while Tehran would agree not to produce or acquire nuclear weapons. Trump wrote on Truth Social earlier that after a framework deal is signed, the Strait of Hormuz, a vital artery for global oil supplies that Iran has effectively blocked, would immediately be "open to all". Once the strait reopens, the U.S. ?would lift its naval blockade, sources on all sides of the talks said. Negotiations over Iran's nuclear programme — a rationale Trump has given for the war — would take place afterwards.

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Gov. Greg Abbott spells out vision for fourth term at Republican state convention in Houston

Gov. Greg Abbott outlined a variety of legislative priorities during his keynote speech at the state Republican Party convention Friday afternoon in Houston, followed by the stunning appearance of an elephant that paraded around the room. Abbott, who is running for an unprecedented fourth term as governor of Texas, also stressed how he intended to help Republicans win elections, including in Harris County. Abbott had previously pledged to spend big to flip blue-leaning Harris County, but he had been largely silent on the issue since his preferred candidate for Harris County judge, Houston firefighters' union president Patrick "Marty" Lancton, failed to make the party's primary runoff. He reiterated his commitment to delegates and gave specifics while speaking on stage at the George R. Brown Convention Center.

"My campaign will spend at least $25 million just in Harris County alone," Abbott said. "We are going block by block, door to door, and we are going to win up and down the entire ballot." Abbott also endorsed a key demand of the party, passing legislation to close the state's primary system. Currently, Texans can vote in either major party's primary. Many Republicans have expressed concerns, with little evidence, that this is encouraging crossover voting by Democrats to influence their party's choice of candidates. The Republican Party of Texas is currently suing the state, arguing that the open primary system violates Republicans' First Amendment right to freedom of association. Much of Abbott's speech revolved around listing past Republican legislative accomplishments, ranging from tightening the state's election laws out of concerns for voter fraud — the evidence for which is minimal — to banning gender reassignment surgery for children. But when Abbott began speaking about the party's efforts to cut property taxes, he focused on his proposals for the next legislative session: legislation to require two-thirds voter approval for municipalities to pass any property tax hikes, as well as legislation lowering the property tax appraisal cap from 10% to no more than 3% per year.

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New World screwworm cases in Texas rise to 10, new quarantine zones established

The U.S. Department of Agriculture has identified 10 cases of New World screwworm in Texas since June 3. Cases have been found in Edwards, Tom Green, Zavala, Gillespie and La Salle counties. The pests have been found in cattle and goats. Officials initially reported an additional case involving a dog in Andrews County on June 8. However, after further epidemiological investigation, authorities determined the animal lives in Lea County, New Mexico, and the case was reclassified as New Mexico's first confirmed New World screwworm infection. The veterinarian who submitted samples from the dog is based in Texas, officials said. Early reports indicated the dog had recently traveled to Mexico.

The Texas Parks and Wildlife Department said updates will be provided as additional cases are confirmed. The agency has established a public information page and said situation reports will be updated daily when new detections occur. According to TAHC, five areas of the state have been designated as "infested zones" and include Coke, Edwards, Gillespie, Kerr, Kimble, La Salle, Sutton, Tom Green, Uvalde, Val Verde, Webb and Zavala counties. A quarantine is in place for those areas and warm-blooded animals cannot leave an affected area without authorization. Officials advised livestock owners and veterinarians to remain vigilant and report suspected infestations to the appropriate authorities. The Texas Animal Health Commission is handling livestock-related cases, while the Texas Department of State Health Services oversees human infestation reports. The screwworm was mostly eradicated in Texas and the rest of the United States in the 60s. But now, it’s moving north up from Panama and has a known presence a little over 300 miles south of the Texas-Mexico border. To eradicate the population, federal officials are expediting the release of billions of laboratory-raised sterile flies, deploying ground release chambers to supplement the four million sterile flies already being dispersed aerially in the region each week. When wild flies mate with the sterile flies, no offspring are produced, eventually collapsing the population.

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How Abbott’s advisers used agency regulating funeral homes to legally harass a Muslim community

Sarah Sanders had spent the day in her small, windowless office drafting letters to funeral directors when her boss came in with a new request. It was a late Monday afternoon in March 2025, and Scott Bingaman, the executive director of the Texas Funeral Service Commission, wanted her to put aside her other work and look into a year-old case. It concerned the East Plano Islamic Center, a mosque and Muslim community in North Texas known as EPIC. The soft-spoken 33-year-old Texas Tech University law school graduate had joined the commission, which regulates the funeral industry, only a few months earlier, after bouncing around law firms in Beaumont and briefly serving in another state agency. Most of her time in her new role in Austin had been dedicated to clearing a four-hundred-case backlog of complaints stretching back years. She figured the EPIC case would be just like the rest. Sanders opened the agency’s file. A complainant alleged that the mosque was offering Islamic funeral services without a license.

Other staffers had left several pages of analysis, in mismatched fonts and text sizes, summarizing evidence the commission had gathered. The file had been shelved for months, sidelined by other, more pressing ones. Sanders took a few minutes to review one piece of the complainant’s evidence, a video that had appeared on EPIC’s YouTube page announcing a “one-stop shop” for funeral services. Families would call the mosque, and a funeral home it had contracted would transport the bodies to and from it for rites and burial—all for “around three thousand dollars.” As a religious institution, EPIC was allowed under state law to perform funerals without regulatory oversight as long as it didn’t charge fees. But if it had done so, it would have needed a license, and its license had lapsed more than a year earlier. To Sanders, the video—which was posted before the lapse—did not provide definitive evidence that the mosque had been charging for services improperly. But that was the point of an investigation, she thought. She prepared to issue a cease and desist order: The facility would have to halt funeral services while investigators did their work. (EPIC would later argue that any money that changed hands was a voluntary donation and that it did not profit. The commission’s lawyers would counter that the definition of compensation was broader than profits.) Sanders then turned to Bingaman’s second instruction, one that was far more unusual: Work on the case with Governor Greg Abbott’s general- counsel division, a small group of lawyers in his inner circle. Sanders wasn’t sure why Abbott’s team was so interested in a routine regulatory matter; she had never discussed one with anyone from the governor’s office. But she trusted and admired Bingaman, who had wooed her to the agency with a pitch about building something together that would outlast them both. She forwarded the file to one of the governor’s lawyers.

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Advocates decry targeting of migrants as thousands of US citizens' spouses, parents caught up in crackdown

In March, Maria Flores drove her husband to the courthouse to pay fees related to a traffic ticket in Tennessee. She expected the court visit to be short, but after waiting for hours, she realized something was wrong. "I went to check in the lobby and I kept asking the sheriff if everything was OK," Flores said. "They kept telling me that they couldn't tell me anything." Flores said she then saw officers with Immigration and Customs Enforcement, and immediately realized that her husband was being detained. Orlin Carrasco, who entered the U.S. in 2013 as a 17-year-old unaccompanied minor from Honduras, was pulled aside after paying his court fees with several others and arrested by federal immigration officers, his wife said.

Carrasco, who doesn't have a removal order or criminal convictions, was sent to a detention center in Louisiana and has been detained since. His attorney told ABC News his detention is unlawful. "We have a young man from Honduras who was targeted, because we are seeing that across the country, despite no criminal history at all," Alexandra Lopez said. "[He's] a contributor to our society, supporting a family who are U.S. citizens." "I've done everything the right way," Carrasco said in a video call with Maria. "I've asked ICE for a reason and they don't answer me." In a statement to ABC News regarding Carrasco's detention, the Department of Homeland Security said "President Trump and Secretary Mullin are now enforcing the law as it was actually written to keep America safe." Carrasco is one of thousands of immigrants targeted by the Trump administration in its ongoing immigration crackdown.

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State Stories

Texas GOP Chair Abraham George ousted by second-in-command D’rinda Randall

Republican Party of Texas Vice Chair D'rinda Randall became the party's new leader Friday after defeating her former running mate, incumbent Chair Abraham George, shaking up the top of the state's majority party ahead of the fall midterm elections.

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A ban on IVF and Sharia law: Here's the Texas GOP platform

Texas Republicans passed a platform Saturday that urges lawmakers to prioritize further tightening the state's election rules, including laws to bar mail-in balloting for seniors, require proof of U.S. citizenship to vote and close the primary. The delegates also called for legislation next session that would ban IVF, oppose "all efforts to validate transgender identity" and prohibit any form of tax-subsidized lobby. The planks in the state GOP's platform and list of legislative priorities were adopted on the final day of the State Republican Convention in Houston with little debate. Approval of the 58-page documents by the more than 4,000 delegates carries no force of law.

Still, it is intended to guide the policy positions for Republican candidates and officeholders heading into the final months of the 2026 midterm election cycle. Typically, the GOP platform skews more conservative than most of the party's rank-and-file voters, and even Republicans running for statewide, legislative and congressional seats. But some of its planks are adopted if not immediately, then over the coming years. Gov. Greg Abbott and other top Republicans who spoke at the convention enthusiastically embraced at least some aspects of several of the proposals, including a call to cut back property taxes. "We need to disrupt property taxes as we know them," Abbott said when he addressed the convention on Thursday. "We must abolish school district property taxes on your homesteads." Election security was ranked as the convention's top priority. The platform would require a proof of U.S. citizenship before someone is allowed to register to vote. The plank also calls for English-only ballots and a mandate that every voter present a Texas government-issued photo ID for every election, with no exceptions. Mail-in ballots could only be used by people with disabilities, members of the military and voters who are absent from the state — meaning Texans aged 65 and older would no longer be eligible. It would also do away with open primaries and require anyone who votes in a primary to register as a member of the party conducting the primary.

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Texas rural hospital organization to end contracts with UnitedHealthcare over ‘unsustainable’ rates

A physician-hospital organization representing 45 rural and community hospitals across Texas said it will end its contracts with UnitedHealthcare Insurance Company, starting at the end of the year. The Texas Organization of Rural and Community Hospital’s Clinically Integrated Network, or TORCH CIN, said the termination represents “one of the most significant statements of rural provider frustration in recent Texas healthcare history.” The organization said UnitedHealthcare’s reimbursement rates are unsustainable and threaten the financial survival of rural health systems. Paul Aslin, executive director of TORCH CIN, said his organization has been negotiating with UnitedHealthcare “in good faith” for more than 550 days – but despite biweekly meetings, TORCH CIN has not received a formal response to a proposal shared in January.

“We would like them to acknowledge that they do underpay us compared to people that have more leverage, especially, for example, the urban hospitals,” he said. “We would like for them to give us a proposal that is sustainable for our hospitals.” In an email to KERA, UnitedHealthcare said it needs to balance the need to ensure long-term sustainability of TORCH providers with the need for affordable care. A UnitedHealthcare spokesperson referred to TORCH CIN’s actions as a negotiating tactic and said they do not reflect the ongoing discussions the insurance company has had with TORCH CIN. “While we are disappointed in [TORCH CIN]’s recent actions, we remain committed to using the time left on our contract to reach an agreement that maintains long-term access to quality, affordable care for the families we serve throughout rural Texas communities,” the spokesperson wrote. The spokesperson pointed to recent prior authorization reforms as part of its effort to support rural hospitals and providers across the country. In addition, they noted that UnitedHealthcare supported the development of TORCH CIN through a multi-million dollar investment.

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Local Texas election officials await appointment of new secretary of state as midterm preparations ramp up

Texas Secretary of State Jane Nelson’s unexpected departure only a few months before the November midterm election, which includes one of the most hotly contested U.S. Senate races the state has seen in years, has some local election officials and voting rights advocates worrying the transition will complicate their ability to administer a smooth election. “It’s the unknown, the uncertainty that is scary,” said Tandi Smith, the Kaufman County elections administrator. “Are we going to continue to receive guidance? Are we going to be ensured that we’ll be prepared for any coming changes? We just don’t know.” Gov. Greg Abbott, a Republican, is required by law to appoint a new secretary as soon as possible. His office, in an emailed statement, said the new appointee would be announced “at a later date.”

Nelson, who has been the state’s chief election official for more than three years, last week announced that she’d be stepping down from the role effective July 17. Nelson’s departure will happen just as election officials across the state are preparing in earnest for the November general election. In the summer months, they’ll be recruiting election workers, seeking polling locations, and processing voter registration applications, among other duties. Some voting rights advocates say a new appointee may want to direct local election officials to change election procedures, which could lead to chaos and confusion for voters. Although the secretary of state’s office has no law enforcement authority and can’t change the law, it can issue election law opinions on how to implement election and voting rules. “If the new secretary of state has a laundry list of demands that election administrators can’t meet, that’s going to throw our elections into disarray,” said Emily Eby French, policy director at Common Cause Texas. French noted that there were three secretaries of state between 2017 and Nelson’s appointment in 2023, some of whom remained in the role only for about a year before resigning.

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Texas takes over voter registration in Val Verde County amid struggles with registration

This coverage is made possible through Votebeat, a nonpartisan news organization covering local election administration and voting access. Sign up for Votebeat Texas’ free newsletters here. Three years ago, Texas Republicans approved a state law that was designed to allow unprecedented state oversight of elections in Harris County, a Democratic stronghold that is also the state's most populous county and includes most of Houston. State Republican lawmakers said at the time they were responding to problems and irregularities with Harris County's elections, while some election and policy experts decried the partisan overtones of the new law and said it amounted to an intrusion on local control of elections.

But the law also said the state could take control of elections in smaller counties, if it found problems there when conducting state-required random audits. Now, the state is using the law for the first time — but not to take over in Harris County. Instead, the state has assumed administrative oversight of voter registration in Val Verde County, which sits along the Rio Grande west of San Antonio and has around 30,000 registered voters. The county voted Republican in the past two presidential elections. The county’s tax assessor-collector and voter registration officials, who are responsible for voter registration duties, have repeatedly failed to maintain accurate voter registration records despite on-site training and help from officials with the Texas Secretary of State’s Office, according to the agency’s preliminary audit of the county, released last year. “A recurring pattern of problems with election administration and voter registration exists and the problems impede the free exercise of citizens’ voting rights,” the preliminary audit report from the state said.

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Report shows Texas restaurants are still struggling

A recent report shows what restaurant owners have been telling us all year long: that the cost of goods and fuel prices are affecting their businesses. Sergio Calderon loves making his food fresh. He says he’s seen it all, working from kitchens in Mexico to diners in New York to owning Panchos and Gringos in San Antonio. “For me, I learned how to survive,” Calderon said. He cited the Great Recession of 2007 as an example. “Then the pandemic,” Calderon said. “This is the worst with the prices of gasoline and inflation.” Kelsey Strefeurt, a public affairs officer for the Texas Restaurant Association (TRA), said 2025 was a difficult year for restaurants. There was a sigh of relief at the beginning of 2026 that things would change.

“And yet, the second finding is that we are still in a very difficult economic climate,” Strefeurt said. The concerns restaurant owners had all year long were reflected in a recently published report from the TRA. A recent report shows that 77% of restaurant owners said the cost of goods have increased, while 66% say suppliers are now adding fuel surcharges because of gas prices. “Food costs are up 35% since the pandemic, labor, utilities, insurance, rent, mortgage payments,” Strefeurt said. There are also the financial strains customers are feeling, which limits the foot traffic in restaurants. “Of course they try to keep me afloat, and they come as often as they can,” Calderon said. Strefeurt says Texas restaurants become more efficient during times like these. Calderon learned that over the years. “My overhead is low, and believe me, I’m no quitter,” Calderon said. “I’m going to stay.”

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STAAR scores show student progress

After the COVID-19 pandemic wreaked havoc on education and standardized test scores, results from the spring 2026 State of Texas Assessments of Academic Readiness, or STAAR, tests show improvement across several subjects. The Texas Education Agency, or TEA, released results from this year’s STAAR End-of-Course, or EOC, exams on Wednesday. The exams measure academic performance in Algebra I, Biology, English I, English II and U.S. History. According to a press release from Texas 2036, a nonprofit public policy organization that did a full analysis of the STAAR EOC results, results improved across all five subjects in 2026, with the largest gains occurring in Biology and Algebra I. However, while the results are a continued improvement, performance in Algebra I and U.S. History remains below pre-pandemic levels.

“These results are great news for Texas families. It means that more students all over our state are succeeding in their academic coursework. This is meaningful because it means more students are prepared for life after high school,” Mary Lynn Pruneda, Director of Education and Workforce Policy for Texas 2036, said in the release. “Texas is on our way to having the best public high schools in the country, and these results show we are headed in the right direction.” Texas 2036 listed the following key findings from its analysis: Biology: 71% of students met grade-level expectations in 2026, up from 62% in 2025 and 63% in 2019. Algebra I: 54% of students met grade-level expectations in 2026, up from 47% in 2025 but below the 62% recorded in 2019. English I: 55% of students met grade-level expectations in 2026, up from 51% in 2025 and above the 49% recorded in 2019. English II: 60% of students met grade-level expectations in 2026, up from 56% in 2025 and above the 51% recorded in 2019. U.S. History: 70% of students met grade-level expectations in 2026, up from 68% in 2025 and below the 75% recorded in 2019.

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TAD’s reappraisal freeze under discussion after Tarrant homes overtaxed, no change in sight

Tarrant Appraisal District board members are split on whether to consider changing the property appraisal process after acknowledging that the current plan delivered less equitable tax bills to homeowners. The board discussed the possibility of undoing the reappraisal plan they voted to continue using in 2025 that switched residential property appraisals to a two-year schedule instead of the typical annual plan while capping tax increases at 5% per cycle. The June 10 discussion came nearly a month after it became public that 190,000 to 200,000 homeowners potentially received overvalued property tax bills. No action was taken during the meeting to change the reappraisal plan.

“Everybody’s talking about the reappraisal plan, and I felt that if we didn’t get this on the agenda to have an open discussion based on the information that we’ve received, that it would be a slap in the face to the public,” TAD board member Gloria Pena said. “I felt like the attention needed to be given.” Pena and fellow board member Wendy Burgess initiated the discussion after local tax consultant Chandler Crouch published TAD data showing more than 195,000 homeowners would have received lower property tax bills this year if their homes had been reappraised in 2025. But because of the reappraisal plan, homes remain frozen at their 2024 value and won’t be reappraised until 2027. Chief appraiser Joe Don Bobbitt confirmed Wednesday that the county’s residential tax roll has become “less uniform and more regressive” since TAD froze reappraisals. However, he argued that about 60,000 of the overvalued tax bills were capped by homestead exemptions, effectively meaning only a ballpark of 130,000 homes were overvalued.

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Frisco elects new mayor in runoff race that mirrored divisions over Muslim residents

Unofficial election results show that Mark Hill has prevailed in the runoff election for Frisco mayor that garnered thousands of dollars in spending and donations. The two candidates' views about this Collin County city's Muslim population featured prominently in their campaigns. Hill got about 58% of the vote, defeating his opponent Villhauer, who received about 42%. The mayoral runoff in Frisco has faced division over Vilhauer’s comments about Frisco’s growing Muslim population. At a Frisco Chamber of Commerce forum last month, Vilhauer expressed his support the Indian community in Frisco, which has also faced backlash over unfounded claims of H-1B visa fraud. But he said he doesn’t support the Muslim community.

“When it comes to people of Sharia that govern themselves, they are not welcome here,” he said. “I will never welcome them here. We're going to fight that.” Sharia Law is a religious code in the Islamic faith that isn’t enforceable in the U.S. Audience members at the candidate forum erupted in applause in response to Vilhauer’s statements. And others applauded when his opponent condemned the discourse about Frisco’s Muslim population. “If you're a family looking to move from anywhere in the state, Dallas, anywhere in the country, say New Jersey, Boston, San Francisco, or anywhere in the world, and you see some of the rhetoric going on these days, you're not coming to Frisco, Texas,” Hill said. The city council canceled public input for non-agenda items at meetings after hours of testimony at a recent meeting where many people testified against building a new mosque, Jain temple and Hindu temple. Several commenters who were against the mosque said they support Vilhauer for mayor. Jeff Cheney, the outgoing mayor, said in a Facebook post most of the commenters who are causing disturbances aren’t local to Frisco. “Most of the disrupters do not live in Frisco and many not even in the state,” Cheney said. “They have not been following our decorum rules and many cases their comments had nothing to do with city business or things we have no control over.”

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San Antonio City Council to vote next week on SAWS rate increases totaling 29% through 2029

The San Antonio City Council received its final update on proposed rate increases for the San Antonio Water System on Thursday. The utility is seeking a series of rate increases that would total about 29% through 2029. SAWS is proposing annual rate increases of 6% to 8% through 2029, though increases planned for 2028 and 2029 could be adjusted. The utility estimates the average residential customer's monthly bill would increase by about $4.60 each year. During the discussion, San Antonio Mayor Gina Ortiz Jones urged her council colleagues to approve the proposal, arguing it would help prevent future water infrastructure problems like those experienced in Corpus Christi.

“We can and must avoid something similar happening here in San Antonio. We need to pass this rate increase, and I hope my colleagues will join me in ensuring the city of San Antonio has the water she needs,” Jones said. The proposal is lower than the plan originally presented earlier this year. In February, SAWS projected cumulative increases of about 34%, but later reduced that estimate after updating its financial projections. Several council members expressed concerns about the proposed increases. District 7 Councilwoman Marina Alderete Gavito said it would be difficult to justify higher rates while residents continue to deal with frequent water main breaks near Jefferson High School. “The significant loss of water does pour into residents' bills, and that's not okay,” Alderete Gavito said. SAWS CEO Robert Puente said the utility's ability to respond to major leaks has improved over the last three years. "I'm very happy to report that since the height of 2023, which was the worst year for both the number of line breaks and the amount of water we lost, we've seen a 19% reduction because we hired more crews to go out into the streets and fix those breaks," Puente said.

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Shots fired after hundreds of juveniles take over Discovery Green, Houston police say

Houston police responded to a reported "teen takeover" at Discovery Green on Saturday night, according to Houston Police Department dispatchers. Police said when officers got to the scene around 9:23 p.m., there were about 500 to 600 juveniles and various adults in the crowd. As officers were working to disperse the crowd, shots rang out from another large group across the street, according to the Houston Police Department. About 10 to 15 minutes later, HPD said officers heard another round of shots being fired. Thankfully, police said no one was hurt. "We had one goal in mind," said HPD Cpt. Jonathan French. "To keep one large crowd from dispersing and developing in another spot, namely our Fan Fest for FIA. We did not want that to happen, so we had multiple units that continued to show up. HPD said one juvenile male and one adult male were detained. They said the two were found with guns in the area where the shots were fired.

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Tarrant Dem commissioner denied town halls over illegal campaigning concern

Republicans on the Tarrant County Commissioners Court denied their Democratic colleague’s use of county facilities Tuesday under the assumption she would be using them for political activity, which is illegal under Texas Election Code. Democratic Commissioner Alisa Simmons, of Precinct 2, asked permission from the court of five members to use the Arlington Subcourthouse, where her office is, for monthly town hall meetings from July to October. She asked the court to waive the $1,314 cost to pay the necessary staff and security. Simmons is challenging Tim O’Hare for his seat as county judge in the Nov. 3 election.

Simmons and fellow Democratic Commissioner Roderick Miles voted to approve the request, but the pair was outnumbered by the three Republicans, O’Hare and commissioners Matt Krause and Manny Ramirez. Friday morning, O’Hare posted on X that Simmons was trying to “misuse taxpayer-funded facilities to hold political, self-serving events.” O’Hare’s post said Simmons disguised the event’s true purpose by calling it a town hall. On Friday, Simmons told the Star-Telegram the town hall meetings would cover the budget, the Southeast Connector Project and mental health services in the county jail. “County facilities are funded and maintained with taxpayer dollars,” Simmons said Friday evening. “Residents should have reasonable opportunities to use those facilities to learn about county services, county projects and county government.” When Krause said the four town halls being in the midst of a contentious election season was coincidental, Simmons denied having planned any political activity for the town halls. “It seems very coincidental, maybe, that these town halls line up right when the election season is really ramping up,” Krause said. “We’ve got four in four months, which is right during the heat of that. It kind of seems like to me, maybe we’re using the fee waiver and access to the courtrooms, it could be for political activity.”

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Oklahoma AG Gentner Drummond calls on the Big 12 to sanction Texas Tech for Brendan Sorsby saga

Oklahoma Attorney General Gentner Drummond publicly called on the Big 12 to sanction Texas Tech after quarterback Brendan Sorsby won a court order restoring his eligibility, setting aside his ban by the NCAA for gambling on pro and college sports. “If Texas Tech will not do the right thing, the Big 12 should,” Drummond wrote Friday in a letter to the conference. Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton warned the Big 12 on Thursday of potential legal action from Texas Tech as the conference considers its options. Big 12 Commissioner Brett Yormark said the notice came shortly before the start of the league’s executive board meeting to discuss Sorsby's situation.

Drummond said claims that sanctions against Texas Tech would violate antitrust laws are meritless. “By adopting and enforcing its bylaws, the Big 12 Conference is simply upholding integrity and fair play among membership," he said. A Texas district court's temporary injunction that was issued Monday prevents the NCAA from enforcing its permanent ban of Sorsby, a decision that sent shock waves across college sports. The transfer quarterback had been ruled ineligible after he acknowledged years of gambling that included more than $90,000 in wagers and at least 40 bets on his own team while he was a freshman at Indiana. NCAA rules call for a permanent loss of eligibility for any player who wagered on his own team. Texas Tech said Sorsby has completed a month-long inpatient treatment program and will continue to receive treatment and support while being monitored.

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1 killed, 10 hurt in mass shooting in Midland, Texas; suspect also dead: DPS

One victim was killed and 10 others were injured in a mass shooting in Midland, Texas, on Friday morning, and the suspected gunman is dead following a standoff with police, authorities said. When police responded to an active shooter report around 8 a.m. local time Friday, the suspect, Victor Mata Villarreal, allegedly fired at bystanders and officers, the Texas Department of Public Safety said. Villarreal, 45, then barricaded himself in an abandoned veterinary clinic, DPS said. After an hourslong standoff, the Odessa, Texas, resident was found dead in the building around 12:30 p.m. local time, authorities said.

Nine victims were taken to Midland Memorial Hospital, where four were rushed into surgery and five were admitted in stable condition, hospital officials said. The five in stable condition have since been discharged, officials said. The person killed in the shooting has been identified as Edward Randall Scott, 62, of Midland, Texas, by the Texas Department of Public Safety. Officials did not name any of the other victims involved but did confirm that no law enforcement officers were hurt. Villarreal had been wanted for attempted capital murder of an officer after he allegedly fired multiple shots at police during a car chase on Wednesday, DPS said.

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District Court Judge Stephanie Boyd issued warning by state oversight commission over YouTube channel, conduct

Criminal District Court Judge Stephanie Boyd was issued a public warning by the Texas State Commission on Judicial Conduct, finding that her conduct in multiple cases and on her court’s YouTube channel violated judicial standards. The commission announced the warning following a review of allegations against Boyd, who presides over the 187th Criminal District Court in San Antonio. Boyd livestreamed proceedings on the court’s YouTube channel and, according to the commission, engaged with viewers outside of court business.

The commission said Boyd hosted a book club on the court’s YouTube channel, allowing real-time comments and messages about court proceedings and participants. The commission also cited Boyd’s conduct during a July 2023 plea hearing involving defendant Willberth Villamil. Investigators found Boyd improperly inserted herself into plea negotiations after rejecting a plea agreement, and asking whether the defendant would accept a 20-year prison sentence offered by the court. During the hearing, Boyd also described the case as a “life-sentence worthy,” according to the commission’s findings. A second complaint centered on an October 2024 probation revocation hearing involving defendant Thomas Henson. The commission found Boyd directed a court reporter to go “off the record,” while the livestream continued, and made remarks suggesting the defendant could be victimized in prison. “Do you want to be passed around for ramen noodle?” she said, according to the commission.

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County Stories

Accountant Robert Garcia elected to join Alamo Colleges District board

Robert Garcia has won the runoff election to join Alamo Colleges District’s board of trustees representing District 9. Garcia, a certified public accountant and Northwest Vista graduate, bested Carolyn DeLecour, a lifelong educator and former Palo Alto College professor, in the pair’s head-to-head Saturday runoff. Garcia finished with 57.52% in the low-turnout Saturday election, winning by 294 votes. About 1.29% of the total 151,691 voters who are eligible to participate in the runoff voted. Garcia, 45, said he was overjoyed and emotional as he watched the results at home with his family, where his campaign started.

Garcia joins the board in the midst of its first financial deficit in at least a decade. The board met the same morning of the runoff elections to be presented with options to address a $28 million deficit, for which they’ll likely have to approve a tax increase to fill in the gaps left by with decreased property taxes across Bexar County, while addressing enrollment growth and course demand. “This is something that you know I do have experience in. This is what sets me apart,” Garcia said. “The financing is one thing, but I think how all these things come together and how we think about the future sales is raising rates right CPS has a budget deficit the city the county you know we need fiscal responsible people we need fiscal watchdogs out there.” During the campaign, Garcia faced attacks about a teen arrest and overcame them, revealing details about a challenging upbringing that won over some with his candor and perseverance. He also earned the support of influential political leaders including former San Antonio Mayor Ron Nirenberg. The race to represent the Northeast portion of the college for a six-year term attracted a number of candidates to take on incumbent Leslie Sachanowicz, who had filled the seat since 2020. Garcia finished first in the May election, over DeLecour, Sachanowicz and former Alamo Colleges trustee Joe “Jesse” Sanchez, who was appointed to the board in 2017 and served until December 2020.

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City Stories

New Braunfels voters toss Mayor Neal Linnartz for Michael French

Voters in New Braunfels elected Michael French as mayor in Saturday’s runoff elections. French defeated incumbent Mayor Neal Linnartz to win the mayor’s race. French is a U.S. Army veteran whose military career included assignments supporting White House communications, intelligence work at the Pentagon and deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan. Linnartz is an attorney who has served in numerous community leadership roles. The mayoral runoff followed a dispute over the city’s election rules. After the May election, city officials determined that state law required a candidate to receive a majority of the vote to win the three-year mayoral term, prompting a runoff and leading to the City Council’s removal of City Attorney Valeria Acevedo.

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National Stories

Knicks win first NBA title since 1973 with Game 5 win

Jalen Brunson and the Comeback Knicks did it again. And now they're the Champion Knicks. For the first time in 53 years, New York rules the NBA. Brunson scored 45 points, including 13 straight for New York in the fourth quarter, and the Knicks beat the San Antonio Spurs 94-90 in Game 5 of the NBA Finals on Saturday night. The Knicks won the series 4-1, rallying from double-digit deficits in all four of those victories. The deficit was 16 on Saturday night. Brunson and the Knicks were never fazed. “I have no words,” Brunson, the NBA Finals MVP, said during the on-court celebration. “It's everything I ever dreamed of.”

Knowing New York had waited 53 years to see the Knicks hoist the NBA championship trophy, owner James Dolan didn't even wait to be handed the 30-pound gold-plated prize. He grabbed it and lifted it skyward with a yell. “I want to say something to New York,” Dolan shouted. “Hey New York! I'm sorry it took so long! But here we are, and hopefully it won't take that long again!” The New York Knicks are champions of the NBA for the first time since 1973, beating the San Antonio Spurs in five games for this title. The clincher came Saturday night in a 94-90 victory, the Knicks' fourth comeback win of the series. Jalen Brunson was fully aware of how much money some people spent to see the New York Knicks finally become champions again. Some tickets during the NBA Finals sold for $5,000, some for $50,000, some for probably more. Of course, Brunson parted with more money than any of those fans. Brunson is now an NBA champion and NBA Finals MVP in large part because of what he did against the San Antonio Spurs in the finals — though, really, his biggest contribution to this title run likely came in 2024, when he left as much as $113 million on the bargaining table to allow the Knicks the financial flexibility they needed to finish building a championship roster. It was considered an unprecedented move.

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Trump's name removed from Kennedy Center following court order: DOJ

The Justice Department filed a certification in federal court one hour before a judge's Saturday noon deadline that said President Donald Trump's name has been "removed" from "all physical signage on the Kennedy Center building and grounds." The Trump administration had made a last-minute request to ask the court to step in and block the removal of Trump’s name ahead of a deadline of midnight Friday. The declaration from Kennedy Center executive director Matt Floca stated that in addition to removing Trump's name from the signage, the president's name was removed from "employees' email signatures, employees' email communications, letterhead, brochures, promotional materials, press releases, signs, [and] contracts."

Trump's name has already been removed from the Kennedy Center's website and YouTube page. The government requested "a short extension of time" for 12 hours until noon on June 13, saying the work "has been delayed because of thunderstorms in the District of Columbia that presented safety concerns for workers," according to the government’s latest filing. A federal judge in D.C. ordered the Trump administration to certify by noon on Saturday that it has complied with a court order to remove Trump's name from the granting a brief extension. The extension came after a federal appeals court on Friday night denied the DOJ’s request for an administrative stay of a court order that requires the removal of Trump's name from the Washington, D.C., performing arts center. In an earlier filing with the D.C. Circuit, the Trump administration argued that removing Trump's name would stall fundraising, prevent repairs from taking place and confuse the public. "No one else other than President Trump would be in the position of both rebuilding the Building, and raising the money for its operation," the filing stated, saying the performing arts center can be " the envy of the World," and arguing the building could suffer a "financial and structural collapse."

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FBI searches offices of Ohio voter registration group, seizing computers

Federal law enforcement officials on Thursday raided the offices of an Ohio organizing group that ran one of the state’s biggest 2024 voter registration efforts, seizing computers and other materials from the group’s Cleveland office, according to people familiar with the law enforcement action. The Ohio Organizing Collaborative is a two-decade-old community activist group that describes itself as “organizing everyday Ohioans, building transformative power organizations for racial, social, and economic justice.” The group registered more than 100,000 Ohioans to vote in the 2024 elections and was active in organizing against Republicans’ 2025 redistricting efforts in the state. The warrants executed Thursday appeared to focus on the group’s 2024 voter registration efforts, according to the people familiar with the action. Prentiss Haney, a former executive director of the Ohio Organizing Collaborative who sits on the group’s board, said that around 25 FBI agents arrived at the office to seize the devices.

The Justice Department declined to provide details about the raid. “Search warrants are authorized by a judge, and anything said by any organization or others in the media is unfounded speculation, as the target of any investigation is not privy to the search warrant affidavit until after indictment,” a Justice Department official said. Separately, Haney said, the group estimates that more than 100 FBI and Department of Homeland Security agents fanned across the state on Thursday and arrived at the homes of people affiliated with the collaborative. Haney said these agents demanded to talk to the residents. They did not have subpoenas or warrants, he added. “The only thing we can think is that this is a political act to try and intimidate people from voting,” said Haney, who was not at his home or office at the time of the raid and did not interact with law enforcement. “There is no basis for this, especially with the kind of force they brought.”

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Inside the whirlwind 24 hours that led the White House to slap export controls on Anthropic

The Trump administration’s decision to impose sweeping export controls on Anthropic followed a frantic 24-hour effort by senior officials to convince the company to voluntarily pull a newly released artificial intelligence model that officials believed posed security risks, according to two administration officials and a senior White House official, who like others in this story were granted anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the episode. The move, which followed multiple tense calls between Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei and administration officials, including Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and White House Cyber Director Sean Cairncross, underscores how the White House is wrestling in real-time with regulating fast-moving and potentially dangerous AI models. The details of the calls have not been previously reported. The administration’s imposition of export controls forced Anthropic to pull its new AI model, Fable, just days after it was released to the public.

Anthropic had given assurances that it was safe but soon after its release, top administration officials developed fresh doubts that the AI’s guardrails were as secure as the company had suggested. On Thursday, two days after the model’s public release, Amazon CEO Andy Jassy raised concerns to the White House about the ability to bypass the model’s guardrails, according to the two administration officials and the senior White House official. (Amazon, which is an investor in Anthropic, was responding to an administration request for feedback, said a person familiar with Amazon’s discussions.) By Friday morning, the issue had reached the highest levels of the White House. Bessent, Cairncross, chief of staff Susie Wiles and other senior officials met to discuss the model and the administration’s response, according to the administration official and the senior White House official. Bessent joined remotely while traveling to Houston for a previously scheduled public event, one of them said.

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AI supercharges deepfake nudes—unleashing a new form of bullying among kids

AI has made it trivially easy for anyone with a phone to digitally undress people and post the content online. Called explicit deepfakes, these images, and sometimes videos, are unleashing a new form of bullying and harassment among young people. Artificial-intelligence “nudify” tools are evolving and multiplying. Laws cracking down on them have lagged behind cases and aren’t always enforced. Schools don’t know how to handle them. Parents are left trying to help their children regain a sense of safety as they try to scrub the images from the internet. Megan Mancini in Hingham, Mass., wished she had a playbook for dealing with the issue. Last year, a boy created a deepfake image of her middle-school daughter and shared it on Snapchat with other kids, who then took screenshots and shared them in the hallways during school.

The local police said the best way to get the photo offline was to upload it to a website that specializes in removing deepfakes. But because the image depicted a naked minor, federal law prevented the police from giving her the image electronically. They gave her a black-and-white printout of the image instead. Mancini said the police told her that her daughter would likely need to testify if she pressed charges and said the boy would face limited consequences because he was a minor. Mancini filed a Title IX complaint against Hingham Public Schools. After a nearly five-month investigation, the district sent a letter saying that there was insufficient evidence to conclude the behavior occurred in the district’s schools. The boy, who had admitted to creating the image, faced no formal disciplinary consequences. The school district didn’t respond to requests for comment. Another mother at the school recently contacted Mancini in distress. A boy had approached her daughter with a threatening message: “You’re next.”

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College sticker prices top $100,000 at 16 schools — but many students pay significantly less

The yearly cost of attendance at over a dozen colleges is now six figures, after factoring in tuition, fees, room and board, books, transportation and other expenses. For the 2026-27 academic year, 16 institutions — including Duke, Georgetown, New York University and University of Chicago — have a sticker price of more than $100,000, according to data exclusively provided to CNBC from The Princeton Review’s upcoming “The Best 392 Colleges” list. Others, such as Brown University, Northwestern and Pepperdine, cost more than $99,000. As more schools cross the $100,000 threshold, others will follow, according to Jeff Selingo, the author of “Dream School.” “We just keep going up and it just never stops,” he said.

“We have been moving toward this six-figure price tag for a long time, and now we are here — and for a lot of people that feels significant,” Selingo said. Some students and their families have reached their breaking point, he added, and as a result, smaller liberal arts colleges have started losing ground to larger — and less expensive — public schools. “There is a group of institutions that used to be able to command increasing their price without a problem, and now they are finding students and families pushing back,” Selingo said. The high cost of college has turned some students off pricey private schools as more students question the return on investment, Selingo said. “The cost of college is sobering — no doubt about that,” said Robert Franek, editor in chief at The Princeton Review, “and with some schools’ sticker prices crossing the $100,000 mark, paying for college seems all the more daunting.”

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He profits off raw milk that’s making people sick. The government isn’t stopping him.

A white Ford pickup truck broke through a thick curtain of fog one morning in February, winding its way down a muddy farm road in California’s Central Valley. From it emerged a 64-year-old dairyman, burly and tan, who left the engine running as he lumbered toward me with open arms. “You must be Mark,” I said, warning him I wasn’t one for hugging. “I’m a hugger,” he said, pulling me in anyway. “I feel like I’ve known you for a lifetime.” I had spent the past couple of weeks corresponding with Raw Farm founder Mark McAfee, who’d filled my inbox with messages and PowerPoints extolling the virtues of his most important, and controversial, product:

It is delicious. It makes you feel good (the gut-brain serotonin and dopamine cycle). It’s great for asthma and literally saves lives. He was talking about raw milk, which, if you trust 150 years of bedrock science, offers little reason to consume. By definition, it has not been pasteurized, the simple process of heating milk to kill off harmful bacteria. Before the practice was widely adopted a century ago, thousands of babies died each year from illnesses linked to contaminated dairy. Today, most scientists and health experts agree that raw milk has no significant, proven nutritional benefits over its sanitized counterpart, cannot treat or cure disease and subjects its consumers to over 100 times the risk of foodborne illness, which can be especially dangerous for young children. And yet, McAfee’s farm, the largest raw-milk dairy in the country, is pulling in about $30 million a year, meeting a growing demand from customers who say they want food that hasn’t been robbed of health benefits by industrial processing. Once drawing a fringe crowd, raw milk has been thrust into the mainstream in recent years by a potent mix of politics, wellness culture and a wave of suspicion that health institutions have been compromised by Big Pharma and Big Food. Its proponents have turned it into a symbol of freedom and defiance. More than 10 million Americans now drink it; national weekly sales rose by 65% from 2023 to 2024 alone.

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Trump trades NBA boos for UFC cheers as sports become dividing line

President Donald Trump began his week by attending the NBA Finals, booed lustily by the New York crowd. He’s set to end it Sunday night being cheered at a UFC cage match outside the White House on his birthday. No prior president has attended the NBA Finals nor hosted a UFC fight — let alone in the same seven-day span. But for Trump, the events are just the latest sports episodes in a presidency punctuated by football championships, golf tournaments and the Daytona 500. The fans’ reaction, meantime, underscores how sports have become a partisan playing field, with football, golf, auto racing and UFC skewing Republican — and Trump repeatedly wrapping himself in those fans’ embrace. By contrast, Trump did not attend the U.S. national team’s first game in the World Cup soccer tournament on Friday night. Polls have shown that fans of soccer, like basketball and tennis, skew toward Democrats.

“He should stick to the UFC,” Joe Rogan, a popular podcaster who supported Trump’s election but has criticized him more recently, said on his show after the president’s rough reception at the NBA Finals. “They’re going to boo him everywhere else.” Trump has said he’s an avid fan of many sports — including the NBA and his hometown New York Knicks, who hosted Monday night’s game. He has extolled the UFC showcase as a one-of-a-kind event that will energize Americans and put on a spotlight on mixed-martial artists, whom Trump has called “the toughest people” in sports. The president has spent months showing off a booklet prepared by the UFC to guests in the Oval Office, including New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani, according to four people who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss private meetings. “This would be the highest-rated event, maybe one of them ever in sports,” the president told his daughter-in-law Lara Trump on a recent podcast, as he gave her a tour of the UFC arena being built at the White House. The White House defended Trump’s decision to attend and host the sporting events amid other priorities, including efforts to reach a peace deal with Iran.

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How longtime friends Trump and Dana White got a fight cage on the White House lawn

It’s the picture of the pen that stops him. Dana White is walking through the White House Rose Garden one recent morning when he sees the Presidential Walk of Fame, the gallery that the current president installed to honor previous ones. White points out Abraham Lincoln and Teddy Roosevelt, lauding their turns at the helm, and acknowledges that Jimmy Carter, while flawed, “did a lot of good.” But there’s one portrait that White, the irrepressible chief executive of Ultimate Fighting Championship, can’t get enough of: that of an autopen signing former president Joe Biden’s name, hung by President Donald Trump in place of a headshot of Biden himself. “You see this, with the autopen?” White says, pointing and chortling. “How funny is that?”

At 56, White is the reigning king of combat sports, having authored perhaps this century’s greatest sports business story by satiating the country’s appetite for intimate displays of violence. Over the course of two decades, he has turned the once unprofitable UFC — famously described by then-Sen. John McCain (R-Arizona) as “human cockfighting” — into a global mixed-martial-arts machine valued at roughly $15 billion. Through it all, White has proved himself unbeatable, surviving criticism over underpaying fighters and circumnavigating covid-19 restrictions, and skirting scandals such as the video of him slapping his wife, Anne, at a nightclub in 2023, an act for which he has repeatedly apologized. He is not just his sport’s most recognizable and relentless figure but its living embodiment. “I look at the UFC as this battleship,” White says. “As long as I’m here, we all f---ing go down together, or none of us go down.” He is also arguably the most powerful man at the intersection of sports and American politics, a status he unlocked in 2016, when he became among the first public figures to endorse Trump’s candidacy. Since then, White, who says he identifies as “an ’80s Democrat,” has spoken at three Republican National Conventions and played a critical role in turning out young, male voters for Trump, including convincing podcaster and UFC broadcaster Joe Rogan to endorse him in 2024. If the “manosphere” has a spiritual leader, it may be White.

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Lead Stories

John Cornyn offers blunt talk for fellow Republicans on his way out

Don’t expect to see Sen. John Cornyn at the state Republican convention this week in Houston after losing the GOP runoff last month to Attorney General Ken Paxton. “I might have to miss it this year,” Cornyn told The Dallas Morning News. In a blunt assessment, Cornyn said the state party is dysfunctional, as evidenced by the small slice of the electorate who voted in the May 26 runoff. And the four-term senator offered a warning for the Texas GOP as it seeks to defeat Democrats like Paxton’s opponent, state Rep. James Talarico of Austin.

“They need to decide: Do you want to actually win or are you putting on a performance to the keyboard warriors on social media?” Cornyn said. “The simple fact is that unless you can win elections you can't govern and you become irrelevant and it seems to me that's the path they're headed on right now.” As the Senate wrapped up its work for the week, Cornyn, 74, said Republicans remain vulnerable on the economy, citing high gas prices and stubborn inflation driven in part by the conflict with Iran. “Standards of living are going down all across the country,” Cornyn said. “While I support the president's efforts to pacify the Iranian regime, the fact that we're not talking about or focused on the things that most people care about at election time, kitchen table issues…is a problem.” Speaking to reporters Thursday, Cornyn weighed in on a series of political and policy issues.

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SpaceX finalizes IPO price at $135 a share in world’s largest public offering

SpaceX, Elon Musk’s rocket and satellite maker, officially finalized its initial public offering price to become the world’s largest stock market debut, in a testament to the tech mogul’s influence and people’s belief in his business vision. On Thursday, SpaceX confirmed its I.P.O. price was set at $135 a share and that it would sell more than 555 million shares, according to a company statement. That means SpaceX would raise around $75 billion from its offering, putting its valuation at $1.77 trillion. With those numbers, SpaceX would shatter an I.P.O. record previously set by Saudi Aramco. Saudi Arabia’s state-owned oil company was valued at $1.7 trillion and raised more than $29 billion when it went public in 2019. SpaceX will begin trading publicly on Friday under the ticker symbol SPCX.

A SpaceX spokesman did not immediately respond to a request for comment. SpaceX’s long journey to the stock market has been accompanied by many superlatives. Apart from being the biggest-ever I.P.O., SpaceX is also the most dominant space company from the world’s richest man. And it would become the benchmark for a wave of other offerings, which are all expected to unleash an avalanche of wealth across Silicon Valley and Wall Street, creating influential new titans in the process. Anthropic, the artificial intelligence start-up that makes the Claude chatbot, and its ChatGPT-making rival, OpenAI, have both confidentially filed to go public in recent days. Each company has a valuation approaching $1 trillion. If Anthropic and OpenAI successfully pull off public offerings, it would mean another milestone: Three-trillion-dollar companies reaching the stock market for the first time. A defining trait of the offerings is that they are likely to make those who are already wealthy even wealthier. At $135 a share, the SpaceX stake controlled by Mr. Musk would be worth more than $860 billion. (He cannot sell some of the SpaceX shares he controls until the company hits various operational milestones, according to the firm’s filings.) And a slight increase in the company’s share price in its first days of trading — perhaps as soon as Friday — could turn Mr. Musk, 54, into the world’s first trillionaire.

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Harris County flood director resigns amid Harvey project delays

Harris County Flood Control District Executive Director Tina Petersen resigned Thursday amid concerns about her handling of and communication about a federal grant program with strict deadlines. Her decision to step down came after commissioners for a second time in recent weeks discussed her job performance in a closed session Thursday morning, and as hundreds of millions of dollars in Hurricane Harvey recovery aid remain in limbo, tied up in projects that are projected to miss state or federal spending deadlines. Commissioners did not immediately name a successor, but County Judge Lina Hidalgo said they plan to appoint Petersen's replacement at a meeting June 25.

"It’s always difficult to make personnel changes, especially at the highest levels of county government," Hidalgo said. "This was not an easy process, but I believe it is the right decision. I look forward to appointing Dr. Petersen’s successor at the next business court." Commissioners learned in January about delays in the program, sparking criticism from some court members who felt they were not adequately informed about the risk of losing federal funds. Petersen said in a letter that she "plan(s) to continue to be available to implement a transition plan." "It has been an honor to serve the residents of Harris County and this team," Petersen wrote. "While I am confident in this organization and the work we have underway, it is clear to me that conversations about my role have become a distraction." The flood control district recently unveiled a plan that officials say is a viable solution to some of the issues, but Commissioner Tom Ramsey said Thursday morning he felt the plan came far too late.

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U.S.-Iran peace memorandum could be signed on Sunday in Geneva, source says

A memorandum between the United States and Iran to halt the war in ?the Gulf could be signed as soon as Sunday, a Western source told Reuters on Friday, with Geneva emerging as the likeliest venue. The source said language in ?the memorandum was still being finalised and Iran was sticking to its position that the deal must also end fighting in Lebanon, where Israel has been battling against the Iran-backed Hezbollah militia. The aim was to finalise the wording by Saturday so the agreement could be signed by U.S. Vice President JD Vance and Iran's Parliament Speaker Mohammed Baqer Qalibaf. No venue had been established but Geneva was emerging as the likeliest. Trump said on Thursday ?he was calling off new strikes on Iran because the deal was now ready. "We just made a great settlement of the war with Iran," Trump told reporters in the ?White House on Thursday.

But the terms of the deal as described on Friday by Iranian officials appear to offer Tehran much of what ?it has demanded so far, with Trump appearing to win little of what he has sought, beyond the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz, which Iran shut after he ordered attacks in ?February. A senior Iranian source told Reuters on Friday that the draft would waive sanctions on Iran's oil, unfreeze billions of dollars of its funds, and require a cessation of hostilities on all ?fronts, including in Lebanon. Nuclear issues would be set aside for later talks. Washington wants a deal to ensure that Iran never develops a nuclear weapon; Iran says it is not seeking one. The waiving of sanctions, unfreezing of Iranian assets and halt to Israeli attacks on Lebanon are essential Iranian demands. The source made no mention of what Iran might offer in return. There was no immediate response from the United States. Iran's Mehr news agency ?said the terms also included other key U.S. concessions, including a commitment to withdraw its forces from around Iran and present a plan for rebuilding the shattered Iranian economy. "The United States ?and its allies must submit plans for Iran’s reconstruction worth at least $300 billion," the Mehr report said.

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State Stories

SpaceX seeks more Texas tax breaks, says Terafab could go elsewhere without them

Last week, SpaceX was awarded tax breaks by a rural Texas county for its massive Terafab chip manufacturing factory. Now, the Elon Musk-led company wants more — and says it will consider moving the project out of Texas if it doesn’t get them. An entity called TeraFab AI LLC has filed for exemptions under the Texas Jobs, Energy, Technology and Innovation program, which provides a 10-year reduction in property taxes that help fund the operations of local school districts. The applications were filed Monday with the Texas Comptroller for tax breaks from Anderson-Shiro Consolidated Independent School District and Iola Independent School District. Both operate near the site in Grimes County where SpaceX is planning to build a semiconductor manufacturing plant on thousands of acres it’s been making deals to acquire.

Beyond seeking tax breaks, the TeraFab AI applications reveal new details about the project. They lay out plans for up to four construction phases with the first starting this year. For phase one, investment in property improvement, machinery and equipment is estimated to reach $10.37 billion by 2029, according to a document filed with the application to Anderson Shiro CISD. The application to Iola ISD lists a $6.43 billion investment for its first phase. Total investment is expected to range from $55 billion to $119 billion for the initial four phases, with further expansion possible. The applications call for creation of 4,234 jobs and tout benefits for the state through the project’s long-term economic impact and tax revenue. The numbers differ from those laid out in SpaceX’s economic development agreement with Grimes County. The Starbase-based company, which has not yet signed that deal, would only be required to complete a capital investment of $5 billion and create 1,800 jobs to receive total county tax relief. Nathan Jensen, a professor in the department of government at the University of Texas at Austin, noted that details to verify compliance with the Grimes County deal are slim and that there is a clause that allows SpaceX to challenge its tax appraisal. In what Jensen describes as a “shocking oversight,” the agreement documents don’t specify wage standards for jobs created.

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Regional Transportation Council approves new TxDOT agreement

Regional Transportation Council members on Thursday approved the signing of an agreement with the Texas Department of Transportation, a key document in a lingering dispute with the North Central Texas Council of Governments executive board. In a 41-4 vote, RTC members requested that executive board members sign a Metropolitan Planning Organization agreement to remain the body’s fiscal agent. Outgoing chair Rick Bailey, a Johnson County commissioner, immediately signed the agreement after the vote. The issue stems from the recent firing of North Texas transportation director Michael Morris by Todd Little, council of governments executive director. The NCTCOG board claims Little had the authority to fire Morris, although two state district judges upheld the assertion that the RTC is the policy-making body for North Texas transportation funding decisions. Morris was later reinstated.

Rob Walters, an attorney for the transportation council, said the independent policy-making body is recognized as the Metropolitan Planning Organization for North Texas because it received federal government certification in 2025 as it has every four years since 1995. Walters said the council regularly approves transportation funding decisions that go directly to implementing agencies without approvals by the council of governments executive board, which pays the organization’s bills. In addition, the RTC “is the only entity in the region” that meets federal requirements on voting authority by transit entities, TxDOT representation, fair-share allocation of voting weights and membership from policy officials within the designated area, according to the RTC agenda. In Texas, the NCTCOG executive board can’t be designated as both the Metropolitan Planning Organization and the fiscal agent at the same time, Walters said. NCTCOG leadership contends in the April 6 lawsuit that the executive board is the Metropolitan Planning Organization. The executive board was accused of overreach in its duties as the council’s fiscal agent, according to the lawsuit by Denton County.

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Former GOP official says he won't vote for Paxton in ad

As Texas Republicans meet for their state convention in Houston to project unity after heated primaries, the former top Republican elected official in the state’s biggest red county will take over local radio airwaves with one message: “I won’t vote for Ken Paxton.” The one-minute ad featuring former Tarrant County Judge Glen Whitley will be blasted on conservative airwaves in Houston on Friday and Saturday during the GOP’s state convention. The pro-James Talarico super PAC, Lone Star Rising, spent around $5,000 for an initial ad run during the convention but will continue to air the spot throughout the campaign season. In the ad, Whitley — who continues to identify as a Republican — notes his 16-year tenure as the top county executive in “the largest red county in America.”

“I supported the rule of law and stood for faith and family. I still believe in those conservative values,” Whitley says. “Ken Paxton has spent years embarrassing Texas. He’s known for scandal, indictment, infidelity and putting his own interests ahead of Texans. That’s exactly why I cannot support Ken Paxton.” Whitley adds that he’s not alone, noting that 60 Republican members of the Texas House impeached Paxton in 2023 for abusing his office to benefit a donor, who helped Paxton’s alleged mistress secure a job. Paxton was later acquitted by the Texas Senate. “This November, I’ll proudly support conservative candidates on the ballot,” Whitley says in the ad. “But I won’t vote for Ken Paxton.” The Republican adds: “Being a conservative is about character, integrity and accountability. If you still believe those values matter, don’t vote for Ken Paxton.” Whitley, who is seen as a member of the more traditional, business-friendly wing of the GOP, has broken with his party in the past. In 2022, he supported Mike Collier, the Democratic candidate for lieutenant governor, over Republican Dan Patrick. Patrick won that election.

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Appeals court rules in favor of former Rep. Pickett in lawsuit against city’s environmental franchise fee on trash bills

The Texas 8th Court of Appeals Tuesday upheld a lower court’s decision that the city of El Paso’s environmental franchise fee tacked on to residential water bills is an illegal tax. The court ruling Tuesday creates the possibility that the city could have to refund some of the tens of millions of dollars collected since the levy went into effect in 2015. The case was brought by former state Rep. Joe Pickett in a lawsuit against the city. “The opinion says it’s an illegal fee, and so I’m entitled to ask for a refund, and so if I’m entitled to ask for one, everybody in El Paso that pays a garbage and water bill is entitled to ask for a refund,” Pickett told El Paso Matters.

City officials in an email statement to El Paso Matters said they’re reviewing the decision “and evaluating all of our legal options at this time.” The city has incurred about $30,000 in outside counsel fees on the case, officials said. If the city wants to challenge the latest ruling, it could appeal to the Texas Supreme Court. The city appealed District Court Judge Patrick Garcia’s August 2024 ruling that the fee was unconstitutional and should be discontinued based on the lawsuit first filed by Pickett in October 2020. The appeals court and trial court sided with Pickett that the $6 franchise fee is an illegal tax and not lawful “because the city used it primarily to raise general revenue rather than to cover the actual costs associated with garbage trucks’ wear and tear on city streets,” the opinion by Chief Justice Maria Salas Mendoza states.

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An old well gushed waste, not oil, in a small West Texas town

An old oil well sprang back to life under the parking lot of the First Baptist Church of Grandfalls in April. Over the next eight days, more than 1.5 million gallons of toxic wastewater flowed out of the earth, according to state records. The state regulator, the Railroad Commission, spent $1.49 million plugging the leak and another $1.16 million disposing of the wastewater back underground. By early June, crews had stopped the flow and plugged the wellbore. Wastewater, fortunately, did not enter the church. The imminent threat passed. But questions linger for the church’s pastor and Permian Basin residents. Why do old wells in the area keep blowing out? What will happen if the next leak isn’t under a parking lot, but a house or school? The Permian Basin’s oil and gas wells generate prodigious quantities of wastewater, known as produced water. This salty, toxic liquid is pumped underground into injection wells, increasing underground pressure.

This pressure is finding its way to the surface through old wells that burst and spew wastewater aboveground. The Railroad Commission requested injection wells within a five-mile radius of Grandfalls to stop pumping waste underground while the leak was being plugged. Agency spokesperson Bryce Dubee said that the old well underneath the parking lot is still under investigation. When David Tucker stepped in as the interim pastor at First Baptist last summer, his biggest concern was replacing an aging air conditioning unit. But once the leak sprang, Tucker, an oil and gas industry veteran, was uniquely qualified to help. He hopes the incident can lead to change. “This was kind of a good thing because it brought attention to what’s happening,” he said, referring to the spate of oilfield leaks and geysers in the Permian Basin. Tucker praised the Railroad Commission’s quick response but said the agency needs more resources to address the problem. “They’re trying to do a good job. But they don’t have the money to do it. They’re overwhelmed,” he said. “The state needs to turn loose some more money to start funding this.” Dubee, the RRC spokesperson, said the agency’s State Managed Plugging program “remains focused on addressing the well in Grandfalls.”

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Fort Worth ISD hit hard by principal turnover following TEA takeover of district

Fort Worth ISD has named new leaders at dozens of its campuses in recent weeks after a string of principals announced their plans to leave their jobs following the uncertainty of the Texas Education Agency’s takeover of the district, with several other principal positions still open. District leaders see the turnover as an opportunity to appoint new principals who can spark academic progress at some of Fort Worth ISD’s longest-struggling campuses. A number of principals left on their own accord. Numerous others were not retained by new state-appointed district leadership. The district named 19 principals for the recently-created Elevate Network, a group of schools handpicked by Superintendent Peter Licata and his team because of persistent underwhelming academic performance.

Of the 19 campuses, 12 will have new principals. Five of those 12 are new to the district, a spokesperson previously told the Star-Telegram. Since then, the district has named new principals at more than 20 other campuses as well. Nearly a dozen other principals have announced their decision to leave the district following the end of the 2025-26 school year. Several sources told the Star-Telegram they expect even more principal and teaching turnover following the Texas Education Agency’s takeover of the district, especially during the summer as current faculty and staff look for new jobs. While Fort Worth ISD leadership remains confident a district-wide principal shakeup can jumpstart some of its stagnant campuses, some education leaders warn that constant leadership turnover can do more harm than good. Others are concerned that long-time district employees no longer wish to work within the district and are instead opting for jobs at neighboring districts.

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Bexar County constable says office halted ICE partnership before training began

A Bexar County constable’s office that was among the first local agencies to sign up for an expanded federal immigration enforcement partnership never completed the training required to implement the program after opposition emerged from both the public and county officials, according to Precinct 3 Constable Mark Vojvodich. The 287(g) program, established through the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1996, allows U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement to train and authorize state and local law enforcement officers to assist with certain immigration enforcement functions. Agencies that do not operate jails, such as constables’ offices and municipal police departments, participate through what is known as the “task force model,” the most expansive version of the program.

The model allows trained officers to assist with certain immigration enforcement functions during routine law enforcement encounters. Earlier this year, the San Antonio Report reported that Bexar County’s Precinct 3 Constable’s Office, Texas Department of Public Safety, Balcones Heights Police Department and several smaller municipal agencies had entered task force model agreements as federal officials pushed to rapidly expand the program nationwide. Vojvodich said his office signed the memorandum of agreement in January and was preparing to move forward with training before deciding to stop the process. “We stopped it at that point in time because we had seen multiple people on Commissioners Court speaking against the program,” he said. “And to go further forward with the training and the reimbursement, we would have had to have Commissioners Court approval, and we knew we weren’t going to get that.” In addition, Vojvodich cited large community turnout in opposition of Immigration enforcement efforts as a signal of the dwindling possibility of approval.

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‘God forbid I’m excited’: Mayor who fought Spurs arena deal says it’s OK to be a fan and a skeptic

For many San Antonians, any questions about the need for a new $1.3 billion Spurs arena went out the window the day the team launched into the NBA Finals. But one high-profile San Antonian who’s been fighting the arena deal since day one is still wrestling with the roughly $800 million in public funding the arena leans on — at a time when the city faces a ballooning budget deficit. Mayor Gina Ortiz Jones was one of the few holdouts on a contract that most of the city and county’s elected leaders considered their only leverage to prevent the emotional and economic hardship of losing the Spurs to another city. Now as the NBA basketball team steps into the national spotlight, Jones is still trying to convince San Antonians that it’s possible for her to be both a fan and a shrewd negotiator.

Despite her public feuds with the team’s owners and fans over the past year, Jones said Wednesday that she’s been getting into the spirit for the playoffs, wearing her Spurs shirt to work, accepting tickets to sit courtside at Game 6 of the Western Conference Finals against the Oklahoma City Thunder, and cracking jokes with Charles Barkley on ESPN. “God forbid I’m excited,” Jones said of the critics scrutinizing her visible fandom. Once the playoffs are over, however, Jones said she believes taxpayers will still hold city leaders accountable for cuts to city services and potential tax increases coming down the pipeline. “I think we have to cheer hard for the team, and be cognizant of [the fact that] they will very likely be champions — I’m knocking on wood — and the day afterwards, we will still have a $131 million budget gap going into [fiscal year] 2028,” Jones said in an interview Wednesday — before the Spurs’ crushing defeat in Game 4 against the Knicks. Though San Antonio is one of the fastest-growing cities in the country, it’s facing an unusual decline in property tax revenue this year as home values cool, residential and business exemptions are expanded and many high-value properties remain in reinvestment zones that effectively keep them off the tax rolls. City officials are proposing their first tax rate increase in 33 years to cover expenses that are rising faster than revenue.

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Travis County judge weighs whether to move Camp Mystic lawsuits behind closed doors and out of public courtrooms

A Travis County judge on Wednesday weighed whether lawsuits filed by Camp Mystic families should be resolved outside of court. The camp and its owners are facing multiple wrongful death lawsuits after 27 campers and counselors died when floodwaters swept through the Kerr County camp in the early morning hours of July 4, 2025. The lawsuits accuse Camp Mystic of failing to protect their daughters. The families are fighting to get their day in court against the camp's operators. Camp Mystic lawyers are making the case for their motion to compel arbitration, which would take the proceedings behind closed doors and out of the public eye into private arbitration, not in a public courtroom.

At issue here are the participation agreements that all the parents signed when registering their daughters for Camp Mystic last summer. Those agreements included a “binding” arbitration clause, which Camp Mystic’s lawyers say was legally valid, so they argue these lawsuits should be resolved outside the courtroom and with arbitration. The agreement highlights the risks associated with summer camp, including "the risk of 'floods,' risks caused by 'errors of judgment,' and those caused by 'careless conduct,' which the agreements warn 'in extraordinary cases, may be serious,'" according to court documents. “I understand this is an incredibly serious case. I understand that there is a lot here,” said Joshua Fiveson, an attorney representing Camp Mystic. “That does not change the legal framework, and the question is whether or not a contract was formed. It was.” Attorneys for the families who lost loved ones say the arbitration waiver they signed was on the parents' behalf, but not on the behalf of the children who died, though Camp Mystic's attorneys said they believe the agreement covered the children. While there is case law that says family members can't waive their minor children's right to seek legal recourse in personal injury cases, Camp Mystic's attorneys say no right is being waived by compelled arbitration; it is just moving it to a different legal venue.

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Texas AG warns Big 12 against Brendan Sorsby related sanctions

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton warned the Big 12 athletic conference against taking legal action against Texas Tech University over quarterback Brendan Sorsby's sports betting scandal, according to conference Commissioner Brett Yormark. Paxton, who is running for U.S. Senate against Democrat James Talarico, sent a letter to the Big 12 on Thursday that reportedly warned any action against Texas Tech could violate state and federal antitrust law and "would expose the Conference to substantial liability." "Should the Big 12 seek to sanction Texas Tech for acting consistent with the Order, Texas Tech will pursue all legal avenues to protect its interests," the letter said. In a statement, Yormak said "all options remain on the table" and the conference is "taking time with our legal counsel to understand the concerns of the state and will meet again with the full Board next week."

The legal fight over Sorsby's eligibility has plunged college sports into chaos this week. On Monday, a Texas state district judge issued Sorsby an injunction against the NCAA that will allow him to play most of the upcoming season, despite an admission that he made at least $90,000 in sports bets while playing for Indiana University and Cincinnati. Yormak said the ruling led to “great concern amongst our membership,” and set up the possibility of sanctions against Texas Tech, which is part of the conference. At the center of the legal fight is Fort Worth oil billionaire Cody Campbell, who has spent millions of dollars recruiting athletes to Texas Tech and has defended Sorsby's right to play. Also supporting is Texas House Speaker Dustin Burrows, one of the lawyers who represented the quarterback in his lawsuit against the NCAA. Earlier this week, Burrows wrote on Facebook that the ruling represented "a fair and balanced outcome." "The judge’s decision includes consequences while allowing a young man to continue pursuing his education, his athletic career, and his future," he wrote. "I wish Brendan continued success in his recovery and on the field."

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Veteran Dallas Cowboys Cheerleader Karley Swindel cut from roster, won’t return for fifth season

Longtime Dallas Cowboy Cheerleader Karley Swindel won't be returning for a fifth season after being shockingly cut from the roster. Rumors recently began circulating online that Swindel, 26, didn't make the squad for the upcoming season. She appeared to confirm the news when she reposted a video of herself in the Dallas Cowboys uniform that included "#JusticeForKarley" via her Instagram Stories on Tuesday, June 9. That same day, the Instagram account @dcc_updates shared an "update" on the situation. "Veterans were reportedly not allowed to go to Karley in the stands after the announcements," the message that was later posted to Reddit read. "They had to stay on the field and were told to pull it together for photos."

Marissa Leschber, a fellow DCC squad member and one of Swindel's close friends, denied the claim, which was later shared by @dcc_updates as well. "This is not true!" Leschber, 26, wrote in response. "Many of us immediately went to be with Karley and our staff members were very respectful and understanding of the gravity of the situation while still trying to show support for the new rookie candidates." Swindel earned a coveted spot on the NFL's most iconic cheerleading team in 2022, and she opened up about how it felt to realize one of her lifelong dreams. "I am so excited to officially say I am a DALLAS COWBOYS CHEERLEADER. I remember locking eyes with the DCC when I was 5 years old at Texas Stadium. I knew in that moment, I wanted to be them one day," she wrote via Facebook at the time, per KFDM.

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After election confusion, New Braunfels voters set to pick next mayor

In May, New Braunfels residents thought they had elected a new mayor, after challenger Michael French captured more votes than incumbent Neal Linnartz and two other challengers in the city's primary election. City officials declared French the winner — only to backtrack the next day, saying they had learned that the city's charter was at odds with Texas law and a runoff would be required between French and Linnartz, the top two finishers in the primary. The weeks that followed have brought unwanted and often embarrassing headlines to the Comal County city, with some residents — and French himself — accusing city officials of trying to thwart the will of the voters. The New Braunfels City Council's decision to fire City Attorney Valeria Acevedo over the election confusion also drew criticism from some in the community.

Against that backdrop, the city's voters on Saturday will give a definitive answer on who will be next mayor, as Linnartz and French square off in the much-debated runoff election. French, a former military intelligence analyst, said he's confident he will win the runoff election. He took 3,667 votes, or 49.18%, to 2,852 votes, or 39.25%, for Linnartz in the primary. “We won the New Braunfels way, which in reality was the wrong way, so we will win again the Texas way,” French said. Linnartz did not respond to multiple requests for comment. The confusion over the primary election was rooted in the New Braunfels city charter. The city charter says that in mayoral races, the candidate that receives the most votes is the winner, even if they don't receive more than 50% of the votes. French received 49.18% of the primary votes, and city officials declared him the winner. However, that was at odds with the Texas Constitution, which requires a runoff in a race for a seat on a governing body with a term of more than two years. The New Braunfels mayor serves a three-year term. State law supersedes local rules, forcing city officials to backtrack and announce plans for a runoff. In the wake of the primary, Acevedo, the city attorney, said in a written statement that the Texas Constitution "clearly requires a majority vote for offices with terms longer than two years. Once this conflict was fully analyzed, it became clear that proceeding to a runoff is the legally required path forward.”

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Buc-ee’s visit goes viral as World Cup fans visit Texas

Europeans visiting Texas for the 2026 World Cup are getting a taste of what the Lone Star State is all about: Buc-ee’s, long drives and hot summers. One German fan’s wide-eyed reaction to the famous mega-gas station went viral this week. Freddy, who posts on X as @FreddyLA7, has been documenting his trip ahead of his team's opening match in Houston. “DUDE LMAO THIS IS A GAS STATION,” he wrote, garnering nearly 23 millions views by Thursday afternoon.

Later, he posted a photo of his late-night meal with the caption: “Dinner from Buc-ee’s at 1am??” Texans on X welcomed Freddy’s familiar enthusiasm for the mega-chain. “It is a gas station. And yet it is so much more,” one user wrote, adding a teary-eyed GIF. Another replied with a picture of Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev’s famous 1959 visit to an American supermarket. “Europeans seeing their first Buc ee’s be like: Why does this gas station have its own economy? ??,” someone else wrote. A fellow World Cup visitor from Scotland, posting on X as @shaunvlog, had a similar reaction after visiting Buc-ee’s. “A place like this could ONLY exist in America and I LOVE it,” he wrote. In a follow up post, he called Buc-ee's Beaver Nuggets "intoxicatingly good." Texans replied to their posts with suggestions for their next stops. “Buc-ee’s. Brisket and HEB. Hopefully you’re able to checkout Austin. Great vibe," one wrote. Buc-ee’s, the Texas-born gas station and convenience store known for brisket, snacks, merch and clean restrooms, has become part of the state’s World Cup pitch. In North Texas, Trinity Metro is running visitor shuttles that include a stop at Buc-ee’s near Texas Motor Speedway. The agency describes it as a “legendary Texas mega-travel center." And Buc-ee's isn't exactly next door to the stadium. The closest location, near Texas Motor Speedway, is over 30 miles from Dallas Stadium, FIFA’s temporary name for AT&T Stadium in Arlington.

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National Stories

Senate Democrats’ political fortunes have improved. ‘It didn’t happen by accident,’ Schumer says.

Chuck Schumer has served as a punching bag for angry Democrats for more than a year — taking flak on everything from his 2026 recruiting to his handling of government funding talks. But with about five months until the midterm elections, the Senate minority leader is gently starting to punch back — pointing out how some of his bets are paying off as his party moves within striking distance of taking back the majority in November. “There’s no victory lap to take in June,” he said in an interview in his Capitol office suite. But he ticked through moves he oversaw in the past year — from leading opposition to GOP safety-net cuts to picking shutdown fights over health care and immigration enforcement funding and orchestrating national intervention in several Senate primaries — that he argued have strengthened Democrats’ hand for the midterms and beyond.

“We made a lot of strategic decisions that got us to this place — it didn’t happen by accident,” Schumer said. “I knew from the beginning that if we recruited strong candidates, found paths to victory, focused on the issues the American people cared about, and forced … the Republicans, to carry Trump’s water, we’d be in much better shape, and that has happened.” Schumer’s confidence comes after an at times rocky year for the minority leader: His decision to help advance a GOP government funding bill in March 2025 fueled a wave of calls from progressive groups and House Democrats for him to step down as Senate Democratic leader. Criticism crested again after eight members of his caucus broke from Schumer to help reopen most of the government after a record shutdown in November. Polling has shown eroding favorability and approval ratings for Schumer — even in his home state of New York, where he has been elected to the Senate five times. He’s maintained support among the Senate Democrats who elected him leader, though some have dodged the subject of his future.

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Trump and allies are working on plan to ‘expunge’ impeachments

President Trump and his allies have discussed pushing lawmakers to pass a resolution aimed at voiding his first-term impeachments, according to people familiar with the matter. The resolution would allow Trump to claim a symbolic victory on a matter that has dogged him since his first term, part of a broader effort to burnish his presidential legacy. It would have little legal significance, however, because the Constitution provides no procedure for undoing an impeachment, according to experts. “It should be done because I did nothing wrong,” Trump said when asked about the resolution in a phone call this week with The Wall Street Journal. “It was a rigged deal—it was a whole rigged situation.”

Any move to attempt to erase the two impeachments, in 2019 and 2021, would open up a debate about Trump’s past behavior in office, forcing GOP lawmakers to relitigate charges of abuse of power, obstruction of Congress and inciting an insurrection. Facing the prospect of losing their majority in the House, Republicans are trying to shift focus to the economy and high costs, the issues that voters care about most. The measure likely wouldn’t be considered until after the November election, the people familiar with the matter said. Even then, it would be difficult to garner the votes needed to pass, according to several House Republican lawmakers. Trump has posted news clips about voiding the impeachments on his Truth Social account. But this week, he played down his own role in the effort. “If they want to do it, I’m honored by it,” the president said. A Democratic-led House of Representatives in December 2019 approved articles of impeachment for allegations related to Trump’s efforts to press Ukraine to investigate Joe Biden, then a Democratic candidate for president. Shortly before Trump left office in January 2021, the House passed an article of impeachment for “incitement of insurrection” over accusations he pushed supporters to storm the Capitol.

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Hunter Biden defends Graham Platner on Newsom podcast

Exclusive Hunter Biden defends Graham Platner on Newsom podcast The California governor’s latest provocative podcast guest argues Platner’s appeal will outweigh the scandals surrounding him. Hunter Biden and his wife Melissa Cohen, leave court after his guilty plea in his trail on tax evasion in Los Angeles, California, on September 5, 2024. Hunter Biden defended Graham Platner on Gov. Gavin Newsom's podcast. | ROBYN BECK/AFP via Getty Images By Jeremy B. White 06/11/2026 07:00 PM EDT Hunter Biden thinks Graham Platner is getting a raw deal. The former president’s son defended Platner’s besieged Senate candidacy during an appearance on California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s podcast, according to a clip shared first with POLITICO, seeking to rebut a cascade of criticism surrounding allegations about his treatment of ex-girlfriends and his tattoo of a symbol associated with Nazis. He suggested that most Americans would fail a “show me your phone” test of their past behavior. “If that’s the standard by which we are going to judge people, particularly people in elected office,” Biden told Newsom, “then I don’t think we’re going to have many people in elected office.”

Both Biden and Platner have been giving their party headaches. Some Democrats have fumed that the scandal-marred Biden’s public re-emergence could damage their political prospects, while others are increasingly concerned that Platner could cost them a vital Senate seat in Maine after convincingly winning his primary on Tuesday. But Newsom does not share those qualms about giving Biden a platform. The Democratic governor’s choice of podcast guests has infuriated his allies before: He hosted MAGA strategist Steve Bannon and late Turning Point USA co-founder Charlie Kirk, brushing off complaints that he didn’t adequately challenge Bannon and echoed Kirk’s position on trans athletes. Platner has denied being violent toward women and has denied knowing the tattoo, which he has since covered up, was related to Nazis. His defenders have argued his progressive policies and personal appeal will win over voters who are unfazed by the drumbeat of damaging revelations. “I have not heard anything in any way that would say to me that he is an abusive, misogynistic, anti-Semitic, or racist person,” Biden said of Platner. “I have heard this from Graham Platner, though, that he thinks we should all have free health care. I have heard this from Graham Platner also, that he thinks that we have to radically change our politics. I have heard this from Graham Platner, that working people are getting fucking screwed.”

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The World cup kicks off with two goals, three red cards and one epic fiesta

The first ever World Cup to be hosted across three countries was always going to be a delicate balancing act. All games are not created equal. So how do you divvy up the biggest spectacle in sports among three continental powers? It took FIFA more than a year to figure it out. And while the U.S. ended up with the lion’s share of the matches, Canada was left with slim pickings. But when it came time to select a host for the official opening of the 2026 World Cup, there was only one right answer. FIFA came to the place where it knew soccer heritage ran deepest: the hulking Estadio Azteca. On Thursday afternoon, in the steamy heat of the Mexican capital, this hallowed stadium became the first to host matches at three different World Cups. In 1970, it saw Pelé lift the trophy. Sixteen years later, it was Diego Maradona’s turn here.

Now, it has also launched the biggest World Cup in history. In the first of 104 games to be held over the next five weeks, Mexico defeated South Africa 2-0 in front of more than 80,000 home fans. “Come what may,” Mexico coach Javier Aguirre said before kickoff, “it will be a celebration that endures for decades.” The supporters who packed the stands on Thursday would have signed up for it. After an opening ceremony that featured Mexican movie star Salma Hayek and Colombian pop star Shakira, they transformed into a wall of noise during Mexico’s national anthem. They booed as one when they spotted FIFA president Gianni Infantino. And they greeted El Tri, which hasn’t won a World Cup knockout game in 40 years, like it was a squad of absolute world-beaters. Never mind that the game itself didn’t quite live up to the standards set here by Pelé, Maradona, or Mexican teams past. (And the notoriously demanding Azteca crowd wasn’t shy about letting its own players know.) After taking the lead in the 9th minute through Julián Quiñones, the home side created few opportunities before the South Africans were reduced to 10 men by a red card. “I saw a desperate Mexico at some moments of the game,” South Africa coach Hugo Broos said. “They didn’t know what to do with the ball.”

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Mosques face increasing challenges to provide security amid growing anti-Muslim fervor

When two teenage shooters armed with multiple weapons began firing on the Islamic Center of San Diego last month, a licensed security guard hired by the mosque exchanged fire with the shooters and warned others to flee. That guard — Amin Abdullah — lost his life in the attack, as did two other Muslims on the property. Abdullah’s presence likely prevented a far deadlier attack, but it also raised long-standing concerns about whether Muslim institutions have adequate security, training and planning to foil such targeted attacks and, critically, whether the federal government is invested in helping them. Next week, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security is expected to announce awards of $274.5 million in nonprofit security grants to houses of worship and other religious institutions. Known as the Nonprofit Security Grant Program, the program is administered by the Federal Emergency Management Agency under the DHS.

The grant program has become an anchor for many religious nonprofits as they try to harden high-risk facilities from physical and cybersecurity attacks with cameras, fencing, gates, bollards, reinforced doors and windows and ballistic film. But some Muslim organizations are already warning they don’t expect any of their institutions to receive federal security grants in this latest round of funding. “We’re not aware of any Muslim organization receiving grants, and if they did, it would be tantamount to the tokenization to say that Muslims had received the grants,” said Robert McCaw, government affairs director for the Council on American-Islamic Relations. “The entire program lacks transparency, and it’s incredibly hard to determine which communities are benefiting the most from them.” American Muslim organizations have had a long and uneasy relationship with the popular security grants program, created in 2004 in the wake of the 9/11 attacks and the ensuing war on terror. But Muslim institutions’ wariness of the program has grown under the Trump administration. Last year, DHS unveiled new terms and conditions for the program that made many Muslim organizations even more concerned about applying for security grants. Those conditions require all NSGP recipients to cooperate with immigration enforcement officials, refrain from operating “any programs that advance or promote DEI” and avoid “discriminatory prohibited boycott,” which could include some forms of advocacy for Palestinian rights. Under former DHS Secretary Kristi Noem, the agency reportedly paused grants for Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, review; discussed proposals for a blanket ban on Muslim organizations receiving grants; and later stripped funding from dozens of Muslim organizations, using vague allegations of extremism, according to CNN reporting.

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Lights! Camera! Cage match! The White House lawn’s Octagon is ready for Trump’s 80th birthday bash

It looks from afar more UFO than UFC. Maybe it’s the kind of contraption that has carried space aliens to the White House to force a meeting with America’s leader. But come closer and you’ll see the contours of the eight-sided cage, 30 feet (9 meters) in diameter and shaped, with careful precision, like the MMA league’s signature Octagon. That is, a STOP! sign flipped on its edge, with wire-mesh sides and padded corners fitted with different sponsors’ logos: Morgan & Morgan, Bud Light, Dodge Ram, Corona Extra and Polymarket, which identifies itself as the world’s largest prediction market. Overhead looms The Claw, a four-sided mass that arcs more than 90 feet (27 meters) into the air and features lights, speakers, thick snakes of wiring and four large screens so fans not seated right next to the Octagon can follow the cage fighting below.

Think more of the four-sided, metal grabby thing that tries to grasp stuffed animals at a video arcade rather than what house cats have — hence the extraterrestrial vibes. And surrounding all that are risers filled with gray folding chairs forming a temporary arena expected to seat 4,000-plus people for the seven UFC fights being staged on Sunday to celebrate the 80th birthday of President Donald Trump and the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence’s signing. For non-UFC fans, all of this might be disorienting under any circumstances. But the temporary arena is covering nearly the entirety of the White House’s South Lawn, where Marine One usually lands to ferry the president to out-of-town trips and gobs of kids scramble in the grass during the Easter Egg Roll every spring. More than $60 million and tens of thousands of hours of labor have been poured into building the arena, according to a court filing from the National Park Service, which oversees the South Lawn and is contesting a lawsuit meant to block the event. The White House says the UFC is covering the costs, though the filing states that seven agencies — including the Department of Homeland Security and the Federal Aviation Administration — have “allocated significant resources and manpower.” Fighters, their entourages and assorted support staffers are expected to take over the driveway and part of the West Wing when they’re not fighting. But they’ll enter the arena via curtained-off walkways with access to the Octagon.

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CBS News boss Bari Weiss poised to oversee CNN editorial operations: report

CBS News boss Bari Weiss is likely to gain editorial oversight of CNN if and when Paramount Skydance’s acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery is approved, according to a report. Paramount executives are said to have held preliminary discussions with several candidates who would come in and run the business-side operations next to Weiss while she continues to oversee editorial. The company is considering several big names, including current CNN CEO Mark Thompson, NBCUniversal News Group chairman Cesar Conde and former NBC News chief Noah Oppenheim, Axios reported.

Ben Sherwood, currently CEO of Daily Beast, and former CBS News president David Rhodes are also under consideration, according to the report. The search implies that once the merger goes through, Weiss will also be put in charge of CNN’s editorial operations, the report said. A CNN spokesperson declined to comment. The Post has sought comment from Oppenheim, Sherwood and NBC News. A spokesperson for Rhodes declined to comment. All five candidates have extensive experience running large news organizations, a contrast with Weiss, whose background is in print and digital journalism rather than television news management. Under the current org chart, Tom Cibrowski is president of CBS News. He reports to Paramount television chief George Cheeks, while Weiss reports directly to Paramount Skydance CEO David Ellison. Last month, Puck News reported that Paramount executives began informal discussions about scaling back Weiss’ role and bringing in a more experienced hand to manage the business side of both CBS News and CNN.

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Copyright June 20, 2026, Harvey Kronberg, www.quorumreport.com, All rights are reserved