Lead Stories

Kimmel says interview with James Talarico won't air under FCC pressure

Late-night host Jimmy Kimmel said the agency that regulates television “threatened” the show and that an interview with James Talarico, the Democratic candidate for U.S. Senate in Texas, will not air on television but on YouTube — thus bypassing any control or regulation by the Federal Communications Commission. It’s not the first time a TV show has moved an interview with Talarico to YouTube. The candidate’s appearance on Stephen Colbert’s show in February was moved online over network fears that it would violate regulatory guidance from the Federal Communications Commission on giving equal time to political candidates. Talarico is in a tight race against Republican, Ken Paxton, the Texas attorney general, and has given Democrats hope of winning statewide in the otherwise GOP-dominated Lone Star State.

“For the whole 20+ years of our show, in fact, I’ve been interviewing Americans who are running for office with no problem,” said Kimmel on his Wednesday night show, the titular “Jimmy Kimmel Live.” “Something has changed,” he continued, suggesting that Trump’s presidency was that something. “His FCC has threatened me, threatened our show, threatened our network, ABC, our affiliates our local stations, based on simple traditional editorial decisions, guest bookings it would seem they don’t like.” The FCC did not immediately respond to a request for comment. But Anna Gomez, the Commission’s sole Democrat, said in a Thursday statement on social media that Kimmel’s decision to keep the interview off-air “shows just how far this Administration’s campaign of censorship and control has gone.” Gomez condemned the latest “intimidation” from her agency — and added that she hopes “courts will soon make clear that the FCC has no place dictating editorial choices or what viewers are allowed to see.” In August, in a further escalation of its battle with the Trump administration, Disney-owned ABC sued the FCC on First Amendment grounds, saying the agency’s demand for early review of its broadcast licenses — years before they were set to expire — posed an “existential threat” to the network.

Read this article at Associated Press - Subscribers Only

Sept. 11 changed the world order. But not for the reason you may think.

When the World Trade Center towers crashed to the ground 25 years ago, they triggered a seismic wave that seemed to smash the world order. It was now “a different world,” President George W. Bush warned Congress. Secretary of State Colin Powell declared: “It was before 9/11 and after 9/11.” Vice President Dick Cheney added: “That day changed everything.” They were right, with a caveat. The attacks were a monumental tragedy. The world order did change. But it was the aftermath—the U.S. response to 9/11, not the terrorism itself—that made the difference. Sept. 11 marked a shockingly successful attack by a stateless and relatively small group of Islamist militants. The U.S., though, launched a massive military response: a War on Terror. It attacked two countries, one uninvolved with 9/11. The rhetoric was so sweeping, Washington borrowed language from World War II and the Cold War. America was now confronting an Axis of Evil.

Consumed by the War on Terror, the U.S. had less capacity to address other global priorities such as the pivotal rise of China and an increasingly hostile Russia. That inattention to shifting global forces was what really changed the world. U.S. leaders were “certainly distracted” and “we continually found ourselves sucked back into the morass of our misadventures in the Middle East,” William Burns, who served in several administrations and later became director of the CIA, said in 2019. “Imagine if a bigger part of the time, energy and resources spent on the Global War on Terror had instead been spent on giving form to an affirmative vision for America’s role in Asia.” “China and Russia have welcomed” the War on Terror, the scholar Robert Kagan wrote in 2008, “because it has distracted the United States’ strategic focus away from them.” Recall America’s standing just before 9/11. It was a time of strength and optimism. The U.S. had won the Cold War and enjoyed international dominance. Its victory over Iraq in the first Gulf War still resonated: a U.S. military so powerful it could crush threats far away, in short order, and with few American casualties. Optimism notwithstanding, warnings still abounded. “Unfortunately, a policy of engagement is doomed to fail,” the scholar John Mearsheimer wrote in his 2001 book, “The Tragedy of Great Power Politics.” “If China becomes an economic powerhouse it will almost certainly translate its economic might into military might and make a run at dominating Northeast Asia.… In short, China and the United States are destined to be adversaries as China’s power grows.”

Read this article at Wall Street Journal - Subscribers Only

Trump wants to hand out cash. Congress and economists seem skeptical

Donald Trump’s pitch to send Americans $5,000 checks should Republicans prevail in the November midterms is drawing scorn from some members of Congress — the very people who have constitutional authority over federal spending. Economists and other political observers are voicing concerns about the potential effects on inflation and the national balance sheet. Taken together, it’s a swift reaction that makes clear that Trump’s dubious election-year gambit is likely little more than another grand promise from a politician with a long history of them. “Donald Trump is a known liar. This is the biggest liar to ever serve in government. Period,” said Rep. Robert Garcia, a California Democrat who was in Dallas on Thursday as part of his party’s effort to counter Republicans’ midterm convention. “The dividend is not happening.”

Trump previously pledged to use savings from the Department of Government Efficiency and revenue from tariffs on foreign imports to distribute payments of $2,000 or more, but none of that came to pass. His latest idea comes as the U.S. economy is reckoning with persistent inflation and rising interest rates, two forces that have politically undermined Republicans after previously helping them reclaim power from Democrats. Trump claimed the payments would be possible because of the economy’s strength, yet consumer sentiment is weak as gasoline prices are increasing because of the war with Iran and wages are struggling to keep pace with inflation. Trump told CBS News Texas in an interview that he doesn’t believe Congress would need to approve his planned payments, though he did not specify how he could spend more than $1 trillion without Congress. “Well, we think not,” Trump said about congressional approval. “I think they will do it if we needed it. But we think not.” Later, when pressed by a reporter at the airport before he left Dallas, Trump denied the $5,000 was meant to turn out the vote even though he originally said the money would be distributed “if the Republicans win.” Instead, he described the payments as a “reward” for citizens who endured Joe Biden’s presidency. “It’s almost a reward for the people having to put up with Biden’s policy,” he said.

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Inside Trump’s aggressive push to build data centers on public lands

President Donald Trump’s directive to accelerate data center development on federal lands is facing public backlash and legal hurdles. Behind the scenes, the Trump administration is pushing full steam ahead and sparking concerns it is prioritizing corporate needs over the public good. The Bureau of Land Management has asked its state directors to identify public land ripe for data center development, according to two people familiar with the request, and those leaders have compiled lists for Interior Department leadership. Interior leadership gave state leaders just three days to produce the lists and told its directors the issue was a top priority, according to a former BLM official involved in the discussions.

The request has encountered several challenges: Bureau lands are typically remote and not near basics like electricity and water, agency staff lack the technical expertise to conduct requisite reviews, and overwhelming vacancies after dramatic staffing losses under Trump have diminished capacity. The directive follows an executive order Trump issued last year to accelerate permitting for data centers, including by identifying federal lands that could accommodate them. As the Trump administration is proposing further cuts to BLM, it has stressed in its most recent budget blueprint that the bureau should refocus its efforts on aiding the building out of data centers for AI. The push also comes after Interior Secretary Doug Burgum held meetings with dozens of technology and energy executives last year, according to a Washington Sun review of his calendar. Those meetings included a conversation with Amazon CEO Andy Jassy last spring about permitting, infrastructure and technology “to support data center growth.” The aggressive push inside the agency, and Burgum’s frequent meetings with industry, has stakeholders fearful that the administration is putting the interests of AI companies first at a time where widespread backlash has made companies desperate for more land to build out their infrastructure. “I’m not against development or progress but I think there are too many questions about this and nobody is asking them,” said Mary Jo Rugwell, a former BLM state director who now serves as president of the Public Lands Foundation. “I think we’re just bending knee to the tech oligarchs and letting them do whatever they need to do.”

Read this article at Washington Sun - Subscribers Only

State Stories

Chris Hollins sends strongest signal yet of a 2027 challenge to Houston Mayor John Whitmire

City Controller Chris Hollins sent the strongest signal yet on Wednesday that he could launch a challenge against Houston Mayor John Whitmire’s bid for a second term in 2027. Hollins, the city’s second-highest-ranking elected official, swiped at Whitmire during remarks at a press event in Dallas, where he appeared with Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker as part of Democrats’ pushback against the ongoing midterm Republican National Convention. While much of Hollins’ short speech was aimed at boosting statewide Democratic candidates, including James Talarico and Gina Hinojosa, he named Whitmire, who he has long clashed with over city finances and other issues, on a list of officials he hoped would be soon unseated.

“We have folks who will do anything that they can to be the lapdog or the doormat of this demented, incompetent tyrant,” Hollins said, referring to President Donald Trump. “We’re stuck for now, for just a couple more days, with Greg Abbott, with Ken Paxton. “We’re stuck for a little bit longer with Ted Cruz, with (Dallas Mayor) Eric Johnson, with John Whitmire,” Hollins continued. “But the day for change is coming.” Hollins did not immediately respond to a request for comment Thursday. In a statement, Whitmire called the controller’s remarks “silly politics that I do not have time for.” The two officials have been at odds since both took office in 2024. From his post as the city’s financial watchdog, Hollins has publicly criticized Whitmire’s actions on the city’s budget woes as inadequate short-term fixes. He also opposed a number of mayoral initiatives, including the city’s settlement with firefighters and its recent $50 million deal to avoid annexing The Woodlands, moves he says significantly raise expenses while cutting off revenue streams. Even so, Hollins’ remarks are a sign that the feud could soon devolve into “open warfare,” said Brandon Rottinghaus, a political science professor at the University of Houston.

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Austin-based Rastegar Capital, founded by former Nate Paul associate, embroiled in a string of court battles

Significant cracks are forming around Rastegar Capital. The Austin-based real estate investment and development firm has had multiple properties foreclosed on in recent months, including its West Austin headquarters. The company is also embroiled in several lawsuits, with some alleging millions in unpaid loans and others from investors alleging fraud. Compounding the issue is that the firm has had a revolving door of legal teams representing it in those lawsuits, with at least two withdrawing due to Rastegar Capital not fulfilling its financial obligations, according to court filings. Behind Rastegar Capital is Ari Rastegar, an Austin native who formerly worked for a notable and controversial figure in Austin real estate, Nate Paul.

Rastegar helped open the private equity division for Paul’s World Class Capital in New York in 2012, according to previous reporting, before leaving World Class in 2014 to start his own firm. World Class for years has been legally hammered by investors and lenders, forcing it to shed many properties. In recent years, Rastegar himself made waves in the industry and has been in GQ, Maxim and the New York Post. In 2022, Austin Monthly magazine dubbed him "the king of Austin real estate" and chronicled his business philosophies and extreme health habits that involve him taking more than 150 supplements and vitamins a day. Rastegar declined to comment for this report. Rastegar has previously described his firm as “asset class agnostic,” and the company’s website touts a 3.5-million-square-foot portfolio across 38 cities in 13 states. That portfolio includes a potentially 1,000-home master-planned subdivision called Infinity Square in Kyle, the 600,000-square-foot Inf1nity Park industrial complex in Del Valle and East Austin’s 24,000-square-foot Inf1nity Views office project, among others. The portfolio also consists of older apartment properties and newly planned multifamily developments.

Read this article at Austin Business Journal - Subscribers Only

Trump blamed bathroom breaks for empty seats at Dallas convention

There was plenty of space Wednesday for President Donald Trump’s opening night remarks at the Republican midterm convention, but he suggested open seats were the result of people visiting the restrooms. Early in his remarks, Trump alluded to the unprecedented nature of the two-day gathering, including skepticism that people would be clamoring to attend. “This place is packed. And not only is this packed, this is a big arena, not only is this packed, but you have an equal number of people standing outside,” Trump said of the American Airlines Center. “If anybody would like to give up their seat . . . would anybody like to raise your hand and give up your seat?”

The floor of the sports arena and the lower bowl were mostly full, but some upper-level sections were sparsely populated, with entire rows empty. Organizers and state parties went through different approaches to distributing tickets, from offering high-priced packages to giving away seats to Dallas-area residents. Trump repeatedly called the arena “packed” and predicted news outlets would say otherwise. “The fake news will go around and see that man up there? He's leaving for the bathroom. He'll be back in two minutes,” he said. “They’ll take a picture of his seat while he's gone. And they'll say, ‘Trump did not fill up the arena. The arena was not filled. Look at the seat.’” Trump then made a request that attendees wait until after his speech to heed nature’s call. Article continues below this ad “So please, if you don't mind, don't anybody go to the bathroom,” Trump said. The Republican National Committee on Thursday stood by Trump's description of the arena, called the energy "electric" and emphasized the event’s wider appeal for "Americans watching from home, the families weighing the choice ahead."

Read this article at Dallas Morning News - Subscribers Only

Kelley Shannon: To protect free speech, strengthen Texas’ public information law

(Kelley Shannon is executive director of the Freedom of Information Foundation of Texas, a nonprofit based in Austin. For more information about the organization and its upcoming state conference, which is open to members of the public who register, go to www.foift.org.) It takes time and energy to keep a close watch on our government, but it’s our right as citizens. Really, it’s a duty. Transparency laws, along with liberties protected by the U.S. Constitution, help us do the job. Access to public information and free speech go hand in hand. We can’t effectively speak to and about our government without knowing the facts. Yet freedom of speech and one of the state’s main transparency laws, the Texas Public Information Act, are in the spotlight amid concerns they are being eroded. The Freedom of Information Foundation of Texas will explore these topics at its state conference “Tracking the Truth, Safeguarding First Amendment Rights” on Sept. 18 in Austin.

Free expression on college campuses is the focus of the conference’s opening session, featuring former KUT News general manager Debbie Hiott, whose recent firing by the University of Texas at Austin ignited a free speech and transparency controversy. The conference will also include First Amendment experts; a look at access to immigration enforcement information; a keynote address by Garrett Haake, chief White House correspondent for NBC News; and a session on using the Texas Public Information Act. Despite a weakening of the Public Information Act over the years, the 53-year-old law still allows light to shine on government to answer essential questions about how taxpayer money is spent and how government officials make decisions. At its core, as it was written and intended, the law is strong and protects citizens’ right to know. That’s because government information is presumed to be open, unless a legal exemption to disclosure exists. This structure gives power to the people by requiring a governmental body that seeks to withhold information to argue why it should be permitted to do so. In most cases, it must seek a ruling from the Texas Attorney General’s Office.

Read this article at Fort Worth Star-Telegram - Subscribers Only

Bud Kennedy: Tarrant leaders’ election cut saves dollars. Does it cost GOP votes?

Make this deal with the Tarrant County commissioners. If you have to drive far to vote Nov. 3 or wait a long time, your decision is easy. Vote against every single incumbent on the ballot who made it tougher to vote. Top to bottom. State house to courthouse. There is no other way to get the word across to the ruling Republicans on the Tarrant County Commissioners’ Court. Saving a few pennies by closing 92 voting locations is not worth the service lost, particularly not in a county that has voted solid Republican since 1994. In a county that is getting more Republican with every new Haslet subdivision — and where Republicans’ margin actually grew in recent elections from a 6-point edge to 8 points — there is absolutely no reason to make it tougher for Republicans to vote. Who are Republicans’ most faithful voters?

The elderly. There are more Republican voters over 80 than under 30. It’s clear why commissioners wouldn’t want voting locations at colleges. There aren’t any Republicans there. But cutting so many other convenient neighborhood locations, particularly in older subdivisions and suburbs, makes no political sense whatsoever for the Republican judges and officials at the Tarrant County courthouse. When your county is 54% Republican — with more moving into northwest Tarrant County every day — you should be adding more polling places. Make sure newcomers can easily vote. Yes, Democrats succeeded in a few specific races in recent years. But there was a reason Beto O’Rourke, Joe Biden and Colin Allred carried the county. They won defense workers’ votes against a Republican senator and president who wanted to cut spending at Lockheed Martin.

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Eric Johnson declares Dallas ‘America’s sanctuary city from socialism'

For five minutes on stage, Dallas Mayor Eric Johnson had the national Republican Party’s attention Thursday to make a pitch he has been making for years now: Don’t concede major cities to the Democrats. Introduced on stage as “the mayor of Y’all Street,” Johnson touted his record, saying Dallas is an example of what a major city looks like under Republican leadership. Johnson, a Republican in a nonpartisan post, built on his 2024 convention speech in Milwaukee, saying large American cities, governed by Democrats, were in disarray.

Dallas is flourishing because of its pro-business attitude and investments in policing, the mayor said. He drew contrasts with New York City, Seattle and Chicago, referring to Dallas as “America’s sanctuary city from socialism.” “While socialist mayors and governors drive away businesses, here in Dallas we are choosing to build America’s next financial capital, which we proudly call Y’all Street,” Johnson said. Johnson took a prime spot in the lineup, speaking after Robert Kennedy Jr., the secretary of health and human services, and before former press secretary Karoline Leavitt. He switched from the Democratic Party in 2023, just months after he was reelected as mayor. He rallied the GOP crowd, detailing how he had abandoned “a political party that was determined to defund the police” and “that embraces tent cities and chaos.” Raucous cheers and applause broke beat after beat as Johnson recounted his reasons. He said he was no longer playing the role of a mayor disillusioned with a political party.

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Elon Musk's Boring Company raises $3B, shattering Austin startup funding record

For the third time this year, the Austin metro's largest startup funding record has been broken. First, it was a $1 billion round for battery energy storage company Base Power, which it raised in 2025 and repeated again this year. Then it was a $1.75 billion investment for drone boat startup Saronic back in March. Now, enter the wealthiest founder of them all: Elon Musk. The tech titan's underground tunnel startup, The Boring Company, on Sept. 9 announced a $3 billion series D funding round. The massive investment was led by the United Arab Emirates and affiliated investment entities. Other investors included Human Capital, Vy Capital, Valor Equity Partners, Sequoia Capital, A16Z, Temasek, Shamal Holding and Baron Capital.

The company said it is now worth $23 billion. The UAE involvement is perhaps not surprising in that The Boring Co. has teamed up with the entity on its Dubai Loop that intends to build out a nearly 100-mile network of underground tunnels across the UAE. It has also worked on projects at Tesla's gigafactory in the Austin area and a tunnel in Las Vegas. Boring Co. plans to channel some of its massive financing package into hiring. It has over 30 open roles posted to its website for the Austin area, as well as dozens more in other metros, including Dubai, Nashville and Las Vegas. Open roles include engineering, operations and production. The company in 2021 set up its headquarters at the corner of Walker Watson Road and FM 1209. Since then, the site has grown to include the Boring Bodega and the headquarters of social media company X, formerly known as Twitter. It also includes a University of Austin engineering lab and space for an elementary school.

Read this article at Austin Business Journal - Subscribers Only

Was Grindr really down last night during the RNC convention? A brief investigation.

Even before the RNC midterm convention started, the jokes about Grindr being down because of demand were already a thriving ecosystem on social media. But did it actually happen? For the uninitiated, Grindr is a popular location-based LGBTQ+ dating and social networking app. At the 2024 RNC convention in Milwaukee there were reports of the app being down, and in 2016, Vice reported on an influx of new users around the convention then. Since at least that time, jokes about the app going haywire during conservative-leaning events have proliferated.

Basically, Downdetector says a lot more people than usual reported having problems with Grindr. Grindr’s own status page says there wasn’t an outage. It’s worth noting that at least some of Downdetector’s data is crowdsourced: people can report that a service isn’t working for them, and Downdetector also monitors other online sources for indications of problems. When those reports rise significantly above the normal level, Downdetector flags a potential outage. That doesn’t necessarily mean Grindr itself was down. “It’s important to note that while we can indicate that an issue may be occurring, we don’t diagnose why the issue may be occurring or what may be happening — that is something the service experiencing the issue can only know. The same is true for how many customers are actually impacted,” Raquel Sanz, a spokesperson for DownDetector parent company Ookla, told Snopes last year. And a lot of things can cause an app to stop working for an individual user, including local network congestion. At a large event, overloaded cell service can make a data-heavy app like Grindr slow to load or appear unavailable, even if Grindr itself isn’t experiencing an outage. It’s the old correlation is not necessarily causation thing. In short, some users may have experienced outages during the convention. But that doesn’t necessarily mean the problem was widespread, and the jokes may have created their own sort of feedback loop, with more people checking—and reporting—Grindr problems because everyone was talking about them.

Read this article at D Magazine - Subscribers Only

Two protesters arrested during a counter-protest outside the GOP Midterm Convention, police say

Two people were arrested Thursday during a protest near the GOP Midterm Convention being held at the American Airlines Center, according to Dallas Police. Police say officers were assigned to a protest near McKinney and Payne Streets. During the protest, police say the two protesters assaulted a counter-protester and blocked the road. Police say the victim didn't require medical treatment. Police have not yet released what led up to the assault or the names of the two arrested and the charges they face, but say those details will be released after the two are booked into jail.

Read this article at WFAA - Subscribers Only

Harry Styles announces two D-FW dates for 'Together, Together' tour

It might be time for North Texas to disco, occasionally. Harry Styles announced two dates at Arlington's AT&T Stadium for his "Together, Together" tour. The shows will be on April 9 and 10, 2027, and feature Argentine duo Ca7riel and Paco Amoroso as special guests. The As It Was singer had originally eschewed a traditional U.S. tour in favor of a 30-night residency at Madison Square Garden in New York City. His Thursday announcement reversed course, adding 25 new shows and 12 new stops to his tour in 2027, including North Texas. He also added North American dates in Phoenix, Toronto, Los Angeles, Atlanta and Chicago.

The tour, which supports the release of Styles' latest album, Kiss All The Time. Disco, Occasionally, originally included the 30 shows at MSG as well as lengthy runs in Amsterdam and London and stops in São Paulo, Mexico City, Sydney and Melbourne. Fans can buy tickets to the two Arlington shows via presales or the general sale. Tickets will first be available on Tuesday, Sept. 15 at 9 a.m. via a ticket presale for American Express cardholders. A fan presale will follow that same day at 4 p.m. before the general sale opens at 9 a.m. on Wednesday, Sept. 16.

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Ken Paxton celebrated a rise in jobs for women. ‘What. Is. He. Thinking???’

It’s not unusual for presidential administrations to cheer on job numbers, as the White House has been doing since a Friday report. They have celebrated women’s employment, pointing to figures that show that the vast majority of net job growth in August — and since President Donald Trump took office — has gone to women. But when the data was touted by Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, a staunch religious conservative and the Republican Party’s nominee in a Senate race that will help determine control of the chamber, not everyone was celebrating. Some on the right don’t see more women in the workforce as necessarily a good thing. “Thanks to President Trump’s leadership, American women are leading the way in our economic comeback,” Paxton wrote on X on Labor Day, amplifying a post from the White House about the numbers. “This is what happens when we put hardworking Americans first.”

“What. Is. He. Thinking???” was the response from Megan Basham, an author and reporter at The Daily Wire, the outlet founded by conservative commentator Ben Shapiro. “Everything wrong with the conservative establishment is encapsulated in this tweet,” she wrote on X. “It’s tone deaf, it’s [sic] fails to understand the moment we’re in, and it reinforces the feminist longhouse situation that we are all trying to address. Seriously what’s the matter with Republican candidates???” Rebecca Jo Plant, a professor and historian of the American family at the University of California-San Diego, said the backlash to Paxton’s tweet was “sad but predictable.” “Men are struggling in this economy, but it’s not because women are employed. Critics would do better to look at who is actually profiting,” she said, pointing to “the extreme concentration of wealth” in the modern American economy. The response highlights growing tensions over family policy within the conservative movement: with affordability and cost-of-living leading voters’ concerns ahead of the midterms, the White House and Republican candidates are eager to tout any positive economic data about women driving workforce gains.

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Family sues Fort Worth daycare over alleged child fight club, lawyer says that puts all daycares on notice

You can see how the parents of a 4-year-old boy light up when they describe their youngest of two children. “He’s into sports now, sports, basketball, anything sports, basketball, soccer, football,” Heather Harris said. Richard Harris said his son also has a love for Michael Jackson and practicing how to moonwalk. “He’s walking around now with his Michael Jackson glove. So, he’s just pretty awesome,” Richard Harris said. The Harris family recently watched the movie on Michael Jackson with their two children during their home movie night together. But the couple says there is a disturbing moment involving their son that they are still trying to make sense of. Heather says she made a surprise visit to Arka Montessori Academy of Risinger daycare in Fort Worth on April 27. She told WFAA TV in an exclusive interview that she knew something was wrong when she saw her son.

“I knew from his cry, in the look on his face, that something had happened. And from that point on, I said, I need to see the cameras,” Heather Harris said. The family’s attorney shared surveillance video that he says shows an adult woman, described as a former employee, allegedly instigating a fight involving the 4-year-old. Heather Harris said she immediately called Richard Harris and told him what she had seen. “I was mortified when she showed me what actually happened on the video,” Richard Harris said. The Harrises say they trusted the daycare to care for their son and were shocked by what they said happened. “The trust that I put in this daycare, they failed us,” Heather Harris said. The couple says they believed they had done their homework before choosing the daycare. “Education was big; it was clean. Arka, we thought we hit gold with Arka,” Richard Harris said. Richard shared with WFAA TV that they even allowed their son to do a half day at the daycare to see how he would respond to the new facility, after changing his daycare based on location, after-school care, and their busy work schedules. The 24-7 cameras inside the daycare day rooms, the couple says, also played a huge role in their decision.

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Alaska surrogate asks U.S. Supreme Court to intervene after Texas judge dismisses custody claims

An Alaska surrogate who gave birth to a child with a rare heart defect in Texas asked the U.S. Supreme Court to intervene in the multistate legal battle over who has parentage and custody rights over the boy. Anchorage nurse McKenna West asked the high court to pause a California court order from last month ruling the child’s genetic parents — Los Angeles couple Nausheen Gilkar and Omar Ahmed — have legal parental authority, and West does not, according to a petition filed with the U.S. Supreme Court Wednesday. West fled from Alaska to Texas in July to give birth to the child after his genetic parents asked her to have an abortion. West argues under Texas law she is the legal parent because she gave birth to the child. She also argues Ahmed and Gilkar didn’t properly serve her notice of the parentage case they opened in California court, violating West’s due process rights.

"The California courts stripped away (West’s) rights to the child she carried for 37 weeks as she fought to save his life from those who sought him dead," West's attorneys wrote in the petition. West’s request for a pause comes after Dallas judge Ashley Wysocki dismissed West’s bid for custody over the child earlier this month, upholding the California court’s order. Wysocki previously kept in place a temporary restraining order barring West from seeing the child after a hearing Aug. 25 pending a final ruling. Wysocki also ordered the court records in the Dallas case to be sealed from public view after a request from the court-appointed attorney for the child. An Alaska court in June gave full faith and credit to the California judgment, declaring Ahmed and Gilkar the child's legal and biological parents, according to a court filing obtained by KERA News before the case was sealed in Dallas. Gilkar and Ahmed named the child Rumi, but West and her legal team refer to the newborn as Baby Gabriel. As of Aug. 25, the newborn was in the hospital in critical condition awaiting further treatment after he received the first open heart surgery to treat his hypoplastic left heart syndrome.

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City Stories

Edinburg CISD to solicit forensic audit as district faces $15M deficit

The school board here Tuesday voted to solicit requests for qualifications (RFQ) for an independent forensic audit that sparked a discussion on what the scope of the audit should include. The solicitation for independent forensic audit comes to the board with the district amidst a $15 million deficit in the proposed budget for next fiscal year The board also voted to solicit bids from the general public for a property of about 113.35 acres which initially was slated for the board to vote on a resolution to authorize a sale to Rhodes Development, Inc. for the development of low-income or moderate-incoming housing. The school board voted unanimously for the RFQ for an independent forensic audit, but not before some discussion.

Board member Leticia “Letty” Garcia started the conversation by saying that she welcomes the audit. Garcia’s comments about the audit referenced several years, including criticism of last year’s compensation plan and the process of fixing the emergency situation at Canterbury Elementary which had trace amounts of E.coil after a flood sewage overflow. Garcia took issue that no procurement was used with the situation at Canterbury Elementary and the $700,000 cost for it. Trustee and former board president David Torres said that the process needed to be expedited since the district had parents up in arms to have something done or were lining up to file lawsuits against the district. “It was our duty to move quickly and fast and get this done properly,” Torres said. “This company came and cleaned the problem that were there which were extreme … we moved quickly because if we had not, we would have been sued by like 50-60 parents or more.”

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National Stories

Why so many incumbents lost primaries this year

It’s been a bad year to be an incumbent. Rhode Island Gov. Dan McKee’s ouster on Wednesday, the first primary defeat for an incumbent governor in eight years, caps off a primary season that’s seen longtime leaders fall across the map and politicians across both parties struggle to make the leap to higher office. Thirteen members of Congress have lost their reelection bids: seven Democrats and six Republicans, including two GOP senators. At least 16 more who were trying to move from the House to the Senate or take on statewide office have lost primaries: nine Republicans and seven Democrats, including Colorado Sen. Michael Bennet who unsuccessfully ran for governor. The upheaval has been driven by a confluence of factors that will continue to dog incumbents through November. Voters are frustrated with both parties’ leadership in Washington. President Donald Trump has targeted some GOP foes as he looks to cement his legacy; Democrats are in the midst of pitched generational and ideological battles. Some members in both parties faced daunting new district lines. Others faced scandals that sank them.

In some races, those factors converged. Rep. Haley Stevens (D-Mich.) didn’t benefit much from her years in Washington in her Senate bid — and lost her primary to a left-flank rival who yoked her to the party establishment. Caitlin Legacki, who advised Stevens’ bid, said incumbents’ losses this year show voters are simply fed up. “It speaks to the high level of dissatisfaction that voters have with everyone,” said Legacki, who noted the anti-incumbent climate contributed to Stevens’ loss. “It’s a major ‘throw the bums out’ moment.” Democrats disillusioned with their leadership in Washington are taking it out on the party’s rank and file. Progressives picked off more-moderate House members from New York to Colorado. Younger challengers ousted older incumbents from Texas to Connecticut. Local elected officials outran Washington incumbents. And voters have spurned lawmakers seeking higher office from Michigan to Minnesota. Sometimes age was the biggest factor, sometimes it was ideology and sometimes both played a role. Democratic socialists defeated decades-older Reps. Diana DeGette of Colorado and Rep. Adriano Espaillat of New York. Former Hartford Mayor Luke Bronin relied on generational change to topple longtime Rep. John Larson in Connecticut.

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Missouri Supreme Court finds Secretary of State Denny Hoskins was in contempt during redistricting fight

The Missouri Supreme Court found Secretary of State Denny Hoskins was in contempt after a tense and twisting legal battle over whether new congressional districts supported by President Donald Trump can be used in the November election. The state's top judges said Hoskins was in contempt of their order, but he has since corrected his contemptuous conduct and has purged himself of contempt. A written order is expected later in the day on Thursday. The judges ordered Hoskins to appear for a contempt hearing for not following their orders on which election maps to use and for instructing local election authorities to use the Trump-backed districts. Missouri’s battle over its congressional districts has spanned more than a year and spawned confusion over which districts will be in place for voters.

State attorneys representing Hoskins had asked Clark to halt the contempt hearing. But Clark declined to do so. The contempt hearing for Hoskins is scheduled to occur as the U.S. Supreme Court is simultaneously considering a request from redistricting opponents to halt Clark's order favoring the Trump-backed congressional map. Missouri was the second Republican-led state, after Texas, to enact new districts after Trump urged Republicans last year to redraw House districts to their advantage ahead of the midterm elections. The revised Missouri districts target a Kansas City-based seat held by Democratic Rep. Emanuel Cleaver by shedding parts into neighboring districts and stretching the remainder into rural Republican areas. The goal is to help Republicans win seven of the state’s eight House seats in the midterm elections — a gain of one seat. Redistricting opponents collected hundreds of thousands of petition signatures seeking to force a statewide vote on the new districts. They submitted the signatures in December. But Hoskins waited until August — on the same day as Missouri’s primary — to reject the petition. Hoskins asserted that a referendum petition could not be used for congressional redistricting.

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Missouri set to use old congressional map after Supreme Court rejects Trump-backed one

Missouri is poised to hold its November election with congressional districts passed after the last census, after the U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday again rejected a new map backed by President Donald Trump that Republicans hoped could help them win an additional seat in the pivotal midterms. The Supreme Court’s decision marked a defining moment in a pitched legal battle that has lasted nearly a year and caused confusion for voters. Citing the court’s latest action, Missouri’s chief election official directed local authorities to use U.S. House districts passed in 2022, as the state’s highest court had ordered. Trump wanted courts to allow the use of his preferred map, which lawmakers approved last year at his urging.

The decision means Missouri could run the November general election with different U.S. House districts than were used in the August primary — an extremely rare situation that could switch the candidate choices for more than a million potential voters, or nearly 1 in 4 voters statewide, according to an Associated Press estimate. No Supreme Court justices publicly dissented from the brief order. It did not detail the court’s legal reasoning, as is typical in emergency appeals. The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the U.S. Supreme Court decision. Earlier Thursday, Missouri’s top court convened a hearing on whether to hold Republican Secretary of State Denny Hoskins in contempt for not following its orders to use the districts passed after the last census. Hoskins had instead told local election authorities to use the new Trump-backed map, pointing to a competing order from a federal judge on Tuesday that forbade him from using anything other than the new districts.

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25 years later, 9/11 fades from Congressional memory

About 10 hours after a pell-mell evacuation from the Capitol building, more than 100 members of Congress returned to send a message that the republic had withstood the most deadly terrorism attack on U.S. soil. “We, Republicans and Democrats, House and Senate, stand strongly united behind the president and will work together to ensure that the full resources of the government are brought to bear in these efforts,” said Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle, a Democrat pledging his loyalty to the Republican president, George W. Bush.

After the remarks concluded at dusk on Sept. 11, 2001, they held hands and sang “God Bless America.” Twenty-five years later, the anniversary will go largely overlooked at the Capitol. Memorial services will be held at the Pentagon and Ground Zero in New York, as well as in southwestern Pennsylvania where a hijacked plane crashed. Twenty-five years later, the anniversary will go largely overlooked at the Capitol. Memorial services will be held at the Pentagon and Ground Zero in New York, as well as in southwestern Pennsylvania where a hijacked plane crashed. The House and Senate are out of session for an extended summer break. Many Republicans are waking up in Dallas after an unusual party convention ahead of the November midterms, a hyperpartisan event in which speakers compared Democrats to the mortal enemy. The House held six minutes of speeches and a brief moment of silence on Sept. 3 honoring the anniversary. “We were a different country then. Our country has changed,” Jane Harman, who retired in 2011 after serving 16 years in the House as a moderate Democrat, told The Washington Sun. “I can’t picture us saying the same things now.”

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9/11 TV specials & documentaries to mark the 25th anniversary: How to watch

The broadcast networks and cable news channels will have special coverage today of the 25th anniversary of the attacks of Sept. 11. Most of the networks will have reporters and anchors at Ground Zero in New York for special events and observances. In many cases, that programming will continue into the primetime schedule. Here’s a brief rundown, but note that this list doesn’t include the myriad of options on streaming sites. All times are ET. On ABC, Special reports on 9/11 observances will air across “Good Morning America” (7 a.m.) and “World News Tonight with David Muir” (6:30 p.m.). “9/11 Tribute in Light: Live from Lower Manhattan” (8 p.m.) — A look back on 9/11 honors the victims killed, reflects on the lasting impact of the day and commemorates the resilience of the survivors, families, first responders and communities forever. David Muir, Robin Roberts and Diane Sawyer “9/11: United We Stand – 25 Years Later” (9 p.m.) — This new documentary, led by Michael Strahan, talks to iconic athletes, entertainers, journalists, first responders and cultural figures who were instrumental in our collective healing about their experiences with 9/11, and how sports, music, comedy and the arts helped Americans rediscover hope, unity and a sense of normalcy.

Special reports on 9/11 observances will air across “CBS Mornings” (7 a.m.) and “CBS Evening News” (6:30 p.m.). “9/11: We Remember” (8 p.m.) – Tony Dokoupil reports from Ground Zero in New York City to mark the 25th anniversary of the September 11 terrorist attacks. The hour features three stories of survival, loss, and hope. “Daughters of 9/11” (9 p.m.) - Twenty-five years after the deadliest terrorist attack on American soil, Elizabeth Miller, Jessica Trant and FBI special agent Frank Pellegrino confront whether the man accused of masterminding the attacks, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, will ever face justice. CNN special coverage: “9/11: 25 Years Later” (7 a.m.) – Throughout the day, the network’s anchors, correspondents and reporters report from sites impacted by the terrorist attacks 25 years ago to remember the thousands of victims and reflect on how that day forever changed the country. Kate Bolduan will anchor from Memorial Plaza at the National September 11 Memorial & Museum in Lower Manhattan, with Brynn Gingras providing real-time reporting from the commemoration ceremony, as CNN carries the day’s events, honors the victims and examines the attacks’ continuing impact 25 years later.

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Elon Musk threatens legal action over Alex Gibney documentary, calls it a ‘hit piece’

Elon Musk responded to the debut of Alex Gibney’s four-hour documentary “Musk,” which had its world premiere at the Venice Film Festival this week, by slamming it as a “hit piece” and threatening legal action over claims that he used his Starlink satellites to influence the 2024 presidential election. In the letter, addressed to Jigsaw Productions and dated Sept. 3, Spiro says they tried to contact the team “multiple times” and “requested an opportunity to present the facts in the normal fact-checking process that is the hallmark of ethical journalism. You have refused to engage.” The letter continues: “While we are ardent supporters of the First Amendment, and respect the reporting process, it has become abundantly clear that the motivations behind this piece are not the pursuit of truth, but something far different. This project did not begin as an inquiry. It began with a conclusion.”

“You are on notice, before release, that the insinuation is false, that the material refuting it is public, and that you chose not to be told the rest,” Spiro wrote. “Starlink was not connected to vote tabulation. Election officials in multiple states, independent cybersecurity researchers, and fact-checkers publicly refuted the Starlink vote-rigging claim in November 2024, and nothing since has revived it,” Spiro said in the letter, which was first reported by THR. “Defamation does not require an express accusation.” The letter alleges that the film hinges on “the accounts of witnesses with acknowledged personal grievances against Mr. Musk” and that “nothing in the available reporting indicates that their consequential claims were independently corroborated,” adding that “the people in a position to contradict them were neither unknown nor unavailable. They came to you and asked to be heard, and you refused them, as you refused us. That is not a gap in the reporting. It is a conscious decision to disregard the truth.” The letter says litigation is “reasonably anticipated.”

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While Trump goes big in Dallas, Collins goes small in Maine to save her seat

Hours before many of her Republican colleagues and those seeking to join their ranks convened in a hulking Dallas arena for a two-day political rally headlined by President Trump, Senator Susan Collins stood in a 10,000-square-foot recreation center in central Maine on Wednesday and examined the ceiling. Instead of the balloons and klieg lights that adorned the rafters hundreds of miles to the south at Mr. Trump’s extravagant midterm convention, Ms. Collins looked up and saw fluorescent bulbs and water stains that prompted her to ask the town’s manager if the building had a leaky roof. “We did,” the manager, Dylan Lajoie, told her. But, he said, because of a $935,000 grant Ms. Collins had secured in a federal spending bill for the town of Newport, it had been possible to renovate and “refresh” the facility.

This is how Ms. Collins, at 73 seeking her sixth term in the Senate, is working to defend her job in a state that Mr. Trump lost, at a time when Republicans face strong political headwinds because of his flagging approval ratings. To win re-election in November, Ms. Collins, a moderate who has been critical of the president and opposed some elements of his agenda, is deploying the same strategy that has kept her in the Senate for decades. She is keeping her distance from Mr. Trump and her party’s national brand and message, and instead highlighting local issues and how she has used her position in Washington, including as the chairwoman of the powerful Appropriations Committee, to deliver for her tiny state. It is a matter of political survival for Ms. Collins, who is viewed as the most vulnerable Republican incumbent and is facing harsh criticism from Democrats who accuse her of failing to stand up to Mr. Trump even as she often expresses grave concern about his policies and actions. Her Democratic opponent, Troy Jackson, a former State Senate president, has tried to make the election a referendum on the president and tag Ms. Collins as “a puppet” for him. He has pointed to her voting record as he works to persuade moderate and independent voters who have backed her in the past that she has not done enough to thwart Mr. Trump’s agenda.

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It’s time to rein in Mamdani’s Influencer Army

As a mayoral candidate, Zohran Mamdani employed social-media influencers with great skill and success, and he brought the strategy to City Hall. His administration regularly works with influencers — some of them paid with public funds — to disseminate information about sanitation, public health, or how to navigate New York’s labyrinthine municipal agencies. Asking people with large digital audiences to post timely reminders on their Instagram or YouTube accounts about when to get a flu shot or how to safely dispose of hazardous waste can be an efficient way to connect with hard-to-reach corners of the city: According to Pew Research, over half of all Americans say they regularly get news from social media, including 38 percent of adults ages 18 to 29. But it’s critical that city-government collaborations with influencers are nonpolitical and fully disclosed to the public in compliance with state law.

“Influencers have multiple hats, and so they may be sometimes acting a bit like a journalist but they may also be making money off another campaign,” says Anya Schiffrin, a researcher at Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs who recently started a firestorm by publishing a paper examining City Hall’s use of influencers. “What I’d like to see is more clarity and disclosure and transparency so we know exactly what these people are doing and when they’re in journalism and when they’re not.” Team Mamdani has done itself no favors by blurring the boundaries and then refusing to disclose the names of the estimated 250 influencers it regularly collaborates with. Some of the group chats are run on the Signal messaging app, which set off alarm bells about whether pro-Mamdani political campaigning is being indirectly supported with public funds and whether City Hall is hiding or deleting public information that, by law, must be preserved. In some cases, the New York Times notes, the same influencers being paid to advance nonpolitical messages for a city agency are also apparently getting talking points geared toward campaign-style promotion of the mayor and his administration. Some of the influencers may not understand the distinction. (“It’s kind of like our role is amplifying all the good things they’re doing,” one 34-year-old parenting influencer with 169,000 followers told the Times.)

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Lead Stories

RNC Midterm Convention: Trump promises Americans $5,000 each if Republicans win midterms, promises a Texas return for Paxton campaign

President Trump used his keynote speech at the first night of the Republican midterm convention to make an unusual promise: If his party keeps control of Congress after November, he will give every American adult a $5,000 “dividend.” The president offered few details on how he would pay for these dividends or how they would work. Trump’s speech, which lasted about an hour and 45 minutes, capped a day in which Republican speakers sung his praises and touted his policy achievements, even as his approval ratings have steadily declined since the start of his second term. Trump is also set to return Thursday to deliver closing remarks. Republicans are hoping the convention will energize voters ahead of the November election, and speakers painted Democrats as too extreme for Americans. In one of the most surprising moments of the convention so far, Democratic Sen. John Fetterman appeared in a video message to praise a bipartisan effort to support the steel industry.

President Trump concluded nearly two hours of remarks by promising to return for the second night of the GOP convention but to keep his subsequent speech short. He also pledged to return to Texas to campaign for Ken Paxton, the state’s attorney general who is running for U.S. Senate. "We have to elect Ken Paxton," Trump said. "We have to." Trump received resounding cheers as he spoke of Paxton. Delegates from Texas, sitting just below the VIP luxury box, jumped to their feet. They applauded, waving their white cowboy hats in the air. Trump also repeated remarks he recently made about people not liking the way Paxton dresses or speaks. The president said his analysts told him not to rehash the insults and that it wasn't included on the teleprompter, but he opted to repeat them anyway. He added that after he said the comments, “[Paxton] went through the roof.” "He may not dress right, he may not talk exactly perfectly, and he may not be the best looking guy I've ever seen, but you know what he is?" Trump said. "He's the greatest attorney general in America, and he deserves to be your next senator." Trump said the United States has "so many victories because of Ken," such as the border wall.

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Trust in US government information has declined, new poll finds

Americans are more skeptical of government information than they were a few years ago, with majorities now saying they have little or no trust in federal government information about elections and politics, foreign affairs or the environment, a new poll finds. The survey from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research and USAFacts shows that while mistrust of government information has grown since 2024, it’s also higher than it was at the end of President Donald Trump’s first term, underscoring how his recent attempts to dismantle parts of the federal bureaucracy may have affected public confidence in the executive branch, particularly among Democrats.

Those suspicions extend to the results of the coming midterm elections. Only 34% of U.S. adults trust government certifications of election results “a great deal” or “quite a bit,” which is down slightly from 40% in 2024. Certification is a typically routine process in which local and state officials confirm the vote count, but it’s become politicized since Trump lost the 2020 presidential election. Trust in government information has also become more partisan since Trump’s first term, the survey found. “It’s pretty hard to trust anything that’s being communicated,” said Shannon Ingram, 46, a Democrat who lives in Maryland, pointing to shifting health recommendations as an example of “questionable” government information she’s seen since Trump regained office. “There is a significant amount of bias, and it comes from the people who are authoring the content.” About 6 in 10 U.S. adults have low trust in information from the federal government about the environment, foreign affairs, elections and politics, abortion or immigration — saying they trust it “only a little” or “not at all.” Mistrust in what the federal government says has risen at least slightly on nearly every topic that was asked about in an AP-NORC/ USAFacts survey from 2019. That includes education — which has risen from 37% in 2019 to 53% now — with a 9-percentage point spike in the last year.

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Iran hackers claim responsibility for North Texas internet outage that affected thousands, AT&T refutes claim

Iranian hackers claimed responsibility for the AT&T outage that left thousands of Texans without internet, TV, and phone services Monday, Sept. 7. The group APT IRAN wrote on its Telegram channel Tuesday that it attacked "telecommunications and other critical infrastructure in Texas" and also took credit for disrupting an unknown water utility in Texas. The claim was first reported by Threat Beat, a publication associated with the McCrary Institute for Cyber and Critical Infrastructure Security at Auburn University. AT&T initially said the outage was due to fiber equipment and cable issues. In an updated statement, the company said there is no evidence to support the claim. “We have no evidence to support that claim. Our assessment indicates that attempted cable theft led to the outage. Internet service across Dallas and surrounding areas is operating normally, and we continue to monitor our network and review relevant information," the statement reads.

The AT&T outage was reported Monday morning, with Downdetector showing a significant jump in customer issue reports at about 2:18 a.m., followed by a large increase in reports starting at about 10:30 a.m., WFAA previously reported. Reports of outages peaked shortly before 3 p.m. at 5,990, but quickly dropped, and the outage was mostly resolved by 6 p.m. Monday. "We were just dead in the water," said Terry Snuggs, who lives in Denton County and relies on the internet as a clinical systems engineer for hospitals and their diagnostic imaging equipment. "It's frustrating, especially when not only just the home fiber goes down, but when the cellular data, the backup method goes down with it, you know, everything was out. And that becomes untenable in this day and age." APT IRAN is closely linked to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps-affiliated CyberAv3ngers, according to Threat Beat. It previously claimed that late July attacks on dozens of water systems were "only to warn" of the group's ability to hack critical U.S. infrastructure. The group claimed it attacked water systems in Minnesota, Michigan, Georgia, New Jersey, South Dakota and Arkansas. On Aug. 30, the hackers claimed they would target more critical infrastructure.

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Texas Comptroller requests $2 billion to expand school voucher program

Texas Comptroller Don Huffines is asking state legislators to double the private school voucher program to $2 billion. More than 100,000 students are still on the wait list for vouchers, also known as Texas Education Freedom Accounts or TEFA, driving the need for expansion. In its inaugural year, the program received more than 270,000 applications, of which 248,000 were deemed eligible, well exceeding the program’s capacity. "This is the longest school choice waitlist in the country," Travis Pillow, a spokesperson for the program, said in a legislative hearing Wednesday morning. "The comptroller’s office hears constantly from Texas families who are eager to apply when the opportunity becomes available."

Pillow said the program needs another $980 million to satisfy those on the waitlist and another $82 million for the newly eligible siblings of students already enrolled in the program. That's in additionto the $1 billion the legislature allocated last year. As many as 4,000 eligible students are expected to upgrade from home school vouchers valued at around $2,000 to private school vouchers worth roughly $10,000. As such, the program's leaders are also asking for additional funding to cover those students. They're also preparing for changes in how much funding special education students are entitled to, as well as any rise in statewide per-student funding from the state. Vouchers honor 85% of the funding allocated per student in the public education system. The comptroller’s office said it plans to announce the new application window for vouchers in the coming weeks. "The results so far speak for themselves," Pillow said. "TEFA is the largest and most successful year-one school choice program in U.S. history and already the second largest education savings account."

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State Stories

Eric Beach: Why some Trump voters are leaning toward Talarico

(Eric Beach is CEO of Lineage HoldCo and co-founder of the Great America PAC.) When I sat down with candidate Donald Trump in 2015, I walked out of the room and told my wife, “This is the guy.” He did not care about the Republican Party as an institution. He cared about America and the forgotten man, and he had the size and force to make everyone else care too. I believed it enough to put in my own money — money I did not have to lose — and founded Great America PAC with Ed Rollins, Ronald Reagan’s 1984 campaign manager. We took that step when supporting Trump was still a career-ending decision in Republican politics. That is why I understand what is happening in Texas now. Republicans who have never considered voting for a Democrat are looking at James Talarico for Senate. They know which party he belongs to. They see him talking about concentrated power, wages, housing, health care and the cost of raising a family, while Republicans give them another loyalty test, another accusation of communism and another week arguing about foreign countries.

But a family cannot pay its mortgage with a podcast clip. Talarico is running against Ken Paxton, who beat John Cornyn campaigning as a sledgehammer against Washington. But Paxton, like JD Vance, has an authenticity problem. Both ran as insurgents. Once power was within reach, both became harder to distinguish from the people they promised to challenge. The movement we played a part in has been overtaken by beneficiaries who arrived after the risk was gone. The original Trump coalition was unruly: Ron Paul voters, Tea Party organizers, working families and antiwar conservatives. Trump gave them a place because he saw people the Grand Old Party had stopped seeing. He united and mobilized those groups. The GOP’s technology, donor and influencer class inherited that audience and became an admissions committee. Their entitlement will be the death of the Republican Party.

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Annie Farmer: 3M pages of Epstein files come to Dallas, with survivors who demand answers

(Annie Farmer, a Jeffrey Epstein abuse survivor and victim advocate, submitted the following op-ed in advance of the Republican National Convention happening in Dallas this week.) It was one year ago this week that I went to Washington, D.C., along with a group of Epstein survivors to demand that the federal government provide answers that were long overdue. We pushed Congress to pass the Epstein Files Transparency Act (EFTA) to force the Department of Justice to finally give us the information we were seeking. Against all odds, the EFTA passed and was signed into law — yet almost a year later, survivors are still being dismissed and ignored by our government. To this day, we still have questions about improper redactions, incomplete records, and the Department of Justice’s ongoing refusal to follow the law as written. We — survivors and the American people — deserved to be listened to and we deserve answers. Something needs to change. It has been 30 years since my sister, Maria Farmer, bravely made the phone call from her tiny New York apartment to the FBI to report Jeffrey Epstein, Ghislaine Maxwell, and their powerful associates.

It has been 20 years since FBI agents came to my door in Austin, after finally following up with my sister on her report, and asked me to recount the abuse I endured at the hands of Epstein and Maxwell when I was 16 years old at Zorro Ranch. They reassured me that Epstein would finally be properly investigated and prosecuted. Instead, he was given an unprecedented sweetheart deal that allowed him to continue abusing women during his sentence. That is why many of my survivor sisters are traveling again this week, this time to Dallas for the opening of The Donald J. Trump and Jeffrey Epstein Memorial Reading Room and Bookmobile tours. Texas was my home for nearly 20 years, where I got married and started my family. I earned my doctorate at the University of Texas at Austin, worked with veterans at the Houston VA, and started my psychology practice. Along the way, I worked with so many Texans of all ages who have faced their own issues of sexual abuse, assault, or coercion. I know how central these issues are to the safety of Texas communities and the challenges that many victims continue to face when they report these crimes. I also know how tired Texans are of the powerful protecting the powerful and ignoring the cost to those who are more vulnerable.

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Council rallies behind San Antonio’s police chief pick. Mayor Jones stays silent.

Acting Police Chief Jesus “Jesse” Salame Jr. was flanked by eight City Council members as City Manager Erik Walsh introduced him as his pick for San Antonio police chief. That included council members Marc Whyte and Misty Spears, who are staunch supporters of increasing the size of the police force, and Teri Castillo and Jalen McKee-Rodriguez, who have been critical of department initiatives and want the city to spend more on public health and infrastructure to address the root causes of crime. Despite their differences, they all stood behind Salame, who is a 27-year veteran of the San Antonio Police Department, to show their support for his appointment. Notably absent from the Sept. 2 news conference at City Hall was Mayor Gina Ortiz Jones. Her office has not provided a reason for her absence.

Jones and the 10-member council will vote Thursday to confirm Walsh’s appointment of Salame. The mayor’s absence stands out given her silence on whether she supports Salame for police chief. That’s unusual because Jones has established herself as a mayor whose positions are clear heading into a vote, said political consultant Mohammad Rasool, whose communications firm has worked with McKee-Rodriguez and ran former Councilwoman Melissa Cabello Havrda’s 2025 mayoral campaign. “She’s been very public on her positions so there’s no surprise on the dais,” Rasool said. Walsh gave the mayor and council four hours’ notice about the news conference’s time and location, said city spokesperson Brian Chasnoff. Council members Phyllis Viagran and Edward Mungia said scheduling conflicts prevented them from attending. Salame was a close advisor to longtime Chief William “Bill” McManus, who retired in July after leading the SAPD for two decades. Jones privately told Walsh in October 2025 that she had lost confidence in McManus after information about her overnight and weekend police security detail was leaked to KSAT-TV. Jones met with Salame on Sept. 4, according to a post on her official social media accounts, which included a photograph of the two of them sitting at a meeting table inside City Hall.

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San Antonio councilwoman wants to outlaw gas-station slot machines

District 5 Councilwoman Teri Castillo is taking aim at gas-station slot machines and the legal gray area in which they operate. On Friday, Castillo filed a formal request co-signed by four other members of San Antonio City Council asking its Governance Committee to consider a ban on the controversial gambling machines as soon as possible. “San Antonio should not allow a legal gray area to undermine the intent of our gambling laws. We need to establish a clear rule and enforce it consistently in order to protect our communities,” Castillo said in a statement.

Specifically, Castillo’s request aims to ban the operation of the controversial gambling gear, commonly known as eight-liner machines, within city limits. She also wants to strengthen enforcement and inspection mechanisms to ensure compliance and prioritize community education and reporting on illegal gambling activities. “For too long, eight-liner machines have been used to skirt gambling laws,” Castillo added. “This policy request presents an opportunity to close a loophole that has allowed eight-liner operations to proliferate despite state and local rules and regulations.” The loophole Castillo is referring to opened in 2022, when the 2nd Court of Appeals in Fort Worth found that eight-liner machines function as unconstitutional illegal lotteries. The Texas Supreme Court subsequently declined to review the lower court’s ruling in 2024, which effectively solidified the illegality of these machines, Castillo argues. Following the Fort Worth decision, nearly a dozen other Texas cities have banned eight-liners and game rooms. Castillo said her request for council debate will protect law-abiding businesses and provide residents with better information, reinforcing the city’s commitment to safe and healthy communities.

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Texas Republicans rely on AI slop to attack Democratic rivals as midterms draw closer

Facing increasingly tight polling and an apparent inability to make dirt stick on their Democratic rivals, two of Texas’ highest-profile Republican elected officials have resorted to using artificial intelligence to generate phony footage for their attack ads. Lt. Gov. Patrick used controversial AI deepfake technology in a spot that debuted over Labor Day weekend mocking Texas Democrats running this election cycle. Meanwhile, Attorney General Ken Paxton’s campaign debuted an AI-generated ad showing James Talarico reading fake passages from the Bible — an apparent attempt to slam the state rep’s background as a seminarian. The spot was released to coincide with the Republican Midterm Convention in Dallas.

“Ken Paxton and his billionaire backers are using AI deepfake videos to literally put words in James’ mouth because they can’t rely on facts to win this race,” Talarico campaign spokesman JT Ennis told the Current. Patrick’s political ad, posted on his social media accounts, featured the likenesses of his Democratic challenger Vikki Goodwin as well as those of Talarico and gubernatorial candidate Gina Hinojosa, also Democrats. The phony clip shows Goodwin playing spoilsport at a University of Texas Longhorns football game as she proposes new taxes, including a soda tax, a brisket tax, a happiness tax and a “nostalgia surcharge.” “They should be chanting taxes instead!” the digitally generated Goodwin is shown saying as the crowd chants “Texas.” Next, the clip shows a phony Gina Hinojosa appearing at Texas Tech to demand a permit for Red Raider fans’ finger guns. Finally, the spot includes fake footage of Talarico at a Texas A&M game eating tofu and asking why the 12th Man has to be so gendered.

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Bexar County spent big modernizing elections. It’s still stuck with a system that ‘destroyed’ voter confidence.

Since replacing a longtime elections chief last year, Bexar County has spent big upgrading the county’s election technology. It’s purchased more voting machines, replaced aging tabulation equipment, added new devices to assist people with disabilities and overhauled its website to deliver results and help voters find the shortest lines. Now as a high-profile Nov. 3 midterm election approaches, Elections Administrator Michele Carew says voters will start to notice some of the improvements, while others won’t be up and running in time for this election. Perhaps most notably, Bexar County’s plan to switch to a new voter registration system — intended to cut ties from a problematic state-run system — won’t happen until January. “We’re wanting to build voter confidence, but TEAM has destroyed the voter confidence that’s in place,” Carew said of the state’s voter registration system. The TEAM system caused a massive registration backlog last year that left voters without a new voter registration card before the March primary.

Carew said in an Aug. 24 interview that it still struggles to present accurate information to voters tracking their ballot — sowing distrust in a system that’s producing fair elections. “Even though we show that we received an application, we mailed them a ballot, the ballot came back, and the ballot was counted, it’s not reflected in TEAM,” Carew said. The switch to a new system was delayed due to a sluggish county purchasing procedures and delays transferring data. Still, Bexar County voters who’ve experienced long lines at the polls and delays in learning the results could see some improvement this year. Bexar County will be operating 20% more poll pads to check voters in for this November’s election, Carew said, thanks in part to a $4 million grant from the Help America Vote Act. That should move lines faster, though the county won’t see a major uptick in the number of polling locations, because the department still lacks the staff and equipment to open them. Voters should also be able to check wait times online before heading to vote — among many other upgrades aimed at updating Bexar County’s antiquated election procedures before a high-profile U.S. Senate race, governor’s race and other contests on the Nov. 3 ballot.

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This North Texas firebrand got more air time than Ken Paxton at the convention. Who’s Brandon Gill?

Among the sea of high-profile speakers at the GOP midterm convention is a rising star in the Republican party from North Texas who played a prominent role Wednesday: Brandon Gill. The 32-year-old conservative firebrand who represents Flower Mound was given about twice as much time to speak than Ken Paxton, who is in one of the most hotly contested U.S. Senate races in the country. Gill’s speech, like many of his public statements, painted a picture of Democrats as extremists or out of touch. "I think we can all remember the good old days when political debates were about marginal tax rates and government spending," Gill said. "Now we're debating whether toddlers can become transgender, whether men can get pregnant and whether your daughter should have to share a locker room with grown men."

He accused Democrats of allowing millions of undocumented immigrants into the country, though deportations remained high throughout the Obama and Biden administrations. He also falsely claimed Democrats want the Christian faith “dismantled.” He blamed Joe Biden for the economy and praised the policies of the Trump administration. "This November, Americans have a very clear choice,” he said. “It's the mainstream versus the extreme. Our country will not go back to Democrats' woke insanity." That rhetoric puts him squarely in line with President Trump — and Gill represents the future of the Make America Great Again movement, said Brandon Rottinghaus, a professor of political science at the University of Houston. "Brandon Gill has been, at a very young age, one of the many members who's been able to build his identity around this America First wing, rather than the older Texas Republican establishment," Rottinghaus said. "So he's effectively kind of at the vanguard of these next generation of Republican leaders."

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Local leaders share progress on Kerrville's flood recovery plans

On Tuesday, Sept. 1, at the Kerrville Host Lion's Club Meeting, Todd Bock of the Kerrville Economic Development Corporation and Kelly Hagemeier of Kerr Together gave an update on damage from the July 16 flooding, the economic impact on businesses and new programs to assist in recovery. Despite experiencing two natural disasters in little over two years, both Bock and Hagemeier said that Kerrville was "years ahead" of counties in similar situations. Both attributed that to the creation of Kerr Together, the county's long-term recovery program. "I started my job with the Kerrville EDC on July 1, 2025," Bock said. "Three days later was July 4. Since then, what I've been doing is a balance of flood recovery and our original purpose, which is retaining and expanding businesses in Kerr County."

Hagemeier said that, even though the long-term recovery is working efficiently, the changes in both damage and funding between the 2025 and 2026 have presented unique challenges. "There was more damage this year, especially to businesses," Hagemeier said. "Business recovery efforts are going to be huge." Throughout Kerr County, 123 businesses were damaged by rising floodwaters and 106 of those affected were within Kerrville city limits. The damage was more substantial than in 2025, when fewer than 100 businesses were physically affected and only 22 within Kerrville city limits. Relief for these businesses has been delayed due to a lack of funding for the 2026 flood. "As an example," Hagemeier said. "In 2025, we received millions of dollars through state flood relief donations. This year, donations from the state flood relief fund are at about $150,000." Hagemeier also said that lack of funding has contributed to the housing crisis many Kerr County residents are experiencing. "Almost 50% of the calls I'm taking now are about mold mitigation," she said. "We've tried to get as many people with confirmed cases of mold into safe, temporary housing as we can. But there are some who are still living in their homes or even in their cars."

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Texas Dems say Tarrant voting site reduction is part of national effort to suppress

Tarrant County’s reduction of voting centers is an illustration of Republicans’ goal to suppress the votes of Texans, Democrats said at a Wednesday morning press conference. The press conference, Texas Democratic Party Chairman Kendall Scudder said, is the Democrats’ way of showing “the other side of the story” the Republicans would lay out over the course of the two-day midterm convention in Dallas. Five Democrats spoke about the negative impacts of Gov. Greg Abbott and President Donald Trump’s policies, Republicans’ efforts to rig elections and the Democratic candidates’ excellence. On Sept. 2, the Tarrant County Commissioners Court opted to reduce the number of Election Day polling locations by 29%.

Democrat Commissioners Alisa Simmons and Roderick Miles Jr. said removing polling locations is voter suppression and will diminish turnout in Black and Hispanic areas. In 2025, the same arguments were made about the reduction of voting sites for the November election, but there ended up being record turnout. Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker said the cut was part of a country-wide effort to suppress votes. “Republicans know that they can’t win on the merits of their unpopular policies, so they’re working to rig the 2026 election,” Pritzker said. Houston City Controller Chris Hollins, a Democrat, said the decision was necessary for Republicans because Tarrant County is becoming more diverse and is on the verge of electing a Democrat, Simmons, to the top county seat. Simmons said Tarrant County residents are worried about affordability, health care and if their vote really matters. She said the Republicans on Commissioners Court said “your vote doesn’t count” by voting to have 92 fewer Election Day polling locations.

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Data center debate ‘transcends partisan sides’, says Tarrant Commissioner Krause

The debate over data centers “is an issue that transcends partisan sides” and one where the Texas Legislature could set standard criteria for projects while leaving much else to the cities, Tarrant County Commissioner Matt Krause said after hosting a town hall Tuesday night. “We’ve got to have some guardrails,” Krause said in an interview with the Fort Worth Report after hearing from constituents at Precinct 3’s Gary Fickes Northeast Courthouse in Hurst. The town hall’s 23 speakers included some from The Lakes at Marshall Ridge Homeowners Association in Keller, a neighborhood adjacent to a planned data center in Westlake.

A number of the evening’s speakers said they accepted the need for data centers, given the growth in artificial intelligence. However, they added that such developments must include regulations on water usage, power consumption, noise and neighborhood setbacks. They also questioned whether municipalities need to offer financial incentives to attract data centers, and whether developers, operators and public officials can be trusted. Some compared the growth of data centers to a speculative gold rush that could abate, or to the spread of regional malls that are now outdated and being demolished. “I am not against development, but it has to be done intelligently,” said Cate Brennan, a Democrat who is running for the open Texas House 98 seat against Republican Armin Mizani. The district is home to 16 cities, including Grapevine, Keller, Southlake, Colleyville, Euless and Westlake. Krause, a Republican, ran a Q&A session with the crowd after hearing the speakers and acknowledged the need for protections multiple times. “Something new needs to happen,” he told the audience.

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The police-shaped elephant in the budget room

As we approach the end of this scorching summer, the Dallas City Council is nearing the end of a heated budget season. In April, Dallas City Manager Kimberly Bizor Tolbert effectively said the city is almost broke, facing a $30 million budget shortfall and a projected deficit of $51 million for the upcoming fiscal year. The key reasons: police and fire overtime, declining sales tax revenue, and ballooning employee health insurance costs (chief among them: GLP-1 drugs). The Council is still in the process of hammering out the final details, but the broad strokes are clear. To balance the budget without increasing property taxes, the city furloughed thousands of employees and is now poised to make layoffs and cuts across a number of departments, including the Dallas Public Library, the Office of Environmental Quality and Sustainability, Municipal Courts and Detention Services, and Emergency Management and Crisis Response.

Other proposed changes fall heavily on city employees, including eliminating the preferred provider organization (PPO) plan that the majority of city staff use. Despite these cuts, the city’s general fund budget will increase, “with nearly all of the growth directed to the Dallas Police Department and Dallas Fire-Rescue budgets.” The Dallas Morning News editorial board has called for cuts big and small, praising some aspects of the proposed budget while also castigating City Council for other decisions, such as preserving the $700,000 budget for six community pools. The elephant in the room is the Dallas Police Department (DPD) budget, which consumes more than 40 percent of the city’s general fund and will see its funding increase by $65 million to a total of $823 million. But due to a number of structural factors, the creeping police budget has largely remained out of the conversation. “We can’t decrease our police budget,” Councilmember Paula Blackmon told D Magazine. “Then we have the pension, which we also have no ability to raise revenue to cover. And our revenue gains are about as much as our increase for DPD. We live in a police state, a police city.” A quick civics refresher to help you understand what Blackmon means. Here are the four governmental realities that make the cops’ budget untouchable.

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Netflix orders new series based on Larry McMurtry’s ‘Lonesome Dove’

Netflix announced Tuesday, Sept. 8, a new series based on Larry McMurtry’s seminal Western novel “Lonesome Dove.” Teton Ridge Entertainment is also behind the project, after securing rights to the book back in February 2025. Zoe Kazan and Jeb Stuart will co-showrun the new series. This is the next project from the duo after working on a new adaption of John Steinbeck’s “East of Eden” for the streamer, which releases on Oct. 1. “After our singular experience on ‘East of Eden,’ we are thrilled to be teaming with Netflix again, along with Teton Ridge Entertainment, to bring Larry McMurtry’s western classic to life,” Kazan and Stuart said in a joint statement. “We come to this material with love and respect, and can’t wait to hit the trail with Gus and Call and the rest of these beloved characters. Yee-haw.”

McMurtry published “Lonesome Dove” in 1985. The novel follows Woodrow F. Call and Augustus “Gus” McCrae, two former Texas Rangers that embark on one final cattle drive from the fictional Texas town of Lonesome Dove to Montana. The pair renew their sense of adventure on the trip as they face heroes, villains and everything in between. Just a few years after publication, “Lonesome Dove” was adapted into a four-episode miniseries on CBS. Robert Duvall starred as McCrae and Tommy Lee Jones took on the role of Call in the series that was a major event for the network, as some 26 million homes tuned in during its four-day run in February 1989. No casting details have been revealed for the new adaption, or if the series will shoot in Texas like the miniseries. Netflix has also not set a release date for the project. “’Lonesome Dove’ is one of the great American stories, and there was no question we wanted to follow Zoe and Jeb wherever they went next,” Jinny Howe, Netflix head of scripted series, said in a press release. “After ‘East of Eden,’ we know exactly what they’re capable of — the depth of character, the sweep of place, the emotional precision. This material deserves that level of care. In their hands, it’s going to be something extraordinary. We’re excited to partner with Teton Ridge to bring this legendary story to life.”

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James Talarico calls deepfake videos of him ‘lies’ that voters are ‘fed up’ with

Democratic state Rep. James Talarico today characterized campaign ads using AI-generated videos of him as “lies” and asserted that voters are “fed up” with them, one day after his opponent in Texas’ Senate race posted a deepfake video of him. “They are lying about a candidate in this race, and so I think Texans are fed up with these kind of lies in our politics,” Talarico said in an interview with NBC News in Dallas. “They want elected leaders who are going to shoot straight with them about their record and about what they’re going to do for the people of Texas, and so these AI deepfake ads don’t add anything to our civic discourse.” In a video state Attorney General Ken Paxton’s campaign released yesterday, which The Texas Tribune reported will air on Newsmax this week, Talarico is depicted writing with a crayon in a “King James Talarico” bible with audio clips of separate remarks he has made in the past about gender and feminism but spliced together without context.

It’s not the first time Republicans have posted deepfake videos of Talarico. In March, shortly after he won the Democratic nomination for the Senate, the National Republican Senatorial Committee posted a video of an AI-generated Talarico reading excerpts of previous posts of his on X. At the time, a spokesperson for Talarico told CNN that Republicans were “scared” of him. “While they spend their time making deepfake AI videos to mislead Texans, we are uniting the people of Texas to win in November,” the spokesperson said. In today’s interview, which came after he hosted an event counterprogramming the GOP’s midterm convention in Dallas, Talarico also addressed recently resurfaced remarks he made in 2020 calling capitalism an “oppressive system.” “I’ve missed the mark on statements that I’ve made in the past. I’ll be the first to admit that,” he said. “What I was talking about when you listened to my entire comments was not capitalism, but crony capitalism, which is what we have today.” He pointed specifically to the Republican candidates and donors gathering this week in Texas to promote their policy agenda ahead of the midterms, saying, “The only people who succeed in this economy are those who can pay for politicians, like the megadonors who are in that convention center across the street, and that’s what we have to dismantle.” Talarico also spoke about Democrats’ yearslong efforts to win a statewide contest in Texas, addressing hopes from members of his party that he could be the one to “turn Texas blue” in November. “I’m actually not interested in turning Texas blue. I know my party wants to turn Texas blue. The Republican Party wants to keep Texas red. I think the best color for Texas is purple,” he said. “When you have competitive elections, it forces every politician at every level to stay on their toes and compete to serve the people of the state and to operate within the 40-yard lines. Right now, one-party rule leads to extremism and corruption, no matter what state.”

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National Stories

Ilhan Omar cleared of wrongdoing after overstating assets by millions

A nonpartisan entity charged with reviewing misconduct allegations has cleared Rep. Ilhan Omar (D., Minn.) of wrongdoing in connection with documents she submitted to Congress that dramatically overstated her wealth. The Office of Congressional Conduct, which reviews allegations concerning House members and staff, made the determination after opening an investigation into Omar earlier this year. The findings, marked confidential, were viewed by The Wall Street Journal. The OCC’s board, in a 5-1 vote, recommended the House Ethics Committee dismiss allegations against Omar that she reported false or incomplete information in potential violation of federal law and House rules.

“The Board recommends that the committee dismiss the above allegation concerning Rep. Omar because there is not substantial reason to believe that Rep. Omar reported false or incomplete information in her financial disclosures,” a report on the case says. A disclosure filed last year showed Omar and her husband had assets of between $6 million and $30 million, a massive rise in wealth from her previous annual filing. That jump triggered questions among Republicans eager to scrutinize a critic of President Trump. But an amended filing addressing major accounting errors in her initial document dramatically dialed back the couple’s assets to just $18,004 to $95,000. The forms don’t require exact values, only broad ranges. Omar’s husband, former political consultant Tim Mynett, is involved with several businesses, including a venture-capital management firm in Washington, D.C., and a winery in Santa Rosa, Calif., her disclosure forms show. Those businesses had previously been listed as worth between $6 million and $30 million. In the amended filing, they were shown as having no value, once liabilities are factored in. The venture-capital firm was listed as generating between $100,000 and $1 million in income, while the winery showed income between $2,501 and $5,000.

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Most data center bans are in metro areas, despite more facilities heading for rural areas

Building data centers is broadly unpopular across the political spectrum, but so far, banning new development is a mostly metropolitan area phenomenon. While more data centers are located in metropolitan areas than nonmetropolitan ones, two-thirds of all new facilities are planned for rural communities. The rural data center boom comes amidst rising backlash to the facilities. Earlier this year, my colleague Sarah Melotte and I mapped rural opposition to data centers. In June, we found that there were 129 groups organized on Facebook who were fighting against data center development in rural areas, compared to 345 groups in metropolitan areas. At the time, the rural groups were representative of around 27% of all of the opposition groups present on Facebook, spanning 43 states. We used data from the Data Center Opposition Report, a coalition of organizations and academics tracking resistance to the facilities. Since June, the coalition has continued monitoring new groups as they emerge. As of August, the researchers have identified 580 local opposition groups active on Facebook, encompassing more than 640,000 members across the country.

It’s still early to identify trends in whether and how local opposition translates into local policy, especially in rural places where development is just starting to ramp up. One reason why there are more bans in metropolitan areas than in rural areas may just be a result of data center development history. Metropolitan areas have long hosted data centers that provide cloud services. But the AI-driven campuses being built now require much more land, energy, and water resources than their 2000s and 2010s-era counterparts. Now, as data center development expands into the countryside, rural communities often face unique barriers to organizing, compounded by news deserts and projects’ lack of transparency. At a national level, hostility toward data centers is quickly calcifying into an election issue ahead of November’s midterms. The sentiment has prompted politicians of all stripes to call for stricter regulation on the facilities, and, in some cases, flat-out moratoriums. Data center-related policies being proposed at local levels of government range from 90-day pauses to permanent bans on the facilities. Of nearly 700 bans we looked at, 25% are in rural areas, as of August 2026. The Daily Yonder uses a county-level definition of rural derived from the Office of Management and Budget.

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Trump’s peace envoy is raking it in

Last year was a very successful one for Steve Witkoff, Donald Trump’s peace envoy. Not because he managed to broker a lasting truce between Russia and Ukraine, but successful in the way it was also a banner year for Donald Trump: He made a shitload of money. And a lot more than he did the year before Trump returned to Washington, which surely does not point to any sort of brazen conflicts of interest. After learning in April that Witkoff’s net worth increased by some $300 million — to $2.3 billion — from when he started working for the Trump administration, we now have further details on the large sum of money Witkoff, a longtime friend of Trump, made last year. On Wednesday, Bloomberg reported that the businessman turned envoy raked in $107 million in 2025 “from the holding company that owned his share of a crypto venture he and his boss helped co-found, according to a recent financial disclosure report.” To be clear, that crypto venture is World Liberty Financial, and that boss is Donald Trump; in addition to the two men, the company was co-founded by Witkoff’s sons, along with Barron, Eric, Don Jr., and others.

While Witkoff did not specify how much WLF earned him last year — there are other assets in the holding company, like real estate — we do know that the president made more than half a billion dollars from tokens sold by the venture in 2025. In 2024, before Trump returned to office and Witkoff joined the administration, Witkoff’s holding company made $34 million. In May 2025, one of World Liberty Financial’s co-founders claimed that Witkoff was “in the process of fully divesting” from the company, yet three months later, it was still being listed under financial disclosure assets. This past May — as in, a full year later — then–White House counsel David Warrington told Bloomberg that Witkoff was divested from WLF and played no role whatsoever in government business that could impact his financial interests. Strangely, not everyone sees it that way. For one thing, while Witkoff may no longer hold a stake in WLF, his sons are still invested in the company, and one of them, Zack Witkoff, is currently its CEO. For another, there’s the fact that shortly before Trump was inaugurated for the second time, Sheikh Tahnoon bin Zayed Al Nahyan, an Abu Dhabi royal, was part of a $500 million investment into WLF, a deal that, per The Wall Street Journal, involved “at least $31 million … slated to flow to entities affiliated with the family of Steve Witkoff … who weeks earlier had been named U.S. envoy to the Middle East.”

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Hunter Biden’s meme coin imploded immediately

On Wednesday morning, Hunter Biden posted to his Substack in a wistful mood, recalling a “warm summer afternoon” when he was 17 spent learning from his father’s operatives around their Delaware pool about “how power is actually won.” Maybe the 56-year-old was feeling nostalgic at the end of summer. Or maybe he was trying to distract from his audience from his other big play today: his meme-coin launch that was going horrifically. Just after 8 a.m. on Wednesday, the former president’s son released his coin, called $LAPTOP, referring to the computer he left at a repair shop in 2020 that created a whole lot of trouble for his family back in 2020. The price, at launch, was $199.51 per coin. If it held, that valuation would have made it the tenth-highest-priced cryptocurrency in circulation. But within the hour, it tanked to around $4. By the afternoon, it had halved again to about $2. There are basically only two reasons to buy a meme coin: You like the celebrity issuing it or you think you can make money as its price inevitably, precipitously declines.

(These coins have no value other than the hype behind them, and hype fades fast in cryptocurrency.) And in the initial hype, at least one person who really loves Hunter Biden or thought they could swindle someone else appears to have lost big: On X, crypto-world figures are accusing Biden of engaging in a rug pull — the industry term for launching a meme coin, then immediately selling off your own liquidity when the price is at its highest, leaving others in the lurch. There is no evidence yet that wallets controlled by Biden or someone close to him actually did such a thing. But he has damaged his reputation in the process. After avoiding the media during his father’s term, Biden has been on a world tour this summer, speaking with everyone from Andrew Callaghan to Tucker Carlson; people seemed to be responding to his populist views and his uncensored tales of fighting his addictions. His meme coin even appeared to be a comment on Donald Trump’s crypto cash grabs, offering free coins to people who lost money on $TRUMP. But the stunt to call attention to Trump’s meme-coin crash has met a similar fate. The Biden and Trump meme coins are both trading just above $2.

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Rhode Island Dem incumbent becomes first sitting governor to lose primary since 2018

Rhode Island Gov. Dan McKee lost his Democratic primary Wednesday to businesswoman Helena Foulkes, becoming the first sitting governor in the country since 2018 to be denied his party's nomination. Foulkes, a former CVS executive and current Costco board member, defeated McKee in a rematch of their closely fought 2022 Democratic primary, when McKee edged her by just a few percentage points. McKee's defeat Wednesday adds another incumbent to a growing list of officeholders ousted during the 2026 primary season. McKee first became governor in 2021 after Gov. Gina Raimondo left office to serve as Commerce Secretary in the Biden administration. The former Cumberland mayor and two-term lieutenant governor went on to win his first full term in 2022 after narrowly emerging from a crowded Democratic primary that included Foulkes.

The last sitting governor to lose his party's nomination was Kansas Republican Gov. Jeff Colyer. Colyer lost the 2018 GOP primary to then-Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach, backed by Donald Trump at the time, by fewer than 400 votes. Foulkes has spent decades in the private sector, including as a senior executive at Rhode Island-based CVS Health, and later served as CEO of Hudson's Bay Company. She sits on Costco's board of directors. Her 2026 campaign marked Foulkes' second bid for elected office after finishing second to McKee in the 2022 Democratic gubernatorial primary. The rematch centered in part on the candidates' competing arguments over their records and leadership. Foulkes criticized McKee's management of state government, including his administration's handling of the Washington Bridge, which was abruptly closed over structural concerns in December 2023 and remains under reconstruction. McKee defended his administration's record and repeatedly targeted Foulkes' tenure at CVS, suggesting she is an out-of-touch corporate executive and going after her leadership role at the company amid its controversial handling of prescription opioids.

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Mail-in voters weigh flying to vote in person and other backup plans amid uncertainty

For almost a decade, Kelsi Kiper has relied on the U.S. Postal Service to cast her ballots as a voter registered in Texas but stationed out of state with her husband, an active-duty service member. This year, though, to make sure her voice is heard, she's making a backup plan. Kiper hopes she'll be able to exercise her voting rights by mail for this year's midterm general election. But she recently started considering spending around $2,000 to book flights and rental cars so she can vote in person. "It's not something that I think a lot of us in the military are prepared to spend because many military families operate on a single income," Kiper said. "For me, I think that it's important to prioritize the rights that our active-duty members are serving to preserve."

The ongoing legal fight over a Postal Service plan for President Trump's attempt to exert control over federal elections is forcing millions of other eligible voters to navigate the uncertainty with voting by mail for the midterms. For now, USPS is expected to handle election mail as usual. North Carolina and parts of Wisconsin have already started sending out absentee ballots for the general election. That's because U.S. District Judge Indira Talwani has blocked USPS from refusing to deliver ballots to voters in states where election officials do not turn over voter lists to the mailing agency and do not have certain specific barcodes on their ballot envelopes. But the Trump administration has asked the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals and the Supreme Court to allow those new federal mail ballot requirements for the midterms. Rulings from those courts may come as soon as this week. They could unleash a major upheaval to voting by mail, which was how about 1 in 3 voters cast ballots in the last two federal elections.

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The US is losing its ability to store water when it needs it most

Turn on a hose in Denver this summer and the water likely flows from the Strontia Springs Reservoir. The small manmade lake in the mountains just west of downtown stores the state’s precious snowmelt and distributes it through the dry months when rain grows scarce and farmers are irrigating frantically. But over its 44 years, Strontia has lost much of its storage capacity. Almost one-fifth of the reservoir is now filled with sediment – sand, silt and mud – the hidden vulnerability of America’s water system. Most of the country’s 90,000 or so storage reservoirs are facing a similar problem to some degree. Engineered decades ago to enable development in some of the country’s harshest conditions, these dams are in a self-propelling sediment loop. Climate change is exacerbating drought and wildfires, decimating vegetation that holds dirt in place. More extreme rainfall, meanwhile, is unleashing torrents of water and debris, as happened in the flash flood that killed two people and washed away bridges and trails in the Grand Canyon last month.

The same fossil-fuel emissions intensifying this cycle are crimping water supplies. This winter, the American West got less snow than ever recorded, sapping the Colorado River and driving water levels at the country’s two largest reservoirs to record lows. Last month the federal government ordered California, Arizona and Nevada to sharply curtail the amount of water they draw from rivers and reservoirs over the next two years. Precisely when utilities need to stockpile water to endure longer dry spells, sediment is robbing them of precious space to store it. America’s shrinking water storage threatens to clog billions of dollars in economic activity from hydroelectric power and agriculture. Farmers, in particular, are spending millions each year to pump extra water from wells, which, in turn, inflates prices at the grocery store. At Strontia, for example, a rash of wildfires between 1996 and 2008, scorched the canyon upstream of the dam. Without healthy trees and brush, the steep banks slough sand into the lake in every rainstorm, said Erin Gleason, a dam safety engineer with Denver Water, the city’s utility. Strontia wasn’t big to begin with, she notes, and it’s shrinking at the worst possible time. Denver — like much of the American West — has spent the summer under emergency drought protocols. Yet nearly four days’ worth of Strontia supply is now occupied by a mound of muck large enough to fill 700 Olympic-sized swimming pools.

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Lead Stories

Republicans are hoping ‘Trump-a-palooza’ isn’t only about Trump

President Donald Trump will be at the center of this week’s GOP midterm convention. Many of his fellow Republicans are hoping he doesn’t make it all about him. The parade of lawmakers, candidates, donors and party officials now headed to Dallas for the two-day spectacle are counting on Trump to make a compelling pitch on the national stage before voters hit the polls. According to interviews with dozens of Republicans, they are largely hoping for a two-pronged approach aimed at getting the president’s committed supporters off the sidelines: a focus on what they call Democrats’ extreme positions and the accomplishments of the Republican Congress — most of which are now more than a year old. “Communism vs. common sense,” Rep. Riley Moore (R-W.Va.) said in an interview, calling the event a “scene-setter” that should stay laser-focused on “what’s on the line” for voters in the election.

Republicans have reasons to be wary. Trump’s approval ratings are at record lows for his time in office, and many swing-district GOP lawmakers are torn between running from an unpopular president and alienating his base of committed supporters. There is little evidence Trump is content to let rank-and-file Republicans run away from him. The first pair of national midterm ads funded by his cash-rich political operation put Trump at the very center. One ad begins with businessman Dana White extolling Trump as “the toughest, most resilient person that I’ve ever met.” The other is more up congressional Republicans’ alley, with a Trump voiceover running through a litany of tax cuts included in last year’s “One Big Beautiful Bill.” Even if not all agree Trump is the party’s best spokesperson at this point, they are eager to see a new effort to promote the tax cuts, which were enacted in July 2025, and want to see them touted anew in Dallas. “It’s incredibly important that we highlight what we’ve accomplished,” Rep. Derrick Van Orden (R-Wis.) said in an interview. “That’s the perfect venue for that.” “It’s a great opportunity for us to brag about what the Republican Party has done the last year and a half,” added Rep. Craig Goldman (R-Texas). “So certainly talking about the One Big Beautiful Bill.”

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Oil hits $100 a barrel as turmoil intensifies in Middle East

The global price of oil reached $100 a barrel on Wednesday for the first time since July as tensions in the Middle East escalated. That’s nearly 40 percent higher than on the eve of the war in Iran. The rise reflects investors’ concerns about how long the war, now in its seventh month, will last; tensions have snarled a large chunk of global oil shipments. Brent crude, the global benchmark for oil prices, briefly surpassed $100 a barrel in July. In the early months of the war, Brent peaked near $120 a barrel. The price of West Texas Intermediate crude, the U.S. benchmark, is up 41 percent since the start of the war, at $95 a barrel.

Crude oil is the primary ingredient for fuels like gasoline and diesel. Rising oil prices have pushed the average price of gasoline in the United States past $4 a gallon, according to the AAA motor club, while diesel this month hit a record high, surpassing its previous peak set four years ago. Diesel is now nearly $6 a gallon, up more than 55 percent since the start of the war. “The biggest impact of the conflict has been on petroleum products rather than crude oil itself,” Bank of America analysts said in a research note on Tuesday. Such high fuel costs squeeze businesses and households as the cost of transporting goods, growing crops and driving a car get more and more expensive. Volatile energy prices remain one of the biggest wild cards in monthly inflation reports. The next measure of U.S. inflation is set to be released on Friday. Since the United States and Israel attacked Iran in late February, oil exports from the Persian Gulf have been greatly curtailed. Iran has used force to keep most ships from passing through the Strait of Hormuz, a narrow waterway between Iran and Oman that before the war carried a fifth of the world’s oil. The U.S. Navy is helping ships navigate the strait, allowing some oil to flow and helping to keep prices from rising more.

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Democrats see a wave. Can they afford to ride it?

Democrats see a wave building. They’ve identified paths to House and Senate majorities that seemed laughable not even a year ago courtesy of an unpopular president, a cost-of-living crisis and a prolonged conflict in Iran. They also see a potential catastrophic problem in their campaign accounts. Interviews with two dozen top Democratic and Republican campaign strategists, party officials and donor advisers described an electoral map, eight weeks before Election Day, as teetering between a district-by-district, state-by-state knife fight and a Democratic landslide. But even the most optimistic Democrats said it’s not clear they’ll have the cash to pull it off. “The money has been slower than anyone anticipated. It’s not at all slow on the candidates’ side, which is maybe the bright spot, but the outside money is not what people expected,” said Bradley Beychok, co-founder of American Bridge, a Democratic super PAC that’s pledged to spend $50 million this cycle. “The money is a five-alarm fire, and the fire starts in September, when the spending gets going, and people are worried.”

Mike Smith, who leads the flagship Democratic House super PAC, said, “We all wish that more people were stepping up and doing larger checks. And would that have a material effect on the battlefield? Yes.” A major Democratic outside group made its own private plea to more than 300 donors and operatives last month. “The next four weeks will determine if we can take advantage of these opportunities, but it requires us to double down on resources now,” according to a copy of the memo, obtained by The Washington Sun. Those concerns — Republicans swamping Democrats with cash and blunting their momentum this fall — only intensified last week, with the start of spending from Elon Musk and MAGA Inc., where President Donald Trump has $400 million stashed. And even though Democratic candidates have held their own in fundraising against GOP counterparts, Republicans hold a significant combined advantage across outside groups and party committees. “You can be a shitty candidate and have a shitty campaign and bad environment, and still win by one instead of nine,” said Corry Bliss, a national GOP consultant who led the party’s premier super PAC in 2018. “Of course people are pissed off, but you only have to win by one in these red states,” and red-leaning districts, “so there’s some wiggle room,” he added.

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KPRC's Harris County judge debate between Plummer, Sanchez crashes

A debate between Harris County judge candidates Letitia Plummer and Orlando Sanchez was postponed Monday night after technical problems on a KPRC live stream disrupted the virtual event. KPRC was set to moderate the debate between Democratic candidate Plummer and Republican candidate Sanchez, who are vying to succeed Democratic Harris County Judge Lina Hidalgo when her term ends Dec. 31. The public livestream ran for about 10 minutes before going offline. Plummer said she was unable to hear Sanchez before dropping off the call. "It seems that Dr. Plummer has temporarily left and will come back," KPRC anchor and reporter Stephania Jimenez said shortly after. "And that’s something that we've had to do in order to make sure that everybody can hear everyone."

Plummer's campaign said the stream crashed, and the next two questions were not broadcast after the debate resumed. A producer had already asked the candidates to log back into the call twice due to audio issues, and after sending them a new link, Plummer spent about 40 minutes in a virtual lobby waiting for Sanchez to reconnect, according to her campaign. Plummer's campaign said she remained ready to continue the debate. Jimenez and producers said they were attempting to reach Sanchez's team, and Plummer later learned he asked to debate another day with "no intention of rejoining." Sanchez's campaign blamed Plummer for failing to make the "necessary technical arrangements," saying that caused repeated disconnections. "Because of technical issues, the debate between Harris County judge candidates Dr. Letitia Plummer and Orlando Sanchez has been postponed," Jimenez wrote on Facebook Monday night. "When I get an update, I’ll let you know." Both campaigns have traded blame and expressed interest in setting a new debate date, but none had been scheduled as of Tuesday morning. KPRC's news director did not immediately return a request for comment. The three local organizations that partnered for the event — Houston's chapter of the League of United Latin American Citizens, the Menudo Club and the Culture Commission Coalition — said the event would be rescheduled due to the technical difficulties and an "influx of unexpected volume." The new debate date would be announced soon, and organizers would ensure it comes without "further disruption," the groups wrote in a statement.

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State Stories

Texas state leaders aim to crack down on alleged birth tourism, as Trump’s executive order hits legal barrier

Texas Republican leaders are pushing ahead with efforts to crack down on alleged "birth tourism," even as a federal district court has blocked an effort by President Donald Trump to do the same nationwide. A federal judge temporarily blocked Trump's August executive order banning the practice last week. The ruling last Wednesday marked the latest defeat for Trump's efforts to curtail or restrict the Citizenship Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which grants U.S. citizenship to virtually anyone born in the United States, regardless of the legal status of the parents. Trump signed an executive order on the first day of his second term denying automatic U.S. citizenship to anyone whose parents were in the United States illegally. On June 30, the final day of its 2025-26 term, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the definition of birthright citizenship as defined in the Fourteenth Amendment, ruling 6-3 that Trump's order was unconstitutional.

Trump responded by issuing a new pair of executive orders in August. One of these ordered the State Department and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to take steps to revoke the visas of any noncitizens coming to the U.S. for the purposes of giving birth and gaining U.S. citizenship for their children, as well as to permanently bar such noncitizens from entering the U.S. "What the Supreme Court said is if you’re born on U.S. soil, you’re presumptively a citizen unless there’s some sort of a fiction, some reason why you’re not actually here," said Josh Blackman, a professor of constitutional law at South Texas College of Law Houston. "I think what Trump [was] arguing in this order is that if there’s allegations of fraud, that is you didn’t come here under the right circumstances, it’s as if you were really never here ... I don’t see that that clearly follows from the Supreme Court’s opinion." Judge Deborah Boardman of the U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland agreed. Boardman wrote in her decision, issued last Wednesday, that the Supreme Court's June ruling meant that Trump's August executive order "is almost certainly unconstitutional."

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Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent defends Trump economy at SMU event

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent offered a prelude to the Republican midterm convention in Dallas at a talk hosted by Southern Methodist University. Fielding questions from Dallas developer and Cox School of Business executive board member Ray Washburne, Bessent defended the Trump administration's economic record and made his pitch for why Republicans should keep Congress. "Texas is the lab for the Trump economy," Bessent said. "In the U.S., we have good trade policy, good tax policy, great energy policy, and importantly, deregulation. So I think we're going to see three competing economic visions: the U.S., the growth agenda, .... the European sclerosis model, ... and then the Chinese state model. I think in 20 years we're going to see that it was the U.S. model that won."

A frequent topic in the hour-long conversation was the national debt, which recently hit $40 trillion. Bessent repeated his common mantra that the U.S. could "grow our way out of it" with 3% annual growth in gross domestic product. "I think that we were well ahead of that when the president rightly decided that Iran could not have a nuclear weapon. We'll get to the other side of this Iran conflict, and the underlying economy is very, very strong, and I think re-accelerating," he said. In the second quarter of 2026, U.S. GDP grew at an annualized rate of 1.5%, down from 2.1 % in the prior quarter, dragged down by high oil prices from the war in Iran. GDP also grew at about 2% in 2025, as the country dealt with tariffs leveled unilaterally by President Donald Trump and then struck down by the U.S. Supreme Court in February. Bessent claimed the federal budget deficit-to-GDP ratio, which currently sits at about 6%, would have been down year-over-year this year, "except the Supreme Court made me give back $180 billion of tariff refunds." Though praising Bessent for a 4.1% unemployment rate, Washburne asked about interest rates, which remain high. Bessent responded by positing that interest rates are the most correlated with energy prices they've ever been, and positioned high energy prices as temporary, potentially a year or two, saying "on the other side of this, I think that the market is going to be oversupplied with oil."

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Longtime Texas politico Ben Barnes is out with a new memoir examining his legacy

Ben Barnes was first elected to the Texas Legislature at age 22. By 26 he was Speaker of the Texas House — and Lyndon B. Johnson was predicting he’d be president one day. Today, Barnes, who went on to serve as Texas’ lieutenant governor, is still something of a political kingmaker at age 88. His new book, “Get It Done: Seven Decades of Lessons from a Political Legend,” reflects on his time in politics. Barnes grew up on a small peanut farm and didn’t have much exposure to politics in his young life beyond his father’s support for Franklin Roosevelt. “Of course, we didn’t have television then. As a matter of fact, we didn’t have electricity at my house until we were in the eighth grade,” he said. “But we would listen to FDR’s fireside chats on a radio.”

Barnes did not think about running for public office as a young person. By the time he was in his early 20s ,he was more focused on his coursework at the University of Texas at Austin. “It was beyond my wildest dreams that I would run for office so young and really, quite frankly, run for office without any money. And that was the most difficult thing,” he said. “I literally knocked on every door in the three counties in Central Texas. And if I had not knocked on the doors, I don’t think I would have had a chance to win.” Barnes said the work ethic he picked up from farm life was key in his early political career. “We had to work or we weren’t going to be able to hang on to the farm — we weren’t going to survive or make a crop,” he said. “So hard work was something I was used to, but I really felt like that this was a chance for me to do something.” He was also influenced by a high school English class in which he read Les Misérables, which introduced him to ideas of justice and revolution. “It was the fact that I realized that you could have a real impact, no matter how old you are,” he said. “Those young teenage children in the streets of Paris made me think that I was maybe 21 and wasn’t too young to run.”

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COVID-19 cases are on the rise in Texas

We are steadily approaching flu season in North Texas, but that’s not the only respiratory illness folks should be vigilant about — COVID-19 infections and emergency department visits are also on the rise. Texas is one of 47 states where COVID infections are growing, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The state's seeing a moderate increase in emergency room visits related to COVID and wastewater monitoring shows that viral activity for COVID-19 in Texas is "very high." Dr. Trish Perl, a professor in the Department of Internal Medicine at UT Southwestern Medical Center who specializes in infectious diseases, recently told NTX Now's Miranda Suarez and Ron Corning that North Texas is in the early days of a "seasonal epidemic."

"What we're seeing right now are positive tests, a few hospitalizations here and there, but it's early on," she said. "I think it's a little early for us to say, 'Is this more severe or less severe?' We just really, at this point, don't have that much information. Even if it seems like it's less severe to me or you, if you're somebody who's immunocompromised, it can be absolutely extremely life-threatening, and so it depends also on your perspective and your underlying condition as to how that may manifest for you." Perl also noted that it’s been hard to track when COVID cases will spike. We know that the fall is flu season and can generally anticipate an uptick in respiratory illnesses, but COVID is not quite as predictable. "Last year, it was more early fall, but prior to that, we had some summer waves," she said. "We have less of a sense of what the sort of classic epidemiology of when we're going to see this is going to be. The current pattern is consistent with last year, and so I think we'll have to wait and see." But Perl said COVID is starting to act like a typical respiratory virus that spreads more in the fall and winter. "We'll just have to really follow it over the next few years to see if the pattern continues in this direction," she said.

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Austin's Red River Cultural District demands city help amid major venue closures

For years, Austin’s Red River Cultural District has thrived with gritty, music-centric bars, crowded streets and an electric nightlife. The area marks a historically significant part of the city as a vibrant live music and entertainment hub. Today, that identity is being threatened. The district’s board of directors released a letter Tuesday urging the city to save Red River. In the letter, the board cited the closing of bars and venues, including Empire Control Room & Garage, Marlow, Koriente and Feels So Good. Valhalla also announced its upcoming closure, and the building housing Elysium and the 13th Floor was recently listed for sale. “One closure is a headline. Two is a cause for concern,” the board said in the letter. “This many, this close together, is a dire warning!”

The letter asks the city of Austin and other stakeholders to enforce zoning rules designed to protect live music spaces in the area, outlined in Austin City Council resolutions. The board also called for cultural-preservation measures. The directors point toward other major cities like San Francisco and Seattle as places with successful cultural-preservation policies. Both cities use antideplacement strategies and development incentives to support local businesses and performing arts venues. “Growth does not have to come at the expense of culture,” the letter said. “Other cities have built policy around that principle. Austin can too.” The Red River Cultural District is urging community members to sign the letter to increase awareness and support. "I will continue to partner with leadership at Red River Cultural District to find resource options that work for our local venue owners and tenants, in addition to working directly with business owners," City Council Member Zohaib “Zo” Qadri, who represents the district, said in a statement. "I highly encourage Austinites to show up and support your local music venues, artists, and creatives. The best part of doing this work is seeing the community, celebration, culture, and history made in our city as a result."

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As Texas expands public pre-K, longtime childcare providers struggle to keep their place

Gwendolyn Sneed points to photographs of children dressed in white caps and gowns on the wall of Good Street Learning Center in South Dallas. "1954, class of 1957 — wall of fame," she said proudly. She's been the director of Good Street Learning Center for more than 20 years. The Baptist church opened the nursery and day school in 1952, when Dallas schools were still segregated. For decades, Good Street has provided South Dallas families a safe place for their children to learn and be cared for. "And look how large those graduating classes were," Sneed said. Decades ago, the school had more than 60 preschoolers. Today, Sneed has just five children in her 4-year-old preschool class. She said enrollment never recovered from the pandemic, and now the nonprofit faces another challenge: the growth of free public pre-K offered by its longtime partner, Dallas ISD.

"It's more like a competition now," Sneed said. "They need seats filled. We need seats filled." Good Street partnered with Dallas ISD in 2008. Sneed said it was because they were already losing 4-year-olds to the district's free pre-K program. "The school district had literally taken children from us when they began enrolling 4-year-olds," Sneed said. "Because we can't compete with free." Under the partnership, the child is enrolled in both Dallas ISD and the childcare center. The district provides a certified teacher, while Good Street offers care before and after the school day for a fee. Families at Good Street can drop children off as early as 6:30 a.m. and pick them up as late as 6 p.m. Today, the district partners with more than 20 childcare centers. Assistant Superintendent Debbie Ramos said the partnerships give families another option. Ramos oversees Early Learning and Centralized Development for the district. "So if they want to go to a partnership center, they have that choice before they're ready for a big school," Ramos said. But the district has also dramatically expanded pre-K on its own campuses. Nearly every Dallas ISD elementary school now offers full-day Pre-K for 3- and 4-year-olds.

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Battle over large Gillespie County solar farm heading back to court

Gillespie County and AMPYR Energy USA will soon be back in court in Fredericksburg in a legal battle over development of the 1,100-acre Marshall Springs solar farm and battery energy storage system (BESS) in the heart of the scenic Texas Hill Country. It's a battle over green energy in one of the greenest-looking parts of Texas. The county has taken legal steps against the Long Beach, California-based company over alleged fire and environmental risks at the planned facility, north of Fredericksburg and about an hour's drive northwest of San Antonio. The two sides are scheduled to be back in state district court in Fredericksburg on Sept. 29 for a hearing over the county's request for a temporary injunction, which, if granted, would stop the project until a lawsuit over it could be heard.

A group and website opposed to the project — fightFBGsolar.com — has been working to educate the community about the alleged risks associated with it. Opponent David Baker said while there is only a slim chance of a battery fire, explosions, and a runaway thermal event, just one could be dangerous. "When that happens, they are burning toxic metals, releasing toxic metals and also gases, such as hydrogen fluoride, which is the worst gas is released," he said. "And hydrogen fluoride is very toxic. Can be deadly." Baker also said much of the private property leased by AMPYR Energy USA for the solar farm and battery storage will have to be cleared for installation, creating runoff issues and possible ground contamination. The Fredericksburg City Council passed a resolution to come out formally against the project. Gillespie County commissioners passed a resolution to proactively mitigate "safety and environmental risks" associated with the project. And the Gillespie County Economic Development Commission passed a resolution too—against all utility scale solar and wind projects. Its resolution read the majority of those projects are not really green or environmentally friendly, harm property values, and "generally thwart smart economic growth."

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Ken Paxton whistleblower endorses James Talarico for Senate

A former Texas Ranger who became Attorney General Ken Paxton's top law enforcement official before testifying against him at his impeachment trial endorsed Democratic U.S. Senate nominee James Talarico Tuesday in a new campaign ad. "Ken Paxton ended my five decade career because I blew the whistle on his corruption," David Maxwell says in the online spot. Maxwell was one of eight top aides who reported Paxton to law enforcement in 2020, accusing him of abusing the office to help a friend and campaign donor. No charges were ever filed, but the allegations formed the bulk of the impeachment charges brought against Paxton by the Texas House.

Maxwell testified against Paxton in the Senate's impeachment trial in 2023. The members ultimately acquitted Paxton, who had insisted that the effort to remove him from office was politically motivated. Maxwell, who was fired along with several other whistleblowers, sued Paxton's office. Last year, a civil judge in Travis county awarded them $6.7 million to cover lost wages, emotional pain and attorney’s fees. Maxwell's endorsement of Talarico follows a similar endorsement of Dan Cogdell, who was part of Paxton's legal defense team during the impeachment trial. Polls have shown Paxton and Talarico neck-and-neck in the months before the Nov. 3 election. Paxton's campaign didn't respond to a request for comment.

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Federal appeals court denies request to rehear Texas Dream Act case

The Fifth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals denied advocacy groups’ bid for a new hearing to defend the Texas Dream Act, a state law that granted in-state tuition rates at public universities for undocumented students. In July, a panel of three judges from the federal appeals court ruled 2-1 that Austin Community College and advocacy groups could not intervene in a lawsuit that ended the Texas Dream Act. The panel said federal law bans colleges from offering benefits to undocumented students unless citizens, including out-of-state residents, are also eligible. In response, the advocacy groups requested an “en banc” hearing, an appeal for the full bench of federal judges to rehear the case. For the case to be reconsidered, at least one judge must request a vote on whether to take up the case again, and a majority of the judges must agree.

None of the judges requested the court be polled on whether to rehear the case, according to Tuesday’s ruling. The denial marks the latest legal blow to the first-of-its-kind state law, which granted students who had lived in Texas for three years before high school graduation in-state tuition at public colleges and universities. Thomas Saenz, president and general counsel of the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund, which is representing one of the groups in the case, said he was "disappointed" in the court's denial to rehear what he called a "terribly flawed panel decision." "We are considering our best option to protect the rights of the many Texans who relied upon tuition equity and the Texas Dream Act to pursue higher education," he said in a statement. Undocumented students and advocacy groups have sought to weigh in on the case for over a year after the U.S. Department of Justice sued Texas, arguing the 2001 act violates federal law. Gov. Greg Abbott and state Attorney General Ken Paxton agreed and declined to fight the suit. In a matter of hours, a district court had blocked the law.

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Parents seek to wrest Camp Mystic bankruptcy from Eastlands’ control

Parents whose children were killed in a flash flood at Camp Mystic are asking a federal judge to appoint an independent Chapter 11 trustee to take control of the Texas Hill Country retreat’s bankruptcy case, a remedy that departs from the typical practice of allowing management to remain in the driver’s seat. In a motion filed Tuesday, Camp Mystic’s unsecured creditors committee asked for an independent fiduciary with the power to investigate potential claims against the family who owns and operates the business and to evaluate a potential sale of the camp’s property. The committee also wants someone who can negotiate with the victims’ families and make progress in resolving the bankruptcy cases. Most parents of the 25 children and two counselors killed in the disaster last summer at Camp Mystic 18 miles southwest of Kerrville are suing the camp, three related businesses and several members of the Eastland family who own or operate the private Christian summer retreat for girls.

Those parents are seeking millions of dollars in damages, accusing the defendants of wrongful death and gross negligence, among other allegations. An attorney for the creditors committee — which includes 13 parents whose children died at the camp — said no real progress has been made since Camp Mystic and the other debtors filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy reorganization on June 24. That won’t change while the Eastlands are in control, he said. Chapter 11 bankruptcy cases allow companies a chance to reorganize with hopes of paying their debts while remaining open for business or someday resuming operations. “Eliminating the Eastlands from all decision making is a critical step in moving these cases forward and paving a path to closure for the victims’ families,” Brett Miller, one of the attorneys for the creditors committee, said in a statement. “The Eastlands refuse to acknowledge their obvious conflicts of interest and have run these cases to protect their own interests.” Because the Eastlands currently control the bankruptcy estate that will decide the parents’ claims, the creditors committee accused the family of using that position to shield themselves rather than trying to emerge from bankruptcy. Bankruptcy attorneys for Camp Mystic and the Eastlands did not immediately respond to a request for comment Tuesday.

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Despite criticism, China Grove doubles down on ICE partnership

Unfazed by outside criticism and potential legal liability, China Grove has reaffirmed that its police officers will continue to partner with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement in enforcing immigration law within the city's boundaries, a relationship officials say has generated nearly $200,000 in federal reimbursement. The City Council on Thursday ratified a memorandum of agreement between the police department and ICE, allowing officers to continue assisting the federal agency under Section 287(g) of the U.S. Immigration and Nationality Act. The provision authorizes ICE to delegate some enforcement responsibilities to local police and sheriff's deputies. Police Chief Ralph Sramek had already signed an agreement with ICE, and his department had been cooperating with the agency, in some cases alerting ICE when it encountered suspected undocumented immigrants.

The agreement was put to a vote of the five-member council on Thursday on the advice of the city attorney. It was ratified 3-0, with one council member abstaining and a fifth absent. The vote came three weeks after U.S. Reps. Joaquin Castro and Greg Casar, along with nine state legislators, three Bexar County commissioners and Bexar County Judge Peter Sakai — all Democrats — urged China Grove and five other municipalities to withdraw from the Section 287(g) program, saying it led to racial profiling and other civil rights violations. The program permits several levels of cooperation between local police and ICE. China Grove participates under the Task Force Model, in which police perform immigration enforcement during routine police work such as traffic stops. The agenda for the council meeting included a summary of the controversy and listed pros and cons of cooperating with ICE. It said the Task Force Model is "the subject of documented civil-rights concerns involving racial profiling and unconstitutional detention or enforcement practices," and added that "misconduct associated with the exercise of delegated 287(g) authority can result in civil-rights litigation in which the city itself may be named as a defendant.

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Sand Branch, Texas, has no clean drinking water. She's trying to fill the gap.

Days after a large grassfire ripped through four acres of land in Sand Branch, Christina Parks is exhausted. On August 29, brush, trash and debris on a vacant property fueled the blaze, and two nearby structures were damaged. There were no reported injuries, though some residents were forced to temporarily evacuate. After two days of containment efforts by Dallas Fire-Rescue and mutual aid crews from nine neighboring areas, the fire was finally suppressed, according to the department. For Parks, who lives in Sand Branch, it’s another blow to the already struggling community that lacks clean accessible water and makes disasters such as this more difficult to handle. “I’m drained physically and mentally,” she told The 19th. Amid the chaos, she’s once again assumed her role as a community leader. With the assistance of other volunteers and community organizations — some of whom traveled as long as two hours — Parks is taking the steps to care for her neighbors in the immediate aftermath of the fire as she grapples with their ongoing need for basic necessities.

Sand Branch is an impoverished pocket of land tucked away in Seagoville, Texas, roughly 14 miles southeast of downtown Dallas. It has been without safe drinking water for decades, and it does not have a sewage system or even trash collection. Historically, it’s a predominantly Black community. Parks has heard stories about a time when more people lived in Sand Branch — that it was once a happy place. When she first arrived four years ago, more young children like her own 12-year-old daughter had also lived there. But since moving to the unincorporated area, she’s seen families go and seen her neighbors struggle. Some people left to start anew in places where resources are easier to come by. Driving along the thoroughfare, as asphalt highways fade into open plains, the area slowly begins to resemble a scene from a bygone era. Horses freely roam along unpaved trails. Abandoned dogs drift through the community. Some residents have begun installing solar solutions to supplement the lack of streetlights. “It’s like you took a step back in time,” Parks said. She is one of the few residents who is raising a child in the area. In 1998, the Texas Almanac listed a population of 400. Today, residents estimate that those numbers have shrunk to about 150 people. “What you’ll hear the older people say,” Parks said, “is that they’re just trying to wait till we all die so they can have our land. And that’s sad because, if you think about it, why else? Why are there no children? Why is there nothing here?”

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National Stories

At 9/11 tribute, Trump adds new claim to his disputed role after attack

At an event honoring those who died on Sept. 11, 2001, President Trump on Tuesday claimed that two firefighters lifted him up and carried him away from a seemingly unstable building when he visited the area shortly after the terrorist attacks. This was the latest in Mr. Trump’s evolving — and often disputed — account of his actions on Sept. 11 and in its aftermath, when he was working as a real estate developer in New York City. Mr. Trump was watching television the morning of the attacks, which is verifiable from news coverage of that day, but what he did next has long been a matter of debate. He has repeatedly said that he took a construction crew with him to Lower Manhattan and was deeply involved in cleaning up the site, a claim that has been called into question by at least one former fire official who was involved in the recovery effort.

On Tuesday, Mr. Trump renewed his claim that he had taken a crew to a building near the site where the World Trade Center had stood shortly after the attacks. He said that two large firefighters picked him up and took him to safety when he observed an unstable building. “I was building a big building in New York, and I took the whole crew down there right after this happened,” Mr. Trump said on Tuesday during an address from the Ellipse. He went on: “The United States Steel building was creaking, really creaking, and we thought it was going to fall down. The truth is, it creaked a lot. It creaked. It still creaks, but it never came down. And I’ll never forget two firemen. We thought it was coming down on top of us, and two firemen, big strong guys. And I’m not the smallest guy in the world. They grabbed me under the arm, said, ‘Got to get out of here.’ And they literally lifted me up. This is not easy to do. I’m big. They lifted me up and they started running with me. I said, ‘Fellas, I can run myself,’ but they were amazing.” There is no evidence backing up Mr. Trump’s claim about the firefighters carrying him to safety shortly after the attack. Almost from the moment the planes hit the towers, Mr. Trump has sought to position himself close to the recovery effort. He has also made a series of questionable and provocative statements to burnish his political brand, notably by sharing a widely debunked claim that Muslims in New Jersey were celebrating after the planes hit.

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Challenge to abortion drug heads back to court ahead of midterm elections

A federal appeals court in Louisiana is set to hear oral arguments Wednesday in a high-profile case that could limit access to a drug used in nearly two-thirds of abortions in the United States. The court action over whether the abortion and miscarriage drug mifepristone can continue to be distributed through the mail and telemedicine appointments, coming weeks before the midterms, is legally and politically thorny for the Trump administration. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. promised GOP state attorneys general a year ago that the Food and Drug Administration would review mifepristone’s safety. But the effort initially stalled amid sharp Trump administration divisions over how to handle the divisive issue in an election year.

The Justice Department is defending a Biden administration policy on mifepristone on procedural grounds at this stage, but Attorney General Todd Blanche told lawmakers during his confirmation hearing in July that the administration wants to reinstate restrictions on the drug. Previously, patients could only get mifepristone at in-person doctor visits. The state of Louisiana, which sued the FDA last fall to reverse the Biden policy, has now asked the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to side with it on a procedural issue as the case appears destined to return to the Supreme Court. In its initial complaint, Louisiana argued Biden-era regulators expanded access without properly considering potential safety risks. The state also claimed the policy violated the Comstock Act, which generally bars mailing of abortion drugs. More than 20 interest groups on both sides of the abortion debate have since intervened in the case, along with the drugmakers. After ping-ponging through the court system over the past year, oral arguments will be heard by a panel of three judges — appointees of former presidents George W. Bush, Barack Obama and Joe Biden.

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Anthropic researcher quits over ‘out-of-control’ AI fears

An Anthropic researcher is quitting the artificial-intelligence industry over fears that the lab and its competitors are racing to build systems they won’t be able to control, a sign of mounting safety concerns within top AI companies. Jacob Coxon, a researcher who specializes in training new AI models by having them consume vast amounts of data, said Tuesday that he is leaving the company because he doesn’t want to participate in an industrywide rush to build AI systems that can improve themselves, worried such systems could spiral out of control and destroy humanity. The 27-year old Brit, who previously studied mathematics, said many of his industry colleagues now use phrases like “crunchtime” and “endgame” to describe the trajectory toward self-improving models.

“We’re on track for a lot of the most aggressive of these scenarios where by the end of next year things could be out of control already,” Coxon said, adding that safety trade-offs are inevitable when companies are competing against one another and Chinese upstarts. Anthropic didn’t immediately comment on the departure. Chief Executive Dario Amodei and other company leaders have repeatedly warned about the risks of rogue AI models, and urged the industry to slow development. Coxon said he left OpenAI earlier this year to join Anthropic because it is known for its model-safety efforts. But even though he found Anthropic’s safety efforts to be earnest, he now believes no company can responsibly develop AI that can outperform humans in a range of tasks, sometimes called artificial general intelligence, absent government intervention or a coordinated industry slowdown. Recent hacks by models from OpenAI and Anthropic, some operating in collaborative swarms of agents, have illustrated how AI systems can adopt nefarious goals and try to conceal them from humans. Once the systems begin to improve on their own, Coxon said, he fears they could advance enough to refuse commands.

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States curb data center tax breaks after AI boom raises costs

Over a decade ago, Ohio lawmakers exempted tech companies from sales taxes on computer servers and other equipment needed for data centers, betting that changes worth millions of dollars would lure much-needed investment to the state. It worked, turning Ohio into one of the leading destinations for data centers. But then the artificial-intelligence boom supersized the tax exemption, pushing it to more than $1.5 billion last year, more than 10 times the original state estimate. Voter outrage after news outlet Signal Ohio reported the scale of the provision prompted Republican Gov. Mike DeWine to pause new applications for the sales-tax exemption in May. Now, some state lawmakers, including Democratic Rep. Tristan Rader, want to repeal the sales-tax exemption and renegotiate past deals with companies such as Amazon.com, Meta Platforms and Alphabet’s Google that secured exemptions for decades by signing contracts with the state. In several states, the exemptions for tech giants have exceeded $1 billion annually.

“They seem to have more money than God and they’re able to build without the need for these types of incentives,” said Rader, who is proposing new data-center taxes and requirements that developers pay more for power and electrical infrastructure. He represents parts of Cleveland, where locals have pushed back against the facilities, and he hopes the new threats force the companies to the negotiating table. A similar dynamic is playing out across the country, as legislators or governors in more than 10 states, including Illinois, New Jersey and Washington, have slammed the brakes on the tax breaks. The reversals underscore how state leaders who once welcomed the facilities powering the AI boom as an economic engine suddenly treat them like a political liability. Dozens of other states including Texas have proposed similar bills or steps, potentially costing the industry billions in tax benefits. That has the potential to push future projects to states such as Indiana, West Virginia and Wyoming that have retained favorable tax regimes, industry executives and advisers say. Industry advocates are telling state officials that other taxes they pay fund local schools and police departments and that eliminating incentives will force data centers to move elsewhere. Amazon said it has invested nearly $40 billion in Ohio data centers since 2015, creating thousands of jobs, and paid almost $11 million in state property taxes and fees last year. Meta and Google declined to comment, as did DeWine’s office.

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Trump gave $45,000 holiday gifts to Natalie Harp and two other aides

President Donald Trump gave sizable holiday gifts to four White House aides, according to new financial disclosures released by the administration. The gifts of $45,000 each to executive assistant Natalie Harp, communications adviser Margo Martin, and deputy director of Oval Office operations Chamberlain Harris as well as a $20,000 gift for director of Oval Office operations Walt Nauta were noted in the staffers’ annual financial disclosure forms that were published by the administration last week. Harp, Martin and Harris make $150,000 annually and Nauta is paid $175,000 a year, according to the White House’s salary disclosure report to Congress. A White House official, who was not authorized to comment publicly and spoke on the condition of anonymity, said Trump “has a longstanding practice of giving Christmas gifts to people in his orbit, including at times employees and aides, both in government and in his time in the private sector.”

The official did not say if any other staffers were given similar gifts from the president, but added that the cash gifts were not related to the “individuals’ official government duties, and therefore are entirely permissible under relevant legal and ethical standards.” The disclosures of the gifts were first reported earlier on Tuesday by The Washington Post. Harp is a constant presence by Trump’s side and is known for carrying a portable printer with her so she can print out favorable media coverage and social media posts for the president, who prefers reading important information on paper rather than on a screen. Martin has been working for Trump since his first go-around in the White House. She started in the first term as a White House press assistant and followed the president to Palm Beach, Florida, to help run his media operations after he lost the 2020 election to Democrat Joe Biden. She returned to the White House with Trump after his 2024 victory. Earlier this year, Trump appointed Harris to serve on the U.S. Commission of Fine Arts, which has oversight over the president’s White House ballroom project.

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Jimmy Kimmel's late-night show set to end in 2027 after 24 years on air

Next season of ABC’s late-night show “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” will be the last, Page Six is told. “His contract is not getting extended,” a source familiar with the situation explained. The season begins Tuesday and would wrap up, after 24 years on the air, in May 2027. A spokesperson for ABC Entertainment told us, “[This] information is inaccurate — any reports about the future of the show at this point are purely speculative.” Kimmel takes pride in signing year-to-year deals, which are rare in the TV biz and allow him unusual flexibility. The news comes on the heels of Rosie O’Donnell completing a four-night guest-hosting run on his show that was a ratings success.

O’Donnell was “in her element,” a source told us. So much so that she went viral for mocking her longtime nemesis, President Trump, by performing a parody of the traditional Irish song “Danny Boy” that she called “Donnie Boy.” Kimmel has been fronting the show since 2003, making him one of the longest-running network late-night hosts. Insiders say the move is unlikely to be related to Kimmel’s antagonistic relationship with the Trump administration. Kimmel was embroiled in a nasty feud with Trump earlier this year after he quipped that first lady Melania Trump “had a glow like an expectant widow,” days before a third assassination attempt on the president. An infuriated Trump immediately called for ABC to fire him. He also criticized the late-night host for his remarks about Charlie Kirk’s assassination in September 2025, which subsequently found him temporarily yanked off the air under Disney CEO Bob Iger. But our sources say new Disney boss Josh D’Amaro wouldn’t be swayed by politics. “He’s not afraid of the administration … Josh isn’t folding,” the TV insider said.

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Lead Stories

Inside GOP’s big-money Dallas events

The Republicans’ “midterm convention” in Dallas begins Wednesday. The made-for-TV event is aimed at boosting GOP base turnout in the midterm elections. But this is also Texas — the Republican Party’s biggest ATM. So there’s a lot of big-money fundraising taking place on the sidelines of the main event at the American Airlines Center. House and Senate Republicans are competing for cash from a small group of big-time GOP donors who can dole out hundreds of thousands — or millions — of dollars. The goal of the party committees and super PACs is to convince the check writers that they’re the best investment to save the endangered GOP majorities on Capitol Hill with just 56 days to go. The White House. First, let’s talk about President Donald Trump and Vice President JD Vance. This convention is Trump’s brainchild, designed to counter slumping GOP ratings, although it’s unclear how focusing even more attention on a widely unpopular president can do that.

Trump posted on Truth Social Monday night yet another promise that oil prices “will drop precipitously” when the United States wins the war with Iran. The war is now in its seventh month. Trump will appear at an RNC roundtable Wednesday. The get-in-the-door price is $250,000. If you want a photo with the president, that will run you $88,600. Vance has his RNC fundraiser Thursday. The roundtable for the VP is $75,000 per person. A photo will cost $35,000. But an event like this, and the confluence of big-money donors, means a lot more to candidates, congressional party committees and super PACs than it does to Trump and Vance. The Senate. The Senate map is increasingly competitive as Trump’s poll numbers sink. Republicans are trying to hold seats in North Carolina, Ohio, Maine, Texas, Iowa and Alaska, and are fighting to flip seats in Michigan, New Hampshire and Georgia. Senate Leadership Fund, the Senate GOP super PAC, has a number of events in Texas, the cycle’s surprise battleground state. SLF has a suite both nights at the convention, as does the Congressional Leadership Fund, the House Republican super PAC. SLF’s brass is participating in the NRSC programming. Alex Latcham, the group’s executive director, will speak at an NRSC “battleground plan lunch” Wednesday.

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Canada imposes new tariffs on U.S. goods, as trade war intensifies

New Canadian tariffs targeting roughly $20 billion in U.S. imports officially snapped into place on Tuesday, the latest escalation in an increasingly costly trade war that has ensnarled two longtime allies. The duties apply to a variety of U.S. goods, including clothing, cheese, metal parts and wood products. The approach is meant to mimic the taxes that President Trump imposed on Canada after trade talks between the two neighbors collapsed in acrimony last month. For now, the economic effects of the tit-for-tat may be limited because the tariffs encompass only a small portion of the annual trade between the United States and Canada. The more pressing concern is a potential cycle of retaliation, one that results in even higher and more exhaustive duties that harm families and businesses on both sides of the border.

In Canada, Prime Minister Mark Carney has sought to position himself as a bulwark against Mr. Trump’s trade aggression, describing his nation as “at war.” Canadian officials generally have pledged to respond “dollar for dollar” to any U.S. duties. In Washington, the president and his aides have repeatedly mocked their Canadian counterparts and the size of their ally’s economy and military. Mr. Trump has already threatened additional tariffs on auto imports from Canada, and on Friday, he even suggested he could try to halt bilateral trade outright. Then, hours before Canada’s new tariffs took effect, Mr. Trump took to social media to continue his attack. He singled out Bombardier, a Canadian plane manufacturer, claiming there would be “NO MORE SELLING BOMBARDIER IN THE UNITED STATES!” Sign up for Your Places: Global Update. All the latest news for any part of the world you select. In doing so, the president accused Canada of blocking “our GREAT American Banks, and Companies,” and he encouraged U.S. consumers to refrain from buying some Canadian goods. “BUY AMERICAN. FLY ON AMERICAN AIRLINERS. ENJOY AMERICAN LIQUOR AND BEVERAGES. SAIL ON LAKE AMERICA,” Mr. Trump wrote.

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Farmers are going broke amid rising gas prices, while the Ag Secretary profits off them

As farmers grapple with soaring diesel and fertilizer prices and the Department of Agriculture yanks support for cheaper, renewable forms of energy, the agency’s chief, Brooke Rollins, is carrying millions in highly profitable oil and gas investments. In disclosure reports filed in July, Rollins indicated that she and her husband, Mark Rollins, an oil and gas industry executive, together hold as much as $2.5 million in fossil fuel investments. At least $1 million of that is in HKN II, a limited partnership with oil and gas interests in the Kurdistan region of Iraq; another $1 million, at least, is in Hillwood Energy New Ventures, which has interests in oil and gas operations in Texas, Rollins’ home state. Rollins also disclosed that she holds between $250,000 and $550,000 in investments in operating companies that own oil and gas assets in Texas. Since the beginning of this year and President Donald Trump’s launch of the war in Iran, oil and gas prices have skyrocketed, and so have industry profits.

Prices for diesel hit record highs this week, while prices of fertilizer, which are manufactured with natural gas and tied to the market, have also spiked this year, hitting an agriculture industry already battered by Trump’s tariffs and increasingly extreme weather events. “Farmers have spent a billion and a half [dollars] just on additional costs for diesel because of the Iran war,” said former Washington Gov. Jay Inslee, a former presidential candidate who campaigned on progressive climate policies. “American farmers are paying through the nose for this.” Inslee is currently working with Climate Power, a strategy and communications group that’s working to push climate and clean energy policies. According to a Climate Power analysis, the only other top Trump administration official with significant fossil fuel investments is Director of National Intelligence Jay Clayton, who held as much as $320,000 in oil and gas stocks as of the end of 2025. Trump himself has been the biggest beneficiary of his own war.

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As Social Security fund runs dry, some Republicans say it’s time to raise taxes

For decades, Washington has replayed the same fight over taming the soaring national debt: Democrats cite a need for more taxes. Republicans refuse. And anyone who suggests cutting the biggest source of spending — federal retirement benefits — gets attacked. But a coming crisis in Social Security appears to be pushing at least a few Republicans off the GOP’s long-standing pledge never to raise taxes. This summer, Sen. Bernie Moreno (R-Ohio) joined Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Massachusetts) in proposing to raise the payroll tax cap so people with higher incomes pay more into the program. Now the idea is emerging as an acceptable fix among other GOP lawmakers, including Rep. Tom Cole, the influential chair of the House Appropriations Committee.

“We’ve got too many people who say, ‘Well, we have to stay within the current income level or stay at the current tax rate,’” Cole (Oklahoma) said in an interview. “I’m willing to look at the tax rate. I am willing to raise the amount of income through tax.” The rare GOP concessions on taxes come as lawmakers begin to confront a Social Security shortfall so large and so imminent that the party’s traditional demand for curtailing benefits is unlikely to suffice. In just six years, millions of Social Security recipients will absorb a 22 percent cut in benefits unless lawmakers provide an immediate infusion of nearly $500 billion. “Twenty or thirty years ago,” when the shortfall was far in the future, “you could come up with a straight-faced solution” that solved the problem entirely by cutting future benefits, said Charles Blahous, a senior research strategist at George Mason University’s Mercatus Center who served from 2010 to 2015 as the Republican public trustee for Social Security. Now the problem is so big and urgent, Blahous said, “I don’t think you can look at it with a straight face and not do all of the above.”

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State Stories

Ted Cruz racks up private jet flights ahead of midterms

U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz has been crisscrossing the country campaigning for Republicans ahead of November's midterm elections. And he isn't flying coach. Through the first six months of the year, Cruz's Jobs, Freedom and Security PAC spent close to $200,000 on private air travel for the Texas Republican, who spent among the most of anyone in Congress on private fights. Cruz spent twice as much as Senate Majority Leader John Thune's Heartland Values PAC, according to analysis of campaign finance records.

The flights come as Cruz attempts to fortify Republicans ahead of a midterm election in which the GOP is trying to hold control of the U.S. House and Senate amid flagging approval ratings for President Donald Trump. The flights appear to comply with federal rules, which largely bar members of the U.S. House from private air travel but not senators. Still, doing so can present a problematic image for politicians, said Bill King, a fellow at Rice University's Baker Institute for Public Policy. "Both parties have the populist problem, where people don't like politicians making a lot of money and cozying up to business interests," he said. Cruz's private jet travel marks a significant increase from last year when his campaign committees spent close to $61,000 on private flights, far behind the $560,000 in flights U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders reported and the $178,000 reported by Thune's PAC. A spokesperson for Cruz declined to answer questions about the purpose of the flights, but Cruz has been eager to tout his efforts to boost the GOP. "In the last decade, there has not been another Republican who’s campaigned for more Senate candidates, more House candidates, more gubernatorial candidates than I have," he claimed on Meet the Press last week. "These are the most consequential midterms we have ever had," he said. "I’m going to be on the road non-stop from now to Election Day. If the Democrats take the Senate and House, we will see the entire Trump legislative agenda grind to a halt." The dates of Cruz's private jet payments largely correlate with a run of campaign appearances ahead of state GOP primaries, which run from March to September.

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TEA is pushing for more third-party groups to run struggling schools. Does it work?

With several public school districts in North Texas and across the state on the cusp of state takeovers, Texas Education Agency Commissioner Mike Morath has increasingly encouraged them to turn to third-party organizations to run struggling campuses and avoid state intervention. Texas public districts are subject to a TEA takeover if one of their campuses receives five consecutive F grades in the state’s annual A-F Accountability rating system. That gives Morath the ability to name a new superintendent and replace the school board with a Board of Managers, a process that has already played out at both Fort Worth ISD and Lake Worth ISD in the last calendar year. But a Texas law passed nearly a decade ago could put takeovers on hold — and an increased number of districts in North Texas are using it to maintain control of their campuses.

Senate Bill 1882 made it legal for districts to partner with external groups to manage struggling campuses. By doing so, campuses get a two-year exemption from state takeovers, meaning a campus can get up to seven F ratings in a row and still not be subject to a takeover. Everman ISD is the latest Tarrant County district to turn to a third party organization to dodge a takeover. Last month the district announced it was partnering with Third Future Schools, a nonprofit educational management organization, to run two of its schools. One of the schools just received a fourth F grade. In a press conference last month, Morath said more districts should turn to third-party organizations, like Everman did. “What I think some school districts are thinking through is, are there partners that might have specialized or a higher degree of expertise in some areas of curriculum, instructional support, those sorts of things?” Morath said. “I think some districts are doing this. They may be doing this because of accountability issues, but like, if it’s a good idea for kids, you should do it. You should do it today. Period. You shouldn’t wait.”

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Judge declines to halt Texas THC ban, court records show

Possession of products containing delta-8 and other forms of THC are still a state felony after the Texas officials banned the substances earlier this year. A Texas judge has allowed a wide-ranging THC ban to stay in effect after a hearing last week. Delta-9 THC can generally be regarded as “regular THC.” When state and federal lawmakers legalized hemp, they defined it as cannabis with .3% delta-9 THC or less on a dry-weight basis. However, there are other forms of THC that were not originally regulated by state and federal hemp laws. So, manufacturers and retailers began making and selling products with other forms of THC such as delta-8, which exploded in popularity over the last few years. Now, those other forms of THC are banned in the state. A Travis County District Court judge recently ruled this ban can stay in effect as hemp businesses sue the state over it.

This is all the result of a Texas Supreme Court decision over the legality of delta-8 THC stemming from a lawsuit brought by hemp manufacturer Hometown Hero in 2021. That year, the Texas Department of State Health Services said all forms of the substance besides .3% delta-9 THC on a dry weight basis were schedule I controlled substances. Hometown Hero sued over the change. For a time, the ban on these other forms of THC was on pause while litigation was pending. The Texas Supreme Court ruled this year that the state could ban delta-8 and other forms of THC outside of delta-9. The state implemented that ban on July 31, adding other forms of THC to the state’s controlled substances list. Possession of these alternative forms of THC is now a state felony. The Texas Supreme Court decision, however, said trace amounts of these substances are allowed in hemp products. However, the court did not define what it meant by “trace amounts.” That’s why hemp businesses such as SS Distro USA LLC and Topps Distro filed suit against the state. Their attorney David Sergi argued in Travis County District Court that trace amounts must be defined if the state hopes to enforce this restriction, and it must be done through a rule-making process. The businesses hoped a judge would grant a temporary restraining order, putting a halt on the ban. The judge ruled otherwise. The businesses and their attorneys are still seeking halts on the bans in court.

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Federal crackdown hits CDL training schools, including 13 in Texas

More than 100 commercial driver’s license training providers are being removed from a federal registry as part of a nationwide crackdown on programs accused of failing to meet federal requirements, with 13 Texas schools included on the removal list. The U.S. Department of Transportation announced the removals last week. Federal officials said they traced more than 5,000 commercial drivers who failed English-language proficiency requirements back to the providers being removed. According to the spreadsheet provided to KVUE by the U.S. Department of Transportation, the 13 entries where training was conducted in Texas are:

ASC Technical Institute LLC, Asere Transport, Brothers CDL Training LLC, CDL Aris Truck LLC, CDL Commercial Trucks Training LLC, Cultural Technical Institute LLC, EP Texas Trucking School, Mountain View Vocational Institute LLC, MT Training Center LLC, One Stop CDL Driver Training LLC, Prime Time CDL, Sun City CDL LLC, and Tony CDL Training. The federal action is part of a broader effort to scrutinize how commercial drivers are being trained before they get behind the wheel. Elyas Aboseid, CEO of Get Drivers Ed, said he supports efforts to hold training programs accountable. “It's our responsibility to make sure who actually is licensed on the road, so I support it,” Aboseid said. Get Drivers Ed is not among the providers on the federal removal list. The company offers the online portion of entry-level driver training nationwide and connects students with partner schools for behind-the-wheel instruction.

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State Rep. Venton Jones, Gregory Scott Jr. are married

Texas state Rep. Venton Jones, Texas House Democratic Caucus whip and vice chair of the Texas LGBTQ Caucus, on Saturday, Aug. 29, issued a statement announcing his marriage to Gregory D. Scott Jr. “With full hearts, immense joy, and deep gratitude, Gregory and I are proud to share that we are officially married. Surrounded by our families, loved ones and community, we have taken this sacred next step to build our lives, our family and our future together,” Jones said in that statement. “From the day I asked Gregory to marry me on the floor of the Texas House of Representatives, our journey has been grounded in the belief that love conquers all, “Jones continued. “In a time when the LGBTQ+ community and our families continue to see our rights and our very existence challenged — often within the halls of government itself — living, loving and celebrating our union openly and unapologetically is an act of resilience. “Gregory and I stand together as living proof that love wins, progress is unstoppable and no amount of hate can erase the truth of who we are,” he said.

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Busy City Council meeting awaits Mayor Guajardo after suspension

Mayor Paulette Guajardo is set to return to City Hall on Tuesday morning following a 30-day suspension. Guajardo was formally reprimanded and suspended Aug. 7 after a four-day hearing over a petition seeking her removal from office. Several major decisions involving Corpus Christi’s water supply were made during her absence. The city returned to Stage 1 water restrictions, and City Council voted 5-3 against moving forward with additional design work for the Inner Harbor desalination project. A busy meeting awaits Guajardo upon her return. The council’s agenda includes an ordinance adopting the city’s budget for the 2026-27 fiscal year.

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Dallas woman who protested Reagan in 1984 returns to challenge Trump

Mavis Belisle protested President Ronald Reagan’s policies outside the 1984 Republican National Convention in Dallas. Forty-two years later, she is preparing to return to the streets, this time to protest President Donald Trump. Next week, Trump and Republicans will gather at the American Airlines Center for the party’s first midterm convention. Demonstrators plan to challenge his administration and its policies, much as they did in when Reagan accepted the GOP's nomination for a second term. “The America that I grew up in hardly exists anymore, but it doesn’t make me want to give up,” Belisle said. “I’m ready to be back out there next week.”

The issues that brought protesters to Dallas in 1984 included Reagan’s military buildup and policies in Central America, poverty, unemployment, homelessness, corporate power, government contracting and gay rights. This year’s demonstrators are organizing around immigration, war, civil rights, economic hardship and concentrated political power. The language and targets have changed. But the question of whether government is serving ordinary people has not. Belisle, 82, an Oak Cliff resident, has spent decades protesting. She helped lead one of the largest acts of civil disobedience in Texas history at the Comanche Peak nuclear plant near Glen Rose. She later became executive director of the Peace Farm, a nonprofit focused on nuclear weapons and hazardous waste. In 1984, she recruited and trained demonstrators as a member of the Dallas March and Rally Committee. She rallied against Reagan’s military policies and the defense budget, which she believed contributed to poverty and economic inequality. Organizers worked out of a small office on Ervay Street, not far from the city convention center. The cramped space became a hub for organizing peacekeepers. “By being present at the same time and place that the Republican Party was, we could show those alternatives,” Belisle said. She spent long, hot days that August moving between rallies, marches and a nearby tent city.

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Dallas City Hall relocation debate stalls as August deadline passes without manager's report

The debate over whether to relocate City Hall appears stuck in a public standstill. Back in June, City Manager Kimberly Bizor Tolbert explicitly told the Dallas City Council she did not want the City Hall debate to drag on past August. In the same June 10 meeting, council directed Tolbert to return by Aug. 26 with specific information on relocation plans and possible leasing options. August has now come and gone, and Tolbert's report to the council hasn't happened. City staffers did not present any items to council members for consideration or approval by the Aug. 26 deadline. The reasons for the delay are varied, city council members say. One explanation is that estimates to demolish the current I.M. Pei-designed building are coming in higher than city officials expected — "astronomically" high in the words of one council member. If the city exits the site, it could sell the site as is or raze the building and clear the grounds. Creating a blank slate for the site's next incarnation would likely make it more marketable.

In the days since Aug. 26, Dallas Business Journal has repeatedly requested an update from the city on the timeline for City Hall decisions, but has not received a response. When asked where the City Hall process stands, Council Member Paula Blackmon said: "I have no idea." She added that she has asked Tolbert for the report but has not seen it. Council Member Cara Mendelsohn, who like Blackmon opposes moving out of City Hall, told the DBJ on Sept. 3 that she believes City Hall plans are not being presented to council because demolition costs are coming in "astronomically higher" than what city staff anticipated. To date, the city has not released any costs estimates for demolition or moving out of City Hall. Dallas City Council Member Gay Donnell Willis told WFAA in an interview that aired Aug. 30 that the council should get proposals on properties to consider "in the next week or so." She called the process a "thoughtful, exhaustive, public process," adding that the long-term savings of exiting the building could be upward of "hundreds of millions of dollars."

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Board approves $60M for Spurs arena site as McKee-Rodriguez calls vote a 'betrayal'

The city is closer to buying the land for a new San Antonio Spurs arena. The Midtown Tax Increment Reinvestment Zone (TIRZ) board of directors voted 7-4 to allocate up to $60 million to acquire the former site of the Institute of Texan Cultures at Hemisfair. The city is still negotiating with the University of Texas Board of Regents for the site, and city staff said a deal is likely to close by the end of this year. City staff estimates that the total acquisition costs, including financing, will be $115.7 million. District 2 Council Member Jalen McKee-Rodriguez, who was appointed to the now 11-member board this week, voted against the measure. Board members Seema Kairam, George Grimes and Joseph Bravo also voted against it.

Just before the vote was taken, McKee-Rodriguez said he requested to join the board to push for more funding for affordable housing projects, which he said is part of why the Midtown TIRZ was resurrected. He called Friday's vote a "betrayal of values." "I think the use of TIRZ dollars for an arena property for the Spurs deviates greatly from the intention of not just the reconstitution, but TIRZ as a whole and the purpose of using these public tax dollars," he said. A TIRZ collects projected future tax growth within a defined boundary. A board then takes applications from public and private developers to partially fund projects. District 1 Council Member Sukh Kaur, who chairs the board, said she backed the measure as an economic development tool and predicted the vote would split along Project Marvel lines. The vote comes as the city weighs extending the Midtown TIRZ lifespan, which expires in 2041. The city's financial team estimates that pushing that further out to 2060 would unlock about $580 million in additional funds for public and private development. The board also voted to earmark $10 million each for expansion projects at the San Antonio Zoo, San Antonio Botanical Gardens and the Brackenridge Park Conservancy. A city council vote on the TIRZ extension is due in the fall.

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Sources: Big 12 withdraws federal suit against Texas Tech

The Big 12 has withdrawn the federal lawsuit it filed against Texas Tech in June, sources told ESPN's Pete Thamel on Monday. The suit was intended to allow the league to enforce its own rules amid former quarterback Brendan Sorsby's legal quest for eligibility. All issues related to the suit have been handled internally and the conference is moving forward, sources added. Sorsby was ruled permanently ineligible by the NCAA in April after he acknowledged placing more than 9,000 wagers totaling at least $90,000 on professional and college sports over four years. Sorsby was issued a temporary injunction by a Texas court to clear his path to play for the Red Raiders, but when the Big 12 filed in federal court with aims to punish the quarterback and Texas Tech, he withdrew his suit and declared for the NFL supplemental draft, which the league ultimately decided not to hold. He previously said he is preparing for the 2027 NFL draft.

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Texas native and convicted fraudster Elizabeth Holmes subject of new shocking documentary

A new documentary about Elizabeth Holmes, the disgraced Theranos founder who was sentenced to more than 11 years in prison for multiple counts of fraud, is set to be released next month. Holmes, who began her prison sentence on May 30, 2023, is seen speaking to filmmaker Nathan Fielder at her home in the trailer for A24’s You Can See Everything, which is expected to hit theaters in October. The clip, released on Sunday, Sept. 6, shows Holmes speaking to Fielder while sitting on a couch. “I’m not that person, I can promise you that. I don’t have anything to deceive you on, of course I’m not deceiving you,” she says in a close-up shot in the teaser. Holmes adds, “I’m engaging with you as a human being. Why would I deceive you? There’s no reason for me to do that.”

“Okay. Alright. Okay, good chat … You’re being real right now?” Fielder replies. Never miss a story — sign up for PEOPLE’s free daily newsletter to stay up-to-date on the best of what PEOPLE has to offer, from celebrity news to compelling human interest stories. Holmes then insists, “I’m always being real,” before the camera panned back to reveal her baby in a bouncer. PEOPLE reported in February 2023 that Holmes had given birth to her second child with her partner, Billy Evans. It’s since been confirmed that the pair had a daughter, named Invicta (Latin for “invincible”), after welcoming their first child, son William Holmes Evans, in July 2021. The trailer’s release came as the documentary’s world premiere took place at the Telluride Film Festival on Sunday night, Deadline reported. The movie was unveiled at a top-secret screening, per the outlet.

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Central Texas is rejecting Flock cameras. What will Austin do?

At least five more Central Texas cities have moved to end or pause their use of Flock Safety’s automated license plate reader cameras in recent weeks, adding momentum to a backlash against the company — and the surveillance technology it sells — that has spread from local privacy advocates to the governor’s office. The latest wave began Aug. 25 in Pflugerville, where the City Council voted to cancel the city's contract with Flock after a resident requested logs showing which outside law enforcement agencies had searched the city’s data. The following week, after Gov. Greg Abbott ordered state agencies to stop spending money on Flock cameras, officials in Bastrop, Elgin, Manor and Leander moved to sever ties with the company.

In Austin, officials had already decided to part ways with Flock. But leaders have also not ruled out contracting with another vendor—or rejected license-plate-reader technology altogether. The City Council approved new surveillance-technology protections in April, but in the months since, Police Chief Lisa Davis has not publicly said whether the Police Department will recommend another system. Any new agreement would require council approval. Meanwhile, Austin police continue to receive license-plate data from other agencies, even though the Police Department does not directly access an automated license plate reader database. As other Texas cities move away from Flock, Austin is confronting whether to replace its cameras, regulate its indirect access to the data or abandon the technology altogether. The unresolved question has divided Austin’s elected officials but only three Austin City Council members told the American-Statesman they opposed the use of license-plate-reader technology altogether. Six members, along with Mayor Kirk Watson, said they were open to a different system with tighter controls. (Two other council members did not respond.) "This isn't an all-or-nothing conversation," Watson said in a written statement. "Technology can be used in law enforcement to assist in protecting the public and, at the same time, protect the privacy of our people and avoid unintended negative consequences."

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National Stories

Could Vance’s soccer mom bonus nudge married women back to the GOP?

Every Republican is liable to give you a different answer if you ask them what constitutes their party’s “base.” But from a purely demographic standpoint, it’s indisputable: older, married, working-class white men. The picture of the 2024 GOP electorate from The Associated Press’s now defunct VoteCast (a loss sure to be long lamented) is plain about the party’s core: 84 percent white, 56 percent age 50 or older, 53 percent male, 60 percent without college degrees. That’s not a bad thing for the GOP. There are some problematic policy implications with persuadable voters, like, for example, being too blithe about how things like tariffs and mass deportations would play with the broader electorate.

There are some demographic cliffs out there, too — especially as the college-educated voters become a majority of the electorate in coming years. But if you had to pick a single bloc of the electorate as your core, the archetypal Republican stacks up pretty well against his Democratic counterpart from 2024: an older, college-educated, unmarried white woman. The two base groups are about evenly matched, but neither is sufficient to win elections on its own, so they have to start adding on. For Democrats, that tends to mean, most crucially, nonwhite voters (34 percent of the 2024 Democratic vote) and younger men (21 percent). The Democrats’ misadventure with Kamala Harris speaks to how even small shifts in coalition subgroups like those can cause a party to founder. It’s a lesson Republicans may soon learn themselves. The first and most essential addition to the Republican base is married white women. These voters were about a quarter of Donald Trump’s 2024 total, and as a whole, broke 56 percent in his favor compared with 43 percent for Harris.

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Trump officials strip military language criticizing Confederate memorial

The Trump administration has removed language criticizing a memorial to the Confederacy formerly located in Arlington National Cemetery, part of its ongoing effort to reshape portrayals of the Civil War. The Confederate Memorial, a 32-foot bronze statue commissioned by the United Daughters of the Confederacy and unveiled in 1914, was removed from the military cemetery in 2023. Its removal followed a congressional mandate to rid U.S. military property of names and symbols honoring the Confederacy and its leaders. The decision by the bipartisan Naming Commission to remove the statue was based on criticism and backlash over the memorial’s depictions, which included an enslaved woman carrying an infant child of a white officer and an enslaved man following his owner to war.

A Defense Department website and a marker at the memorial’s former site included contextual language describing the sculpture as portraying a “nostalgic, mythologized vision of the Confederacy, including highly sanitized depictions of slavery.” The website also described the two Black figures as enslaved people, including an enslaved woman depicted as a “Mammy,” and it remarked on how the portrayal of the “faithful slave” helped to shape American pop culture. Now, that language has been removed from the website, and the marker in the cemetery has been replaced by a new sign that omits wording critical of slavery and the Confederacy. The website also formerly featured additional context about the sculpture’s symbolism, including a Latin phrase inscribed on it. “An inscription … construes the South’s secession as a noble ‘Lost Cause,’” the website previously read. “This narrative of the Lost Cause, which romanticized the pre-Civil War South and denied the horrors of slavery, fueled white backlash against Reconstruction and the rights that the 13th, 14th and 15th Amendments (1865-1870) had granted to African Americans.”

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Missouri group asks the Supreme Court to let former district maps stand

A citizens group fighting a Republican-led redistricting effort in Missouri is calling on the U.S. Supreme Court to deny a request from GOP state officials to allow new maps to go into effect ahead of the midterms. Last week, the Missouri Supreme Court ruled that voters should elect members of Congress from a 2022 map, not the new map passed by the state legislature during a special session in September 2025. Missouri Secretary of State Denny Hoskins then asked the U.S. Supreme Court to overrule the state court’s decision. Missouri was one of the first states to take up President Donald Trump’s call to engage in mid-decade redistricting efforts ahead of the midterms. The new map would probably give Republicans seven of the state’s eight U.S. House seats, one more than they hold now, by slicing 11-term Democratic Rep. Emanuel Cleaver’s Kansas City district into three parts.

People Not Politicians Missouri, which sued the state over the redistricting plan and the state’s rejection of a petition to put the issue on the November ballot, responded Monday to a petition in front of the U.S. Supreme Court to halt the state high court’s decision.That was the deadline the group had been given by Justice Brett Kavanaugh, who covers this region for emergency appeals. “Now that the Missouri Supreme Court has rejected [Hoskins’] gambit, he asks this Court to deliver him the political victory to which he was never entitled under the Missouri Constitution,” People Not Politicians Missouri asserts in the filing. “This Court cannot and should not reward the Secretary’s scheme to outsmart Missouri voters, Missouri law, and the Missouri Supreme Court by granting Applicants the extraordinary relief they seek.” The citizens group — which collected over 300,000 signatures from Missouri residents to force a referendum on the November ballot — accused Hoskins of filing a last-minute appeal “in the hopes of running out the clock on the judiciary’s tolerance for a last-minute reversion to the 2022 districts.” The group argues that the Hoskins’ decision to block its “timely” referendum from the November ballot violated state laws that give “voters the power to suspend legislation through the referendum process.”

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New Hampshire voters pick nominees as Sen. Shaheen’s exit sparks a scramble for key seats

New Hampshire primary voters are choosing candidates for Congress, governor and the 424-seat state Legislature on Tuesday, and incumbents aren’t the only familiar names on the ballot. U.S. Sen. Jeanne Shaheen’s decision to not seek reelection created a cascade of competitive races. Two of the eight Republicans hoping to replace the three-term Democrat are former U.S. senators she previously defeated: John E. Sununu and Scott Brown. The five-way race for the Democratic nomination includes U.S. Rep. Chris Pappas, whose departure from his 1st Congressional District seat in turn attracted a crowd of candidates. Shaheen’s daughter, Stefany Shaheen, is among those seeking the Democratic nomination for Pappas’ seat, along with former candidate Maura Sullivan. Several other candidates in top races also are making repeat appearances.

Sununu, who spent six years in the U.S. House and one term in the Senate before being ousted by Shaheen in 2008, has this time focused on themes including affordability for housing, healthcare and energy, holding Congress accountable and constituent service. “I’ve been out of politics for 17 years. I’m not worried about reelection,” he said during a campaign stop last month. “I don’t need an appointment or a job. I don’t need to make anyone happy. I need to do one thing: Stand up for the people of New Hampshire.” Brown previously represented Massachusetts, where he won a special election in 2010 after the death of Sen. Ted Kennedy before losing in 2012. He unsuccessfully challenged Shaheen in 2014 and served as ambassador to New Zealand and Samoa during President Donald Trump’s first term. In a July interview, he said he decided to run again because New Hampshire Republicans have no representation in Congress and because, in his view, his experience as a veteran, lawmaker, ambassador and grandfather is unmatched.

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What to expect in Rhode Island’s state primary

Rhode Island Gov. Dan McKee faces a tough Democratic primary challenge Wednesday in his bid for a second full term. Ocean State voters will also choose nominees for a full slate of federal, state and local offices. McKee was elected governor by a wide margin in 2022 after first assuming the role in March 2021 when then-Gov. Gina Raimondo stepped down to become U.S. commerce secretary. He now is at risk of becoming the nation’s first elected governor since 2014 to lose renomination and the first in Rhode Island since 1994. His challenger is Helena Buonanno Foulkes, a former longtime executive with Rhode Island-based CVS. She placed a close second behind McKee in the five-way 2022 Democratic primary. She is the niece of former Democratic Sen. Chris Dodd of Connecticut.

A top issue in the campaign has been McKee’s handling and oversight of the reconstruction of the Washington Bridge, which connects Providence and East Providence and carries 100,000 vehicles per day. McKee closed the westbound bridge in December 2023 after authorities discovered critical structural flaws. Authorities then determined in March 2024 that the bridge would need to be demolished and replaced. State officials initially estimated the bridge would be reopened to traffic this year, but that has since been pushed back to Nov. 2028. Campaign ads have also referenced a 2024 joint investigation of McKee by the state Attorney General Peter Neronha and the state police that found that the governor “personally and directly intervened” in the awarding of a multimillion-dollar state contract, but that he did not violate the state’s bribery or campaign finance laws. Neronha endorsed Foulkes in March. McKee meanwhile has focused on Foulkes’ work at CVS and the company’s alleged role in fueling the opioid crisis. Foulkes’ campaign fundraising and spending has almost doubled that of McKee’s, according to state campaign finance records. Independent polling from the University of New Hampshire shows that Foulkes has maintained a lead over McKee throughout the year, although in the latest poll many voters remained undecided.

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Republicans are making Muslims a campaign issue in the 2026 US midterms

Republican Vice President JD Vance called Abdul El-Sayed, a Muslim and a Democrat running for the U.S. Senate in Michigan, "very, very evil" at a rally last week, accusing him of defending terrorism because of remarks he made after a March attack on a suburban Detroit synagogue. In Texas, Republican Governor Greg Abbott, in ?a close race for another term, attacked a proposed Muslim-led development and called for an investigation into what he described as efforts to create “sharia courts,” a claim disputed by developers and civil rights groups. In Alabama, ?where Muslims make up less than half a percent of the population, U.S. Senator Tommy Tuberville, a Republican running for governor, warned that “the enemy is inside the gates,” referring to what he called radical Islam.

The comments reflect an effort to make Muslims and Islam part of the election debate ahead of the November 3 midterms that will determine whether Democrats can wrest control of Congress from President Donald Trump's Republican Party. Critics say the rhetoric unfairly targets Muslims, while Republicans say they are raising legitimate concerns about security, extremism and the role of religion in public life. Abbott campaign spokesman Eduardo Leal ?said the Texas governor's actions regarding the development were aimed at alleged illegal conduct, not religious beliefs. Muslims number about 5.5 million people in the United States, up from 2.4 million in 2007, according to Pew Research Center. Over the past year, Muslims have gained more political power than at any point in recent memory. New York City elected its first Muslim mayor, Zohran Mamdani, ?while El-Sayed could become the first Muslim senator. Last year, Ghazala Hashmi became the first Muslim woman elected to a statewide office when she became Virginia's lieutenant governor.

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EverBank to combine with WaFd in $3.9 billion reverse merger

Florida-based EverBank Financial has agreed to acquire WaFd, a smaller ?bank in the Pacific Northwest, in a $3.9 billion reverse ?merger transaction, ?the ?companies said on Monday. The deal would create a regional bank with some $75 ?billion ?in assets, the Wall Street Journal ?reported earlier on Monday, citing a statement from the companies. Under the deal, EverBank will merge ?into WaFd, with the latter remaining a publicly traded company ?after changing its name to EverBank Financial Corp and trading under the new ticker ?symbol EVBK on the Nasdaq. Upon completion of the ?transaction, EverBank investors will ?collectively own about 59.2% of the pro forma combined company, with WaFd shareholders owning ?the remaining 40.8%. The companies said the merger, ?which is expected to ?close in early 2027, is projected to increase WaFd’s 2027 earnings ?per share ?by roughly 29% and recoup tangible book value dilution in less than two years.

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Lead Stories

An ‘albatross’ or a GOP turnout force: Trump’s role in Texas midterm elections

Navigating the politics of President Donald Trump is a balancing act for Texas Republicans in the November midterm. Trump is, without dispute, the face of the modern GOP: A powerful figure whom candidates and elected officials have gone out of their way to endear themselves to over the course of three presidential campaigns and two White House terms. He’s also a divisive leader whose popularity has waned in Texas and nationally in a midterm election year with Republican control of Congress on the line. Those opposing pulls will be front-and-center on Sept. 9-10 as the Republican midterm convention — deemed “Trump-a-palooza” by the party’s chair — sets up in Dallas. The president caps off the event with a speech Thursday night.

The convention, a novelty that doesn’t involve the party business typical of a gathering in a presidential year, is expected to contrast what the party sees as GOP wins, with Trump at the helm, against Democratic failures. Texas is playing a closely-watched role in that fight for Washington power as Republican Ken Paxton and Democrat James Talarico vie in a tight U.S. Senate race. RNC spokesperson Zach Kraft says it this way: The midterm event puts “President Trump on the ballot across the country.” “He’s one of the strongest forces for turnout in Republican politics of all time, especially right now, and nowhere is that more true than Texas,” Kraft said. Democrats are — in their own way — capitalizing on his visit to the state. “Whatever role they’re going to try to play to prop him up, we intend to talk on the issues,” said Texas Democratic Party Chair Kendall Scudder. “The actions of Donald Trump can speak for themselves.” Whether Trump helps or hurts a Republican candidate depends on the office. But in a political era in which traditional midterm strategies may be less effective, Texas candidates are walking a tightrope. Will they fall?

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Trump administration expands mass deportations with noncriminals

A surge in immigration arrests is sweeping up immigrants with no criminal record whatsoever, including many who were already known by the government, as officers push to meet quotas set by the Trump administration. U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers broke records for the second Trump administration with back-to-back months of arrests topping 50,000 in July and August. But the data undercut a long-running claim by the Trump administration that it is targeting the “worst of the worst” by removing those with criminal records. In fact, more than half of those arrested — 55 percent — had no interaction with law enforcement whatsoever, while another 24 percent have faced charges but were never convicted, according to data obtained by the Deportation Data Project.

These statistics have raised reservations among some Republicans in Congress. “I’ve been telling the administration that do not conflate the gangster with the gardener, the nanny with the narco,” said Rep. Maria Elvira Salazar (R-Fla.), who represents a district where more than half the population is foreign born. It’s a figure that reflects a growing dynamic in immigration enforcement under the Trump administration — going after those with pending asylum claims or are otherwise seeking to adjust their status who are already known to authorities. “What this shows is that the Trump administration is expanding its mass deportation operations away from people who are public safety threats or who have had some interaction with the criminal justice system and towards everybody else in an effort to hit the quotas put on them by the White House,” Aaron Reichlin-Melnick, a senior fellow with the American Immigration Council, told The Hill.

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Democrats have finally figured out their campaign message on data centers

Democrats want voters to see data centers as giant outposts of megacorporations that enjoy undue tax breaks and ill-begotten monstrosities that suck up precious water and hog electricity. After months of probing and message-testing, Democrats are aligning on a few key thematic attack lines as they figure out how to take advantage of a fast-moving issue riling up voters across the political spectrum. The two themes of costs and corruption have dominated politics during President Donald Trump’s second term, and new party guidance makes that strategy even more explicit. In recent days, House Democrats’ campaign arm updated the webpage it uses to quietly communicate with super PACs, signaling them to focus on data centers in 11 different battleground races, either by calling for negative ads that connect data centers with candidate corruption or resource scarcity or requesting more polling on the issue.

And an internal memo from the House Majority PAC, the top super PAC supporting House Democrats, obtained by POLITICO, calls on allies to attack vulnerable Republicans with language that touches the “conspiratorial nerve that runs through the data center discourse among voters.” “The candidates and party that most effectively meets voters where they are on this issue stands to maximize their gains on election day,” HMP deputy director for independent expenditures Jon Bosscher wrote in the memo. “Rather than see this as a distinctive hit, it’s best to understand it as an effective proof point that marries the costs and corruption themes on a high salience issue.” The memo included the results of polling that tested negative messaging on data centers in 24 battleground House districts. The messaging resonated widely with voters, especially in top Democratic targets in the Midwest, including the Ohio seats held by Republican Reps. Max Miller and Mike Carey and the Michigan seats held by Republican Reps. Tom Barrett and John James, who is running for governor in the state.

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What Gina Hinojosa’s deeply personal new campaign ad doesn’t say

There’s something striking about Gina Hinojosa’s much-buzzed-about new campaign ad—in a story about loss, there is something missing. The ad starts off somber: Hinojosa tells us about her first pregnancy, 23 years ago, and how it turned tragic. “The doctor said, ‘I need you to understand she’s not gonna live,’?” she recalls, her voice catching. “And I did understand that I was making that choice. I chose her.” This segment is spliced against footage of the candidate with her husband, John; then, alone in a room, sunset pouring through the window, she tells us the baby died shortly after birth, just as her doctor said she would. Halfway through the ad, there is a distinct tonal shift. Her daughter, who didn’t make it, is the reason she fights now, she says. The music turns energetic, even jocular. “She is why I fight for every Texas family—for their right to send their kids to good neighborhood schools. For an economy where their kids can afford to stay. Where the powerful don’t get to tell the rest of us how to live.” Notably absent from this list of rights: the reproductive ones, now nearly nonexistent in the state of Texas, that two decades ago allowed Hinojosa to choose to bear her sick daughter, who was sure to die. Now, she would likely be forced to do so.

Hinojosa is, of course, excruciatingly aware of this fact. The first time she chose to publicly speak about the loss of her daughter, it was 2021, and Senate Bill 8—the so-called Texas Heartbeat Act, which banned abortion beginning at about six weeks of pregnancy—was making its way through the Legislature. On the floor of the Texas House, Hinojosa, a Democratic state representative, shared her story in much greater detail than her recent ad allows. She and her husband had learned late in the second trimester that their baby had trisomy 18, a genetic condition, and that she would not survive outside the womb. She took a week to pray, consult her priest, and discuss with her husband and family. She decided to continue the pregnancy. But she would never judge another woman for choosing differently. “It was in making that choice that I experienced God’s grace. It was in making that choice that I found my own strength. And why would we take that opportunity, that choice, away from anyone, from any woman in this state?” She noted she may not even have been “standing here today” had she not been permitted to make that choice. There was an implication, just as there is in the new ad, that the experience shaped her in some determinative fashion, making her the sort of person who wanted to run for public office and fight for the passage of bills that could improve the lives of others. It is a story of unimaginable loss and the grit that it takes to move through something unimaginable. This is the framing promoted by Hinojosa and her campaign, which did not make the candidate available for an interview, though it did send a statement to Texas Monthly.

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State Stories

Fear of deportations adding to Texas construction worker shortage

Veronica’s favorite part about being a construction worker is watching people’s reactions to the new house she helped build. She watched her late husband do drywall and demolition while she was pregnant with her middle child, having recently immigrated from Honduras to seek out a life free from violence. Veronica liked how every day was something different, so the Dallas woman decided to turn construction into her career. But today she is more afraid of being deported than ever before, and of what that would mean for her three children. “Day to day I live with an on-edge anxiety,” Veronica said in Spanish. “I can’t go to work because I’m a single mother. My children depend on me.”

Veronica — who asked to be identified by her first name because of her immigration status — is not the only construction worker who is afraid to come to work. The fear sparked by enhanced immigration enforcement under President Donald Trump’s administration has added pressure to a preexisting labor shortage in the construction industry. The shortage has led to delays, a decrease in building quality and an inability to meet the housing needs of a growing North Texas, according to labor and construction experts. Demand for data centers, housing and commercial and infrastructure projects pulls at North Texas construction firms. Meloni Raney, president and CEO of the Texas construction industry trade association TEXO, said she’s never seen the workforce stretched so thin. “The past two years have been extremely overwhelming,” Raney said. “We are very blessed to be in Texas with the economy and everybody moving here, but it has put a big strain on construction.” That trend holds true across the country. Even with the housing market down, the residential construction sector needs to add 740,000 workers a year to meet demand nationwide. Immigrants made up 38.6% of all construction workers in Texas in 2024, according to the American Community Survey, an annual survey conducted by the U.S. census. When it comes to blue-collar jobs, immigrants represent 50.2% of the Texas construction industry.

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Harris County commissioners may approve highest tax rate in 20 years

Harris County commissioners will consider a nearly 8% property tax rate increase next Tuesday in a bid to bridge a more-than $180 million deficit projected for the next fiscal year. The Office of Management and Budget is recommending commissioners approve a combined rate of 67 cents per $100 in appraised value, according to agenda documents published Tuesday. The rate would be the highest since at least 2006, and represents a roughly12% higher tax bill for the median homeowner, should commissioners approve the budget office's recommendation.

The proposed rate is 7.6% higher than last year, and coincided with a 1% decrease in valuations for existing properties, according to the proposed budget for fiscal year 2027. State law limits the property taxes the county can collect each year. Since this cap is calculated using last year's total tax revenue, a decrease in property values gives commissioners more room to increase the tax rate. Commissioners have authority over four distinct taxing entities: The county itself — which accounts for a majority of the combined rate — Harris Health, the Port of Houston and the Harris County Flood Control District. The county accounts for a little over 60% of the proposed increase, with Harris Health responsible for a majority of the remainder. At least some of the proposed increases stem from voter-approved bond initiatives for county projects, such as the $2.5 billion flood bond passed in the wake of Hurricane Harvey and another $2.5 billion bond approved by voters in 2023 to fund a new hospital for Harris Health, according to budget documents. The proposed tax rate increase alone would not bridge the county's budget deficit. Officials are also considering raising fees for various county services, including engineering permits, and selling underutilized property to help bridge the projected gap for the next fiscal year, which begins Oct. 1.

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HISD strategic initiatives chief Orlando Riddick resignsq

Houston ISD Chief of Strategic Initiatives Orlando Riddick, who joined the district the day of the state takeover, has resigned. Riddick, who joined on June 1, 2023 when the state tapped Mike Miles as superintendent, served as a regional chief supervising different schools. In 2025, he was promoted to be the "Chief of Strategic Initiatives." In that role, Riddick was the point person for Miles' new vision for school autonomy, which allows schools to turn over their operations to outside nonprofits in exchange for greater decision-making authority — rather than HISD's central office making decisions for those schools. HISD did not respond to questions sent Aug. 20 about Riddick's departure, and Riddick did not respond to a request for comment. His resignation agreement, effective Aug. 4, does not detail why he left.

Riddick helped present details about the new school partnerships, which are allowed under a 2017 law, to the board of managers in spring 2026. HISD received state approval for partnerships for four high-performing high schools and a pre-K partnership with community child care centers. Under the resignation agreement, Riddick will receive the remainder of his salary for the month of August at his 2025-26 salary rate; a payout of his unused leave and vacation days; and any incentive compensation he earned for his performance last school year. Riddick earned $246,844 last school year; at that rate, he earned about $20,570 a month. In addition to Houston, Riddick has worked in Austin, Dallas and Cedar Hill ISDs, according to the Midland Reporter-Telegram. He was Midland ISD's superintendent from 2017 through 2020. Under his tenure, Midland ISD's elected board agreed to partner with the charter network Miles started, Third Future Schools, allowing it to operate an in-district charter school in Midland. (Midland ISD has multiple partnerships with Third Future Schools and other external groups under a 2017 law, according to the Texas Education Agency.) Riddick was one of at least two former Midland ISD administrators hired by Miles.

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TWIA makes key decision on coverage for 53,620 second homes, beach cabins

On the same day Tropical Storm Edouard hit Southeast Texas, a Texas Windstorm Insurance Association committee has removed a proposal that could have changed wind-insurance eligibility for 53,620 second homes statewide — including 22,632 policies in Galveston, Jefferson and Chambers counties. The proposal would have required TWIA residential policies to be limited to owner-occupied homesteads, putting coverage for vacation homes, beach cabins, rental properties and other secondary residences in doubt. Instead, TWIA’s Legislative and External Affairs Committee voted Tuesday to remove the proposal from consideration for its Biennial Report to the Texas Legislature.

Among the proposals the committee voted to remove was one that would have limited TWIA residential policies to owner-occupied homesteads: Secondary Home Coverage: Modify the property types eligible for TWIA coverage to require residential policies to be owner-occupied homesteads. The committee’s action leaves current TWIA eligibility rules in place and means the secondary-home restriction will not move forward as one of its recommendations to the TWIA Board. The proposed restriction had been especially significant for owners of beach cabins and weekend homes on Bolivar Peninsula and on Crystal Beach, where many properties depend on TWIA for wind coverage. The committee forwarded five topics to the full TWIA Board for possible inclusion in its 2026 Biennial Report to the Texas Legislature. They involve multidistrict litigation, FORTIFIED home construction, changes to TWIA’s catastrophe-funding structure, its depopulation program and tort reform. The secondary-home coverage proposal is not among those five topics. The committee instead voted to remove it from consideration. TWIA must submit the report to the Texas Legislature, Texas Insurance Commissioner and Sunset Advisory Commission before the next legislative session. The association’s most recent Biennial Report was published in 2024, ahead of the 2025 legislative session. Under state law, the report must include proposed changes to laws regulating TWIA, the reasons for those changes and any information the Texas Department of Insurance asks the association to address.

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Developer Ray Washburne: mayor's race is enticing but no plans to run

Developer Ray Washburne says he would like to be Dallas mayor but does not plan to enter the 2027 race, at least for now. “I’d very much enjoy being mayor of Dallas, but I just don’t think that’s something that I need to be doing at this time,” Washburne said Sunday on NBC5’s Lone Star Politics. His comments come as he serves as co-chair of the Dallas Host Committee supporting the GOP convention opening Wednesday at American Airlines Center, putting him at the center of one of the city’s highest-profile political events.

The committee reported raising $45 million in private donations, and Washburne said in the joint interview with NBC5 and The Dallas Morning News that organizers expect to cover most of the city’s convention-related costs so Dallas isn’t “on the hook.” Washburne, a former national finance chairman of the Republican National Committee, lives in Highland Park, where he and his family own the Highland Park Village shopping center. To run, he would first have to move into Dallas. The city requires mayoral candidates to have lived in the city continuously for at least six months before the regular filing deadline. Asked why he would consider seeking the city’s top office, Washburne pointed to his lifelong ties to Dallas, the thousands of people employed through his businesses and his investments downtown. Washburne was among business leaders urging Dallas to move municipal operations out of City Hall, saying redevelopment of the site could help revive the southern end of downtown. He proposed relocating city offices to his Founders Square property downtown.

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In race for Texas’ redrawn 35th District, Johnny Garcia says it all comes down to affordability

Riding high on good polling, Democratic candidate for Texas’ 35th Congressional District Johnny Garcia didn’t mince words about what he thought of the GOP’s redrawing last summer of the district he’s running to represent. “They came in, they tried to redraw this district to favor Republicans, and they’re starting to see that their gerrymander turned into a dummy-mander,” Garcia told the Current. The comments from the former Bexar County Sheriff’s Department public information officer came during a rally of progressives near UT San Antonio on Wednesday. Garcia’s remarks also came days after recent polling from the left-leaning House Majority PAC reported Garcia in a virtual tie with his Republican opponent, Carlos De La Cruz.

Garcia said he isn’t surprised by the polling, which puts him at 45% to De La Cruz’s 44%. In the end, he said the TX-35 race comes down to affordability. “We’re seeing Latinos that are fed up and frustrated,” Garcia said. “I’ve been saying it all along, folks just want to be able to make it to Sunday to buy their barbacoa and Big Red, and Republicans forgot that they redrew it as a Latino majority district.” Indeed, nonpartisan elections analysis publication Inside Elections shifted its forecast Thursday from Likely Republican to Lean Republican. “The 35th was redrawn to elect a Republican, but a rebound for Democrats among Latino voters and strong top-of-ticket campaigns … are keeping Bexar County sheriff’s deputy Johnny Garcia in the hunt against Republican Carlos De La Cruz.”

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‘Making private wealth work for public good’: Austin to start imposing new fees for private planes

Austin plans to charge new fees on private and other corporate planes touching down at Austin-Bergstrom International Airport, a move city leaders say will make private aviation shoulder more of the airport’s infrastructure costs. The new fees and revenue, Council Member Vanessa Fuentes says, are intended to make “private wealth work for public good,” as an increasingly busy airport undergoes a multibillion-dollar expansion and renovation. But the new changes would extend beyond private jets Fuentes has targeted. They would also apply to smaller general aviation aircraft, raising concerns that an effort aimed at wealthy travelers could increase costs for recreational pilots, flight students, and other pilots paying out of pocket.

As early as Oct. 1, pilots of non-commercial aircraft could start paying a new landing fee, higher hangar rental fees and a higher fuel rate. The new fees are expected to generate hundreds of thousands of dollars in new revenue for the airport, but general aviation advocates warn they could have unintended consequences for pilots of modest aircraft who lack the financial resources associated with luxury private jet owners. “Our folks don’t typically get to pass along those costs … The vast majority of our folks, it’s coming out of their own pocket each time,” said Tom Chandler, a regional manager with the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association. “It’s a cost of getting to Austin and choosing to do business there as well, or to come in and see a show.” The new fees stem from an Austin City Council resolution, authored by Fuentes, approved in August 2025. It directed the city manager to determine whether the city could raise fuel fees, collect landing fees based on aircraft weight and impose a “surge” landing fee during high-traffic events, such as South by Southwest and Formula 1.

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‘We will kill you’ North Texas man charged over threats to Gov. Greg Abbott

A North Texas man faces a felony charge after authorities said he left two threatening voicemails for Gov. Greg Abbott’s office, including one in which the caller said, “We will kill you,” according to court documents obtained by 3NEWS. Brandon Andrew Miller, 36, of Whitney, is charged with making a terroristic threat intended to influence the conduct of government or place the public in fear of serious bodily injury, according to court documents. The charge is a third degree felony. According to an arrest affidavit, the Texas Department of Public Safety began investigating after the Governor’s Office reported receiving two voicemails on Aug. 21. Investigators said the calls were placed about two minutes apart after regular business hours.

The arrest affidavit states that the caller said in the first voicemail, “You are fired, you worthless f***. Do not try to make our f***ing laws around you getting f***ing money, you worthless piece of sh**. We will kill you. You do not understand what you're putting yourself into. As a people, we are done with your goddamn bulls***. Learn your f***ing place, dog.” According to investigators, the caller left another voicemail about two minutes later. The affidavit states that the caller said, “When I called you a dog, it was not as a person speaking to another person -- I was speaking to you as the animal that you f***ing are! You worthless piece of s***! If you keep f***ing around, you will find out -- you are such a piece of s*** that if I could pull your entrails out through your throat while making you live through it, I would do so. In a f***ing heartbeat.” Denny Morgan, a communications supervisor with the Governor’s Office Constituent Communications Division, provided investigators with a sworn statement Aug. 26. According to the affidavit, Morgan said the voicemails caused concern and left him and other staff members in fear of serious bodily injury.

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Ross fire still burning 14 days later, with over 90,000 acres scorched and more than 150 structures destroyed

A wildfire that sparked near Ross in Palo Pinto County on Aug. 24 has burned at least 90,400 acres and is about 57% contained. It has destroyed more than 150 structures in the area, including homes, forced evacuations in neighboring Jack County and affected local schools, North Texas officials said. The National Weather Service said the Ross Fire is now the second-largest wildfire in North Texas. The Ross Fire has burned at least 90,400 acres in Palo Pinto and Jack counties, with the fire burning near U.S. 180 and FM 919. According to the Texas A&M Forest Service, the fire was 57% contained as of Monday, Sept. 7; 157 structures have been destroyed, 140 structures are damaged, and 453 structures have been saved.

Residents in Jack County along County Road 2210 toward Highway 281 were instructed to evacuate on Tuesday, Aug. 25; however, those mandatory evacuations were lifted a day later as conditions improved. Jack County Emergency Management warns returning residents to stay vigilant as the fire is still burning in neighboring Palo Pinto County. The fire began near Ross in Palo Pinto County just before 1:30 p.m. Monday, Aug. 24, and was initially estimated at 25 acres, according to the Palo Pinto County Emergency Service District. It rapidly expanded to thousands of acres.

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Goldman Sachs exec touts Dallas' 'really bright future' as new campus takes shape

Goldman Sachs is making progress on its new 800,000-square-foot campus in Dallas as it deepens its presence in the city, which has emerged as a key regional financial hub. The firm has a longstanding presence in the Dallas metro area, where it has its second-largest base of employees in the U.S. behind only its New York City headquarters, and the new campus will allow Goldman Sachs to combine two offices into one facility where all the firm's various business units can be situated and collaborate. Ericka Leslie, chief administrative officer at Goldman Sachs, told FOX Business in an interview after visiting the new campus in Dallas as construction continues that "I can't say it enough, I think Dallas is a great place to do business, it really is. The building is beautiful."

"We're in two buildings now, we're going to be able to combine everybody into this state-of-the-art space, and it's right next to the Perot museum, and the city itself is very vibrant. So we're looking forward to it, and we're going to grow there," Leslie said. "It's a growth opportunity for us inside of the United States, and it's a really vibrant place to do business." The new campus will include an auditorium as well as a wide range of amenities, including a wellness center, fitness facility, a backup daycare, multiple spaces offering cafeteria or cafeteria-like services, a coffee bar and outdoor spaces with trees and shade. Employees will be able to park underneath the building and a retail space will be built across the street that offers additional options nearby for those working at the new campus. "I find people want to leave their desk, so to speak, and go to another place, but maybe they only have 30 minutes free, and they want to grab a coffee or have a conversation with people," Leslie said. "There are a lot of places where you can meet up and sit down and be outside or be inside. And I think that's really important to people because it gets hot there in the summer, people don't want to have to walk around outside, it's completely air-conditioned."

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National Stories

Democrats see wider path to take Senate as Trump backlash grows

Senate Republicans in Dallas this week for the party’s unusual midterm election convention could use a good show. Democrats see expanding opportunities with voters irate over the rising cost of living, the country mired in an unpopular war with Iran and President Donald Trump’s job approval polling at a low point. While House control has long been considered in play, the Senate increasingly appears up for grabs in an environment rife with parallels to 2006, a wave election that swept Democrats into power amid a backlash to the Iraq War. The stakes will be high for the president when he takes the stage. Democratic victories would leave him open to a barrage of investigations, a potential impeachment trial, struggles to confirm judicial and cabinet nominees and tough negotiations on budgets.

Trump’s interventions have added to Republicans’ challenges in retaining control. In Texas, his GOP primary endorsement tipped the scales in favor of scandal-plagued Attorney General Ken Paxton, and the Senate election in the usually reliable Republican state is now rated a toss up by nonpartisan analysts like the Cook Political Report. A trade war he just triggered with Canada threatens industries in border-state Senate battlegrounds including Maine, Michigan and Alaska. Still, Democrats face obstacles of their own, among them a Senate map tilted heavily toward the GOP. To gain a Senate majority, they would need to net four seats, including at least three in states Trump won in 2024. Republicans also have a huge financial advantage, including support from well-funded super political action committees, which will allow them to hammer away at Democratic candidates’ weaknesses. Democratic candidate James Talarico is leveraging scandals in Paxton’s record to raise doubts about his character. The Republican state attorney general has been plagued by accusations of infidelity, financial mismanagement and a state impeachment trial on charges approved by the Republican-controlled state House. The Talarico campaign fed the storyline with a cheeky ad featuring surveillance video of Paxton taking an expensive pen another attorney left at a courthouse security checkpoint. Talarico, a soft-spoken Presbyterian minister-in-training, is campaigning as a bridge-builder to independent and disaffected Republican voters. He even hired a former policy aide to current Texas Republican Senator John Cornyn, who Paxton defeated in the party primary after securing Trump’s endorsement.

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Far-left Democrats had a huge summer. Now they have big demands for party leaders

The left wing of the Democratic Party flourished this summer as fed-up liberals in key races across the country have eschewed traditional, more moderate candidates in favor of hard-charging progressives. But behind the scenes, ultra-progressive House members and candidates are pushing their own party leaders to reflect more of that mood — arguing that Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries and his allies are, so far, failing to grasp the demands of far-left voters who showed up in droves this summer. Those liberals watched in alarm in recent weeks as Jeffries publicly disavowed their marquee “Medicare for All” bill while a pro-Israel Democrat was elevated to a key foreign policy role within the caucus. They also argue his allies were working to undermine a pair of progressive candidates in Michigan and California.

“I was very confused and surprised by that,” Rep. Pramila Jayapal, a senior progressive and author of the House’s “Medicare for All” bill, told CNN about the leader’s comments about her signature bill. She added that she has been having “direct” conversations with Jeffries about it. The emerging frustrations on the left offer a preview of some of the pressures that await Jeffries if the party can flip the chamber next year, particularly as a new crop of far-left progressive candidates threaten not to support him for leader post-election. “I think what we’ve seen around the country is that people all over are dissatisfied. They’re not happy with the administration. They’re not happy with the current leadership in the Democratic Party — and are looking for a change,” Dr. Adam Hamawy, a progressive candidate who is likely to win a deep blue seat in New Jersey this November, told CNN. Hamawy is among several candidates fresh off primary victories who have not decided whether to back Jeffries. “Most Democrats, I think, agree that the current leadership is failing to face the moment,” Hamawy told CNN when asked if he’ll support Jeffries. “I have to see what the choices are and what the situation is.”

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Trump posts map that renames New Mexico 'New America'

President Trump posted a map showing New Mexico rebranded as “New America” during a rapid-fire Truth Social storm on Sunday. The post, one of 34 made in less than an hour, showed a map of the southwestern state with the word “Mexico” crossed out and replaced with “America.” The rebrand would be the latest America-themed name change by the president after he ordered that the Gulf of Mexico and Lake Ontario be rechristened the Gulf of America and Lake America, respectively.

The president also changed the name of Lake Ontario to Lake America as a part of an executive order late last month amidst a trade war between the US and Canada, which the lake sits between. What do you think? Post a comment. The president’s Truth Social storm also included a photo of the commander-in-chief’s face superimposed over wrestler Hulk Hogan, with a “MAGA” bandana photoshopped onto his head. Another post showed the borders of Iran reshaped in an outline of the president’s head as the US’ war with the Middle Eastern country continued past the six-month mark. Also featured in the posting were a series of graphs showing purported economic gains made by the admin.

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Armed man charged toward Democratic Ohio governor candidate, law enforcement says

An armed assailant charged toward the Democratic candidate for Ohio governor, Amy Acton, on Sunday during a campaign stop at the Canfield Fair, injuring several people before he was stopped by troopers, the Ohio State Highway Patrol said. The Ohio State Highway Patrol said in a statement that a man it identified as Patrick Havas, 38, forced his way through a crowd, knocking over multiple members of the audience as he moved toward Acton, the state’s former public health director. He had a taser and two pistols, the statement said. The Mahoning County Sheriff’s Office said two handguns and a set of brass knuckles were recovered after his arrest, and “no weapons were ever brandished or even removed from their holsters.”

Havas was taken to the county jail and booked on charges of disorderly conduct and two counts of assault, the highway patrol statement said, adding that no other details were available pending an investigation. Online court records didn’t yet list the case, and it wasn’t clear as of Sunday night whether Havas has an attorney. Republican Gov. Mike DeWine said in a statement.that the man “tried to forcefully push himself” toward Acton as she was speaking at the fair in Canfield, in northeastern Ohio. “Violence or the threat of violence at political or public events is always unacceptable,” he added. The attempted attack is the latest political violence to roil the United States. And the Ohio gubernatorial race is one of the most high-profile races this year as the campaigns enter the final six weeks of campaigning before the election in November. Acton is facing Republican Vivek Ramaswamy, who has parlayed his national name recognition, tech industry connections and alliance with President Donald Trump into a record fundraising haul that he is tapping for advertising spots aimed at the November election. He is using campaign rallies and advertising to criticize Acton. Ramaswamy’s campaign called the incident Sunday unacceptable.

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Far-right AfD wins key German state election but falls just short of majority

The populist, far-right, anti-immigration Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) has surged to a resounding victory in a crucial state election in Germany, but fell just short of winning a majority in its quest to form the country’s first far-right state government since the second world war. The party of Germany’s unpopular chancellor Friedrich Merz, the Christian Democrats (CDU), slumped to a disastrous result in the eastern state of Saxony-Anhalt. AfD’s candidate for governor, Ulrich Siegmund, said “we have written history” and the party had a clear mandate to govern. He told public broadcaster ARD that voters had sent a signal that “things cannot carry on like this”. “A very good campaigner for us in this election campaign was Friedrich Merz,” Siegmund said.

AfD was seeking an absolute majority in the state legislature to govern alone and overcome the so-called firewall of mainstream parties’ refusal to work with the party. AfD in Saxony-Anhalt has been classed as “rightwing extremist” by Germany’s domestic intelligence agency. Final results showed AfD falling three seats short, with 39 lawmakers in an 83-member parliament. Siegmund, 35, said it would not engage in “games” such as a minority government. But it was not evident how its divided opponents could assemble any stable government without it. AfD won 43.8% of the vote, more than double its showing five years ago in the region of 2.1 million people west of Berlin. That was far ahead of Merz’s CDU , which polled 17.2% – losing about half its support – and won 15 seats. The centre-left Social Democrats polled 9.3%, the Greens 8.9% and the Left party 8.6%, winning eight seats apiece.

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Five dead after an Amazon cargo plane veers off MIA runway and smashes into cars

An Amazon cargo plane skidded off the end of the runway at Miami International Airport Sunday afternoon, careening through a wire fence and smashing into several cars on a nearby road, killing five people, injuring five more and causing a full ground stop that halted all flights for hours. The Federal Aviation Administration said flight 7598 from Miami-based cargo transportation company 21 Air, a Boeing 767-300, departed from San Juan, Puerto Rico, earlier in the day. It overran the runway after landing at MIA around 2 p.m. After crossing Northwest 67th Avenue, Miami-Dade Fire Rescue said, the plane “struck multiple vehicles.” Photographs from the scene show crunched cars snarled in chunks of the wire fence that used to separate the airport from the road.

Miami-Dade Sheriff Rosie Cordero-Stutz confirmed Sunday evening in a press briefing with other officials that the crash killed five people. Five others were sent to the hospital, three of whom were in critical condition, said Miami-Dade Fire Rescue Chief Raied “Ray” Jadallah. Several of the casualties were on the ground. The plane crashed into “a couple” of vehicles, trapping people inside, Jadallah said. One of the victims was trapped underneath a car and had to be extracted by technical rescue personnel, the department said in a statement. It was a “complex” search and rescue, extraction and fire, the chief said, emphasizing that it was a “very complex situation.” There was an active fuel leak, which was being addressed as officials briefed reporters around 6 p.m. The pilot and co-pilot were also trapped in the plane, Jadallah said, although it was not clear how long — or the extent of crew members’ injuries. The resulting fire from the crash sent large puffs of black smoke into the air. A firefighter was heard on the radio telling his colleagues, “The plane is on fire. The plane is on fire. Put your game faces on guys.”

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Lead Stories

How Talarico is countering Trump’s midterms convention

James Talarico is planning to counterprogram President Donald Trump’s GOP midterms convention in Dallas with a focus on affordability. The idea from the Texas Democratic Senate candidate and seminarian: host a statewide “Love Thy Neighbor” food drive to offer a contrast with Republicans coming to town and highlight the high cost of groceries, according to plans shared first with POLITICO.

“Next week, billionaire mega-donors and their puppet politicians will gather at a convention in Dallas to clink champagne glasses and toast their own corruption. They’re paying $20,000 for entry to a Billionaire Ball celebrating corrupt tariffs, billionaire tax breaks, and a new forever war that are all driving grocery costs through the roof,” Talarico said in a statement to POLITICO. “We’ll be doing something different. We’re bringing Republicans, Democrats, and Independents together to collect groceries for our neighbors who have been screwed over by corrupt politicians.” The campaign said it will “mobilize volunteers to collect, sort, and donate groceries for middle class Texans struggling with the high price of groceries.” The event will last from Sunday, Sept. 6 through Wednesday, Sept. 9 — the same day the GOP convention kicks off. Talarico is also expected to field media interviews in a large warehouse near the convention. “Texans across the political spectrum will come together to build community, show up for their neighbors, and take power back for working people,” the campaign said in a statement. A recent poll conducted by Texas Public Opinion Research poll released last week showed Talarico leading ,his opponent Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, 48 percent to 42 percent. Trump this week said he would campaign for Paxton soon.

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Trump’s first major midterm money move: A $10M Texas Senate ad blitz

The political group associated with President Donald Trump is spending $10 million on television and digital advertisements in the Texas Senate race, according to a Saturday filing with the Federal Election Commission. This is the first significant spending in a premier general election contest by MAGA, Inc., and reflects how a once-safe Republican seat in Texas may be viable for Democrats with the candidacy of James Talarico , a 37-year-old state representative. Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton is the Republican nominee in the race. Trump’s endorsement helped Paxton to defeat the incumbent , Sen. John Cornyn, in a May primary runoff election. Public disapproval of Trump over the economy and the Iran war has been a headwind for many Republican candidates. Voters generally go against the party in control of the White House in midterm elections and Democrats are hoping to gain control of the House and Senate — with Texas being a symbolically powerful indication of how the political map might be expanding this year.

The ads seek to highlight taxes as a dominant issue at a time when many voters have expressed concerns about continued inflation. Talarico has favored higher taxes on wealthier households and the two ads seek to portray him as seeking tax hikes more broadly while claiming that Paxton would give tax breaks to first-time homebuyers and families with children. The key piece of legislation signed into law by Trump last year enhanced and extended many of his expiring tax breaks from his 2017 overhaul. But that measure also increased budget deficits, which has contributed to higher interest rates on the national debt. Trump has also hiked tariffs, which are taxes on imports, to try to raise revenue. “High Tax Talarico wants to take money out of Texans’ pockets. MAGA Inc. is going to ensure Texas knows about Talarico’s radical policies and elects Ken Paxton to the U.S. Senate,” Alex Pfeiffer, a spokesman for MAGA, Inc., said in a statement Saturday. Talarico campaign spokesperson JT Ennis pushed back against the ads’ claims that the Democrat seeks broad tax hikes.

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Republican House candidates tone down Trump on their campaign websites

Why did Mike Beltran, a Republican trying to unseat Rep. Kathy Castor (D-Florida), first decide to run for public office? Earlier this summer, his campaign website offered a clear answer: “Mike felt inspired by President Trump’s 2016 victory.” The former state lawmaker has “stood with President Trump every step of the way,” it said, and is running for Congress to “stand with President Trump to finish making America great again.” Ahead of the general election, that section of his website has been revamped. Now, it says, Beltran “felt called to public service” and is running to be a “champion for lower costs, lower taxes, and increased healthcare access.”

Images of Trump and mentions of “America First” have also been removed from his homepage. At least seven Republican House candidates in battleground races have de-emphasized or removed mentions of Trump and his priorities on their campaign websites ahead of the general election, according to a Washington Post analysis. Candidates from both parties have long shifted messages after a primary to appeal to a broader electorate. But changes this year highlight the particularly challenging balancing act some Republican candidates face. Trump’s unpopularity threatens to turn off independent and moderate voters that Republicans will need to win in competitive congressional districts. The president’s approval rating has hovered in the mid-30s, and he has faced pushback over an unpopular war in Iran. But Republicans also have an interest in not running too far from the president. Trump maintains a strong influence over the party base, with the overwhelming majority of his endorsed candidates winning their primaries. He is also sitting on more than $400 million in his super PAC, MAGA Inc., the lion’s share of which has not yet been allocated for the general election.

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Trump’s state capitalism comes to the oil industry with his unprecedented Venezuela deal

The Pentagon has received a big ownership stake in an obscure private oil company that will control crude reserves larger than ExxonMobil’s global portfolio if President Donald Trump’s Venezuela deal is successful. The deal comes eight months after Washington ousted former Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro in a military raid and co-opted the remaining regime led by interim President Delcy Rodríguez. The Rodríguez government has granted North American Blue Energy Partners, headquartered in Barbados, concessions to 17 oilfields in Venezuela for a century. NABEP’s CEO, Alejandro Betancourt, is a controversial figure who has faced investigations into his past ventures.

NABEP has in turn granted the Pentagon’s Office of Strategic Capital a 35% equity stake at no cost to the U.S. taxpayer, according to deal details released by the White House this week. The Trump administration has taken ownership stakes in companies at an unprecedented pace, particularly for a Republican administration, outside major crises like the world wars and Great Depression and Recession. It has argued such deals are needed to secure resources critical to national security. But it is difficult to find a historical precedent for the U.S. government taking a direct ownership stake in an oil company, not to mention one that will operate fields in a foreign nation, said Tyler Priest, a historian of the oil industry at the University of Iowa. The deal gives the U.S. majority control over 65 billion barrels of Venezuela’s proven crude reserves, the White House said. This is about 20% of the 303 billion barrels the country is thought to possess. If the White House figures are accurate, NABEP would be the second-largest oil company measured by proved reserves in the world behind Saudi Aramco, said Patrick Rutty, director of global intelligence at Enverus. It would be around four times larger than Exxon’s reserves, Rutty said.

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Without Charlie Kirk, Turning Point is building a future for his movement — and for JD Vance

Charlie Kirk sat before a Salt Lake City audience of restaurateurs last September 10, dispensing business advice drawn from his own unlikely rise. The conservative activist argued that a company needed a deep connection to the founder’s “energy and vision” to endure, but he also warned that “separating the brand from the founder” was among the greatest challenges an entrepreneur could face. “We have not done this successfully yet,” Kirk acknowledged of Turning Point USA, the organization he built to influence and mobilize young people.

Hours later, a gunman fatally shot Kirk on a Utah college campus. He was 31. In the year since his death, Turning Point’s leaders — including Kirk’s widow, Erika, and some of his closest friends and lieutenants — have confronted the very challenge he described that tragic morning: preserving and expanding a political movement that had been built, to an extraordinary degree, around the energy, instincts and celebrity of its charismatic leader. They have done so amid remarkable circumstances, including the criminal case against Kirk’s alleged killer; conservative influencers warring over his legacy; and far-right figures, led by former Turning Point employee Candace Owens, spreading baseless conspiracy theories about his death. The 2026 midterm elections present the biggest test yet of the question hanging over the organization: What is Turning Point without Charlie Kirk?

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State Stories

Fake RNC midterm convention website redirects to DOJ Epstein files

A fake website for the Republican National midterm convention, gopdallas2026.com, was redirecting visitors to the U.S. Department of Justice's Epstein Library on Friday. It is unclear when the redirect first appeared or who is responsible for the creation of the alternate webpage. The official RNC midterm convention website is gopconvention.com. According to the internet archive Wayback Machine, the fake website includes a statement at the bottom: "This website is an independent informational resource and is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or operated by the Republican National Committee (RNC), the 2026 RNC Midterm Convention, the American Airlines Center, or any official convention entity. For official convention information, please visit the appropriate official websites."

The official website is intended to provide information about the Republican Party's first-ever national convention ahead of the midterm elections, which is scheduled to take place in Dallas on Sept. 9 and 10. The event is expected to draw about 20,000 visitors, including President Donald Trump, Vice President JD Vance and other Republican leaders, as the party seeks to energize voters in races that will help determine whether Republicans retain control of Congress. The fake website currently redirects users to the Justice Department's online repository of records related to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. The files have been a persistent problem for the president, who has repeatedly denied knowing about Epstein's sexual abuse of girls. He and Epstein had been close, though Trump said the friendship had ended.

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Trump’s convention comes to Dallas. What will Eric Johnson make of it?

Mayor Eric Johnson declared himself a Republican three years ago in a county Democrats have dominated for two decades. Now, he is preparing to welcome his party — and President Donald Trump — to Dallas. The two-day, first-of-its-kind GOP midterm gathering gives Johnson more than a turn in the national spotlight. It offers him a chance to promote the city, strengthen his standing among Republicans and stoke speculation about what comes next. “Big moments don't intimidate Dallas. In fact, they inspire us,” Johnson said last month.

GOP organizers say Johnson will speak at the convention, which opens Wednesday, though they have not released the full schedule. The night before, he is hosting a “country casual” state Republican Party fundraiser at a craft brewery. For Johnson, the convention draws attention to key parts of his political profile: the party switch, his future after City Hall, the Republican Mayors Association he created and his record in Dallas. The former Democratic state legislator switched parties less than five months after he was elected to a second term as mayor, a nonpartisan post. The party swap made Dallas the most populous U.S. city led by a Republican. Johnson has often cited the 2020 protests after George Floyd’s death and calls by racial justice activists to cut police funding as reasons for his disaffection with the Democratic Party. He carried his criticism of Democrats on public safety into his 2024 Republican National Convention speech in Milwaukee, using Dallas’ declining violent-crime rate to contend that American cities need Republicans. This time, the question is whether he uses the midterm event to expand his message.

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Kelly Keel to lead Texas Association of Business as CEO and president

The Texas Association of Business has a new leader to advocate for business interests across the state. The organization announced on Sept. 4 that Kelly Keel is the new CEO and president. She officially takes the role on Oct. 2. Keel previously was the executive director of the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality. She has spent 25 years working for the commission. As the TCEQ executive director she managed the day-to-day operations of the commission which includes oversight of 3,200 employees, 16 regional offices and an annual budget of $665 million. The role had her working closely with Texas businesses on permits related water, air and infrastructure needed for projects in the state.

The TAB job was opened after the previous full-time TAB president and CEO, Glenn Hamer, resigned in 2025 after he was sued over allegations of sexual assault. Following Hamer's resignation, TAB had Megan Mauro serve as interim CEO. She previously was the group's vice president and chief of staff. "There is no better time to be leading the most dynamic and important business community in the country," Keel said in a statement.. "Texas employers are the driving force behind the world's 8th largest economy, and deserve a strong, unified voice at the capitol that can navigate the complex legislative and regulatory challenges our businesses face as Texas continues our unprecedented population and economic growth. I am honored to take on this role and look forward to working on behalf of Texas business to ensure our state remains a global leader and the national model for cultivating a pro-business environment." Keel is an Austin resident and earned both a bachelor's degree and a master's degree from Texas A&M University.

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Hinojosa promises to recover TX public schools from Abbott’s tenure as governor

Democrat state Rep. Gina Hinojosa stopped at a Dallas park Thursday, Sept. 3, to lay out her plan to fix Texas public schools if elected to the governorship on Nov. 3. With public school advocates of varying political leanings standing in support of her, Hinojosa said she will fire Texas Education Agency Commissioner Mike Morath on Day One and bring Texas public schools back to the basics of learning. Hinojosa promised to pause the A-F school grading system and replace it with an assessment that brings true accountability. She said she would audit TEA, wipe out all corrupt school vendors and reroute money to make Texas teachers among the highest paid nationally.

“When I’m governor, I will prioritize our kids in the classroom, not vendor contracts, not some corporation’s profits, not testing company profits, but our kids in the classroom and making sure we have a great teacher in the classroom,” Hinojosa said. Three supporters came up to the press conference microphone after the Democratic candidate to say she is the one to elect, not Republican incumbent Greg Abbott. Ashleigh Johnson, a mother of four in the Grapevine-Colleyville school district, said her kids were pushed into an overcrowded school when the district was forced to close its elementary school because of budget shortfalls and declining enrollment. “This time last year, I had no worry whatsoever that my kids’ thriving arts-integrated A-rated public school would be closed, which it was in May with very little warning,” Johnson said. “Now we’re suffering the consequences of over-functional schools. I saw teachers, remarkable tenured teachers, forced out because there was no spot for them.” A lifelong Republican, Johnson said the time has come to vote Abbott out.

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Shots fired at Brownsville commissioner’s home following disannexation vote

Police say someone shot at the home of a sitting Brownsville city commissioner early Saturday morning. In a statement Saturday afternoon, the Brownsville Police Department confirmed an active investigation but did not yet identify the commissioner whose home was in the vicinity of the shooting. “The investigation remains active, and investigators are working to determine the circumstances surrounding the incident and identify suspects in the case,” police said via Facebook, adding later, “… When an investigation establishes that a criminal offense has occurred, the (d)epartment will pursue the appropriate criminal charges against those responsible.”

Mayor John Cowen Jr. in his own statement Saturday said he’s been briefed by police on the situation and acknowledged the current political climate in the city, which as of late has been tense due to a recent disannexation of land as part of a property swap for SpaceX in exchange for hundreds of millions of dollars in water infrastructure upgrades. Although the mayor stopped short of identifying any singular item of recent city business for the shooting, which he said “is being taken seriously,” he did reference “political disagreements.” “Political intimidation and violence — real or attempted — have no place in Brownsville,” he said on Facebook. “Our elected officials, city staff, and every resident deserve to feel safe in their own homes, regardless of political disagreements. “I have full confidence in BPD’s ability to run this investigation down to the facts and hold anyone responsible accountable. I’d ask the community to remain patient as this process unfolds and to share any information with BPD’s tip line rather than speculation on social media. Brownsville is a city that looks out for one another, and we will get through this together.”

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Texas doctor loses license for prescribing ‘abortive’ to patient

A Stephenville doctor’s medical license has been revoked, according to the Texas Medical Board, after he allegedly engaged in an inappropriate sexual relationship with a patient and then prescribed that patient an “abortive.” Texas has a strict abortion ban that prohibits performing or attempting to perform abortion in nearly all cases. The Texas Medical Board on Friday revoked the medical license of William Rockwell Evans, according to an alert from the board. Evans’ physician profile on the medical board’s website lists him as an orthopedic surgeon who’s had an active medical license for 27 years. Evans did not immediately respond to requests for comment made to an email address and a phone number listed under his name.

A call to Evans’ practice — Cross Timbers Orthopaedics in Stephenville — went straight to voicemail on Friday evening. The practice’s website is currently dominated by a message notifying visitors that the office has “closed effective immediately.” Stephenville, in Erath County, is about 70 miles southwest of Fort Worth. The medical board released only a summary of the situation. The board found that Evans had engaged in an inappropriate sexual relationship with a patient and, in December 2023, had prescribed that patient an “abortive.” Under Texas’ strict abortion ban, licensing boards are required to revoke the license of any “health care professional who performs, induces, or attempts an abortion” in violation of the ban. Texas’ near-total abortion ban, which allows abortions only in rare cases of medical necessity, has been in place since 2022. Attempting a prohibited abortion is considered a felony under Texas law. It also carries a penalty of at least $100,000 for each violation. It’s unclear if Evans is facing either criminal or civil penalties in addition to the revocation of his medical license. On Friday evening, Evans’ physician profile on the Texas Medical Board website did not yet include the change to his license status. His profile did include documents from 2020, when the board placed Evans on a remedial plan for allegedly operating on the incorrect knee of a patient and then attempting to cover it up.

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Free Trump convention ticket text is legitimate, GOP says

A text message offering free tickets to see President Donald Trump at next week’s Republican convention in Dallas may look suspicious, but convention organizers say the offer is legitimate. The unsolicited message comes from an unfamiliar phone number, announces “FREE TICKETS” in capital letters and directs recipients to a shortened link — several characteristics commonly associated with scam texts. The destination page is hosted on GOPConvention.com and identifies the gathering as a “first-of-its-kind Midterm Convention.” It says Trump supporters may register for up to six tickets per mobile phone number for either day or both days. The registration form requests a person’s name, email address, mobile phone number, ZIP code and state. It does not request payment information. Registration, however, does not guarantee admission. Each attendee must appear in person, register a credential and comply with security instructions.

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A homeowner got $1 after Texas City demolished his home. Now a jury will reconsider that.

A federal court last week ruled that a Texas contractor who received $1 after Texas City demolished his home has the right to have a jury, not a judge, determine compensation. Michael Ramirez sued Texas City in October 2023 after officials demolished his fire-damaged house five months earlier. Ramirez argued that the city violated his due-process rights by demolishing the house without giving him additional notice. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit ruled Thursday that a lower court incorrectly denied Ramirez a jury trial to determine whether he was entitled to compensation and sent the case back to the Texas Southern District Court.

Ramirez, a contractor who renovates and sells properties across the state, purchased the house with plans to renovate and sell it. The property was damaged in a fire in 2022, and Texas City officials deemed the structure substandard. He maintained that the house could still be repaired. According to Pacific Legal Foundation, a nonprofit law firm representing him, Ramirez hired an architect experienced in restoring fire-damaged properties and began working to obtain permits to renovate the house. Almost a year later, on May 9, 2023, the city demolished the property. Texas City officials couldn't immediately be reached for comment on Saturday. Ramirez argued he was not given notice or an opportunity to remove tools and construction materials from inside the house. Pacific Legal Foundation said the property was worth more than $167,000 at the time and contained an additional $15,000 worth of tools and construction materials. Ramirez later filed a lawsuit alleging that Texas City violated his Fourteenth Amendment right to due process. The state’s Southern District Court agreed that the city violated Ramirez’s due process rights but denied his request for a jury trial. Instead, the court awarded him $1 in damages.

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Data center developer withdraws Taylor annexation request, still eyes big project there

Developers behind a 665-acre data center in Taylor have withdrawn an application to annex into city limits. But Taylor officials and the developers maintained they will continue to negotiate an agreement to avoid building under county purview with less regulations. What's been called "Project Mustang" from South Dakota-based Big Watt Digital LLC and Virginia-based PowerHouse Data Centers is still moving forward at 3301 Farm to Market Road 112, just east of the city's limits, about 30 miles northeast of Austin. The project was brought before the city's planning and zoning commission last month for annexation and zoning consideration, but a vote was tabled amid a wealth of opposition primarily from neighbors.

The project has been described as a "closed campus for data center buildings, substations, gas infrastructure for power generation and auxiliary buildings" and "includes data center facilities that would house computer servers and on-site power generation equipment to meet the facility’s electricity needs." Representatives said during the Aug. 18 special meeting it would use roughly 13,450 gallons of water per day after an initial 1.6 million-gallon fill for a closed-loop system, and would include ample setbacks and on-site power generation. It would also create up to 500 full- and part-time jobs at full buildout on top of thousands of construction workers. They also cautioned they would move forward with or without city participation. "This is such a good site that it would be difficult to walk away from it," Big Watt's John Stokes said during the meeting. City officials on Sept. 3 announced the developers had pulled back the requests for annexation and zoning and are still pursuing the development.

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Vikki Goodwin campaigns on support for marijuana reform at ‘Legalize It’ rally

The Democratic candidate running to become Texas’s next lieutenant governor is drawing a clear contrast with the Republican incumbent on the issue of cannabis. Vikki Goodwin, who is currently a state representative, will be holding what her campaign calls a “Legalize It” rally in Houston on Saturday. It will feature a performance from Grammy award-winning musician Kam Franklin and an update from an attorney helping to lead litigation against hemp THC product restrictions that were recently enacted by Texas officials. A press release from Goodwin’s campaign calls out “pharmaceutical and alcohol industry donations” to her opponent, Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick (R), who oversees the Senate and has championed legislation to recriminalize many hemp products.

While the bill Patrick favored was ultimately vetoed by Gov. Greg Abbott (R), the governor then issued an executive order on the issue and regulators have since enacted significant restrictions on derivatives from the crop. “Join us to Ban Dan and elect the only one who can stop the THC ban, Vikki Goodwin,” the campaign said of the Houston event, which is expected to be the first of several cannabis-focused rallies in major urban areas of the state. Meanwhile, Goodwin is also endorsing a local measure on Houston’s November ballot to make misdemeanor marijuana possession the “lowest possible enforcement priority” and ban no-knock warrants. “We should not be wasting public resources and ruining lives over low-level cannabis possession. We should not be barging into people’s homes with no-knock raids that escalate danger for both residents and law enforcement,” she said. “Houston voters have an opportunity to lead the state with a smarter, safer approach to public safety. I believe in local government, and communities should have the power to demand policies that reflect their values and prioritize safety and dignity.”

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Months past first deadline, Abbott says Capitol ban lawsuit moot after bans expire

Gov. Greg Abbott, who also chairs the Texas State Preservation Board, on Monday filed a motion to dismiss a federal lawsuit brought against the board by three women who were banned from the state Capitol following an anti-redistricting protest in Aug. 2025. In a May lawsuit, the plaintiffs said they were arrested at that protest, but that the Travis County Attorney’s Office declined to prosecute the misdemeanor trespass charges against them. “Despite the dismissal of the charges, DPS’s one-year criminal trespass notice remains in effect against each of the women. The ban prohibits them from entering the Capitol complex,” the lawsuit says.

The notices are not criminal charges; rather, they’re warnings that DPS would charge someone with trespass if they return to the Capitol. The only apparent way to challenge them is via civil lawsuit. An assistant attorney general wrote Abbott’s response. It argues that, since the notices expired on Aug. 19, the case becomes moot as there’s nothing for a court to enjoin or rescind. “The CTNs expired by their own terms … that expiration moots Plaintiffs’ requested relief seeking to enjoin their enforcement and to rescind them,” the motion states. It’s important to note that the court, on May 27, extended its initial June 2 deadline for defendants’ response to the lawsuit until July 2, according to court records. On June 23, the Attorney General’s Office requested another extension on Abbott’s behalf. It was granted on July 1, which again pushed the deadline to Aug. 31. In total, Abbott and the board received nearly three extra months. During those months, several Texas Legislative committees held meetings and hearings related to interim charges of two of Abbott’s co-defendant board members, Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick and House Speaker Dustin Burrows. The lawsuit argues that the bans would impair plaintiffs’ ability to perform their duties as political party officials and organizers. It’s possible those duties could include the interim public meetings. “Restricting access to this environment does not merely limit physical presence; it disrupts the full range of expressive activity that defines democratic participation in Texas,” the lawsuit says.

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City Stories

Terry Black's Barbecue to go toe-to-toe with Black's Barbecue

Austin-based Terry Black's Barbecue will open its newest location in New Braunfels on Sept. 15. Plans for the 8,649-square-foot space at 1310 E. Common St. were filed with the Texas Department of Licensing and Regulation in November 2025. Renovations to the former Los Cucos Mexican restaurant included adding a 1,400-square-foot pit house and a two-story outdoor dining space with additional seating. Construction costs are estimated at $5 million, according to TDLR. San Francisco-based Gensler served as the project's design firm. Mike Black, co-founder of Terry Black’s Barbecue, said the company had its eye on New Braunfels for a while. “It’s a city with deep Texas roots, a strong sense of community and a lot of energy behind it. We’re proud to plant some roots here ourselves and can’t wait to start serving New Braunfels," he said in a prepared statement.

Like other restaurants in the area, Terry Black's can bank on hungry customers from the nearby Schlitterbahn water park. The new Terry Black's will be a stone's throw from Black's Barbecue, the oldest family-owned barbecue restaurant in Texas and the Black family's original business, founded in 1932. Mike Black split from the original operation in 2014, founding Terry Black's with siblings Christina and Mark Black. The split created two competing barbecue chains within the Black family. The New Braunfels site marks the eighth location that the sibling trio has opened since the chain's founding. Terry Black's operates locations in Austin, Dallas, Lockhart and Waco. In San Antonio, the city's first location is under construction on a vacant lot along the lower Broadway corridor. Work started in September 2025. The barbecue restaurant is just one piece of the Black family's plans to develop The Mandeville, a three-story hotel with a glass greenhouse dining structure, a spa called The Depths, a pool, and courtyards, according to architectural renderings submitted to the Historic and Design Review Commission in July 2026.

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National Stories

'Hidden tribunals': Immigration court due process in tumult with new locations

Immigrants are being told last minute about new in-person hearings at previously undisclosed courtroom locations. That's according to five immigration attorneys who reviewed notices or observed the hearings and spoke to NPR about them. The last-minute notifications appear to be another tactic in a broader strategy from the Trump administration to short-circuit immigrants' already limited due process options to speed up arrests and deportations. NPR has learned that over the past few weeks, immigrants who were scheduled to appear in coming months for hearings out of the Hyattsville and Baltimore immigration courts in Maryland and the Sterling court in Virginia have instead been rescheduled to two other buildings: one in Washington, D.C., and another in Falls Church, Va.

Neither of these buildings currently has an immigration court that's set up for in-person hearings. The D.C. location has no listed affiliation with the Justice Department. Instead, the building is listed as being occupied by the Federal Emergency Management Agency, according to one source familiar with the project who was not authorized to speak publicly. Immigrants were notified about the change in location within days of the newly scheduled appointments — or were not notified at all, in at least two cases identified by NPR. Kel White, an officer of the D.C. chapter of the American Immigration Lawyers Association, attended one such hearing this week. "The most unusual thing I've ever seen" in her more than 15 years of practicing the law is how she described having an immigrant appear in person at the unusual location before a judge and prosecutor who were remote-only. She also said the last-minute changes and lack of notice violates regulations as set by the Justice Department, which oversees all such immigration courts. "People need to receive at least ten days' notice in order for there to be a response," White said. She cited a policy manual that indicates immigrants should get ample notice of a new hearing date.

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Trump officials draft plan to pay at-home parents, using funds for working ones

The Trump administration is moving to allow married couples with a stay-at-home spouse to collect child care subsidies, a policy championed by Vice President JD Vance, using funds from a federal program intended to assist working parents, according to people familiar with the discussions. The change would create the only federal subsidy to pay parents to stay home and raise their children, one of the most significant efforts to date by the Trump administration to harness federal funds to promote a traditional view of families. To do so, officials are seeking to use a Health and Human Services Department fund that was created in the 1990s to help low-income and working-class parents afford child care so they could work or go to school.

Under the draft new rule, parents who stay home with their children could benefit from the program, which typically provides about $9,000 per child each year, potentially reshaping which families get federal child care money. The move could end up redirecting money away from working parents and their child care providers, causing some to raise their rates or even close, critics said, potentially worsening what many experts say is a child care crisis in the country. About 80 percent of the 870,000 families who currently get the child care subsidies have single working parents, most of them mothers, according to Health Department data. The policy change would effectively create a government incentive for parents to stay home with their children, an idea embraced as part of a broader conservative effort to advance policies that promote more mothers staying at home. The new rule being drafted would allow married couples with one stay-at-home parent in certain income brackets to collect a subsidy, according to the people, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe the plan before it is finalized. The change could be made without approval from Congress.

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The unlikely winner of Trump’s Canada trade war? MapQuest.

The most-downloaded free apps on the Apple App Store are pretty predictable: Claude, ChatGPT, and TikTok currently rank in the top ten. But this week there has been a surprise guest in first: MapQuest. The navigation app was dominant in the days before GPS-enabled smartphones were in everyone’s pockets, back when when printing out directions from the computer room and bringing them on the road was how you got to a new place. But when tech giants like Google and Apple took over the mobile game, the company — which was sold for more than $1 billion before the dot-com crash — was left behind by most users who just use the GPS apps preloaded on their phones. MapQuest’s unexpected rise began last Thursday — a “normal workday,” says general manager Doug Berger. Then President Donald Trump, amid his economic war on Canada, let it be known that he wanted to change the name of Lake Ontario to Lake America. Berger quickly conferred with his team in Denver and told the world in a post that the company was keeping the name used since at least 1639:

Web-mapping apps have been through all this before; in January 2025, Trump decided that the Gulf of Mexico would now be called the Gulf of America. But for “the sequel,” as Berger calls it, the company has seen a surge of popularity as Google Maps and Apple submit to the president’s whims, as they did with the gulf. “Around 1 million people have downloaded the app since Thursday,” Berger told me the following Wednesday. (In the previous month, some 40 million people used the app, he says.) “I think it’s just a much more loaded moment,” Berger says, explaining why MapQuest has been gaining users during this renaming controversy, but not the last one. The Gulf of Mexico situation did create a stir; Mexican president Claudia Sheinbaum sued Google over the name change, as American authority extends only 12 nautical miles from the shoreline. But this time around, our closest —and most upset — ally to the north has been furious over the attempt to claim Lake Ontario. “I just don’t see the purpose, it’s absolutely backwards,” Canadian Prime Minister Doug Ford said over the weekend. Berger says that he tries to avoid politics in business decisions at MapQuest, which was acquired in 2019 by the web advertising company System1; its other properties include has-been search engines like Dogpile and the infotainment site HowStuffWorks. “Private entities are not required to make name changes like this, and so we haven’t,” he says. As for the capitulation of Apple and Google, he says “we are trying to stay focused on what we can control.” The million new users mark a huge opportunity for MapQuest and its 50 employees — and not just because of the chance to become a household name again. “This is a pretty surreal moment,” he says, “people are talking about geography again.”

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Behind closed doors, John Fetterman shows little interest in the work of a Senator

One morning in June, three paralyzed military veterans in wheelchairs from rural Pennsylvania arrived at the office of Sen. John Fetterman for a long-awaited meeting to discuss legislation that would improve their care. Fetterman’s staff greeted them with bad news: The Pennsylvania Democrat had to cancel. He’d told his staff he may have eaten something bad and wasn’t feeling well, according to people familiar with the matter. Less than an hour after his staffers met with the veterans in his place, Fetterman walked into his office, showing no signs of illness. He had an appointment he didn’t want to miss, he told staff: an interview on Fox News to discuss Israel and the war in Iran. With his hoodie-and-shorts wardrobe and working-class appeal, Fetterman occupies a unique place in a Democratic Party increasingly populated by leftist insurgents. Fetterman often portrays himself as a “regular Democrat” calling out aspects of his party’s progressive fringe—just the profile that past centrists have leveraged in a divided Senate to cut bipartisan deals and score big wins.

But behind closed doors, the first-term senator shows little interest in doing the job beyond cultivating relationships with conservative media figures and advocating for Israel, according to interviews with more than a dozen former staffers and lawmakers, as well as text messages and other internal records. With a pivotal election looming in November that could yield a split Senate and give Fetterman outsize influence, his office is staffed with a revolving door of aides who are constantly scrambling to keep up the face of a functional operation, the interviews and text messages show. Fetterman keeps a light daily schedule, often refusing to meet with constituents and fellow lawmakers, or canceling at the last minute, records and interviews show. Last September, when an aide told Fetterman that officials with the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, known as CHOP, wanted to meet because they were worried about Medicaid cuts, he was dismissive. It marks a contrast to his 2022 campaign, when Fetterman spent long hours traveling to small rural communities, embracing people who felt left behind.

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How a Memphis gambling raid became a sweeping immigration operation

For the people dressed up in sparkly skirts and cowboy boots, Saturday nights were best spent at El Corralón. The cantina, tucked in the middle of Berclair, a heavily Hispanic neighborhood in Memphis, Tenn., was a rowdy joint where the mix of regional Mexican music and bachata was loud, the pool tables plenty and beer cheap enough. Gambling machines jangled by the wall. Then, in recent weeks, neighbors started spotting drones overhead. Suspicious vans parked by the dumpsters. Unfamiliar patrons came in and left quickly. Some in the neighborhood believed the gambling machines, illegal in Tennessee, might make the business a target. But the cantina remained open.

Last Sunday, a crush of agents raided El Corralón, searching for the owner, Marco Sabillon-Urbina, an immigrant from Honduras, but detaining anyone who was in the country illegally. In the end, the operation targeting illegal gambling and drugs spiraled into one of Tennessee’s largest sweeps of undocumented immigrants this year, as Immigration and Customs Enforcement escalates its operations across the country. More than 120 people were detained, inflaming tensions in Memphis, where many residents were already on edge over a separate federal anti-crime task force that, among other things, has also targeted immigrants. “This takes them back to being afraid and not wanting to go out again,” said Jose Salazar, a community organizer who assists the immigrant community in Memphis. “All those fears and concerns are worse now.” Arrests by ICE surged across the country this summer as the Trump administration pulled back from highly visible raids in Minneapolis and other cities earlier this year. The agency has carried out lower-profile operations, including targeting predominantly immigrant neighborhoods like Berclair last weekend.

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President Trump debuts new brown hairdo — and people are shocked

President Trump’s iconic hairdo has seemingly entered its dark age. The president, who is famous for his swooping golden-blond locks, was seen sporting an almost brunette look after Air Force One landed for his weekend getaway to Trump National Golf Club Bedminster on Friday. Trump’s darker mane set the internet ablaze, as it marked one of the few times when he has messed with his trademark hairstyle.

“The hair????” posted journo Yashar Ali. “If I hadn’t pulled the photos from Getty Images myself, I wouldn’t have believed it.” Jeopardy champ Hemant Mehta quipped that “If everyone keeps mocking this, there will be hell toupée.” One user mused that “Summer’s almost over,” and so it is “a natural time to switch from bottle blonde to brunette.” “I love it. So youthful. Very Pierce Brosnan,” author Annie Lamott remarked. On Saturday, he went out golfing with Fox News anchor Bret Baier and several others, but donned a red “Trump was right about everything” hat that obscured his new look, making it impossible to tell if Friday’s shocker was merely a one-off. It’s unclear how long the new look will last. While Trump rarely messes with his iconic look, there is precedent for the move. Back in 2019, the president visited a church service in Virginia and debuted a new slicked-back hairstyle, somewhat similar to California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s (D) look.

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The DSA is using "Coffee With Comrades" and "Socialist Softball" to convert the curious

On a recent Saturday morning, a youngish group gathered around a table in the sun-dappled garden of a Brooklyn coffee shop. Beneath a bright blue sky they were sipping drinks, chatting—and building socialism. The “Coffee With Comrades” was hosted by the Democratic Socialists of America. It was yet another in an endless buffet of social events the DSA uses both to attract new members and more closely bind existing ones to the movement. In Queens, DSAers were playing “socialist softball” at Queensbridge Park. “Bring your own glove if you can—but if you don’t have one, we’ll encourage folks to share as need be,” an invitation advised. Meanwhile, at Forest Park in Woodhaven, other socialists gathered for a “Desi, Afro and Latin” potluck picnic. The previous evening featured a DSA game night in Long Island City. The socialists, it turns out, are highly social.

In chapters across the country, they enjoy DSA barbecues, beach days, running clubs, happy hours, karaoke, prom nights, transgender rights and bodily autonomy game nights, reading groups, Marxist study circles and more. The DSA is even moving into affairs of the heart with a recent “Socialist Speed Dating” event in New York’s Lower East Side. (“In the era of late-stage capitalism, our dating and social lives are more and more controlled by for-profit companies,” read a flier.) “It’s a good way to be social,” Caroline Hill, a printmaker who had attended the Brooklyn coffee, said of her DSA activism. The 25-year-old estimated about half of her social life was tied to the DSA. For others, the DSA can become all encompassing, according to David Duhalde, a longtime member and writer. The movement, he argued, has stepped into a gap left by a withering civic society—particularly for a generation yearning for engagement after the isolation of the pandemic. “It really fulfills a social function that a church would,” said Duhalde, who plays pickup basketball with DSA chums, often finds himself at dinner parties with fellow DSA couples and whose phone is populated by various DSA message chains—the DSA Knicks Chat, the Socialist Majority Caucus Chat and others. “It becomes a way for people to hang out.”

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Lead Stories

Trump endorses Ken Paxton while also trashing his clothes, looks and TV presence

President Donald Trump went to bat for fellow Republican Ken Paxton on Wednesday, but not before taking a few vicious swings at the U.S. Senate candidate’s clothes, appearance and TV presence. Trump’s backhanded compliment, if you can even call it that, came during a meeting with GOP congressional candidates in Washington, D.C. Although Paxton wasn’t there, the Texas attorney general and his turbulent Senate campaign appeared to be on Trump’s mind. “Ken Paxton, you might not like the way he dresses,” Trump said. “And I say this, it’s so insulting to him, but I might as well say it. You might not … like the way he looks. You might not love his look. You might not love his television interviews. But he was the best attorney general in the country. He was one of the best in the entire country. And that speaks a lot louder than the suit he’s wearing that doesn’t look so great.”

Trump’s not the only one who’s taken aim at Paxton’s choice of attire lately. Last week, Paxton’s Democratic opponent, state Rep. James Talarico, mocked him for flashing a $41,600 Hublot watch, an ill-fitting golf polo from the Four Seasons Orlando and shoes that appeared a couple of sizes too big during a San Antonio block walk. “Nothing says you understand the affordability crisis like wearing a $41,000 watch and a Four Seasons polo,” Talarico tweeted in response to clips of Paxton in his finery. Trump’s lukewarm praise for scandal-tarred Paxton comes as Republican operatives, including former Bush administration senior advisor Karl Rove, raise alarms about the possibility of a Talarico victory, which would give Dems their first statewide win in Texas since 1994. “[Paxton] was in Washington the week before the Fourth of July, on that weekend. No fundraiser that I can find,” Rove told Fox News on Wednesday. “And then on Tuesday, he was seen leaving for Iceland with his latest girlfriend, and then the two of them spent the Fourth of July celebrating in London, England … . If he wanted to go to London, he should have gone to London, Texas.” Rove continued: “If the president wants to have Paxton win, he needs to be tossing a lot of money Paxton’s way.” To that point, Talarico has out-fundraised Paxton 3-to-1, their latest campaign finance reports show. t Although Trump has said he’ll help pour millions into Paxton’s campaign, that pledge has yet to materialize. At the same time, Team Talarico has been spending freely on TV ads, last week dropping its first attack ad against Paxton. RealClearPolitics’ average polling shows Talarico leading Paxton by 2.4 points with just two months before the Nov. 3 election.

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Energy jobs fell in almost every sector last year

The energy industry’s workforce shrank last year. The energy sector lost roughly 86,000 workers — roughly 1% of its workforce — between 2024 and 2025, according to an annual report from the Department of Energy. The losses came from almost every part of the energy industry, the United States Energy and Employment Report said, amid increased automation and the Trump administration’s push away from green energy. Only the transmission, distribution and storage parts of the energy sector saw job growth in 2025, a trend DOE officials attributed to the expansion of data centers, growth in manufacturing and industrial activity and the increased adoption of electric vehicles and heat pumps. Enrollment in apprenticeship programs also increased.

The Trump administration’s efforts to increase coal- and nuclear-power generation led to employment bumps, with each of those industries adding about 2,500 workers. But as a whole, the power-generation sector lost about 15,000 workers from 2024 to 2025. Most of those losses were in the solar industry, with additional job losses in wind and hydroelectric power. Jobs in petroleum and natural gas also declined in 2025, dropping by 3% and 4%, respectively. Energy officials said that reflected a shift toward a “smaller, higher-paid workforce.” “Industry sources also point out the role of AI, automation, and digital technologies in improving operational efficiencies and reducing labor requirements,” the report said. About 50,000 jobs disappeared from the motor-vehicle industry in 2025, but wages in that sector also increased. Energy Department officials said “output-per-worker” increased over that time, too. The report found that higher-wage occupations added workers in 2025, while lower-wage occupations declined. The median salary in the energy sector in 2025 was $63,000, higher than the national median of $51,000. Across several energy industry sectors, employers reported having difficulty hiring workers and concerns about a lack of people available for technical positions like electric work or construction. Despite the drop in employment, the Energy Department report projected that demand for workers in the energy sector would increase as electricity demand rises and data centers expand.

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House GOP leadership cancels two weeks of votes ahead of the midterms

House Republican leadership canceled the last two weeks of September votes on Thursday, meaning that after members depart the Capitol later this month they will not return until after the November midterm election. “This is a change from House GOP leadership’s previously announced schedule,” Minority Whip Katherine Clark (D-Massachusetts) wrote in an update. House lawmakers are now set to leave Washington on Sept. 17 rather than Oct. 1 for their break before the midterm elections. The official House legislative calendar, maintained by House Majority Leader Steve Scalise (R-Louisiana), shows that the House was supposed to be in session the week of Sept. 21 and Sept. 28.

When House lawmakers came back to Washington earlier this week after a monthlong August recess, they quickly passed a stopgap measure to keep federal agencies funded until mid-December. The funding bill averts the threat of a government shutdown ahead of the midterm elections. House Speaker Mike Johnson has frequently touted the 119th Congress as “one of the most productive Congresses in the history of the institution.” But last year under Johnson’s speakership, Congress set a 21st-century record for casting the least amount of votes, according to The Washington Post. The 362 votes the chamber held was half as many votes as in 2017, which was the first year of President Donald Trump’s first term in office with a Republican majority. With only a few months left of the year and more canceled in-session weeks on the horizon, the House has held less than 300 votes in 2026.

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Texas comptroller asks to double school voucher funding to $2B

The Texas comptroller is asking lawmakers for $2 billion to fund school vouchers for the next two years, which would double the program’s current biennial allotment. Don Huffines, who oversees the Texas Education Freedom Accounts, wants $916 million to continue funding participating students and $980 million to fund waitlisted students, according to the appropriations request for fiscal year 2028-29 filed this week. Lawmakers set aside $1 billion for the program's first two years. It offers families taxpayer money to offset private education costs. In its first year, nearly 110,000 students are participating, and 106,000 students remain on the waitlist.

“Comptroller Huffines recognizes the strong and growing demand from parents who are eager to have more options for their child’s education,” the request said. “The agency is requesting exceptional items that will further support greater choice in education.” So far, the office has handed out $270 million to participating students, according to the document. Private schools have received more than $127 million in tuition. Families have spent $36 million through the program’s online marketplace. The program is still awarding students on the waitlist, and families are still confirming their participation. More than 27,500 students have returned the voucher, according to records obtained by the Dallas Morning News through a request. In addition to the waitlist, Huffines wants to give participating students more money. The office anticipates 4,200 students will switch from homeschool to a private school, which would increase their award by at least $8,474.

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State Stories

Why Ken Paxton allies are attacking James Talarico on China

There’s one thing Republicans really want Texans to be thinking about as they prepare to cast their ballots for U.S. Senate – China. In the last week, several groups backing Attorney General Ken Paxton have dropped millions on broadcast advertisements that warn about the Chinese Communist Party buying land in the state. In an election where affordability has dominated voter’s concerns, the threat of Chinese land ownership may seem like a random topic. Even some Republican operatives think so, with one calling it the party’s “eighth best issue.” Others see it as an attempt to win back Republicans who aren’t sold on Paxton before the campaign enters its final stretch.

“It is pretty niche,” said Brendan Steinhauser, a former campaign manager for U.S. Sen. John Cornyn. He said the message is definitely going for the core activist base, but that “Cornyn Republicans also care about this.” Republican enthusiasm dropped after the bruising primary between Paxton and Cornyn. A Fox News poll from July showed Paxton winning about 90% of Republicans when a candidate’s share of their own party is usually expected to be much higher. Paxton was only winning about 80% of Republicans in a Texas Politics Project poll from last month. These surveys also showed Talarico winning significantly more independent voters. “The most recent polling continues to indicate that Republican enthusiasm is lower than expected for Texas elections, and that not all Republicans have consolidated behind the top of the ticket candidate,” said Josh Blank, director of research at the Texas Politics Project. “What's going on right now is not a general election message. It's a message aimed squarely at Republican voters to get them reengaged and to get them mobilized.” Paxton’s PAC, Lone Star Liberty, dropped its first major TV ad buy last week in Dallas and Houston, and it, too, was focused on China. The PAC announced a new, even larger buy this week featuring two ads, one of which also centers on the country.

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Mike Miles' charter network Third Future Schools facing layoffs

One of Texas’ most high-profile charter school networks could soon begin laying off staff amid a multimillion-dollar budget shortfall, throwing its future into question just as more and more districts have turned to it to avoid a state takeover. The Texas branch of Third Future Schools, founded by Houston ISD Superintendent Mike Miles, is facing a $14 million deficit, forcing it to cut many of the 700 new employees it hired this year. The grim budget projection follows years of multimillion dollar deficits and a dire warning by its auditor — issues that might have forced other charter schools out of business. Instead, the nonprofit has seen its footprint more than triple this year, and state officials continue to allow school districts that hire Third Futures to avoid being taken over.

At a board meeting last month, its leaders said the nonprofit was experiencing the same problem as many of its traditional public school counterparts: fewer students. “As you guys know, districts across Texas are seeing a declining enrollment,” Third Future Schools Superintendent Zach Craddock told board members. “Some of that is passed on to us.” The Colorado-based nonprofit network is far from the state’s largest chain of charter schools, which are taxpayer-funded public schools operated by third parties. But it’s among the most scrutinized because of its ties to Miles, who was brought to Houston under a state takeover, and its unusual role. Rather than open its own campuses, school districts hire Third Future to turn around failing schools using a tool under state law that allows districts to avoid being taken over by the Texas Education Agency. To avoid takeover, districts have to have their plan approved by TEA, run by longtime education commissioner Mike Morath. Morath tapped Miles to lead Houston ISD in 2023, where he implemented Third Future’s rigorous learning model, which includes daily quizzes in core classes and requiring teachers to stick to provided curriculum rather than coming up with their own. The model employs high numbers of staff.

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ICE agent arrested in Texas federally charged with lying about Minneapolis shooting, AP reports

A U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer who was arrested in Texas earlier this year has been federally charged with lying to investigators about a January shooting in Minneapolis, according to The Associated Press. ICE agent Christian Castro has been charged with making false statements to federal investigators, the AP reported Thursday, citing a person familiar with the investigation who wasn't authorized to publicly discuss the case. The Texas Newsroom reached out to the U.S. Department of Justice and the U.S. Attorney's Office in Minnesota on Thursday for confirmation and additional information but didn't immediately receive a response. Andrew Mahaleris, a spokesperson for Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, referred questions about the reported charge to the Justice Department.

"State law enforcement stands ready and willing to assist federal partners in facilitating Mr. Castro's arrest if needed," Mahaleris said on Thursday. The reported charge comes a week after Castro was released from a Texas jail amid an ongoing legal dispute between Minnesota and Gov. Abbott over whether Castro should be extradited to face separate state charges. Minnesota prosecutors charged Castro in May with assault and falsely reporting a crime over the Jan. 14 shooting of Julio Cesar Sosa-Celis during an immigration enforcement operation in Minneapolis. Prosecutors say evidence contradicted Castro's account that Sosa-Celis and others attacked him before he opened fire. Sosa-Celis was shot in the leg. Texas Rangers arrested Castro on May 29 after Minnesota issued a nationwide warrant. Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz later requested his extradition, but Abbott hasn't approved or denied the request and has questioned whether Castro qualifies as a fugitive. Minnesota sued Abbott in an effort to force him to act, but a federal judge declined to intervene. Castro was released from jail last week after reaching Texas' 90-day detention limit for holding someone while awaiting extradition. The Minnesota charges and extradition request remain pending. The AP also reported Thursday that a federal prosecutor who worked on the case was fired. The prosecutor had previously told attorneys that Justice Department officials blocked an effort to pursue a more serious civil rights charge against Castro, according to previous reporting from ProPublica. But a person familiar with the investigation disputed that account and told the AP that the prosecutor is now under investigation for alleged obstruction of a grand jury investigation.

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Texas State Board of Education set to OK anti-Islam social studies curriculum

The 15-member Texas State Board of Education on Friday is expected to approve updated social studies and history lessons that portray Islam in a largely negative light, tying it to violence and slavery. Members have been meeting in Austin all week working through the last high school Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills updates, having completed K-8 changes earlier this summer. Over the course of hours public testimony, speakers praised and criticized the proposals, which also requires students to understand “that important tenets of Christianity during the time of the Roman empire influenced Western Civilization, America, and Texas.”

Speaker Chuck Allmon said he liked what the board had in mind, including references to Christianity’s role in the nation’s founding and rhetoric against Islam — among the largest faiths in the world. “This is a godly nation, the United States,” said Allmon. “The Supreme Court, 1892, proclaimed it as such. We don't need or want Islam teaching to indoctrinate our Texas school students. All they need to know is how evil Islam is.” Texas school lessons would mention radical Islam, not Al-Qaeda, as motivation for 9-11. They also depict Islam's founder as a warring, military and violent leader and require students to "explain early Islam in terms of the Prophet Mohammed's brutal military campaigns against Jewish and Christian tribes, the normalization of slavery, and the taking of female captives as harem slaves." High school sophomore Hanifa Nayeemuddin recommended the board stop “using a broad indoctrinating term like 'radical Islam’. and explain the history without making students associate an entire religion with terrorism.” She said students deserve to feel safe without getting the wrong idea about an entire group of people. Speaker Bahia Amawi simply called the curriculum discriminatory, saying the lessons are “written intentionally to portray one faith in a positive light while deliberately casting another in a negative one.” The board earlier this year removed a standard that would have taught about “Muslim contributions to algebra and astronomy.” Friday’s vote comes after the board approved a new statewide reading list that includes numerous Bible passages, curriculum Southern Methodist University professor Marc Chancey said “privilege[s]” Christianity over other religions. With 10 Republican members and 5 Democrats, the board is expected to pass the new social studies curriculum. The changes would go into effect in 2030.

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San Antonio's Greater Chamber taps interim CEO after leadership exodus

Former Frost Bank president Pat Frost is stepping in to lead the Greater Chamber of Commerce until it finds a new chief. The chamber’s current president and CEO, Jeff Webster, plans to retire Dec. 2. Webster announced his move last month, as two other top staffers were also leaving for other opportunities. The chamber’s board unanimously selected Frost to serve as an interim leader at its Aug. 31 board meeting. Frost is a previous Greater Chamber board chair, making an unusual transition to the frontlines of the organization’s policy efforts. He recently played a big role in the Spurs’ Win Together campaign last November, which secured the public funding for a new downtown NBA arena. Greater Chamber Chairman Kevin C. Dinnin said Frost will be volunteering his time while the chamber continues looking for a new permanent leader. “We owe a debt of gratitude to Pat,” Dinnin said in a statement Thursday. “I can’t think of anyone better to lead the organization during this transition.” Webster said he’d spend his remaining months helping help Frost navigate the new role. “As I prepare for my retirement, I am pleased to know that Pat will be assuming the interim leadership of this great organization,” Webster said.

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Independent Jason Wolff stays on Bexar County District Attorney ballot after failed GOP challenge

The Bexar County Republican Party and its nominee for district attorney Ashley Foster tried this week to remove independent candidate Jason Wolff from the November ballot, arguing that widespread problems with how his petitions were notarized should invalidate hundreds of the signatures he needed to qualify. After a daylong court fight that examined everything from Wolff’s TikTok videos to testimony from the people who collected his signatures, a Bexar County judge found that errors did in fact occur in the notarization process — but stopped short of removing Wolff from the ballot. The ruling leaves Wolff in a three-way race for Bexar County criminal district attorney against Foster and Democratic nominee Luz Elena Chapa, though Foster and the Bexar County Republican Party say their challenge isn’t over.

Foster and Bexar County GOP Chair Kris Coons sued late last month seeking to invalidate enough of Wolff’s petition signatures to disqualify him, while also requesting an emergency order preventing Bexar County Elections Administrator Michelle Carew from moving forward with his name on the ballot. Unlike candidates who secure a party’s nomination through a primary, Wolff had to collect signatures from at least 500 eligible Bexar County voters who did not participate in a party primary or runoff to qualify as an independent. Court records show Wolff submitted 1,147 signatures to the Texas Secretary of State’s Office. The state accepted 710 after checking whether signers met the eligibility requirements, placing Wolff on the statewide ballot certified last Friday. Foster testified that she began scrutinizing Wolff’s signature drive after seeing videos he posted to TikTok. In one, Wolff told supporters they could drive behind his law office and honk their horns for someone to come outside with a petition. In another, posted days before the filing deadline, he encouraged people circulating petitions to bring them to him so he could file them.

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Oxfam index puts Texas near bottom for working families, women

Texas ranked 45th among U.S. states for working families, according to a newly released index by global nonprofit Oxfam. For working women, it ranked even lower at 47. Released ahead of Labor Day, the 2026 Best States To Work Index scores and ranks all 50 states, D.C. and Puerto Rico on how their policies support working families through wages, worker protections and the right to organize. Texas was one of five states that scored zero on workers’ right to organize and collectively bargain, bringing its overall score down to less than 15 out of 100. By contrast, California ranked first, earning a total score of over 80 and scoring over 90 on organizing rights.

For the seventh year in a row, North Carolina sat at the bottom of the index as the worst state for workers, preceded by Alabama and Mississippi. In the current affordability crisis, labor policies such as minimum wage, paid leave and collective bargaining rights are essential to address deepening inequality, according to Abby Maxman, president and CEO of Oxfam America. “All workers deserve robust protections that ensure they can thrive and lead dignified lives, no matter where they live,” Maxman wrote, adding, “The policies we track are essential to the well-being of not only workers and working families, but also to the well-being of our communities and our economy.” Oxfam research shows women and workers of color are overrepresented in agricultural work, domestic work and tipped jobs. This is how they remain disproportionately excluded from fundamental worker protections such as full minimum wage, overtime and the right to bargain collectively, according to the report. Recent “overlapping economic shocks” such as the U.S. war with Iran and federal policies such as the One Big Beautiful Bill Act have compounded the inequities, it added.

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The GOP’s game of chicken over Ken Paxton in Texas is getting testy

This spring’s Texas GOP Senate runoff was one of the costliest and ugliest Republican nominating contests in recent history. And more than three months after Attorney General Ken Paxton prevailed over Sen. John Cornyn with President Donald Trump’s backing, Republicans are still struggling mightily to move forward, despite how central the race is to the Senate majority. Pride appears to be winning out over common purpose, as the party engages in a high-stakes internal game of chicken. And things are getting increasingly testy. The big standoff, as CNN wrote over the weekend, is over who is going to help Paxton compete financially with Democratic state Rep. James Talarico, who is raising significantly more money than the GOP nominee.

Senate Republicans have left Texas out of their ad spending reservations in an apparent ploy to force Trump’s political operation to bankroll Paxton. And the message to the president seems increasingly unsubtle: You defeated an incumbent with a less-electable, scandal-ridden alternative, now you get to make sure he holds this red state. But Trump’s operation has yet to comply. That’s left Paxton outgunned for weeks, with potentially major implications. With two months left, polls show Talarico benefitting from a significant image advantage and the state looking more competitive than it has been in decades. And if Democrats win Texas, they’ve moved themselves significantly close to a Senate majority. In recent days, we’ve seen something rather remarkable: Congressional Republicans have stepped forward to more overtly tell Trump’s operation that it needs to pony up. “We need help from the president,” Sen. John Kennedy of Louisiana told Fox News on Sunday. “The president says he has $850 million in his campaign accounts. That’s a lot of jack. I’m hoping that the president’s going to spend $100 or $200 million in Texas, but he hasn’t committed to it yet.”

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Ex-girlfriend of Fort Worth billionaire Sid Bass sues him for $400 million

A former girlfriend of billionaire oil heir Sid Bass claims he backed out of financial promises made to her after he married another woman, according to a federal lawsuit filed this week. The 98-page lawsuit, filed in a New York federal court by Oona O. Sperr, seeks at least $400 million in damages from Bass, and also names Bass’ wife, Althea Viafora Kress, as a defendant. Sperr, 64, and Bass, 84, were partners for roughly a decade starting in 2014, and during that time, Bass bought her a diamond ring worth $2.1 million and the couple frequently held themselves out as married, according to the lawsuit. They owned several expensive properties, including one in Fort Worth, traveled together and “spared no expense on the lavish life” they shared, attorneys wrote.

At the start of their relationship, Sperr verbally agreed to give up her interior design career in favor of managing the pair’s homes, overseeing renovations, caring for Bass and representing the couple socially, according to the lawsuit. In return, Bass allegedly agreed to provide lifetime financial support and maintenance to Sperr. The couple were so entwined with one another that they shared the same bank account and planned their wills and end-of-life care together, according to the lawsuit. But, as Bass’ cognition and judgment deteriorated due to “excessive consumption of alcohol and early signs of Parkinson’s,” Kress began to groom him with the aim of gaining access to his fortune, attorneys for Sperr wrote in the lawsuit. When the relationship between Sperr and Bass eventually ended, Bass committed to continue providing financial support, care and property to her even though they were separated, according to the suit. Ultimately, though, the promised support was altered “beyond recognition,” and some aspects were repudiated altogether, Sperr’s attorneys claim.

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Fort Worth man threatened to castrate Talarico, drag his corpse, authorities say

A Fort Worth man who appeared in August to be furious with the political issue of slavery reparations threatened in writing to kill state Rep. James Talarico, according to law enforcement authorities. Billy McFatridge, 29, has been charged in a state district court in Travis County with making a terroristic threat against a public servant. McFatridge is accused of writing two messages to Talarico, a Democrat who is running for a U.S. Senate seat. Talarico told a Texas Department of Public Safety special agent who is investigating the case that he felt the need to enhance security for future campaign events, especially one in the Fort Worth area on Aug. 21. On Aug. 3, Talarico received an email to his campaign account from a Gmail account of which McFatridge later admitted ownership, according to an arrest warrant affidavit.

The email contained homophobic slurs and crude language. “I will slit your ... throat in front of the world and drag your body through the streets,” McFatridge wrote, according to the affidavit. On Aug. 11, McFatridge sent a direct message via Instagram to Talarico, according to the affidavit. “I will castrate your ... [expletive] and drag your corpse through the streets if you ever suggest such a weak minded idea again ...,” McFatridge wrote, according to the affidavit. McFatridge told DPS special agents that he had no intention of hurting anyone but wanted to scare the representative. In June 2018, McFatridge was accused of stabbing his mother with a spear, authorities have said. McFatridge was charged with aggravated assault with a deadly weapon. A grand jury declined to indict McFatridge in the case. Talarico’s chief of staff reported the threatening messages to DPS.

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National Stories

Missouri Supreme Court blocks gerrymandered map in major loss for Republicans

The Missouri Supreme Court on Thursday blocked the state’s gerrymandered congressional map from being used in the November election, a seismic ruling that halts a Republican attempt to force Kansas City’s longtime congressman out of office. The unanimous decision found that Republican Secretary of State Denny Hoskins was wrong to reject a campaign seeking to strike down the map, called HB 1. The ruling also makes it explicitly clear that the new map cannot be used in November. “The secretary and all of those acting in concert with him are restrained and enjoined from implementing, using, or mandating the use of the congressional redistricting in HB 1 for the November 2026 general election,” Judge Ginger K. Gooch wrote in the opinion released Thursday.

The court ruled that the campaign seeking to strike down the map must appear on the Nov. 3 ballot. The map can only be used if voters approve it, the opinion said. The ruling hands a key loss to President Donald Trump amid a bitter fight for control of Congress this year. Missouri Republican lawmakers redrew the map last year under pressure from the Trump administration. But hundreds of thousands of Missourians fought back. A campaign called People Not Politicians used a referendum, a mechanism for direct democracy that allows citizens to challenge laws, and collected more than 305,000 signatures to force a statewide vote on the map. Thursday’s ruling marked the culmination of that fight, making Missouri the first state in the country to use a referendum to block a Trump-backed map. The campaign survived a series of attacks from state officials and months of court battles to reach the Nov. 3 ballot. “BOOOOOOOMMMM!!!!!!,” Chuck Hatfield, an attorney for the referendum campaign, wrote on social media after the ruling came down. Now, the decision is poised to scramble the upcoming November election. Missouri already held primary elections using the new map. Attorney General Catherine Hanaway, a Republican whose office defended the map in court, vowed to file an emergency motion with the U.S. Supreme Court to challenge the decision.

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Maryland Supreme Court says redistricting ballot question can go to voters

A proposed ballot question that could set new standards for the way congressional maps are drawn in Maryland will go to voters in November, the Supreme Court of Maryland ruled Thursday evening. The order from a divided high court overturned two lower courts that had sided with state Republicans who challenged the proposed amendment to the Maryland Constitution. The Thursday evening order came as an end-of-the-day deadline to finalize the ballot for printing approached.

The decision was anything but a full-throated victor for legislative Democrats who muscled the bill and a legally faulty question through a two-day special session. Even so, the end result is voters will be asked to weigh in on the proposed change this fall. In an eight-page order written for the majority, Chief Justice Matthew J. Fader agreed with judges in Anne Arundel and Dorchester counties who ruled that the ballot question as written by the Maryland General Assembly “is misleading and therefore violates due process requirements.” In particular, Fader said the majority found fault with the question’s reference to “applicable federal laws” as the criteria for determining congressional boundaries.

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Pentagon temporarily rescinds guidance on testosterone screening for US troops

The Pentagon ?is temporarily rescinding recently published clinical guidance for a new, mandatory testosterone deficiency screening policy for service members aged 30 and ?older, a U.S. official told Reuters on Thursday. On Wednesday, the Pentagon posted the "Clinical Guidance for Health and Human Performance Optimization" on its website. By Thursday, the memo and an accompanying statement from spokesperson Sean Parnell had been removed. Keep up with the latest medical breakthroughs and healthcare trends with the award-winning Reuters Health Rounds newsletter. Sign up here. "The draft (document) published on September 2, 2026, has been temporarily rescinded to allow for updates," the official said, adding that interim guidance remains ?in effect.

Reuters was first to report the guidance being rescinded. The detailed clinical guidelines had laid out separate testosterone deficiency screening paths for ?men and women that were to happen during their annual health assessments. The guidance was set to take effect immediately, and ?the Pentagon said it is aimed at improving military readiness by identifying and managing hormonal and energy-availability issues. A "Page Not Found" banner appeared on ?websites for both the Pentagon and Defense Health Agency when clicking on the links for the memo and statement. Wednesday's guidance said men aged 30 and older ?would be screened through a questionnaire that could then trigger a blood test for testosterone levels and, if needed, testosterone hormone therapy. Women would also be screened through a questionnaire and could then move to treatment for conditions related to hormonal imbalance that can manifest as Relative Energy Deficiency in Sport, or REDs. Testosterone hormone therapy is advised only for ?Hypoactive Sexual Desire Disorder, which is characterized by a distressing level of low sexual interest.

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Former Labor Secretary stoked dysfunction and toxicity, Department report finds

Former Labor Secretary Lori Chavez-DeRemer violated department policy repeatedly, a report released on Thursday by the department’s internal watchdog said, including tolerating harassment, spending public money on personal travel and conducting an “inappropriate relationship” with a member of her security detail. The 40-page report revealed new details of the dysfunction and toxicity at the top of the Labor Department under Ms. Chavez-DeRemer, who resigned in April after one year in the job as scandals and investigations closed in. More than three dozen witnesses described working in the secretary’s office as “toxic, intimidating and humiliating,” the department’s inspector general, Anthony D’Esposito, wrote.

The report followed a monthslong investigation into a whistle-blower’s allegations of misconduct by Ms. Chavez-DeRemer and her aides. The claims included that she was having an affair with a member of her security team, that she and her aides abused younger women on the staff and that they flouted federal spending limits on trips that mixed business and pleasure, including on fancy hotels, S.U.V. rentals and strip clubs. Ms. Chavez-DeRemer did not respond to a message seeking comment. She recently started a national political action committee aimed at electing Republicans who support organized labor. The report closes an embarrassing chapter for the department. Its acting leader, Keith Sonderling, is awaiting Senate confirmation to become the next secretary. Ms. Chavez-DeRemer, 58, served in local government in Happy Valley, Ore., before being elected to the U.S. House in 2022. Her father was a Teamster, and she had support from organized labor. Ms. Chavez-DeRemer lost her re-election bid in November 2024. Sean O’Brien, president of the Teamsters union, who had spoken at the 2024 Republican National Convention, urged President Trump to choose her as labor secretary. She took office in March 2025.

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Southeastern Conference sues LSU, Lane Kiffin

The Southeastern Conference is suing Louisiana State University (LSU) and its head football coach Lane Kiffin for what it contends is an effort to bring former NFL players to the school and gain an unfair competitive advantage over other schools. The LSU Tigers waged what the conference says is “a deliberate and coordinated campaign to recruit professional athletes to play football for LSU during the 2026-27 season, including players who had signed NFL contracts with the Cleveland Browns, New Orleans Saints, and Tampa Bay Buccaneers.”

“Numerous reports have shown that at least two of these professional athletes are on campus and actively practicing with LSU’s football team,” the conference wrote as part of its suit, filed in Alabama and assigned to U.S. District Judge Annemarie Axon, who was appointed by President Trump. “Defendants have also expressed their unequivocal intent to place those athletes on LSU’s official football roster and allow them to participate in football games during the upcoming season,” the conference added. The suit comes as a Louisiana judge was set to rule Thursday on a temporary injunction involving LSU’s football program that could clear the way for a number of players who were cut by NFL teams this fall to play for the Tigers this fall. The Southeastern Conference has previously said it would consider sanctioning LSU over the effort to recruit former professional players, floating options that included potentially expelling it from the conference. It also comes as Congress works to pass legislation that would grant the NCAA and its member schools antitrust protection and cap the amount of times an athlete can transfer between schools and earn through name, image and likeness endorsement money.

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Jaw-dropping reason Fox abruptly fired Maria Bartiromo revealed

Fox News fired one of its top stars due to a shady betrayal. Maria Bartiromo, 58, was fired from the network on Thursday because she had informed the White House about Fox’s secret instructions to not promote President Donald Trump’s election conspiracies on the air, according to Status. The particular incident happened in July following the president’s primetime address to the nation, in which he claimed that China had interfered in the 2020 presidential election. Status reported that Fox News had issued written instructions to senior employees to steer their coverage of Trump’s address away from his false claims, which the network largely abided by—to the White House’s surprise.

However, the outlet said Trump or a White House official pressed Bartiromo about the lack of coverage of Trump’s claims, and she revealed that her bosses had ordered the claims not to be covered. She even shared the text message that relayed the network’s guidance with the White House. Disclosing the network’s confidential information violated her employment agreement, Status reported. The Daily Beast has reached out to Fox News for comment. The bombshell update comes only hours after Fox announced Bartiromo’s departure from the network without explanation.

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Copyright September 11, 2026, Harvey Kronberg, www.quorumreport.com, All rights are reserved