Lead Stories

6 ways lawmakers could respond to the Texas floods in their special session

With the death toll still rising from this weekend’s catastrophic floods, Texas lawmakers are vowing to shore up any flaws in the state’s emergency warning systems and take other actions that could help prevent similar tragedies. They could have a chance to make good on those promises as early as this month, when the Legislature reconvenes in a special session to tackle THC regulations. Gov. Greg Abbott, who controls the special session agenda, told reporters on Sunday that he expected lawmakers to address the flood when they return to Austin on July 21. He had not officially set the agenda as of Tuesday morning. It was still too early for several lawmakers to say what long-term policy changes and investments should look like. But a few critical improvements were emerging as potential priorities:

The lack of sirens along the Guadalupe River has piqued lawmakers’ interest, with some saying they trust their efficacy more than even some modern systems. State Sen. Paul Bettencourt, R-Houston, said Monday he would file a bill “at the earliest opportunity” to assist counties in installing physical sirens, as opposed to newer alerts sent to cell phones, which he said many people may miss at nighttime. “It’s time to go back to what worked and still does in Tornado Alley, Civil Defense Sirens,” Bettencourt posted. House Speaker Dustin Burrows praised an op-ed in the Houston Chronicle Tuesday morning that called for more flood gauges and a modern radar-based flood assessment system that could provide officials with more real-time information. “The Texas House will work with leading experts like @RiceUniversity’s SSPEED Center to identify and help fund solutions like those outlined,” Burrows said of the op-ed, written by Phil Bedient of Rice University’s Severe Storm Prediction, Education, & Evacuation from Disasters Center.

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Abbott calls seeking blame for floods ‘the word choice of losers’

The question facing Gov. Greg Abbott of Texas at a news conference on Tuesday was whether he would call for an investigation into possible failures surrounding the deadly floods, which include a lack of state and local spending on flood control measures and warning systems. To answer, Mr. Abbott said asking about blame was “the word choice of losers,” and then invoked a beloved Texas tradition — football — as he deflected questions about accountability for a disaster that has left at least 111 people dead and more than 170 missing. “Every square inch of our state cares about football,” Mr. Abbott said, referring to the Friday night lights of high school fields and the state’s college and pro teams. “Every football team makes mistakes,” he added.

Extending the metaphor further, the governor said losing teams assigned blame while championship teams responded to mistakes by saying: “We got this. We’re going to make sure that we go score again, that we win this game.” Mr. Abbott, a Republican, said the Republican-controlled Texas Legislature would be investigating the flash floods in Central Texas and discussing how to prevent their recurrence when state lawmakers meet for a special session later this month. But he and other prominent Republicans have pushed back against critics who have called for investigations into unfilled staff positions at National Weather Service offices in Texas, or a lack of emergency warning systems along the Guadalupe River. On Monday, Representative Chip Roy, a Republican who represents the devastated area, said “finger pointing generally is just offensive when you’re dealing with trying to find bodies, and trying to deal with families grieving.” Senator Ted Cruz similarly scolded anyone “trying to blame their political opponents for a natural disaster.” President Trump, who excoriated the Democrats in California for their response to wildfires in Los Angeles and the Biden administration for its response to Hurricane Helene during the 2024 campaign, has offered only support to the leadership in Texas. And the White House press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, rebuked critics for raising questions about the administration’s efforts to shrink federal disaster agencies.

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Texas inspectors approved Camp Mystic’s disaster plan 2 days before deadly flood, records show

Texas inspectors signed off on Camp Mystic’s emergency planning just two days before catastrophic flooding killed more than two dozen people at the all-girls Christian summer camp, most of them children. The Department of State Health Services released records Tuesday showing the camp complied with a host of state regulations regarding “procedures to be implemented in case of a disaster.” Among them: instructing campers what to do if they need to evacuate and assigning specific duties to each staff member and counselor. Five years of inspection reports released to The Associated Press do not offer any details of those plans at Mystic, raising new questions about the camp’s preparedness ahead of the torrential July 4 rainfall in flood-prone Texas Hill Country.

The National Weather Service had issued a flood watch for the area July 3 at 1:18 p.m. That danger prompted at least one of the roughly 18 camps along the Guadalupe River to move dozens of campers to higher ground. The uncertainty about what happened at Mystic comes as local officials have repeatedly dodged questions about who was monitoring the weather and what measures were taken ahead of the flooding. Camp Mystic, established in 1926, did not evacuate and was especially hit hard when the river rose from 14 feet (4.2 meters) to 29.5 feet (9 meters) within 60 minutes in the early morning hours. Flooding on that stretch of the Guadalupe starts at about 10 feet (3 meters). A wall of water overwhelmed people in cabins, tents and trailers along the river’s edge. Some survivors were found clinging to trees. At least 27 campers and counselors died during the floods, and officials said Tuesday that five campers and one counselor have still not been found. Among the dead was Richard “Dick” Eastland, the camp’s beloved director described by campers as a father figure. Charlotte Lauten, 19, spent nine summers at Camp Mystic, mostly recently in 2023. She said she didn’t recall ever receiving instructions as a camper on what do in the case of a weather emergency. “I do know that the counselors go through orientation training for a week before camp starts,” she said. “They do brief them on all those types of things.” One thing that likely hindered the girls’ ability to escape was how dark it would have been, Lauten said. Campers don’t have access to their phones while at camp, she said, adding they wouldn’t have cell service anyway because of the remote location. “This is the middle of nowhere and they didn’t have power,” she said. “It would have been pitch black, like could not see 5 feet in front of you type of darkness. I’ve never seen stars like there because there’s just no light.”

Read this article at Associated Press - Subscribers Only

Trump’s new trade threats set off global scramble to avoid tariffs

Over the past three months, nations across the world tried to avoid new tariffs that would punish their economies by giving President Trump something he might want. Indonesia offered to buy $34 billion more in U.S. crops and fuels. Thailand proposed lowering many of its own trade barriers, and buying more U.S.-made planes. Japan was ready to buy more liquefied natural gas over the next two decades. But as Mr. Trump’s self-imposed July 9 deadline approached, those entreaties made little difference. The 14 letters he posted online on Monday, mostly aimed at countries in Asia, largely matched the rates set in April, before he backed off and gave dozens of countries 90 days to negotiate agreements that would satisfy the White House’s demand for more balanced trade.

“We have had years to discuss our Trading Relationship with Thailand, and have concluded that we must move away from these long-term, and very persistent, Trade Deficits engendered by Thailand’s Tariff, and Non-Tariff, Policies and Trade Barriers,” Mr. Trump wrote, swapping out only each country’s name in otherwise virtually identical missives. That fresh volley has left countries large and small, nearly all of them longstanding allies of the United States, with profound questions about how to move forward with the world’s largest consumer economy when negotiations over trade conflicts are labored and deadlines are extended without warning. “Many in Asia are going to ask, ‘Is this how the U.S. treats its friends?’” said Manu Bhaskaran, chief executive of Centennial Asia Advisors, a research firm. “Will there be permanent damage to American standing and interests in Asia and elsewhere through these crude threats and unpleasant language?”

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State Stories

Riding along with the volunteers rescuing pets from the Guadalupe flood

Courtesy of Austin Pets Alive! Hours after the Guadalupe River receded, a brown pitbull named Hulk, whose family and half their riverside house were swept away by the July 4 flooding, returned to the wreckage of his home. He settled atop a torn-up floorboard, turned up his nose, and sniffed the air. A day later, he hadn’t budged, and friends and neighbors called Kerrville Pets Alive, a local nonprofit no-kill animal shelter, concerned that the dog might be hurt. When the shelter sent its vet team to assess the situation, it found that he wasn’t injured—he was waiting for his family to return. On social media, scattered among the now-ubiquitous photos of missing persons are the faces of their best friends: dogs and cats. As Kerr County officials, along with state and federal agencies, continue their days-long search, Kerrville Pets Alive has led a parallel effort to locate displaced animals and reunite them with their families. In Hulk’s case, the shelter was able to locate a surviving family member who had lost everything in the flood—including her phone—and found a foster home for the dog while his owner regained her footing.

Austin Pets Alive! has quickly become a crucial partner in these efforts. Lindsay O’Gan, who works for APA, arrived in Kerrville on the Fourth hours after the catastrophic flood had torn through whole neighborhoods, the death toll steadily rising. “We didn’t know what we were getting into,” O’Gan said. “We just kind of drove straight in.” She soon began coordinating with the Kerrville shelter, helping create a Google form that pet owners or their friends and family members could use to provide information and photos of missing animals, forming a makeshift database for the shelters to reference. Unlike in the disaster response for missing people, there is no centralized system for lost and found pets, making the task of reunion a challenge. “One of the hard parts is that almost every one of these animals that I’m working on, their people are all missing or deceased,” said O’Gan. “And so it’s a lot of coordinating with friends and family.” At the Kerrville Pets Alive office, which occupies a small house on high ground that was unaffected by the storms, volunteers fielded an endless stream of calls, trying to connect found animals with their families or recover the deceased. They accepted donations of pet food and animal crates, which they stacked high outside the building, and distributed the supplies to those in need. In a nearby trailer, two veterinarians who’d traveled from Austin to assist in the rescue efforts gave vaccines to a litter of stray kittens that had been recovered from a local’s front porch.

Read this article at Texas Monthly - Subscribers Only

Austin firefighters union initiates 'no confidence' vote against Chief Joel Baker

The Austin Firefighters Association decided unanimously Tuesday to initiate a vote of no confidence against Austin Fire Chief Joel Baker over allegations of questionable leadership decisions, according to union leaders. Association President Bob Nicks said about 50 to 60 rank-and-file firefighters attended the regularly scheduled meeting where members discussed what to include in a no-confidence resolution before voting on it. No one indicated dissent in the show-of-hands decision, he said. Vice President Christine Jones confirmed the outcome. A copy of the resolution obtained by the American-Statesman says Baker has "forfeited" the confidence of the association and calls for the city to investigate the “decisions and actions” Baker took during the recent floods.

The rare vote came a day after Nicks lodged allegations against Baker in a public post on the association's Facebook page that accused the chief of contributing to the death toll in the Kerr County floods by issuing a temporary pause on all mutual aid requests a month ago. Reached by phone Tuesday afternoon, Baker declined to comment. On Monday, he told the American-Statesman that his pause was misinterpreted as a blanket policy and that he “absolutely will not step aside” regardless of any no-confidence vote. As the union met, Austin Mayor Kirk Watson and City Manager T.C. Broadnax issued separate statements condemning Nicks and the union and expressing support for Baker.

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Emotions raw as Kerrville council meets for first time since floods

In its first meeting since devastating flooding struck the area, the Kerrville City Council on Tuesday voted to renew a state of emergency across the city, and city staffers said that despite the widespread damage, the town's key infrastructure held up well through the disaster. The meeting was often punctuated with emotion, especially from Mayor Joe Herring Jr., who choked up several times as he discussed the flooding, which has killed more than 80 people in the county and left many more missing. "This has been a tragedy," Herring said. "I've lost friends. We've lost precious families, precious children. I wish to God there was a way we could have warned them, and that's the truth."

Assistant City Manager Michael Hornes said that while it did suffer damage in the flooding, much of the city's key infrastructure is in good shape. Hornes paused during his report, overwhelmed with emotion. He was consoled by the mayor, who told him to "take his time." "I think I've had 500 phone calls, emails and texts of people offering to help," Hornes said. "It's fantastic." Some bridges and sidewalks need repairs, several water lines were broken, and the city's water plant sustained damage, Hornes said. That required shifting to using well water to supply its water utility customers. The city can meet demand for several months using only well water, said Stuart Barron, the city's public works director. State agencies are assisting the city with debris removal, Hornes said. The city will need to move "millions of cubic yards" of debris, he said. Plans call for using city-owned soccer fields to pile up tree debris for removal. Council Member Jeff Harris asked if the 28-acre soccer fields would be large enough. "I've lived here for 20 years. I did not recognize where I was yesterday," Harris said.

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Gun rights activist sues Tim O’Hare, Tarrant County, others

A gun rights activist at the center of a pair of tumultuous Tarrant County Commissioners Court sessions in January has sued county officials in federal court over his detention and removal from the meetings. C.J. Grisham, an attorney and gun rights activist from Temple, was detained at the Jan. 14 meeting when he attempted to enter the courtroom with a pistol. The disruption escalated to violence and resulted in the arrest of another man who filmed Tarrant County sheriff’s deputies and demanded their names and badge numbers. Grisham, who argued he was legally allowed to carry a firearm in the court as a former law enforcement officer, was not arrested, but left voluntarily after Sheriff’s Office employees, including Sheriff Bill Waybourn, said he would not be allowed to return to the courtroom with his weapon. Grisham is a retired federal counterintelligence special agent.

Grisham returned to the commissioners court the following session on Jan. 28, when County Judge Tim O’Hare instituted a new decorum policy. He was removed for saying an expletive during his comments. In a lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court in Fort Worth, Grisham claims his First, Second and Fourth Amendment rights were violated in those sessions. He is demanding punitive damages of $250,000, as well as attorney fees, compensatory damages to be determined by a jury and any other relief “as appears just and proper.” The lawsuit also lists Tarrant County as a defendant, as well as three Sheriff’s Office employees involved in the events from January. These are Chief Deputy Jennifer Gabbert, Chief Deputy Craig Driskell, Sgt. Orville George and Sgt. Michael Jauss. Grisham, who is representing himself, also refers to Waybourn, who attended the Jan. 14 session for a briefing on recent deaths in the county jail and was present during Grisham’s detention, as a “defendant,” but the sheriff is not listed among the defendants.

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Texas congressman's daughters among those rescued from Camp Mystic

A Texas congressman said two of his daughters were among the girls rescued from a girls' Christian camp located on the banks of the Guadalupe River. Rep. August Pfluger said his daughters, Caroline and Juliana, were among the girls rescued from Camp Mystic in Hunt, Texas. Pfluger represents the 11th Congressional District of Texas. There are still 11 girls and 1 counselor missing from the camp as of Sunday morning after flash floods swept through the area early Friday morning.

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From bacterial runoff to mosquito swarms, public officials warn of risks after flooding

Flood waters that took lives and destroyed homes throughout the Hill Country over the long July Fourth weekend, also saturated the Central Texas region, pushing contamination and debris through creeks and waterways. While the storms’ full environmental impacts may take weeks to assess, Austin-area officials warn they could be serious. “It's really important to emphasize that stormwater runoff, even from smaller rain events, washes high levels of bacteria and other pollutants into creeks,” Austin Watershed Protection's Ryan Hebrink said. "Best safety practice [is] to stay out of water for several days after rainfall.” Hebrink, whose team oversees environmental spill response, said Austin was fortunate that flooding was not as bad within city limits as in other parts of the region.

“We have not seen a spike in spills or other reports. I think a lot of folks were probably hunkered down during the wet weather over the weekend,” he said. Hebrink said he expects he may get more reports of spills this week if people see more damage as they are out and about. The city of Austin has closed Bull Creek, Barton Creek and areas of the Colorado River from the Tom Miller Dam to below the Longhorn Dam, including Lady Bird Lake for "personal and commercial" watercraft until Tuesday afternoon. The ban includes creeks and streams. Heavy rains mean lots of standing water and that provides ideal conditions for a mosquito population boom. “This massive rainfall will raise the risk of mosquito-borne diseases in our community,” Marcel Elizondo, Austin Public Health’s environmental health services division chief, said in a statement. Mosquito bites can be more than just an annoyance. According to preliminary data, 33 cases of West Nile virus, including two deaths, were reported in Travis County in 2024. Austin Public Health is encouraging people to empty standing water in their yards and neighborhoods to prevent the spread of “infections such as Zika, West Nile, dengue fever, encephalitis and canine heartworm.”

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Tony Gonzales wants medals for pilots who bombed Iran. He has his reasons.

U.S. Rep. Tony Gonzales thinks the bomber pilots and other personnel who carried out last month’s attack on Iranian nuclear sites deserve medals. He’s not just giving lip service to the idea. The Texas Republican has filed legislation to create an Iranian Campaign Medal. He’s lined up 12 co-sponsors, all Republicans. Gonzales, a Navy veteran who served in Iraq and Afghanistan, says the pilots, ground crews and others involved in Operation Midnight Hammer have earned the recognition. But he has a broader political objective in mind as well. Two critical Army commands based in San Antonio are in jeopardy of being relocated to North Carolina, and Gonzalez sees the Iran campaign medal as way to remind Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth of the role the city's military infrastructure plays in U.S. national defense.

Gonzales, in an interview with the San Antonio Express-News, said the city "sucks at self-promotion" and doesn’t do enough to play up its ties to the armed services beyond calling itself “Military City U.S.A.” Among its many military assets, San Antonio is home to Joint Base San Antonio-Lackland, where Air Force recruits go through basic and technical training. Laughlin Air Force Base, outside Del Rio, is a pilot training hub. Both installations are in Gonzales’ 23d Congressional District, which stretches from San Antonio’s Southwest Side to the border. "It’s not just this operation,” Gonzales said, referring to the Iran airstrikes. “It's all these operations where we have this direct connection, where we train the people, they're from here. And I don't think we do a good enough job of promoting how important San Antonio is to the overall DoD force." As part of a wider consolidation of the armed forces, Hegseth has ordered Army North and Army South, two commands headquartered in San Antonio, to merge with the Army's Forces Command in Fort Bragg, N.C. The combined organization would be called the Western Hemisphere Command. Where it will be headquartered is the subject of intense lobbying and speculation. Hegseth has declined to commit to basing it in San Antonio.

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‘Overwhelming’: Misinformation spreading as Travis County recovers from devastating floods

As the community near Big Sandy Creek in western Travis County works to rebuild after a devastating flood in the early morning hours of July 5 killed at least 7 and left 10 missing, tensions are starting to run high. On Monday night, false information that a dam broke and a wall of water was once again coming for the community was spread on social media. Residents started to show up at the Round Mountain Baptist Church looking for evacuation information — only to find that information was untrue. “I think there’s a lack of communication, I think there’s a lot of bad information being spread,” Justin Hendrix said. “I think that this might just be stressing out and overwhelming everyone.”

Hendrix lives in the Big Sandy Creek area and has been out volunteering — he also knows some of the community members who have passed away due to the floods. He admitted he shared that news on social media Monday night before learning it was untrue. “You have to give things time because as much as we want it right this second, as much as we wished this never happened, it happened and we are in this together,” Hendrix said. Travis County says getting information directly from the county is the best way to know what’s going on. In the case of an emergency, Travis County will use its WarnCentralTexas system to get critical information to residents. “I understand the public’s frustration right now. They’re desperately searching for information…This will continue to be a long road to recovery, but I hope they know that Travis County is here to stand with them, and we’ll get through this recovery with them,” Hector Nieto, the director of Travis County’s public information office, said.

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Austin retail construction roaring back to life after a decade of slowdown

More than a million square feet of new or expanded retail space is expected to be delivered in Austin by the end of 2025, according to a new report, more than double the amount added in 2024. If that much is completed, it would mark the first time since 2016 that deliveries of such space in the Austin area have exceeded 1 million square feet. According to a mid-year market report from Weitzman, a Dallas-based commercial real estate firm, developers are planning to add 1.24 million square feet of space across the five-county Austin metro area this year, up from 485,520 square feet in 2024.

“The retail market’s strength is boosted by the Austin area’s strong economic activity,” Weitzman said. “For example, the area’s unemployment at mid-year was a near-full-employment rate of 3.1 percent, compared to the national unemployment rate of 4.2 percent.” Most of the new space can be attributed to the large number of big-box shopping center anchor stores increasing their footprints in Austin, the report said, including Lowe’s, H-E-B, Home Depot, Costco and others. Manor Crossing, a growing retail center, accounts for a significant chunk of the increases. A 134,000-square-foot Home Depot opened there in May and an H-E-B store is set to be completed later this year, adding another 100,000 square feet. Despite the burst of growth, Austin’s occupancy rate remains high at 97%. “Austin is once again the healthiest major retail market in Texas in terms of occupancy and balanced supply and demand,” Weitzman’s report said. Both San Antonio and Dallas-Fort Worth trail in occupancy, with rates in both cities sitting at about 95%. But Dallas-Fort Worth is expected to nearly triple Austin’s deliveries of retail space this year.

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Texas flood claims lives in Fort Worth singer’s family

Country music singer and Fort Worth resident Pat Green shared that his family “suffered a heartbreaking and deeply personal loss” in the deadly floods that swept through Central Texas over the Fourth of July weekend. “We kindly ask for privacy and space as we mourn, support each other, and begin to process what comes next for our family,” the musician posted Monday on Facebook. Green’s step-brother — 39-year-old John Burgess of Liberty, Texas — was one of over 100 people confirmed dead in the flash floods that pummeled Kerr County and the surrounding region. John Burgess’ wife, 39-year-old Julia Anderson Burgess, also died, KHOU-TV reported.

The couple were camping at an RV park near the Guadalupe River with their two small sons. James Burgess and Jack Burgess were still missing as of Monday night. The Burgesses’ 8-year-old daughter was at a camp that wasn’t impacted by the flooding and is safe, according to KHOU. Pat Green’s wife, Kori Green, posted about the tragedy on Instagram. “We are heartbroken and anxiously waiting for all of them to be found,” she said. “Thank you for your prayers.” John Burgess had his own financial services business, and Julia Burgess was a teacher at Liberty Elementary. A former neighbor said on Facebook that they were a special couple. “We shared many laughs and beautiful moments with their family,” the neighbor posted. “They will be missed dearly.”

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

Keller mayor announces run for Texas Senate District 9

Another Republican has entered the race for Texas Senate District 9. “It’s official,” Keller Mayor Armin Mizani said in his post on X. “I’m in.” Mizani will be on the ballot along with fellow Republican Leigh Wambsganss and Democrat Taylor Rehmet. Whoever wins in the special election on Nov. 4 will represent much of Northwest Tarrant County including North Richland Hills, Keller and White Settlement. The race will go into a runoff if a candidate doesn’t get more than half of the votes. “Texas is at a critical juncture in its long and proud history,” Mizani said. “Now, more than ever, Texans deserve leaders with the experience and resolve necessary to offer solutions to the challenges we face.”

The mayor’s announcement for candidacy comes within two weeks of Wambsganss’s, when Texas Rep. Nate Schatzline withdrew. “My #1 goal was for SD9 to be represented by a true conservative, & with Leigh Wambsganss, that’s exactly what you’ll get,” Schatzline said in his June 27 post on X. “She has my full support.” A day after Wambsganss entered the race, Mizani told his social media following that he was giving prayerful consideration to running. “Senate District 9 is the Republican lifeblood of Tarrant County—our voters deserve a strong and principled conservative that is only beholden to the interests of the people of SD9 and not the whims and wills of the Austin political machine,” Mizani said in the June 28 post. As Keller’s mayor, Mizani said he has been just that. “Simply put, this campaign will be motivated by my family and yours, guided by our shared conservative values, and focused on offering solutions to the challenges we face as Texans,” Mizani said.

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Houston doctor fired after MAGA comments about Texas flood victims: 'What they voted for'

A Houston pediatrician was fired after recent comments over the deadly Texas Hill Country floods. Dr. Christina Propst, who practiced at Blue Fish Pediatrics, wrote a social media post that appeared to ridicule flood victims in Kerr County because of the county's politics. As of Tuesday, officials reported that the death toll surpassed 100 lives due to the flash floods that swept through Central Texas. Among the victims are at least 28 children from Kerr County.

Dr. Propst allegedly shared in a now-deleted Facebook post that victims of the floods who voted for Trump "got what they voted for." "May all visitors, children, non-MAGA voters and pets be safe and dry," the post allegedly said. "Kerr County MAGA voted to gut FEMA. They deny climate change. May they get what they voted for. Bless their hearts." On Sunday, Blue Fish Pediatrics announced on its website and social media that Dr. Propst was no longer employed at their practice. "This past weekend, we were made aware of a social media comment from one of our physicians," the statement reads. "The individual is no longer employed by Blue Fish Pediatrics. As we previously mentioned in our original statement, we strongly condemn the comments that were made in that post. That post does not reflect the values, standards, or mission of Blue Fish Pediatrics. We do not support or condone any statement that politicizes tragedy, diminishes human dignity, or fails to clearly uphold compassion for every child and family, regardless of background or beliefs.

Read this article at Austin American-Statesman - Subscribers Only

National Stories

Supreme Court allows Trump to proceed with large-scale government agency staff cuts, reorganizations

The Supreme Court on Tuesday said it will allow the Trump administration to proceed with large-scale reductions in staff at many federal government agencies as opponents continue to seek to block those efforts in lower-court proceedings. The Supreme Court’s decision is not the last word on the legality of the cutbacks at individual agencies themselves, which are being challenged in a lawsuit filed by a group of unions representing government workers, as well as by a handful of U.S. cities and counties. The high court is likely to consider that issue at a later date. In its unsigned order, the Supreme Court said that the Trump administration was likely to succeed in its arguments that an executive order directing agencies to prepare for the job cuts was lawful. But, the ruling added, “We express no view on the legality of any Agency [Reduction in Force] and Reorganization Plan produced or approved pursuant to the Executive Order and Memorandum.

Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson was the only one of the court’s nine members to openly dissent from the ruling Tuesday, which stayed an injunction blocking the so-called reductions in force at 19 federal agencies that was issued in May by a federal district court judge in San Francisco. “Today’s decision has dealt a serious blow to our democracy and puts services that the American people rely on in grave jeopardy,” the coalition that has sued to block the cuts said in a statement. “This decision does not change the simple and clear fact that reorganizing government functions and laying off federal workers en masse haphazardly without any congressional approval is not allowed by our Constitution,” the coalition said. Jackson, in her dissent, wrote, “In my view, this was the wrong decision at the wrong moment, especially given what little this Court knows about what is actually happening on the ground.” “This case is about whether that action amounts to a structural overhaul that usurps Congress’s policymaking prerogatives — and it is hard to imagine deciding that question in any meaningful way after those changes have happened,” she wrote.

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With broken promise on Epstein, Pam Bondi draws the ire of Trump’s supporters

Pam Bondi’s tendency to exaggerate is catching up to her. Right-wing influencers and allies of President Trump are calling for the attorney general’s resignation after she backtracked on a promise to release what she once called a “truckload” of documents from the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s investigation into convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. Bondi also previously implied that she had a list of Epstein’s clients sitting on her desk waiting for her review. The Justice Department on Monday denied the existence of such a list and said it would make no further disclosures about the case.

The about-face drew a chorus of criticism from right-wing figures, including Glenn Beck, Benny Johnson and Jack Posobiec. Laura Loomer asked late Monday on X, “How many more times is this woman going to get away with Fing (sic) everything up before she is FIRED?” For many of the president’s supporters, Bondi’s handling of the Epstein files is just the latest in a series of reversals driven by her tendency to overstate. Bondi has also made exaggerated claims about immigration matters, drug policy and the law enforcement agencies in her own purview, which legal experts said risks hurting the Justice Department’s credibility in court and the public eye. “It is challenging if you get into the habit of saying whatever seems politically convenient at the moment. At least occasionally, it will come back to bite you,” said Peter Keisler, who served as acting attorney general under former President George W. Bush. “There is a broader value in having credibility with courts and with other institutions that she does squander this way.” Trump has shown no public sign thus far that he plans to heed calls from right-wing influencers to force Bondi out. During a cabinet meeting Tuesday, the president seemed eager to move on from the Epstein debacle, saying in response to a question from a reporter, “Are people still talking about this guy, this creep? That’s unbelievable.” Trump said nothing about the criticisms of Bondi, one of his most trusted allies.

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Churches can endorse politicians, IRS says in court filing

For years, conservative legal groups have argued that an IRS rule barring churches from endorsing candidates was unconstitutional. Now the IRS agrees. In a court filing, the IRS said the-so called Johnson Amendment, which bars all nonprofits from being involved in campaigns, should not apply to political speech during religious services. Speaking about politics at a church or other house of worship is not the same as intervening or participating in an election, lawyers for the IRS as well as for conservative groups suing the agency wrote. “Bona fide communications internal to a house of worship, between the house of worship and its congregation, in connection with religious services, do neither of those things, any more than does a family discussion concerning candidates,” they wrote. “Thus, communications from a house of worship to its congregation in connection with religious services through its usual channels of communication on matters of faith do not run afoul of the Johnson Amendment as properly interpreted.”

The filing also notes that the IRS has rarely punished houses of worship for endorsements during religious services, though the agency has investigated churches over alleged Johnson Amendment violations. In April, Robert Jeffress, pastor of First Baptist Church in Dallas, told RNS that his church spent “hundreds of thousands of dollars” during an IRS investigation. “The case was ultimately resolved in our favor,” he said. Jeffress also said he’d been with President Donald Trump during a meeting where several pastors also spoke about being investigated over alleged Johnson Amendment violations. Trump has long promised to do away with the IRS rules barring pulpit endorsements. During his first term in office, Trump signed an executive order designed to give churches more leeway under IRS rules. Still, only one church has ever lost its tax exemption over politics. In 1992, a church in New York took out ads opposing Bill Clinton, leading to the loss of its tax exemption. The federal court filing is part of a proposed settlement of a lawsuit filed by the National Religious Broadcasters and a pair of Texas churches that sought to overturn the Johnson Amendment, named after famed Texas politician and former U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson.

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Think Democrats and Republicans can't work together? On sealing eviction records, they do.

When North Dakota state Sen. Ryan Braunberger first introduced a slate of tenant protection bills this year, he knew the odds of passage weren’t in his favor. Braunberger, a Democratic lawmaker in a Republican-controlled legislature who represents a renter-heavy district in Fargo, spent years as a housing advocate — walking tenants through eviction court, helping them navigate late fees and lease violations. But inside the statehouse, he was an outlier: one of the only legislators who rents his home. By the end of the legislative session, just one of his five proposals passed. But that one might prove to be a major overhaul of the state’s eviction process. Eviction filings are public and often lack case outcomes or context, yet they’re widely used by screening companies, creating barriers even when tenants win or cases are dismissed. A 2020 study of 3.6 million eviction records across a dozen states by Princeton University’s Eviction Lab found that 22% of the records were ambiguous or falsely represented a tenant’s past.

Black women, especially those with children, are disproportionately affected by evictions. Young children and infants are affected more than any other age group. Barta noted that many North Dakotans are evicted for financial reasons or may be fleeing domestic violence, and that holding old evictions against tenants prevents them from rebuilding stability. “That’s really what caught my eye,” Barta said. “I need to be aware of what my constituents are facing. Some people weren’t evicted for being irresponsible. They were fleeing violence or hit by one bad break.” Grand Forks, which is in Barta’s district, is more than 50% renter-occupied, making it one of the most tenant-heavy in the state, thanks in part to its proximity to the University of North Dakota. Grand Forks has also seen rents climb and vacancy rates tighten, while evictions — sometimes stemming from as little as a few hundred dollars of unpaid rent — can leave permanent marks on a tenant’s record. “Most landlords wouldn’t even give people a second chance once they saw an eviction on someone’s record,” Braunberger said. “It didn’t matter if the case was from a decade ago or if it had been resolved. That record stuck to them like glue.” If I want any policy to move, I have to collaborate. That’s almost a given here.

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Hegseth did not inform the White House before he authorized pause on weapon shipments to Ukraine, sources say

Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth did not inform the White House before he authorized a pause on weapons shipments to Ukraine last week, according to five sources familiar with the matter, setting off a scramble inside the administration to understand why the halt was implemented and explain it to Congress and the Ukrainian government. President Donald Trump suggested on Tuesday that he was not responsible for the move. Asked on Tuesday during a Cabinet meeting whether he approved of the pause in shipments, Trump demurred, saying only that the US would continue to send defensive weapons to Ukraine. Pressed again on who authorized the pause, Trump replied, “I don’t know, why don’t you tell me?” The episode underscores the often-haphazard policy-making process inside the Trump administration, particularly under Hegseth at the Defense Department. The pause was the second time this year that Hegseth had decided to halt the flow of US weapons to Ukraine, catching senior national security officials off guard, sources said.

It first happened in February and the decision was quickly reversed, three of the sources said — mirroring what happened on Monday night, when Trump announced that the weapons shipments would continue despite Hegseth signing off on the pause. The US special envoy to Ukraine, Ret. Gen. Keith Kellogg, and Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who is also Trump’s national security adviser, were also not told about the pause beforehand and learned about it from press reports, according to a senior administration official and two of the sources. Pentagon press secretary Kingsley Wilson told CNN in a statement that said in part, “Secretary Hegseth provided a framework for the President to evaluate military aid shipments and assess existing stockpiles. This effort was coordinated across government.” Asked whether Hegseth informed the White House prior to approving a pause on the shipments, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said in a statement that the Pentagon conducted a review “to ensure all support going to all foreign nations aligns with America’s interests,” and added that Trump “has made the decision to continue providing defensive weapons to Ukraine to help stop the killing in this brutal war, which the Pentagon has said they are actively working on.” She added that “the President has full confidence in the Secretary of Defense.”

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Rural hospitals brace for painful choices after Trump's Medicaid and Obamacare cuts

Rural hospitals across the U.S. say they’re being forced to consider tough choices — like cutting services for children or cancer patients — after President Donald Trump signed into law a sprawling domestic policy bill that includes sweeping cuts to not only Medicaid but the Affordable Care Act, as well. Benjamin Anderson, CEO of Hutchinson Regional Healthcare System, oversees a 180-bed hospital that serves as the only hospital for many residents in rural South Central Kansas. Anderson said he’s evaluating how the hospital and its broader health system will be able to afford to keep offering all of its services, which includes hospice and home care, inpatient mental health treatment, and a cardiology program. Services that aren’t traditionally profitable — such as women’s health and pediatric care — will be the hardest to sustain, Anderson said. He added the system is trying to see which programs can be saved.

The cuts in the bill will also mean the hospital will have to continue its hiring freeze — a move that risks burning out staff members already strained from the pandemic and high patient loads. The real test, he said, will come this fall when flu, Covid and RSV cases are expected to rise. “What this does is put us at risk when the respiratory season hits,” Anderson said. “We’re at real risk of wearing out the staff we have right now.” Rural hospitals rely heavily on Medicaid funding because they typically serve a higher share of low-income patients. An estimate from KFF, a health policy research group, found that Trump’s legislation, dubbed the “big, beautiful bill,” could lead to about 17 million people losing coverage due to the changes in Medicaid and the ACA. More than 300 rural hospitals in the U.S. are at risk of closing down because of the bill, Democratic lawmakers wrote in a letter last month. If more of their patients are uninsured, these hospitals risk not getting paid for their services, the letter said. The bill includes nearly $1 trillion in cuts to Medicaid, mainly through work requirements, as well as a change to how states are able to help fund their programs known as the provider tax.

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Lead Stories

104 confirmed dead from Texas floods as searches - and grief - continue

The Texas floods over Fourth of July weekend have killed more than 100 people, local officials said Monday afternoon, as search and rescue efforts continued. In Kerr County, searchers have found the bodies of 84 people: 56 adults and 28 children, according to the Kerr County sheriff’s office. Twenty-two adults and 10 children have yet to be identified, the sheriff’s office posted on Facebook. “At present, 10 Camp Mystic campers and one counselor remain unaccounted for,” the post read. “We share our deepest condolences with all affected by this tragedy.” Twenty other deaths have been reported in other parts of Texas: One in Tom Green County, two in Williamson County, four in Burnet County, six in Kendall County and seven in Travis County. The death toll stands at 104 people as of Monday evening.

Texas Hill Country is home to several summer camps, including Camp Mystic, which grieved “the loss of 27 campers and counselors.” Local first responders and government officials said they expect the number of confirmed dead to grow in the coming days as search and rescue teams and volunteers comb the banks of the Guadalupe River. With additional rain on the way, more flooding still threatened in saturated parts of Central Texas. “I need to tell my community and those families who are waiting, this will be a rough week,” Kerrville Mayor Joe Herring Jr. said at a news briefing Monday. “Primary search continues, and we remain hopeful. Every foot, every mile, every bend of the river, our work continues.” Kerr County Sheriff Larry Leitha said at the news briefing that of the dead, 27 were children. Nine children and 15 adults remain unidentified, he said. Texas Rangers are collecting DNA from victims and family members.

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Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick calls on Texas to buy sirens for flood-prone counties

Texas should buy warning sirens for counties in flash flood zones by next summer to better alert residents so they can d get to safety when catastrophes hit in the middle of the night while residents are asleep, Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick said on Fox News on Monday. Patrick said he met with Gov. Greg Abbott earlier in the day to talk about the catastrophic floods that killed at least 79 people in the Texas Hill Country over the Fourth of July weekend. Among them were at least 27 campers and counselors from Camp Mystic, a Christian summer camp on the banks of the Guadalupe River. Ten children and one counselor are still unaccounted for, officials said. Local first responders and government officials said they expect the number of confirmed dead to grow in the coming days as search and rescue teams comb the banks of the Guadalupe River.

What stood out to him and Abbott about the disaster, Patrick said, were news reports with officials saying residents didn’t have emergency sirens because the counties couldn’t afford them. Alerts went out to phones in the middle of the night and many people didn’t hear them, Patrick said. “The state needs to step up and pay for these,” Patrick said, adding that the Texas Senate would be “all in” on such an idea. “Had we had sirens along this area, the same type of sirens that they have in Israel when there’s an attack coming, that would have blown very loudly, it’s possible that that would have saved some of these lives.” A spokesman for Abbott declined to comment on the conversation but said the governor looks forward to addressing the issues during the special session. It was not immediately clear how much it would cost to provide the sirens or how many counties would need them. Residents and regular summer campers may be familiar with risks of staying in the area during flood season, but those regions get tourists every summer who may not even be aware that “this is kind of flash flood alley,” Patrick said.

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AccuWeather estimates Texas floods will cost at least $18 billion

The floods that devastated Texas’ Hill Country over the weekend will also result in a hefty economic toll, according to new data released Monday. The natural disaster that killed at least 84 in Kerr County represents a total projected economic cost between $18 billion and $22 billion, a preliminary estimate from AccuWeather shows. Along with immediate damage to homes and businesses, the cost of search and rescue operations is also likely to mount, the private forecasting company noted, while the disaster will also likely negatively impact everything from the area’s tourism industry to regional supply chains. The estimate also includes predicted insurance claims and long-term physical and mental health costs for survivors, among other factors.

“This is the latest disaster in an area with a long and tragic history of deadly and destructive flash floods,” Jonathan Porter, AccuWeather’s chief meteorologist, said in a statement. He added that damage “will have long-lasting economic impacts in the Hill Country region.” The $18 billion forecast comes as analysts have also pointed to Texas’ unique susceptibility to the ravages of extreme weather. The Lone Star State leads the nation in property damage linked to natural disasters, according to an analysis by Rainbow Restoration. Another 2022 study, by Value Penguin, found that weather-related property damage cost Texas over $121 billion between 2017 and 2021, with flash floods as the biggest culprit. An economic cost in AccuWeather’s range would place the weekend’s flood disaster among the most expensive natural disasters in recent Texas history.

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Trump sets 25% tariffs on Japan and South Korea, and new import taxes on 12 other nations

President Donald Trump on Monday set a 25% tax on goods imported from Japan and South Korea, as well as new tariff rates on a dozen other nations that would go into effect on Aug. 1. Trump provided notice by posting letters on Truth Social that were addressed to the leaders of the various countries. The letters warned them to not retaliate by increasing their own import taxes, or else the Trump administration would further increase tariffs. “If for any reason you decide to raise your Tariffs, then, whatever the number you choose to raise them by, will be added onto the 25% that we charge,” Trump wrote in the letters to Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba and South Korean President Lee Jae Myung.

The letters were not the final word from Trump on tariffs, so much as another episode in a global economic drama in which he has placed himself at the center. His moves have raised fears that economic growth would slow to a trickle, if not make the U.S. and other nations more vulnerable to a recession. But Trump is confident that tariffs are necessary to bring back domestic manufacturing and fund the tax cuts he signed into law last Friday. He mixed his sense of aggression with a willingness to still negotiate, signaling the likelihood that the drama and uncertainty would continue and that few things are ever final with Trump. “It’s all done,” Trump told reporters Monday. “I told you we’ll make some deals, but for the most part we’re going to send a letter.” South Korea’s Trade Ministry said early Tuesday that it will accelerate negotiations with the United States to achieve a mutually beneficial deal before the 25% tax on its exports goes into effect.

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State Stories

Democrats call for probes of deadly Kerr County flooding to discover ‘what went wrong’

U.S. Rep. Julie Johnson, D-Farmers Branch, said Monday she will demand a full investigation by the House Homeland Security Committee into “what went wrong” with the devastating Kerr County floods that left dozens dead. “We need answers, accountability, and immediate action to prevent this kind of failure from happening again,” Johnson said in a statement. “We owe it to the victims and their families.” Johnson is a member of the panel, which is under the control of Republicans. President Donald Trump’s administration pushed back on suggestions that National Weather Service staffing levels had any impact on the tragedy.

Texas Democrats and Republicans expressed gratitude to the first responders and volunteers involved in rescuing people from the floodwaters and said they were grieving with those affected by the tragedy. “Right now, with more rain expected, the focus must be on finding the missing, reuniting families, and supporting Texas communities in crisis,” Johnson said. The National Weather Service falls under the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration branch of the U.S. Department of Commerce. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., on Monday urged Commerce Department Acting Inspector General Duane Townsend to launch an inquiry into weather service staffing shortages and if they contributed to the “catastrophic loss of life and property” in the Texas floods. “As those impacted begin to mourn their catastrophic loss and start to rebuild their communities we must do everything possible to provide answers as to why the community was not alerted sooner that dangerously high floodwaters were imminent – both to bring some semblance of peace to those impacted and to insure we do everything within our power to make sure it doesn’t ever happen again across the U.S,” Schumer wrote in a letter to Townsend. He cited a New York Times report that key weather service positions in Texas were vacant. The service has been pushed to reduce its staffing numbers under Trump, according to the Times.

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Austin fire chief faces no confidence vote over delayed Kerr County flood response.

The Austin firefighters union will decide Tuesday whether to initiate a no-confidence vote against Fire Chief Joel Baker for allegedly waiting to send local firefighters to Kerr County to help with flood response. “We are disgusted with our fire chief,” the Austin Firefighters Association said in a Monday post on its Facebook page. “He needs to be held accountable and fired for his disgraceful dereliction of duty.” Association President Bob Nicks told the American-Statesman the Fire Department denied an informal request from the state for help on July 2 ahead of a storm that ended up killing at least 84 people in the Kerrville area, including 28 children.

Another request on July 3 was also denied. After learning the Fire Department had denied the requests, Nicks said he texted Baker throughout the weekend in an attempt to persuade the chief into deploying local firefighters to the Kerrville area but received no response. “I didn’t want to air our dirty laundry out in public, but the public has to know about what was happening,” Nicks said in an interview, referencing the social media post. “We could have had boots on the ground 48 hours in advance, before floodwaters were even rising.” In a phone interview Monday evening, Baker acknowledged receiving text messages from Nicks but said he was not aware of any requests for mutual aid prior to one sent on the morning of July 4. He authorized a deployment of two crews, including four rescue swimmers, following that ask and additional deployments over the weekend as rescue efforts were unfolding. “I have not seen any documentation that any of our firefighters received an unofficial request,” he said. “It is possible it did happen but I was not made aware of it.” An internal email obtained by the Statesman indicates that Baker suspended emergency deployments through the Texas Intrastate Fire Mutual Aid System (TIFMAS) in late May or early June as a cost-savings measure as the city faces a historic budget deficit.

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Coast Guard swimmer saved 165 lives at Camp Mystic after flooding devastation, U.S. officials say

Scott Ruskan had never been on a rescue mission when he boarded a helicopter to find a crowd of about 200 campers stranded by deadly flooding on July 4, according to the U.S. Coast Guard. But the 26-year-old rescue swimmer saved 165 lives at Camp Mystic — the Christian summer camp where 27 people died in the weekend's catastrophic flooding, Department of Homeland Security officials said. Ruskan was part of a four-person Coast Guard flight crew that landed at Camp Mystic early Friday afternoon and carried scores of campers to safety, away from the flooding disaster that killed at least 82 people total. When asked about the other 35 or so people in the crowd, Coast Guard officials said they did not "have clarity on the status of those rescued and would have to defer to local authorities." Ruskan said he finished his Coast Guard training about six months earlier and has been with the Coast Guard for roughly a year, based in Corpus Christi. It's a far cry from Wall Street, where the Coast Guard said he left a career to "do something different with his life."

During the rescue mission, Ruskan said he was the only first responder at Camp Mystic, having traveled there with two pilots and a flight mechanic. The crew took off for Central Texas from Corpus Christi at about 6:30 a.m. and took seven or eight hours to reach the camp grounds due to the weather conditions in Texas. "They said it was probably some of the worst conditions they've ever flown in," said Lt. Commander Steven Roth, a spokesperson for the Coast Guard. The crowd Ruskan found was cold, huddled and scared, according to the Coast Guard. So he got to work. Roth said Ruskan set up a triage to evaluate campers' medical conditions and prioritize a series of evacuations with a set of 12 helicopters. Roth said Ruskan guided groups of 10 to 15 children onto the helicopters stationed between two landing zones, which Ruskan arranged with the National Guard and Texas state officials. One was an archery field. The other, a soccer field. The helicopters took off, carrying the survivors to medical care. Roth said Ruskan was on the ground for hours, guiding children to the aircraft. He said much of the flooding had subsided at the time, but debris was scattered, buildings were crumbling and rain was pouring.

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Conroe ISD looks to opt out of requirement to allow homeschool students UIL participation

The Conroe ISD Board of Trustees wasn’t supportive of allowing homeschool students to participate in University Interscholastic League activities on behalf of the district and is considering opting out of a new legislative requirement. Previous legislation allowed districts to opt in, providing homeschool students the opportunity to represent the district in UIL activities and allocating $1,500 to those students. The newly passed Senate Bill 401 will take effect this September and requires public school districts to allow non-enrolled (homeschool) students who meet UIL requirements to have the same opportunities to participate in UIL activities as enrolled students. The bill does allow for districts to opt out.

The legislation also grants students who reside in a school district that does not allow non-enrolled students to participate in UIL activities the right to participate in UIL activities in the closest school district that does. Chris Povich, assistant superintendent for Conroe high schools, said 43 districts in Texas allow homeschool students to participate in UIL activities, but none are in the Houston region. “I am concerned that if we were the only district, and the largest district in the area, what would we be setting ourselves up for,” Board President Misty Odenweller said regarding if the district didn’t opt out. Trustee Maryanne Horton said allowing homeschool students would create an unfair advantage. “I think it would be unfair to our students who are enrolled to accept students from the outside not held to the same standards,” Horton said.

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8-year-old Austin girls, Linnie and Mary, among Texas flood victims from Camp Mystic

Two 8-year-old girls are the first from Austin to be publicly identified as victims of the raging flood waters that swept through Camp Mystic, their families and close friends confirm. Linnie McCown was a student at Casis Elementary in West Austin, her father, Michael, told the American-Statesman on Sunday. In an emotional social media post, he wrote: "She filled our hearts with so much joy we cannot begin to explain. We are going to miss her so very much but know she's up there shining bright." Mary Stevens, who attended Highland Park Elementary School in north-central Austin, also was among the victims, a family spokesman said. The spokesman shared a social media post written by her mother, Stacy, saying "you have left the most positive impact on everyone who knew you. I'm the luckiest that I got to be your mom and I will never stop loving you and trying to live life as you did. Fearless. Enthusiastic. Compassionate. And full of joy."

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VA secretary vows during Dallas visit that massive jobs cuts will not weaken patient care

Veterans Affairs Secretary Doug Collins on Monday dismissed worries that federal job and spending cuts would weaken health care for veterans, saying the sprawling agency will actually improve service for its patients. Speaking at the Dallas VA Medical Center in Oak Cliff, Collins said the cuts are targeting duplicate services and some contracts and that improving care is his top priority. “I always promised we would never take out of patient care, and we have kept that promise,” said Collins, marking his first visit to Texas since taking the helm of the organization this year. Collins’ visit came the same day Veterans Affairs announced it is on track to cut 30,000 employees from the agency by the end of September.

The cuts are a result of the federal hiring freeze, deferred resignations and normal attrition. Because of those moves, the agency said it will no longer be forced to conduct a larger reduction in workforce, as it initially planned. The number of job vacancies in North Texas, which has roughly 7,000 employees, was not immediately clear Monday. More than 350,000 positions deemed critical are exempt from the federal hiring freeze, Collins said Monday, ensuring that veteran care will not be affected. At the start of this year, the agency had about 484,000 employees, about a quarter of whom are veterans themselves. The cuts are part of efforts by the Trump administration’s Department of Government Efficiency, formerly spearheaded by entrepreneur Elon Musk, to dramatically trim the federal workforce. Collins said the cuts are making the agency more nimble. The VA says its disability claims backlog is down nearly 30% since Trump took office, and the agency is processing a record number of disability claims, reaching 2 million claims by June, more than a month faster than the previous year. “We only have one constituency, and we’re going to serve that constituency well, and that is the veterans,” Collins said. Some veterans pushed back against the cuts at the agency. “Cutting jobs won’t necessarily make the VA more efficient. If they’re making cuts, what are they doing to make it better?” said Albert Zapanta, a retired major general in the U.S. Army who lives in Irving. “I don’t think they have an answer for that yet.”

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Texas summer camp evacuated 70 staying near river ahead of flooding: 'Saw it coming'

A Texas summer camp near the Guadalupe River evacuated about 70 children and adults after camp officials noticed rising waters and a deluge of rain early on the Fourth of July. The 500-acre Presbyterian Mo-Ranch Assembly, a recreation destination which had been hosting a summer camp, as well as a youth conference with churches across the U.S., is located at the headwaters of the river and had been monitoring the situation for about 24 hours, Mo-Ranch communications director Lisa Winters told KENS5. It was about 1 a.m. Friday when a facilities manager, Aroldo Barrera, notified his boss, who had been monitoring reports of the storms approaching, the Associated Press reported. Despite the absence of warning by local authorities, camp officials at Mo-Ranch acted quickly on their own, relocating about 70 children and adults staying overnight in a building near the river. With the kids safe, camp leaders including President and CEO Tim Huchton avoided the catastrophe that hit at least one other camp near Hunt, Texas.

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Robert Wilonsky: An unfathomable tragedy in the Hill Country carries its grief to Dallas

Every conversation, no matter the subject, inevitably turns now to the unfathomable tragedy still unfolding in the Hill Country, along and near the banks of the Guadalupe River. Because sooner or later, it seems, we’re all discovering we’re somehow connected to someone who lost someone this weekend. Even if that just means we’re bound up in the same shock and grief, a big state made smaller in mourning. As of the time of this writing, among the more than 100 confirmed dead are at least seven children from Dallas or the Park Cities. They are 9-year-old Lila Bonner and her best friend, 10-year-old Eloise Peck, both of whom just finished second grade at John S. Bradfield Elementary School. And 13-year-old Blair Harber and her 11-year-old sister Brooke, who were recovered 15 miles from Kerrville, their hands clasped. And 8-year-old twins Hanna and Rebecca Lawrence, who attended University Park Elementary. And 9-year-old Janie Hunt, great-granddaughter of William Herbert Hunt. There’s also 8-year-old Hadley Hanna of Dallas, who remains among the unaccounted for, and so many other children not yet found.

There are the adults, too, including Blair and Brooke’s grandparents, Mike and Charlene Harber, with whom the girls had been staying in a cabin along the river. The Harbers are late 1960s graduates of my alma mater, Thomas Jefferson High School, whose alumni took to Facebook over the weekend to offer prayers for and memories of the couple. As of Monday afternoon the Harbers remained among the missing, as did Tanya and Jeff Ramsey, who’d been camping in an RV park swallowed by floodwaters. Countless mutual friends have spent the last several days posting photos of the Flower Mound couple on social media. It’s our inclination to turn away from tragedy when it doesn’t enter our home, to let it be someone else’s problem — someone else’s misery. Especially when it happens over there, hundreds of miles from our backyards. We’re seemingly overwhelmed now with headlines bearing unimaginable nightmares, horror stories too incomprehensible to process. It’s far easier to snap off the television and lay down the phone and pretend it didn’t touch us. Yet it did. It does. Monday morning, one of my dearest friends — and my son’s pediatrician — told me his group treats three of the children claimed by the floodwaters. He told me he has tried to watch the news in “doctor mode,” but that one listen to Jackson Browne’s “Before the Deluge” shattered that dispassion. Especially the line, “Let the buildings keep our children dry.”

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Hunt family member staying at Camp Mystic killed in Texas floods

A 9-year-old girl from Dallas’ prominent Hunt family was killed in the fatal floods that ran through Camp Mystic in the Hill Country on Friday. Janie Hunt, who was among the missing campers, was identified on Saturday afternoon, according to social media posts from family. Janie was the great-granddaughter of the late American oil baron William Herbert Hunt and a cousin of Clark Hunt, the owner of the Kansas City Chiefs. In a post on Instagram, Clark Hunt’s wife, Tavia Hunt, shared words of faith and grief over the loss of Janie. “Our hearts are broken with the devastation from the floods... and the tragic loss of so many lives — including a precious little Hunt cousin, along with several friends’ little girls,” Tavia Hunt said. The Hunt family also owns FC Dallas, chaired by Clark Hunt and Dan Hunt. On Friday evening, FC Dallas observed a moment of silence for those impacted by the floods before the Dallas match against Minnesota United FC. “The devastation today in Central Texas is probably at the forefront of everybody’s minds and should be,” said Eric Quill, FC Dallas head coach. “I think we should all say a deep prayer that God can make sense of this.”

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Sarah Jakes and Touré Roberts installed as Potter’s House co-senior pastors

The Potter’s House in Dallas formally installed founder Bishop T.D. Jakes’ daughter and son-in-law, Sarah Jakes Roberts and Touré Roberts, as the church’s new co-senior pastors in a packed service Sunday, ushering in a new era at the megachurch. Worshippers cheered, clapped and danced in the pews of the nearly full church auditorium, big enough for 7,600 people, for a high-energy service that ran almost four hours. “This moment is a history-making moment — it’s a defining moment,” said Cindy Trimm, who gave the morning’s sermon.

The Potter’s House also marked its 29th anniversary Sunday. Jakes moved to Dallas and founded the nondenominational megachurch in 1996. The church says it has 30,000 members. “Far more than a ceremonial handoff, this moment signals the beginning of a bold new era for The Potter’s House, as Bishop T.D. Jakes shifts from senior pastor to legacy builder, expanding his global influence and redoubling his efforts to address economic, cultural, and spiritual needs through the T.D. Jakes Group,” the church said in a statement before Sunday’s service. In April, Jakes announced he would hand over leadership of the church to his daughter and son-in-law. “I know the crown is heavy,” he said during an April service. “But I also know that if God is for you, who can be against you?” Jakes will continue in his role as chairman of the T.D. Jakes Group, which includes his real estate company, social impact holding company and T.D. Jakes Foundation. The transition comes about seven months after what he described as a “massive heart attack” while delivering a sermon on stage in November.

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Reports of 2 girls rescued from a tree fueled false hope after Texas flood

As torrential rains slammed central Texas and the death toll from the resulting floods grew into the dozens over the weekend, rumors started to spread online about a sliver of good news. Two girls had allegedly been found alive in a tree near Comfort, Texas. The “crusty, embittered, grouchy journalist” in Louis Amestoy, editor of The Kerr County Lead, was skeptical — but the messages he was getting about the miraculous rescue wouldn’t stop, he said. An on-the-ground social media report from a volunteer seemed to corroborate the story. After sending a reporter out to investigate and hearing from what he said were multiple self-described eyewitnesses, the Lead ran with the story July 6, which was subsequently shared both locally and nationally. The only problem was that the story was not true. “100% inaccurate,” as a local sheriff put it.

On Facebook, thousands of people had seen the story, with many expressing hope, gratitude and relief. Those hopes were crushed when Amestoy was forced to retract the story. Like other disasters before it, the floods had attracted fast-spreading misinformation and served as a warning about the vigilance required of journalists during emotionally charged news events. After the story was debunked, many Facebook pages and accounts, including verified ones deleted or updated their original posts sharing the unverified report. Yet some posts with the initial reports, including one with 4,700 shares, remained unchanged as of Monday evening. Flash floods starting July 4 in central Texas have killed at least 104 people, according to news reports. Though officials have discouraged people from interfering with rescue operations, that didn’t stop volunteers from showing up, Amestoy said. When a reporter for the Lead, Jennifer Dean, went to the scene of the supposed rescue, “volunteer firefighters” and other community members recounted the story about the two girls as proof of the volunteers’ efforts, Amestoy said. “You had so much enthusiasm in that community for that story. So many people were telling us that they saw the situation,” Amestoy said. “We literally had eyewitnesses.” Dean talked to roughly 20 to 30 people in Comfort, all of whom told similar versions of the story, Amestoy said. (Dean could not be reached for comment.) A few even took her to the site of the made-up rescue, he said.

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11 charged after July 4 shooting at North Texas ICE facility

Attorneys with the Department of Justice’s North Texas division unsealed charges against 11 suspects connected to a July 4 shooting at an Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention facility in Johnson County. Nine of the 11 have connections to North Texas. Court documents named 10 suspects who’ve been charged with three counts of attempted murder and three counts of discharging a firearm in furtherance of a crime, according to an unsealed federal complaint. The charges come three days after an Alvarado police officer was shot while responding to an incident outside the Prairieland Detention Facility. The suspects used fireworks and vandalism to lure ICE personnel out of the facility, acting U.S. Attorney Nancy Larson said Monday at a press briefing in Fort Worth. Larson said the intent was to attack the officials and kill them. “Make no mistake — this was not a so-called peaceful protest. It was indeed an ambush,” she said.

The defendants include four Fort Worth residents, three from Dallas and one each from Kennedale, Waxahachie, and College Station, according to court documents. The documents identify the suspects as Cameron Arnold, Savanna Batten, Nathan Baumann, Zachary Evetts, Joy Gibson, Bradford Morris, Maricela Rueda, Seth Sikes, Elizabeth Soto and Ines Soto. If convicted they could face anywhere from 10 years to life in prison, Larson said. The 11th suspect was charged with obstruction, however, their name was not present in the court documents, and officials did not answer questions after the briefing. The incident began around 10:37 p.m. July 4 when about 10 to 12 people started shooting fireworks at the ICE detention facility, according to the complaint. About 10 minutes later, one or two members of the group broke off to spray-paint vehicles and a guard booth with anti-ICE slogans. Two ICE corrections officers came out of the facility around 10:58 p.m. shortly after calling 911. The bullets started flying about a minute later, after the Alvarado police officer arrived, according to the complaint. Two shooters fired 20-30 rounds before fleeing the scene, the complaint states.

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Democrats’ new chair, a familiar face, plans to flip Tarrant County

Allison Campolo was elected to be Tarrant County Democratic Party Chair by a landslide of votes Monday evening, according to unofficial election results. She took over for the former chair, Crystal Gayden, at the close of the meeting. Campolo, who had served as the party’s chair from 2021 to 2023, was elected by 90.3% of the 144 special election voters. She ran on a campaign of surpassing her previous fundraising successes and turning Tarrant County blue. Patrick Moses, her competitor, earned 14 votes. He ran on informing, inspiring and mobilizing the marginalized community. The special election canvased the 144 precinct chairs who attended the meeting out of 239 eligible. Campolo, who has served as a precinct chair until being elected on Monday, said the Democrats are facing an important year.

In her two-minute speech before the vote, she pointed at her fundraising successes in her own campaign for state senate in 2018 and the $500,000 she raised as chair in 2022. “I’m aiming to make us a million dollar party. I’m aiming to talk to over a million voters. We can flip this county,” Campolo said. “We can kick out Tim O’Hare. We can keep Alissa Simmons’s seat. We can replace Manny Ramirez on the county commissioners court. We can replace our whole county-wide elected slate here in Tarrant, and then flip a bunch of other amazing districts that need to have Democrats in them. And I’m ready to do that.” Moses held a similar view of flipping the county blue in his two minutes. “We turn blue, the whole nation will turn blue,” he said. Moses also said his main point of focus would be to reach out to the marginalized communities who have been ignored by the Democratic Party.

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State commission sanctions Dallas County State Dist. Judge Amber Givens

Dallas County State Dist. Judge Judge Amber Givens has been sanctioned by the State Commission on Judicial Conduct. The commission reprimanded Givens on June 23 for allowing her coordinator to impersonate her online four years ago, according to disciplinary documents. Defense lawyers had filed a complaint to the state. Givens also was admonished for putting a man in jail and revoking another offender’s bond after she had recused herself from those cases. Documents show that in 2022, more than 100 recusal motions had been filed against her in a short period. The sanction document says that Givens maintains that in 2023 the district clerk's office did not update the county courts docketing system to reflect her recusals. Lawyers and prosecutors have accused Givens of "making unfair rulings, treating lawyers with disrespect, and having a "retaliatory nature," according to the commission's documents.

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National Stories

Musk’s fiery reentry into politics ignites a new Tesla backlash

Longtime supporters of Tesla appealed to the company’s board Monday to pull CEO Elon Musk’s attention back to the embattled electric vehicle company, as the entrepreneur appeared to renege on an April pledge to spend more time at the company by saying he would start a new political party. “The board can’t just sit here and watch this go by without saying something and putting guardrails in,” said Dan Ives, managing director of Wedbush Securities, who has consistently expressed a bullish outlook on Tesla and Musk’s leadership. “I’m hearing from many shareholders that the frustration is hitting a tipping point.” Tesla’s stock closed about 7 percent lower Monday, after Musk declared in social media posts over the weekend that he was creating a political party amid his escalating feud with President Donald Trump — and claimed his America Party would target next year’s midterms.

The backlash from Ives and other longtime Tesla supporters underscored how the entrepreneur’s effort to give the United States a third major political party, already in search of a political constituency, risked eroding support among even some of his most ardent backers. “I encourage the Board to meet immediately and ask Mr. Musk to clarify his political ambitions and evaluate whether they are compatible with his full-time obligations to Tesla as CEO,” wrote James Fishback, CEO of investment firm Azoria — whose largest position is in Tesla — in a letter to Tesla’s board chair over the weekend. “I remain hopeful that Mr. Musk will return his full attention to Tesla. If not, I trust the Board will take appropriate action.” In response to Musk’s announcement of his new party, Fishback, a Trump supporter, said his firm was pulling the planned launch of a Tesla-focused investment fund that had been set for the coming days. “This creates a conflict with his full-time responsibilities as CEO of Tesla,” Fishback’s letter said. “It diverts his focus and energy away from Tesla’s employees and shareholders.” Fishback declined further comment. Musk and Tesla’s board did not respond to a request for comment.

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Trump to resume sending weapons to Ukraine

President Trump said Monday the U.S. would resume providing Ukraine with arms to help it withstand Russian attacks after months of trying without success to draw Moscow into negotiations on ending the war. “We have to, they have to be able to defend themselves,” Trump said of aiding Kyiv during a meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. “They are getting hit very hard. Now they are getting hit very hard. We’re gonna have to send more weapons.” His comments were the strongest indication so far that Trump has come around to the idea of strengthening Kyiv’s defenses less than a week after it was disclosed that the Pentagon was withholding a shipment of arms earmarked for Ukraine.

In a statement late Monday, Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell said: “At President Trump’s direction, the Department of Defense is sending additional defensive weapons to Ukraine to ensure the Ukrainians can defend themselves while we work to secure a lasting peace and ensure the killing stops.” Trump told Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in a telephone call Friday that he wasn’t responsible for the halt in weapons shipments to Kyiv. Trump said that he had directed a review of Pentagon munitions stockpiles after the U.S. struck Iran’s nuclear sites last month but hadn’t ordered the department to freeze the arms deliveries, according to people briefed on the conversation. The call with Zelensky came shortly after Trump publicly said he was “very disappointed” and “didn’t make any progress” on a Ukraine peace deal in a separate call Thursday with Russian President Vladimir Putin. Trump urged Putin to end the war during the call, but Putin refused, according to the Kremlin. “I’m disappointed, frankly, that President Putin hasn’t stopped,” Trump said Monday night.

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Kennedy’s battle against food dyes hits a roadblock: M&M’s

Less than three months after he declared war on synthetic food dyes, Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has already secured the cooperation of the makers of some of America’s most colorful culinary products. If they fulfill their promises, Jell-O snacks, Kool-Aid beverages, and Lucky Charms cereals, among a host of other foods, will be rid of synthetic dyes by the end of 2027. But the candy industry and its most colorful chocolate treat, M&M's, are a big obstacle standing between Mr. Kennedy and the ability to claim total victory. Other than Froot Loops cereal, perhaps no food carries as much symbolism as M&M’s for Mr. Kennedy and the movement he calls “Make America Healthy Again.” Upon taking the reins at the Department of Health and Human Services, he made synthetic dyes the first target in his plan to rid the nation of ultra-processed foods.

When Mr. Kennedy announced in April that he had an “understanding” with food makers to remove petroleum-based dyes by the end of 2026, citing research showing they were linked to behavioral problems in children, critics scoffed at his voluntary approach. Yet his peer-pressure campaign appears to have produced some results. Last month, Nestle and ConAgra joined Kraft Heinz, General Mills and PepsiCo in signing on to the secretary’s plan. Candy manufacturers, which lean on artificial colorings for the bright treats they market to children, are still holding out. “I think RFK and his team are learning the limits of their power to persuade,” said Scott Faber, an attorney with the Environmental Working Group, an advocacy organization. As much as 19 percent of processed foods include synthetic dyes, and confectionary companies had the most products containing them, according to a study published in late June in the Journal of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics. In an appearance on Capitol Hill in May, Mr. Kennedy pronounced the food industry “very, very receptive.” His spokesman, Andrew Nixon, said both the secretary and the Food and Drug Administration were urging “other food manufacturers, including the candy industry, to follow suit in putting public health first over industry profit.”

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ICE agents wearing masks add new levels of intimidation, confusion during L.A. raids

For many Angelenos, the spectacle of armed federal agents — faces hidden behind neck gaiters and balaclavas — jumping out of unmarked vans to snatch people off the streets presents a clear threat to public safety. As federal immigration agents have ratcheted up enforcement raids, arresting and detaining anyone they suspect of violating immigration laws, critics warn their tactic of masking — particularly when wearing plain clothes and no visible marker of identity — spreads fear and panic across communities and imperils citizens as well as immigrants without legal status. “It’s very dangerous,” said Scott Shuchart, who worked for the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement from 2022 until January of this year as an assistant director for regulatory affairs and a policy counselor.

“If somebody comes up to you with a mask and a T-shirt and no badge, why would you think that they are exercising a legitimate authority, as opposed to being a violent criminal trying to do you harm?” Schuchart said. “How do you know that you need to not resist to avoid arrest, as opposed to resist arrest to possibly survive the encounter?” But defenders of federal immigration agents also cite security as a reason for masking. They present immigrants without legal papers as a threat to public safety, even though the majority of people ICE arrested across LA in early June had no criminal record. They also argue that masking is necessary because a convergence of factors — supercharged political rhetoric, more sophisticated facial recognition technology, and increased threat of doxing on social media — makes the job more dangerous for agents in the field. “We have a lot of agents whose faces are being put on social media platforms across the country,” said Mathew Silverman, national president of the Federal Law Enforcement Officers Association. “We have politicians right now that are saying, ‘We will find these federal agents who have masks on. We will expose them.’ It’s just creating an era in law enforcement where trying to do the jobs of law enforcement is becoming more and more difficult.”

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A Marco Rubio impostor is using AI voice to call high-level officials

An impostor pretending to be Secretary of State Marco Rubio contacted foreign ministers, a U.S. governor and a member of Congress by sending them voice and text messages that mimic Rubio’s voice and writing style using artificial intelligence-powered software, according to a senior U.S. official and a State Department cable obtained by The Washington Post. U.S. authorities do not know who is behind the string of impersonation attempts but they believe the culprit is likely attempting to manipulate powerful government officials “with the goal of gaining access to information or accounts,” according to a cable sent by Rubio’s office to State Department employees. Using both text messaging and the encrypted messaging app Signal, which the Trump administration uses extensively, the impostor “contacted at least five non-Department individuals, including three foreign ministers, a U.S. governor, and a U.S. member of Congress,” said the cable, dated July 3.

The impersonation campaign began in mid-June when the impostor created a Signal account using the display name “Marco.Rubio@state.gov” to contact unsuspecting foreign and domestic diplomats and politicians, said the cable. The display name is not his real email address. “The actor left voicemails on Signal for at least two targeted individuals and in one instance, sent a text message inviting the individual to communicate on Signal,” said the cable. It also notes that other State Department personnel were impersonated using email. When asked about the cable, the State Department responded that it would “carry out a thorough investigation and continue to implement safeguards to prevent this from happening in the future.” Officials declined to discuss the contents of the messages or the names of the diplomats and officials who were targeted. The incident with Rubio comes after several recent impersonation attempts targeting high-profile U.S. officials. In May, someone breached the phone of White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles and began placing calls and messages to senators, governors and business executives while pretending to be Wiles, the Wall Street Journal reported. The episode spurred a White House and FBI investigation, although President Donald Trump dismissed its significance, saying Wiles is “an amazing woman” who “can handle it.”

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DOJ says there is no Epstein client list as it backs off promised releases

Trump appointees leading the Justice Department are backtracking on a promise to open up the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s files on convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, attempting to shut down long-simmering questions and conspiracies they once promoted. Officials said Monday that after an “exhaustive review” they had found no “incriminating client list” or additional documents that warrant public disclosure. The FBI also confirmed a medical examiner’s finding that Epstein killed himself in jail in 2019 while awaiting trial on sex-trafficking charges, responding to unproven claims that the disgraced financier was murdered to keep him quiet about other powerful people who sexually abused the young women and girls he trafficked. “There was also no credible evidence found that Epstein blackmailed prominent individuals as part of his actions,” the Justice Department and FBI wrote in a memo released Monday. “We did not uncover evidence that could predicate an investigation against uncharged third parties.”

The findings were meant to settle yearslong questions surrounding Epstein, who once hobnobbed with the rich and powerful. But the memo so far has only intensified those doubts. Some of the conspiracies around Epstein and the “deep state” of bureaucrats supposedly covering up the extent of his crimes have been fanned by the same people now in top roles in the Trump administration, including FBI Director Kash Patel and his deputy Dan Bongino. Among those theories is the allegation that the government concealed a list of men who abused some of Epstein’s victims. Women who were trafficked by Epstein have named more than 20 men as alleged participants in sexual exploitation or abuse, according to a lawyer representing many of those women. The FBI’s Monday explanation failed to satisfy many of the more conspiracy-minded MAGA influencers. “NO ONE IS BUYING THIS!!” Infowars founder Alex Jones said on X. “Next the DOJ will say ‘Actually, Jeffrey Epstein never even existed.” This is over the top sickening.” In an interview with Fox News in February, Attorney General Pam Bondi was asked whether the Justice Department would release “the list of Jeffrey Epstein’s clients.” She replied: “It’s sitting on my desk right now to review.” Shortly after that, she invited right-wing personalities to the White House to receive “Phase 1” of the Epstein documents. The event flopped when the material contained few new revelations.

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Lead Stories

Death toll in central Texas flash floods rises to 82 as sheriff says 10 campers remain missing

Families sifted through waterlogged debris Sunday and stepped inside empty cabins at Camp Mystic, an all-girls summer camp ripped apart by flash floods that washed homes off their foundations and killed at least 82 people in central Texas. Rescuers maneuvering through challenging terrain, high waters and snakes including water moccasins continued their desperate search for the missing, including 10 girls and a counselor from the camp. For the first time since the storms began pounding Texas, Gov. Greg Abbott said there were 41 people confirmed to be unaccounted for across the state and more could be missing. In Kerr County, home to Camp Mystic and other youth camps in the Texas Hill Country, searchers have found the bodies of 68 people, including 28 children, Sheriff Larry Leitha said in the afternoon.

He pledged to keep searching until “everybody is found” from Friday’s flash floods. Ten other deaths were reported in Travis, Burnet, Kendall, Tom Green and Williamson counties, according to local officials. The death toll is certain to rise over the next few days, said Col. Freeman Martin of the Texas Department of Public Safety. The governor warned that additional rounds of heavy rains lasting into Tuesday could produce more life-threatening flooding, especially in places already saturated. As he spoke at a news conference in Austin, emergency alerts lit up mobile phones in Kerr County that warned of “High confidence of river flooding” and a loudspeaker near Camp Mystic urged people to leave. Minutes later, however, authorities on the scene said there was no risk. Families were allowed to look around the camp beginning Sunday morning. One girl walked out of a building carrying a large bell. A man, who said his daughter was rescued from a cabin on the highest point in the camp, walked a riverbank, looking in clumps of trees and under big rocks.

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Trump faces crucial week for reaching trade deals

President Trump faces a crucial week for reaching trade deals before new tariffs are scheduled to hit dozens of countries starting Wednesday. He has scored several big wins in the past two weeks, including signing his tax and domestic policy megabill and helping broker a cease-fire between Israel and Iran. U.S. job growth in June was steadier than economists had expected, signaling strength in the economy. Trump will attempt to build on his momentum by tackling a series of trade agreements that have proven elusive ahead of his fast-approaching deadline. Among other sticking points, the president has refused to budge on his industry-specific tariffs, including those targeting foreign automobile manufacturers.

Trump said Thursday that he wants to start sending letters to countries to notify them of the new tariff rates on their exports to the U.S. after monthslong complex negotiations. “It’s just much easier. We have far more than 170 countries. And how many deals can you make? And you can take good deals, but they’re much more complicated,” Trump said about his letters. Trump later said new tariff rates would potentially range from 10% to 70%, with payments due by Aug. 1. The president said Sunday that a dozen or more letters could go out this week, and that letters will be delivered starting at noon Monday. On Truth Social late Sunday, he threatened an additional levy on countries aligning themselves with the Brics group of emerging economies. “Any Country aligning themselves with the Anti-American policies of BRICS, will be charged an ADDITIONAL 10% Tariff. There will be no exceptions to this policy,” Trump said. His post came as leaders of the bloc, whose members including Brazil, Russia and China, met in Rio de Janeiro. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said on CNN’s “State of the Union” on Sunday that the tone of the letters being sent might not be a declaration of immediate tariffs on dozens of countries. Instead, Bessent said, the letters will feature another deadline that trading partners will have to meet to come to a deal with the U.S. to avoid the same so-called reciprocal duties originally announced in April. “President Trump is going to send letters to some of our trading partners saying that ‘if you don’t move things along, then on August 1st, you will boomerang back to your April 2nd tariff level,’” Bessent said.

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Did Texas officials do enough to prevent flood devastation?

The first warning came Thursday afternoon, shortly after 1 p.m. Meteorologists for the National Weather Service in New Braunfels predicted up to 7 inches of rain would fall in the flood-prone Texas Hill Country, which includes Kerr County, early on the Fourth of July morning. Less than 24 hours later, the Guadalupe River surged to its second-highest height on record, with 15 inches of rain falling in some places. In the town of Hunt, the river recorded an astonishing 22-foot rise in just two hours. “This is a very dangerous and life-threatening flood event along the river,” the weather service warned on X at 5:08 a.m. Friday. “Move to higher ground!” From snow to 100-degree heat, we've got you covered. At least 82 people were killed by the historic flood. More remain missing, including 10 girls from Camp Mystic, a popular summer camp tucked along the banks of the river. The total number of unaccounted for is not known, but authorities have warned the death toll will rise.

As the frantic search limped into a third day, grief-stricken Texans are asking if meteorologists and local officials did enough to prevent the catastrophe. Questions have emerged over whether federal job cuts by the Trump administration hobbled the weather service, and why Kerr County lacked an emergency response system. “There’s going to be a lot of finger-pointing, a lot of second-guessing and Monday morning quarterbacking,” said Republican U.S. Rep. Chip Roy, whose district includes Kerr County. “There’s a lot of people saying ‘why’ and ‘how,’ and I understand that.” At news conferences, local and state officials appeared to blame meteorologists for initially underestimating the amount of rainfall, but some meteorologists say officials did not heed urgent warnings and flash flooding is unpredictable. Because of the flooding risk, Bob Fogarty, a longtime weather service meteorologist in New Braunfels, said four meteorologists were working early Friday, double the usual number for an overnight shift. The agency issued the first flash flood warning at 1:14 a.m. Friday for Kerr and Bandera counties, with the tags “considerable” and “catastrophic,” said Erica Grow Cei, a spokeswoman for the weather service. That warning automatically triggers alerts to cell phones in the region, but not all areas have cell phone coverage. Jonathan Porter, the chief meteorologist at AccuWeather, a private weather forecasting company that uses National Weather Service data, said local officials had adequate information to order evacuations.

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At least 8 dead, 18 missing in Austin-area floods. Travis County hardest hit.

At least eight Central Texans have died and at least 18 are reported missing after widespread flooding ravaged the region late Friday into Saturday, officials said Sunday morning. Travis County, which is under a flood watch until 7 p.m., was hardest hit with at least four people dead and somewhere between 11 and 13 reported missing. About 50 people were rescued, county officials said at a 10:30 a.m. news briefing. “We've been through a lot the last few days, but we're Travis County, and we're going to get through this together," Travis County Judge Andy Brown said. "We are committed to doing everything possible to protect lives, help families recover and rebuild stronger than before.” Brown urged residents not to go out on boats on Lake Travis or Lake Austin because of debris and the possibility of hindering rescue efforts.

Austin-Travis County Chief Emergency Management Coordinator Eric Carter said it was too early to tell if the deaths were preventable. "Why any one individual would have found themselves in a tragic circumstance, we can't know that today," he said. Williamson County officials confirmed one person had died and two were still missing because of the flooding. Emergency responders in the area conducted 10 rescue operations to save 27 people from the floods, county officials announced Sunday. Several mobile home parks located near the South Fork of the San Gabriel River received voluntary evacuation notices and the Georgetown Animal Shelter was also evacuated to the Williamson County Regional Animal Shelter. “This is historic flood levels that came in a short amount of time,” said Connie Odom, the county’s spokeswoman. Any areas near the south fork of the San Gabriel River were subject to flooding, she said. Three people are confirmed dead and five people are missing in Burnet County following flooding over the Fourth of July weekend, emergency management coordinator Derek Marchio said in an afternoon update. The body of Preston Prince, who had been missing, was found, Marchio said.

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State Stories

Trump signs disaster declaration, activates federal aid to Kerr County

President Donald Trump on Sunday signed a major disaster declaration for Kerr County after deadly flash flooding through Texas’ Hill Country. Authorities said the death toll had climbed to 68 in Kerr County alone. “These families are enduring an unimaginable tragedy, with many lives lost, and many still missing,” Trump said in a social media post announcing the signing. The declaration comes one day after U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem arrived to survey the storm-battered region, including a visit to Camp Mystic, where a group of girls were apparently caught in fast-moving floodwaters. Ten girls and one counselor from the summer camp remain missing. Texas Gov. Greg Abbott has expanded the state’s disaster declaration beyond Kerr County to include counties near Austin, but Sunday’s federal declaration appeared confined to Kerr County, the hardest-hit area.

Over the weekend, assets from the Federal Emergency Management Agency, the U.S. Coast Guard and Customs and Border Protection have been assisting the local search and rescue efforts, state and federal officials said at Saturday’s news conference. Trump’s declaration will provide federal disaster assistance to individuals seeking housing, home repairs and loans to cover home damages, according to a FEMA news release. It will also make federal funding available to government agencies and nonprofit organizations for emergency work and facility repair and replacement “on a cost-sharing basis.” The president said the Coast Guard and state first responders have saved more than 850 people from the flooding. Following Trump’s declaration on Sunday, Noem said in a social media post that her department is deploying federal resources to Texas first responders and will continue supporting state and local officials “as search efforts continue and recovery begins.”

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A ‘raging torrent’: Sensor data shows Guadalupe River swelled 20 feet in 95 minutes

Though the Guadalupe River basin high in the Texas Hill Country is known for its flooding danger, the lack of a modern flood warning system sent campers and others in low-lying areas scrambling with little sounding of alarms. Local emergency officials and the National Weather Service get their information from four gauges along the Guadalupe River upstream from Kerrville, where the flash flooding that killed at least 68 people occurred on July 4. One of four gauges on the river failed, likely because of the wall of water that surged downstream in the early hours of Friday. In places, water rose 40-feet above the streambed. As crews raced to respond to low areas along the river, and campers and others fled, a review of the sensor data shows the river grew in height, width and speed with sudden force.

No design, dam or flood control project is going to solve the threat posed by the uppermost part of the river basin. “You cannot engineer yourself around the Guadalupe,” said Phil Bedient, the director of Rice University's SSPEED Center, who has spent decades designing flood protection and prediction systems. “This one is crying out for a warning system.” State and local officials rely on those gauges to monitor the Guadalupe, along with a more antiquated system that warns drivers of high water at low parts of state roads and tracks rainfall. Along Texas 39 and FM 1340, the Texas Department of Transportation has sensors that monitor when the roads are topped by floodwaters. All told, fewer than 35 sensors along roads or the riverbank can activate flashing lights or tell emergency officials where water is encroaching and the river is flooding. Kerr County Judge Robert Kelly on Friday called the Guadalupe “the most dangerous river valley in the United States,” as rescuers scoured low-lying areas for victims. “He is probably right about that,” Bedient said. The reason is three-fold, Bedient said: Intense storms, steep slopes and rapid movement of those storms into the low-lying areas in the Hill Country.

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Democrats trying to field candidate slate to win first statewide race in 32 years

Texas Democrats are hoping to develop a candidate slate that would win the party its first statewide triumph in 32 years. Over those three decades there have been a few close calls, but for the most part Republicans have dominated statewide races in a place where Democrats used to be as plentiful as pecans. Democrats hope next year is different, in part because of a potentially challenging political climate for Republicans. Throughout history the party that controls the White House has suffered losses in midterm elections. It happened in 2018, when Democrats picked up 41 seats to wrestle control of the U.S. House from President Donald Trump and Republicans. The GOP also suffered losses in governorships and state legislative seats, but widened its hold on the U.S. Senate. In Texas, Beto O’Rourke lost to Republican Sen. Ted Cruz by 2.6 percentage points, and Democrats flipped 12 seats in the Texas House, including 10 in North Texas. Still, Republicans won every statewide contest.

With history providing a boost, Democrats hope to gain traction from a shakeup in the Texas GOP, including the hotly contested Senate primary showdown between Attorney General Ken Paxton and incumbent Sen. John Cornyn. Democrats see Paxton, who during his career has been saddled with legal troubles, as vulnerable in a general election. Paxton, however, has been reelected twice since becoming attorney general in 2015. The challenge for Democrats is to find candidates who are viable in a red-leaning state. According to various analysts from both parties, there are typically at least 750,000 more Republicans in the Texas electorate than Democrats, and in recent years that total has climbed to about a 1 million-voter structural advantage. That means in order to win, Democrats must have candidates that maximize turnout and add to the total of Democratic voters who participate, as well as appeal to independents and crossover Republicans. Four of Texas’ leading Democrats met in May to discuss the formation of a slate, though each of them — former U.S. Rep. Colin Allred, U.S. Rep. Joaquin Castro of San Antonio, state Rep. James Talarico of Austin and O’Rourke of El Paso — would rather run for Senate.

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'We are being erased': Austin's Sharp Skirts revived to give women an outlet

More than 15 years ago, Carla Cook envisioned a company dedicated to supporting female entrepreneurs. That vision became Sharp Skirts, a company that hosted meetings, established chapters across multiple cities and earned recognition as one of Forbes’ Top 10 Entrepreneurial Sites for Women just a year after its launch. But three years later, Cook stepped away from the company to pursue a more sustainable career, taking on a role as senior director of content at Austin-based Argodesign. But she retained the Sharp Skirts name and domain. Now more than a decade later, Cook envisions a new chapter. Inspired by societal reactions to Roe v. Wade being overturned and another failed campaign to elect the nation’s first female president, Cook decided it was time to revive Sharp Skirts.

"It’s not a great time to be a woman these days. The defeat of Roe a couple of years ago was just the tip of the iceberg. And especially, of course, an administration right now that seems very intent on erasing every American that isn’t a rich, white Christian male and that’s overwhelming and it’s infuriating. So I was inspired to resurrect Sharp Skirts with a new focus in of guiding women to find their voices and putting them out there and to feel confident in sharing their experiences and speaking their truth," she said. "It’s vitally important right now that we do so, because we are being erased, for lack of a better term, and that’s frightening. Eventually, I’d actually like it to be something of a movement of a bunch of smart, successful women who are speaking up and making their mark in the world and talking about it and talking about what’s important to us and what our experiences can lend to the world."

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Austin American-Statesman Editorial: Tragedy hit quickly in Texas Hill Country floods. Answers must follow

The torrent of floodwaters that crashed through Central Texas this weekend left an unimaginable trail of grief and wreckage in its wake: At least 68 dead along the Guadalupe River, plus four in Travis County, one in Williamson and three in Burnet County, numbers that could continue to rise as the waters recede. A Kerrville high school coach and a Humble ISD teacher are among the dead; a Marble Falls-area volunteer fire chief is among the missing, along with a person he was trying to rescue. More than a dozen families who sent their daughters to Camp Mystic, a Christian girls’ camp in western Kerr County, will never again hold their girls or hear their laughter. We share in the sorrow of all Central Texans who lost a piece of their world as the waters that sustain our region quickly overwhelmed it. We are grateful for the rescue crews that have whisked hundreds to safety and continue to search for the missing, even as more rainfall complicates their mission. We stand with all of our neighbors whose homes and businesses were reduced to rubble, who now face the long climb back to a place resembling normalcy.

Texans, in these moments, become strong for each other. Gov. Greg Abbott and other state and local leaders are rightly prioritizing efforts to account for every missing person and keep others out of harm’s way. In the days and weeks ahead, however, Texans deserve a clear-eyed assessment of how such a devastating event unfolded with few warnings or evacuations in an area that Kerr County Judge Rob Kelly called “the most dangerous river valley in the United States.” Extreme weather has long been a feature of the Texas landscape, a terrain shaped by droughts and floods. The persistence of those perils, and the lives and livelihoods at stake, demand a proactive posture. Instead, almost with an air of resignation, Abbott told reporters Saturday that “ever since I’ve been governor, we’ve had weather events that were completely unpredictable, and that’s just a part of nature.” But it’s clear this disaster wasn’t “completely unpredictable.” While forecasters underestimated the volume of rainfall that would arrive early Friday morning, the National Weather Service still issued flash flood warnings hours before the Guadalupe River swelled with floodwaters that uprooted trees, overturned cars and swept away cabins. Kerrville resident Bud Bolton told the Express-News that he saw floodwaters carry away an RV while a family was trapped inside. “(They were) caught inside that RV, and that RV’s floating away,” Bolton said. “And kids are screaming, and you can’t do nothing for them?” That question should haunt all Texans, and this board will press for answers. What systems should have protected people in an area known for flooding? How do we keep people — residents, vacationers, summer campers — safe from the next deluge?

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Bodies of Texas flood victims sent to Fort Worth for identification

Bodies recovered from the Texas Hill Country floods will be sent to Fort Worth for identification, authorities said Sunday. Col. Freeman Martin, head of the state’s Department of Public Safety, said at a news conference that bodies of adults and children at a local funeral home are awaiting identification. Texas Rangers are collecting DNA from the bodies and family members searching for missing loved ones. The bodies are being flown to the University of North Texas’ Center for Human Identification in Fort Worth, one of the premier DNA facilities in the country. A spokesperson for the center did not immediately respond to an email Sunday afternoon. “We will have answers with rapid DNA in hours, not days, to get some closure to these families,” Martin said.

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Houston Mayor Whitmire permanently removes food insecurity board member after Camp Mystic comments

Houston Mayor John Whitmire is taking steps to permanently remove a member of the city’s food insecurity board following racial comments she made on social media about the devastating flooding in the Hill Country that decimated Camp Mystic, a private summer camp for girls. Sade Perkins was appointed to the Houston Food Insecurity Board in October 2023 by the late former Mayor Sylvester Turner. The board is tasked with making recommendations to the mayor and Houston City Council on food security issues throughout the city. Perkins’ term on the board expired in January 2025, according to the city’s website. In a video posted to TikTok on Saturday, Perkins told her audience there was context that “needs to be said” regarding Camp Mystic.

“I know I’m probably going to get cancelled for this, but Camp Mystic is a whites-only, girls’ Christian camp,” Perkins said in the video. “They don’t even have a token Asian, they don’t have a token Black person. It is an all-white, white-only, conservative Christian camp. If you ain’t white, you ain’t right, you ain’t getting in, you ain’t going. Period.” Perkins said in the video it wasn’t that she didn’t want the girls who went missing to not be found. She made reference to the area’s demographics, and said that in “today’s political climate,” a group of Hispanic girls who went missing wouldn’t get the same attention. “If this were a group of Hispanic girls out there, this would not be getting this type of coverage that they’re getting. No one would give a f---,” Perkins said. “And all these white people, the parents of these little girls, would be saying things like, ‘They need to be deported, they shouldn’t have been here in the first place.’” Perkins continued in her video that the children’s parents had chosen to go to the camp to carve out “an all-white, whites only enclave” for their white children.

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South Texas forecast: Here’s where thunderstorm chances are highest today

A lingering low-pressure system – leftover from Tropical Storm Barry, which made landfall in eastern Mexico last week – is still triggering scattered showers and thunderstorms across Central and South Texas. This system has already brought devastating impacts. Since the Guadalupe River overflowed early Friday morning, flooding has claimed dozens of lives across the region. Now, as we start a new week, scattered storms continue to bring the risk of isolated flooding on Monday. We do have some good news, though. Rain chances will begin to taper off noticeably by midweek. Here’s a look at where storms are most likely today and when we can finally expect a break from the rain.

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'Last act of kindness': Camp Mystic owner died trying to save campers

As director of Camp Mystic, Richard “Dick” Eastland was a father figure to generations of girls who attended the Christian summer camp. His son Richard Eastland Jr., told the Washington Post that his father died trying to save campers from as floodwaters from the Guadalupe River overwhelmed the camp, which is on the banks of the river. More than 750 girls were at the camp when the flooding struck. Eastland was trying to rescue the campers in the Bubble Inn cabin, which is about 150 yards from the river's edge, when he was swept into the water, his son said.

Eastland’s nephew also confirmed his death in a Facebook post, saying Eastland's body was found near his vehicle, alongside bodies of some of the other flooding victims. Eastland's “last act of kindness and sacrifice was working to save the lives of campers," former Camp Mystic attendee and Eastland’s longtime friend Paige Sumner wrote in the Kerrville Daily Times. Sumner camped at the Hill Country retreat as a child and later worked in the office with the director. She said Eastland put campers first in every situation. She said he’d bolt from the office to a golf cart and race to the scene anytime a camper sustained a minor injury or there was danger from a along the river. Sumner recalled that when Eastland was diagnosed with brain cancer, former campers rallied around him as he had done for many of them. Sumner wrote that the camp had a safety plan for heavy rains, but she called the level of flooding at the campsite “unprecedented.”

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A Texas dad tried to kayak to his daughters. The girls texted, ‘I love you.’

The search for survivors continues two days after a flash flood killed dozens of people across central Texas, but some of the stories of the families caught in the July Fourth weekend storms are starting to be told. The Harber family was spending the holiday at a cabin they owned in the Casa Bonita cabin community near Hunt, Texas. Around 3:30 a.m. on Friday, July 4, RJ Harber was awakened by pounding rain, thunder and lightning. Hours earlier, he had received flash-flood warnings for other areas but not where he was staying. RJ, a 45-year-old father and Dallas lawyer who had been vacationing and going to summer camp in the area his whole life, thought the river might rise a little. He wanted to check on his two young daughters: 11-year-old Brooke and 13-year-old Blair.

The girls were staying in a borrowed cabin closer to the river with their grandparents, Mike and Charlene Harber. RJ said he thought he would also clear away a kayak and some fishing gear he was keeping by the river. He put his foot down on the floor of his cabin—and felt about 4 inches of water. RJ turned to his wife, who was lying in bed beside him, also awake. He told her, “Annie, the cabin’s flooding.” RJ could see water rushing in through the front door. He tried to open the door, but couldn’t. He looked out the window and saw the water level was about two feet below the window. “We need to get out right now,” RJ told Annie. They grabbed a few items—their cellphones and a bag they hadn’t unpacked. By the time they jumped out the window about two minutes later, the water had reached up to Annie’s neck. The Harbers hurried to another cabin nearby, on slightly higher ground. They knocked on the door and woke the family. By the time the family came to the door, the water was almost at their door. They went to another cabin and woke a third family as well. RJ borrowed a kayak, life vest and flashlight. He started to kayak to the cabin where the couple’s daughters and RJ’s parents were staying. It was about 100 feet below and he reached about halfway when, RJ said, a swell knocked him into a post. “I shined a flashlight out there, and I could see it was white water, and I’ve kayaked enough to know that that was gonna be impossible,“ RJ said.

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Tarrant County adopts new software to clean voter rolls, stay ahead of registration challenges

Tarrant County is paying for new software to clean up its voter rolls, which could help elections staff stay ahead of thousands of voter registration challenges, according to the county elections administrator. In Texas and other states, people can challenge other residents' voter registrations. The Houston-based nonprofit True the Vote has driven mass challenges across the country. The organization created an app called IV3 that makes it easy to compare public records and make thousands of challenges at a time, with the goal of preventing what True the Vote calls “election manipulation.” At a meeting Tuesday, Tarrant County commissioners approved $46,000 for a year's access to skip-tracing software, often used by debt collectors.

The software will help identify people who may have died or moved away to keep the local voter rolls current, Elections Administrator Clint Ludwig told KERA News Thursday. "This is kind of a way that we can check the information we have against the most current information available,” Ludwig said. Skip-tracing gets its name because it helps find people who have skipped town, according to Thomson Reuters, a company that offers the service. The software gives the county a wider range of public records to consult, Ludwig explained. His office already gets a report of everyone who has died in Tarrant County each month, but that doesn’t include Tarrant County voters who died somewhere else, he said. The skip-tracing software does include that information. A small group of people in Tarrant County sent in more than 15,000 voter registration challenges from January to August last year, according to documents obtained in a public records request. More than half came from one person. One of the challengers told KERA News she was concerned about fraudulent voters impersonating dead people on the rolls — an extremely rare crime, according to PolitiFact.

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National Stories

Defunct oil wells are a national problem. Finding them is the first step

A knee-high pipe sticking out of the ground not far from a school. A gurgle in a pond on rolling farmland. A patch of forest undergrowth hiding a long-forgotten, leaking oil well. Relics like these dot the country from California to Pennsylvania: unused, unplugged oil and gas wells. They're called orphan wells. They should have been plugged when their useful life was over. But many weren't. These unplugged wells can leak oil, natural gas and toxins into waterways and air. Because natural gas, also known as methane, is a potent greenhouse gas, these wells are adding to climate change. And nobody knows how many are out there. "It is entirely possible that we have a million or more undocumented wells in the United States," says Mary Kang, an associate professor at McGill University who has extensively researched methane emissions from these old wells. This old problem is attracting new scrutiny, and a multibillion dollar effort to fix it. Step one: Figuring out where they are.

Last spring, Dan Arthur, a petroleum engineer and geologist, stepped carefully through Oklahoma prairie grasses to examine a capped pipe sticking out of the ground. An entourage followed: Arthur's stepson, an NPR reporter, a photographer, and one of Arthur's employees with an expensive camera that could detect gas leaks. Arthur's an oil guy. He loves the view of pumpjacks scattered over the prairie, the oil pumps that bob up and down across the horizon like strange, skinny birds pecking at the ground in slow motion. But to him, orphan wells are a serious problem — and they're a lot less visible than those pumpjacks. "A lot of people don't see them," Arthur says with frustration. And if you don't see them, you don't even know there's a problem there to fix. Finding them is kind of like hunting for fossils, another hobby of Arthur's. "Some people take their friends fishing," he said, standing in Tallgrass Prairie Preserve in Osage County and gazing out on a stormy horizon. "I'll go, 'Let's go hunt for dinosaurs.' You know, 'Let's go hunt for orphan wells.'" More than 100,000 orphan wells have been documented, but everyone in the industry knows the problem is much bigger than that. Arthur and his stepsons have found wells in the middle of the Arkansas River in Tulsa, actively leaking pollutants into the river. They've found old wells in urban parks.

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As women have far fewer babies, the U.S. and the world face unprecedented challenges

When Sarah and Ben Brewington got married and moved to Los Angeles, they expected their next life step would be having kids. It just seemed like the natural thing to do. Instead, they kept delaying their first child, focusing on their careers, enjoying travel and spending time with friends. "I started thinking, 'What do I want?'" Sarah Brewington said. Gradually, they reached a decision: "It's a resounding no. It's not something I'm interested in or want," she said. "This life we're building together didn't need this other element in it," agreed her husband, Ben Brewington. "I don't feel guilty at all about it now to say I don't want kids." The Brewingtons, both age 35, say they understand they are part of a wider trend. Far more people in the U.S. and around the world are choosing to have significantly fewer children or opting out of parenthood altogether.

"I think it probably should be a concern for the government, the declining birth rate," Sarah Brewington told NPR. "There is going to come a time when everyone is retiring and there's not going to be a workforce." Many researchers believe this accelerating global shift is being driven in large part by a positive reality. Young couples, and women in particular, have far more freedom and economic independence. They're weighing their options and appear to be making very different choices about the role of children in their lives. "It's not that people don't like kids as much as they used to," said Melissa Kearney, an economist who studies fertility and population trends at the University of Notre Dame. "There's just a lot of other available options. They can invest in their careers, take more leisure time — it's much more socially acceptable." This change in decision-making and behavior appears to be accelerating. New research from the United Nations found that the number of children born to the average woman worldwide has reached the lowest point ever recorded. In every country and every culture, women are having fewer than half as many children as they did in the 1960s. "Especially in high-income countries, the birth rate has very quickly plummeted in a sustained way," Kearney said. "We're actually really facing the question of depopulation."

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Social Security no taxes message on Trump bill raises eyebrows

President Trump’s “big, beautiful bill” is sending mixed messages about whether most Americans are required to pay federal income taxes on their Social Security benefits. “It’s a mixed bag for seniors, because some seniors will get some tax relief; the cost of that, though, is borne by the entire Social Security system,” Alex Lawson, executive director of left-leaning advocacy organization Social Security Works, told USA Today. The bill, which Trump signed into law on Saturday, included a $6,000 tax deduction for Americans 65 or older. After Congress passed the bill on Thursday, the Social Security Administration said the legislation “delivers long-awaited tax relief to millions of older Americans.”

“The new law includes a provision that eliminates federal income taxes on Social Security benefits for most beneficiaries, providing relief to individuals and couples,” the Thursday press release said. “Additionally, it provides an enhanced deduction for taxpayers aged 65 and older, ensuring that retirees can keep more of what they have earned.” However, policy experts are concerned that the bill does not include a provision to eliminate federal income taxes on Social Security benefits. “There is no provision in the budget bill that directly ‘eliminates’ or even reduces taxes on Social Security benefits,” Howard Gleckman, senior fellow at the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center, told the Washington Post. Trump’s bill offers a tax deduction of $6,000 to seniors making up to $75,000 individually, or $150,000 on a joint return. The deduction is lowered for incomes above that level and axed for seniors with individual incomes of more than $175,000, or $250,000 jointly. However, the new deduction for seniors is set to expire within a couple of years. The median income for seniors in 2022 was about $30,000. “The people who benefit by definition have to be richer, and people who benefit the most are the richest people,” Bobby Kogan, senior director of federal budget policy at the Center for American Progress, told CBS News.

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Chantal, now a tropical depression, raises concerns of flash flooding in North Carolina and Virginia

Tropical Storm Chantal was downgraded to a depression Sunday but raised concerns of possible flash flooding as it makes its way through central North Carolina toward south-central Virginia. Chantal made landfall near Litchfield Beach, South Carolina, at about 4 a.m. EDT Sunday, the National Hurricane Center in Miami said. At 5 p.m., it was located about 65 miles (105 kilometers) south-southwest of Raleigh, North Carolina, and was moving north-northeast at 10 mph (17 kph) with maximum sustained winds of 30 mph (45 kph).

The system was expected to turn more to the northeast late Sunday as it weakens over North Carolina but may strengthen slightly as it approaches the Virginia Capes on Monday. Flood watches were issued for central North Carolina and south-central Virginia through Monday, with total rainfall of 2 to 4 inches (5 to 10 centimeters) and local amounts up to 6 inches (15 centimeters) that could lead to flash flooding, the hurricane center said. Forecasters said dangerous surf and rip currents at beaches from northeastern Florida to the mid-Atlantic states are expected to last for the next couple of days.

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What’s at stake as Netanyahu and Trump meet in Washington

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel landed in Washington on Monday for talks with President Trump, in what will be their first meeting since the two leaders launched unprecedented strikes on Iran and as the U.S. president pushes for a cease-fire in Gaza. Just last month, Mr. Trump ordered American stealth bombers to join an Israeli military offensive against Iran’s nuclear and ballistic weapons program — a fierce assault that was met by Iranian missile attacks in Israeli cities. With the fighting in Iran over, Mr. Trump is considering whether to pursue a new nuclear agreement with Tehran. He is also urging a new cease-fire deal to end the fighting in Gaza.

Many in Israel and Gaza hope Mr. Netanyahu’s meeting with Mr. Trump will pave the way for a new truce that would end 21 months of war and free the hostages still held there in exchange for Palestinian prisoners. Israel and Hamas have previously agreed to two short-lived cease-fires. The last one, which Israel ended in mid-March, saw more than 1,500 Palestinian prisoners released during exchanges for 30 hostages and the bodies of eight others. Mr. Trump has said that Israel and Hamas could reach a new agreement as soon as this week, but past efforts to broker a comprehensive cease-fire have failed. The latest proposal being discussed stipulates a 60-day truce during which both sides would negotiate an end to the war. Both Israel and Hamas may now have reasons to agree to a temporary truce. As Mr. Netanyahu’s plane headed west to Washington, Israeli negotiators traveled east to the Gulf emirate of Qatar for indirect talks with Hamas about the details of the accord.

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ICE raids derail Los Angeles economy as workers go into hiding

Los Angeles was already struggling to revive its fragile economy after the most destructive wildfires in its history erupted six months ago. Now, immigration raids are driving workers crucial to the rebuilding into the shadows. Framers and landscapers are abandoning job sites. Renovations of retail shops have stopped midway. Real estate developers say they’re struggling to find crews to keep projects on track in a sector that relies heavily on immigrant labor. “We don’t have enough people to staff the work and we’re scrambling to figure it out,” said Arturo Sneider, chief executive officer of Primestor, a manager of $1.2 billion in shopping centers and 3,000 apartments under development in California and three other states. “It’s triggering delays.”

President Donald Trump’s deportation campaign has roiled workplaces and communities from Florida to Illinois and New York. But few places are feeling the shock as acutely as LA, a longtime sanctuary city and home to one of the nation’s largest migrant labor forces. Between June 6 and June 22, immigration agents arrested more than 1,600 people across the LA area — at car washes, construction sites and day-laborer hubs such as Home Depot parking lots. The scope of the crackdown has rattled neighborhoods. Businesses have shuttered, police overtime costs have surged and Fourth of July events in Latino areas were canceled amid fears of apprehensions. The wave of detentions sparked a week of protests in downtown LA and outlying suburbs, some turning violent. Trump deployed the National Guard and US Marines to protect federal property, dismissing the objections of Democratic Governor Gavin Newsom. While the demonstrations have largely eased, the Trump administration escalated tensions last week by suing LA over its refusal to cooperate with federal agents. Homeland Security officials argued in the case that the city’s sanctuary policies — which limit local cooperation with federal immigration authorities — obstruct enforcement and create instability.

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Lead Stories

Texas floods leave at least 51 dead, 27 girls missing as rescuers search devastated landscape

Rescuers scoured a devastated central Texas landscape of mangled trees, overturned cars and muck-filled debris Saturday in an increasingly bleak mission to locate survivors, including 27 girls who have not been seen since their camp was slammed with a wall of water in a historic flash flood. The flooding in Kerr County killed at least 43 people, including 15 children, and at least eight people died in nearby counties. Authorities still have not said how many people were missing beyond the children from Camp Mystic, a Christian summer camp along a river in Kerr County where most of the dead were recovered. The destructive, fast-moving waters rose 26 feet (8 meters) on the Guadalupe River in just 45 minutes before daybreak Friday, washing away homes and vehicles. The danger was not over as rains continued pounding communities outside San Antonio on Saturday and flash flood warnings and watches remained in effect.

Searchers used helicopters, boats and drones to look for victims and to rescue people stranded in trees and from camps isolated by washed-out roads. Gov. Greg Abbott vowed that authorities will work around the clock and said new areas were being searched as the water receded. He declared Sunday a day of prayer for the state. “I urge every Texan to join me in prayer this Sunday — for the lives lost, for those still missing, for the recovery of our communities, and for the safety of those on the front lines,” he said in a statement. Authorities were coming under scrutiny over whether the camps and residents in places long vulnerable to flooding received proper warning and whether enough preparations were made. The hills along the Guadalupe River in central Texas are dotted with century-old youth camps and campgrounds where generations of families have come to swim and enjoy the outdoors. The area is especially popular around the July Fourth holiday, making it more difficult to know how many are missing. “We don’t even want to begin to estimate at this time,” Kerrville City Manager Dalton Rice said earlier.

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As floods hit, key roles were vacant at National Weather Service offices in Texas

Crucial positions at the local offices of the National Weather Service were unfilled as severe rainfall inundated parts of Central Texas on Friday morning, prompting some experts to question whether staffing shortages made it harder for the forecasting agency to coordinate with local emergency managers as floodwaters rose. Texas officials appeared to blame the Weather Service for issuing forecasts on Wednesday that underestimated how much rain was coming. But former Weather Service officials said the forecasts were as good as could be expected, given the enormous levels of rainfall and the storm’s unusually abrupt escalation. The staffing shortages suggested a separate problem, those former officials said — the loss of experienced people who would typically have helped communicate with local authorities in the hours after flash flood warnings were issued overnight. The shortages are among the factors likely to be scrutinized as the death toll climbs from the floods.

Separate questions have emerged about the preparedness of local communities, including Kerr County’s apparent lack of a local flood warning system. The county, roughly 50 miles northwest of San Antonio, is where many of the deaths occurred. In an interview, Rob Kelly, the Kerr County judge and its most senior elected official, said the county did not have a warning system because such systems are expensive, and local residents are resistant to new spending. “Taxpayers won’t pay for it,” Mr. Kelly said. Asked if people might reconsider in light of the catastrophe, he said, “I don’t know.” The National Weather Service’s San Angelo office, which is responsible for some of the areas hit hardest by Friday’s flooding, was missing a senior hydrologist, staff forecaster and meteorologist in charge, according to Tom Fahy, the legislative director for the National Weather Service Employees Organization, the union that represents Weather Service workers. The Weather Service’s nearby San Antonio office, which covers other areas hit by the floods, also had significant vacancies, including a warning coordination meteorologist and science officer, Mr. Fahy said. Staff members in those positions are meant to work with local emergency managers to plan for floods, including when and how to warn local residents and help them evacuate.

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Texas lawmakers launch bipartisan campaign for flood relief effort, as death toll climbs

State representatives are launching a bipartisan campaign to support relief efforts, as flooding killed dozens of people in Central Texas and the Hill Country over Independence Day weekend. More challenges, however, could be on the horizon for these areas, as the National Weather Service extended its flood watch until 1 p.m. Sunday. In Saturday posts on X, Frisco Republican Jared Patterson and El Paso Democrat Joe Moody said they are asking every Texas House member to help raise funds for communities affected by the floods. In particular, they highlighted the Community Foundation of the Texas Hill Country, which says on its website that it will “direct funds to vetted organizations providing rescue, relief, and recovery efforts as well as flood assistance.”

“There are hurts that money can’t fix, but this is one part of easing what burdens we can,” Moody said in his post. With 150 members in the chamber, Patterson said the goal is to raise $150,000. “When tragedy strikes our state, that’s an opportunity for us to come together and really show Texans what leadership is about,” he told The Dallas Morning News Saturday evening. “And it’s not about quibbling over small things. It’s about standing up for our communities and helping Texans, and that’s what we’ve tried to do today.” Related:How to help victims, first responders in Texas Hill Country floods The campaign was launched Saturday evening — shortly after local officials raised the confirmed death toll to 43 people in Kerr County, roughly 60 miles northwest of San Antonio. They included 15 children and 28 adults who died after flash floods swept through the Guadalupe River on the Fourth of July. Over 70 miles northeast away, at least six people were killed in Travis and Burnet Counties due to flooding Saturday. Search and rescue efforts also continued Sunday, as many people were still missing.

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The Supreme Court and Congress cede powers to Trump and the presidency

The Supreme Court last week sharply curtailed the ability of federal judges to block a presidential action nationwide, even if they find it unconstitutional. That followed its decision last year granting the president broad immunity from prosecution for crimes committed in the course of his core duties. The Senate several days ago rejected a resolution that would have let Congress decide, under its war powers, if President Donald Trump can strike Iran again. And Congress in recent months has repeatedly declined to assert its constitutional authority over spending or tariffs. In a striking dynamic of the Trump era, analysts say, the judicial and legislative branches have been steadily transferring many of their powers to the executive — or at least acquiescing in the transfers. That has shaken up a system that depends on the three branches of government jostling sharply as each jealously guards its own prerogatives, many critics contend.

“When the constitutional framers designed a system of checks and balances, they didn’t mean a system where Congress and the Supreme Court give the president a blank check,” said Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-Maryland). “That’s not the kind of check they had in mind. … It was intended to create friction among the three branches to produce balance.” But the country has become so divided, some scholars say, that leaders of the three branches are often more loyal to their parties than to their institutions. “I think the framers envisioned a structure where it would take two branches to do anything major — go to war, pass a law, enforce a law,” said Erwin Chemerinsky, dean of the law school at the University of California at Berkeley. “We have gone away from that. The executive can do so much without the other two.” Some conservatives respond that Trump is only doing what other presidents have done — asserting his powers and leaving it to the courts to decide whether he has exceeded his authority. Many lower courts have done just that, blocking his executive orders, only to see the Supreme Court scale back or lift many of those rulings. “I think everyone is getting all Sturm und Drang and go-to-your-bomb-shelters-quick about it,” said Paul Kamenar, lead counsel at the conservative National Legal and Policy Center. “But overall, I don’t see that Congress or the courts are ceding too much power to the president, because at the end of the day, the Supreme Court will decide that.”

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How healthcare cuts in the ‘Big, Beautiful Bill’ will affect Americans

The passage of President Trump’s “one big, beautiful bill” has left some hospitals, doctors and patient-advocacy groups reeling. Millions of people will lose health-insurance coverage, and struggling hospitals across the country may have to close, lay off staff or shut down some services, they say. States will also face difficult budget choices as federal funds are reduced. “The magnitude of these reductions—and the number of individuals who will lose health coverage—cannot be simply dismissed as waste, fraud, and abuse,” Rick Pollack, president of the American Hospital Association, said after the House narrowly passed the bill. Trump signed the bill into law on Friday, Independence Day. The act slashes over $1 trillion in healthcare spending over the next decade, mostly from Medicaid, the joint federal and state program that provides health insurance to poor Americans. It is the biggest cut to federal healthcare spending—and to Medicaid—in history.

The legislation’s health provisions, including work requirements for Medicaid recipients, represent a fundamental shift in the federal government’s approach to healthcare for its poorest citizens, both Republicans and Democrats have said. “This is a much more conservative approach to healthcare,” said David Mansdoerfer, a former health official in the first Trump administration. “The big beautiful bill would represent a significant mindset change for federal safety-net programs.” There will be nearly 8.7 million fewer people covered by Medicaid over the next decade because of the bill, according to an analysis by Manatt Health, a consulting firm that advises states and healthcare providers on Medicaid policy. Other provisions in the bill, including more-stringent requirements for people to enroll and retain health-insurance plans under the Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare, are projected to drive up the number of uninsured, healthcare experts said. Many who study healthcare policy say that people who lose insurance, or people who live in rural areas where doctors and hospitals are closing up shop, often delay preventive care, sometimes costing the system more later. Many of the Medicaid policy changes target the 40 states that expanded eligibility for Medicaid to low-income able-bodied adults. Those enrollees will now have to prove their incomes are below a certain threshold every six months to remain on Medicaid, instead of annually, as well as show that they have spent 80 hours a month working, volunteering or attending school.

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State Stories

Kerrville didn’t have weather sirens used by other cities

At a Friday news conference, Kerr County Judge Rob Kelly said he “can’t answer” why camps weren’t evacuated but acknowledged: “We do not have a warning system.” “We didn’t know this flood was coming,” Kelly told reporters. “Rest assured, no one knew this kind of flood was coming. We have floods all the time. This is the most dangerous river valley in the United States and we deal with floods on a regular basis. When it rains, we get water. We had no reason to believe that this was going to be anything like what’s happened here. None whatsoever.” Nicole Wilson, 42, watched the news conference from her home in San Antonio and was “blown away.” Wilson told KXAN two of her friends have daughters that were at Camp Mystic and one had a son at Camp La Junta. All three children are accounted for. One of the girl’s cousins, however, is still missing, she said.

“Just not having those plans in place is crazy to think about,” she said. “That they wouldn’t have risk mitigation in place when you’re surrounded by water.” While the National Weather Service issued flash flood warnings and the city of Kerrville’s Facebook paged warned to “move to higher ground immediately,” campers at Camp Mystic likely wouldn’t have seen that since cell phones, smart watches, iPads and anything with Wi-Fi capability were considered “unacceptable electronic devices” to bring and “not allowed,” according to a recent list of instructions. Wilson was born and raised in Kentucky, where she said outdoor weather sirens – primarily used for tornadoes – were common. On July 5, she started a Change.org online petition “urgently” calling for Kerrville and Kerr County to implement an outdoor early warning siren system for life-threatening emergencies, like flooding. So far, she said she’s received “a lot of positive feedback on that.” “The tragic events at Camp Mystic and the devastating flooding along the Guadalupe River that happened in July are stark reminders that severe weather can strike with little notice,” Wilson wrote. “A well-placed siren system will provide critical extra minutes for families, schools, camps, businesses, and visitors to seek shelter and evacuate when needed. This is not just a wish – it is a necessary investment in public safety.”

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Federal appeals court upholds block of Texas immigration law

A federal appeals court upheld a lower court's ruling on Thursday continuing to block Texas from enforcing a 2023 law that would allow local police to arrest people they believe crossed the Texas-Mexico border illegally. A 2-1 decision from the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the law is at odds with federal law that says that immigration is an issue for the federal government and not state governments.

What they're saying: "For nearly 150 years, the Supreme Court has recognized that the power to control immigration—the entry, admission, and removal of aliens— is exclusively a federal power," Judge Priscilla Richman wrote. The other side: Judge Andrew Oldham, in dissent, said the majority ruling "usurps the State of Texas's sovereign right to police its border and battle illegal immigration." "Today is a sad day for Texas and for our court," Oldham wrote. "It is a sad day for the millions of Americans who are concerned about illegal immigration and who voiced those concerns at ballot boxes across Texas and the Nation—only to have their voices muted by federal judges."

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How long can Beto O'Rourke and Joaquin Castro wait on Senate race?

Democrats Colin Allred and Terry Virts are already running for the U.S. Senate in Texas in 2026. But what about other potential Democratic candidates? U.S. Rep. Joaquin Castro, state Rep. James Talarico and former U.S. Rep. Beto O’Rourke are among those who have said they are also looking at the race, as well as other statewide contests. After a rally in San Antonio last week, I caught up with all three and pushed them on what their timetables look like for declaring. O’Rourke, 52, couldn’t say for sure when he or any of the others, whom he has been in contact with, would make decisions on the Senate race. “I think it will probably get worked through by the end of this summer if not sooner,” said O’Rourke, who ran for the Senate in 2018 and for governor in 2022.

Candidates have until the first week of December to get into the race. Castro acknowledged that other Democrats might be interested in running for the 20th Congressional District seat he holds now, if he runs for another seat. He said he knows people will be looking to see what he decides because it also affects their political futures. “I’ll make a decision soon,” said Castro, a 50-year-old attorney who has been in Congress since 2013. Talarico, Castro and O’Rourke could technically all end up in the same Senate primary against each other, but Talarico said that doesn’t mean he considers the other two rivals. “We are not rivals,” he said. “We are on the same team. We are all trying to change the state for the better and bring power back to the people. We’re going to coordinate and work together and see what that looks like over the next few months.” While Talarico has talked about running for the Senate, he said he is looking at other races too, like for governor.

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'A huge pain': Critics say this quirk of the San Antonio court system is unjust, inefficient and costs millions

A power struggle between the city of San Antonio and Bexar County has resulted in a glaring redundancy in the criminal justice system that's costing taxpayers millions every year. The standoff is over the magistration system, one of the first formal steps a person has to take after being arrested. A person picked up by San Antonio police goes before a magistrate judge who reviews the evidence in their case and decides whether to dismiss the charges or let them stand. If they're left standing, the judge explains the charges to the defendant, reads the person their rights and then sends them back to a holding cell. That happens at San Antonio Municipal Court.

Then the defendants are bussed to the Bexar County jail complex on the near West Side, less than a mile from the municipal court building. There they will eventually stand before another magistrate judge — who often rewinds defendants' cases to the beginning, covering a lot of the same ground as the first judge. The only difference between the two magistrates is that the one in municipal court doesn't set bond amounts — that's up to the county judge. Critics of the double magistration system, which took root nearly five and a half years ago, say it can substantially increase the time arrestees must wait to post bail — in addition to creating an unnecessary expense. It also disrupts San Antonio police officers' street patrols when a county judge calls them in to answer questions about arrests they made hours before. The two-court system affects only people arrested by San Antonio police, not those picked up by suburban police departments or the Bexar County Sheriff's Office, or those taken in on arrest warrants.

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Jessica Gonzalez announces re-election bid

State Rep. Jessica Gonzalez announced she will run for a fifth term in office. She represents District 104, which includes parts of Oak Cliff, Cockrell Hill and Grand Prairie. Gonzalez is a founding member of the Texas Legislature’s LGBTQ Caucus and is vice chair of the National Hispanic Caucus of State Legislators’ Human and Civil Rights Task Force. Before running for a seat in the Texas Legislature, she served as Nevada voter protection director for the Barack Obama 2012 presidential campaign and was a legislative assistant to U.S. Rep Karen Bass. In an emailed statement, Gonzalez wrote:

“I’m running for re-election to the Texas House of Representatives because the voters of District 104, my neighbors, want a bold, progressive leader representing their interests, fighting for them in the legislature. I’ve proven since I was first sworn in that when out-of-touch bullies in Austin try to push Oak Cliff and Grand Prairie around, I never back down. “Throughout the legislative session, Texas House Republicans made their priorities crystal clear to people across Texas. In just 140 days, they gave handouts to Texas’ most wealthy families via private school vouchers, proposed constitutional bans on tax increases for our state’s richest individuals, and gave Elon Musk his own beach city, all while doing nothing to stop the rise of food prices, healthcare costs, or rent for working families. Billionaires have bought the Republican Party, but they can’t buy me — I’m running for re-election because I will always fight for you, regardless of political consequences.

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‘My favorite place in the entire world’: Camp Mystic inspired generations of Texas women

Camp Mystic, the 99-year-old Christian summer camp on the banks of the Guadalupe River, has for years given girls a place to be themselves, former campers say. Now, the popular all-girls camp set among limestone hills 80 miles northwest of San Antonio is the site of an unfolding tragedy. After rapidly rising flood waters swept through the area over the holiday weekend, 27 girls were missing from the camp as desperate parents posted pleas for help online. More than two dozen people have died in the area, including Richard “Dick” Eastland, an owner of Camp Mystic. During the past two days, camp alumnae have rapidly shared information through group chats, struggling to understand how this could have happened at a place they thought of as a refuge.

“It's my favorite place in the entire world,” said Lauren Garcia, a former camper who is now a physician assistant in New York City. “It really is like just a safe haven. I've never experienced anything like it.” Garcia described foggy morning horseback rides, competitive canoe races and riverside lessons on fishing, as hundreds of girls disconnected from the outside world. The camp has for nearly 100 years offered 30-day programs to improve the spirituality and self-confidence of girls. Generations of families have passed through Camp Mystic’s valleys. Garcia’s mother, aunts and sister all stayed in the numerous camp housing facilities with names like Twins, Bubble Inn, Gigglebox and Chatterbox. Campers spent Sundays doing religious readings near the river before holding a small service on Chapel Hill, a nearby ridge with a cross overlooking the valley. “We don’t know what will happen to it,” said Shelby Patterson, a University of Virginia fundraiser who attended the camp for eight years. “There is a mourning for what happened, a mourning for what we still don’t know and all the girls they still haven’t found, but also an extreme mourning for the special place that you know may not exist past this.”

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Mayor Jones' chief of staff quits after less than a month on the job

Mayor Gina Ortiz Jones' chief of staff, Jordan Abelson, resigned Saturday after less than a month on the job. The reason for Abelson's departure was unclear. Jones has only made one other known hire since winning the mayoral runoff on June 7. She tapped Cynthia De La Cruz as her executive secretary, a position De La Cruz previously held in the City Council District 6 office. Abelson, a Pennsylvania native, moved to San Antonio in January to work on Jones' mayoral campaign. She handled communications before being named campaign manager. Former Mayor Ron Nirenberg had already hired a chief of staff, a communications director and two senior policy advisors by this same point after he won the June 2017 mayoral runoff. Jones and Abelson have not responded to requests for comment.

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Glenn Rogers: Influential legislator scorecards don’t add up

The activist group Texans for Fiscal Responsibility, founded by Michael Quinn Sullivan and primarily funded by GOP megadonors Tim Dunn and Farris Wilks, will soon release its 2025 index scores ranking Texas lawmakers on a scale from most to least conservative. While some legislative careers may live and die based on those scores, they have nothing to do with conservatism. The scores are based in part on data compiled by Mark P. Jones, a political science fellow at the James A. Baker Institute for Public Policy at Rice University. Jones’ methodology is complicated to say the least. For the 89th legislative session, his analysis is limited to 2,666 non-lopsided roll call votes where at least 2.5% of legislators who cast a vote were on the losing side. Clear as mud.

For the 2023 ratings, TFR used only 95 out of the 2,769 votes used by Jones. In this analysis, questions abound: How was the sample size derived? Who decided which votes would be included? Were specific votes chosen to ensure a predetermined outcome? Frankly, these rankings do not reveal who is the most or least conservative. The content and the text of the bills used in the analysis are largely irrelevant to the scores. Instead, these “findings” show which legislators voted in the minority the most times. In other words, these rankings reveal which legislators are the most unwilling to work with their colleagues. Collaboration remains an inconvenient necessity for effective conservative governance. In the 2025 Jones analysis, the top eight most conservative members collectively passed a total of two bills that they authored. Granted, the number of bills passed is not the only, or even most important, method to determine a legislator’s effectiveness, and too many bills are filed each year. However, most districts in Texas have specific needs that can only be addressed through legislation. In a list of the 10 House members passing the most bills this session, none scored near the top of the Jones analysis. No committee chairs scored near the top. It appears that high TFR index scores are inversely related to legislative productivity. In reality, the TFR index score is a measure of megadonor compliance and is the antithesis of district representation. The speaker’s race from the last session illustrates this dynamic. Much ado was made in the 89th legislative session about the importance of voting only for the candidate endorsed by the House Republican Caucus. In the 88th session, Dade Phelan received an overwhelming majority of votes by the caucus and was the endorsed candidate. Yet a vote for Phelan lowered the TFR index score. Phelan is undeniably conservative and a vote for him was a vote for conservative values. But Phelan fell out of favor with the party’s puppet masters so his supporters had to be punished. Another example: In the 88th session, House Bill 12 by Rep. Toni Rose, D-Dallas, sought to continue Medicaid coverage for 12 months to women who were enrolled during a pregnancy. This pro-life bill received only nine votes against the conference committee report and was signed into law by the governor. Yet a vote for this bill lowered a legislator’s TFR score.

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Dallas agrees to block enforcement of weed decriminalization after appeals court ruling

Dallas will not enforce a voter-approved charter amendment that aimed to decriminalize small amounts of marijuana, for now. Last week, the city of Dallas filed a joint motion with Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton’s office asking a judge to issue a temporary injunction blocking the new amendment. It comes after an appeals court said in April that cities cannot prevent police from enforcing marijuana-related offenses. Proposition R, which 66% of voters approved last November, decriminalizes marijuana under 4 ounces. It prohibits the police department from using smell as probable cause for search or seizure, as well as arresting or citing individuals for possessing 4 ounces or less of marijuana if a felony isn’t involved. Weeks after voters approved the measure, Paxton sued Dallas.

“Cities cannot pick and choose which State laws they follow,” Paxton said in a Nov. 21 news release. “The City of Dallas has no authority to override Texas drug laws or prohibit the police from enforcing them. This is a backdoor attempt to violate the Texas Constitution, and any city that tries to constrain police in this fashion will be met swiftly with a lawsuit by my office.” As part of the joint agreement, the city and its leaders are not allowed to enforce any part of Proposition R. They also cannot punish city employees who do not enforce the proposition. Early last year, Paxton sued five other municipalities, including Austin and Denton, which passed similar measures. This April, a state appeals court sided with Paxton and struck down Austin’s marijuana decriminalization ordinance. Supporters said the charter amendment was necessary to address the disproportionate number of Black people arrested for the low-level offense and help direct police resources to more serious crimes. The proposition was backed by Austin-based nonprofit Ground Game Texas, which gained enough signatures to get it onto the election ballot last November. Having less than 2 ounces of marijuana is a Class B misdemeanor punishable by up to 180 days in jail and a $2,000 fine. Carrying between 2 and 4 ounces of marijuana is a Class A misdemeanor that could lead to up to one year in jail and a $4,000 fine.

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Welcome to Dallas, North: The region that just can’t stop expanding

The growth north of Dallas has been so dizzying that people talk about it as if it were a storm, or some other force of nature. That’s how Heather Cowan describes it. She came to the area in 1995 to raise a family after graduating from college in South Dakota. Six months ago, she and her husband moved farther north to the quiet of Gunter, 50 miles from Dallas, “to get ahead of the curve,” as she put it. Even in rural Gunter, though, Cowan said she was starting to “feel” the growth. She was right: The next day, Centurion American Development Group announced it had closed on a thousand-acre parcel in Gunter that would form part of a new development, Platinum Ranch, with 4,200 homes. The corridor north of Dallas is capping a decade as one of America’s fastest-growing regions, pulling in droves of newcomers from California to India and turning them into newly minted Texans. The companies are coming, too. Among them are Toyota, Amazon Web Services, State Farm and others.

Where cattle once outnumbered people, new shopping malls, housing developments and office towers now reign, and a region that was once overwhelmingly white and country is now increasingly South Asian and techie. It is also brimming with a kind of morning-in-America confidence. While the struggle to build housing has become a seemingly insoluble crisis in other parts of the country, locals talk about when—not if—Dallas’s northward march will reach Oklahoma. If that sounds implausible, it may seem less so since Texas Instruments announced a few weeks ago it would invest up to $40 billion to build a mammoth semiconductor campus in Sherman, just 12 miles from the state line but still within commuting distance of Dallas’s northern satellites. A first laboratory is set to begin production later this year. To drive along Preston Road, which extends 70 miles from Dallas, weaving through the towns that form its expanding frontier, is to encounter a patchwork of new chain stores and restaurants, building sites laden with steel pipes and concrete tubes, and rumbling earth movers. Signs dot the roadside advertising land for sale and communities that exist only on billboards and brochures.

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Arlington mayor on payment plan with IRS for $174K in back taxes, council peers say work unaffected

Arlington Mayor Jim Ross owes $174,945.93 to the IRS in back taxes, according to public records obtained by KERA News. Ross told KERA he is already on a payment plan with the IRS after the agency began garnishing the $250 monthly stipend he receives from Arlington as mayor. The unpaid taxes are from 2015 and 2019. A Notice of Federal Tax Lien from the IRS lists the amounts owed at $79,418.73 in 2015 and $95,527.20 in 2019. The notice was included in documents filed as part of a lawsuit for the unpaid property taxes. Ross' back taxes were mentioned in a post by The Dallas Express, a conservative publication focusing on North Texas.

"It's not anything that I'm proud of," Ross told KERA News in a phone call Wednesday. "It's not that I hang a sign on me saying, 'Look at this. I'm having financial troubles.' But it comes when you are a full-time volunteer, and you get paid $250 a month to do what I do. ... I knew I was only gonna get $250 a month when I took it. And I took anyway." Ross said he is also late on paying property tax for his home in Arlington, but the bill will be paid this month. "It's just been overlooked, to be honest, because I'm focused on this other thing and I used to have a team that does this for me and I no longer do," Ross said. "I just realized that the property taxes hadn't been taken care of. I'm expecting the money to come in this month so that I can take care of those and I'll take care them as soon as that money comes in." It’s not the first time Ross has faced trouble over taxes. When he was running for reelection in 2023, Ross said he was late paying his property taxes but was caught up. "My office staff typically pays it but the person in charge is no longer with me, so it slipped through the cracks," Ross wrote in a 2023 text message to KERA News. Ross told KERA the IRS originally began garnishing his wages from the city — the $250 a month he gets paid as mayor. Despite owning a restaurant and law firm, Ross said his only paychecks come from the city. Ross left his business ventures in the hands of trusted employees when he was elected to council, he said. That allowed him to dedicate around 70 hours a week to his job as Arlington's mayor but meant no longer cutting himself a paycheck and even some downsizing.

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‘With what water?’: Texas, Mexico, and the disappearing Rio Conchos

Alonso Montañez killed the outboard, and the boat swung against the scum and trash that had accumulated in the stagnant water on the high side of the dam. “Escucha,” he said, gesturing at the surface of the lake. In the quiet, we heard water slapping the hull, a life jacket buckle pinging on a metal pole. “Listen,” he said again. “You can hear the force of it, no?” The sound was imperceptible at first. But soon enough it emerged, swelling upward from the murky emerald depths beneath our little boat. The sound was like an enormous rainstick held underwater. Montañez, muscle-bound in a tight blue t-shirt, explained we were hearing the sediment-infused water of La Boquilla Reservoir sluicing into the dam’s gigantic outlets. “That’s not something you want to hear,” he said.

Montañez is a tour boat operator and fisherman on La Boquilla Reservoir, the largest reservoir in the northern Mexican state of Chihuahua and a body of water whose drastically dwindling supply portends ever-more hardship for the drought-stricken Rio Grande. Never in the history of Mexican National Water Commission records has La Boquilla plunged to its present levels. The day we motored up to the dam—September 21, 2024—the reservoir had sunk to 16.1 percent of its capacity. This May, the reservoir sat at 14.7 percent. La Boquilla impounds the water of the Rio Conchos, the largest tributary of the Rio Grande. With a capacity of more than 2.35 million acre-feet—enough, in other words, to submerge 2.35 million acres of land in a foot of water—La Boquilla can be thought of as a gigantic storage tank perched at a high point in a complex binational river system. If the lake lacks water, the river below it dries. And a dried-up Rio Conchos signals distress and political tensions extending throughout northern Chihuahua and all along Mexico’s border with Texas. Historically, the Rio Conchos served as Mexico’s most reliable workhorse for delivering water to Texas in accordance with a treaty negotiated by the United States and Mexico in 1944. But it’s become increasingly apparent that decades of megadrought and overexploitation have ridden the old river nearly to death.

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National Stories

Musk announces arrival of new ‘America Party’ after Trump split

Elon Musk declared the launch of his new political party on Saturday, a project he has repeatedly floated in the weeks since his explosive breakup with President Donald Trump — but provided no details as to how he planned to jump through the hoops necessary to establish a viable alternative. The billionaire entrepreneur and onetime Republican megadonor — who mere months ago appeared as the president’s right-hand man in the Oval Office after pouring millions into his campaign — has for weeks publicly contemplated starting a new third party to disrupt the current system. Musk on Saturday appeared to confirm his intention to launch his “America Party,” after posting a poll to his X account the prior day asking followers whether or not he should create the new party. “By a factor of 2 to 1, you want a new political party and you shall have it! When it comes to bankrupting our country with waste & graft, we live in a one-party system, not a democracy,” he wrote. “Today, the America Party is formed to give you back your freedom.”

Musk’s third-party musings began in earnest after last month’s massive meltdown between the president and his former adviser over the “big beautiful bill,” which the former DOGE head has decried as wasteful. As Trump on Thursday flaunted his successful push to muscle the Republican megabill through Congress this week, Musk sought to drum up support for his potential third party launch, positing that his new party would target a handful of vulnerable swing seats to leverage political power. “Given the razor-thin legislative margins, that would be enough to serve as the deciding vote on contentious laws, ensuring that they serve the true will of the people,” he wrote. While Musk may have the millions to pour into backing certain candidates — which he has already promised to do, pledging to support Rep. Thomas Massie’s (R-Ky.) reelection campaign amid targeting from Trump — establishing a third party involves a series of thorny obstacles including navigating complex state laws, ballot access regulations and other legal hoops. So far, the billionaire would-be party founder has yet to outline a concrete plan forward. Just two months ago, Musk had vowed to cut back on political spending, saying he had “done enough.”

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‘We’re the frontline of defense’: Food banks grapple with megabill’s impact

Food banks say they are wholly unprepared to feed millions of Americans when Republicans’ cuts to traditional federal safety net programs take effect. The GOP’s megabill slashes more than $1 trillion from the nation’s largest food aid program and Medicaid, with some of the cuts taking effect as early as this year. Low-income people grappling with higher costs of living could be forced to turn to emergency food assistance. In preparation, food bank leaders are trying to convince private foundations and state leaders to give them more money. Some states like Minnesota and Pennsylvania have already been weighing shifting additional resources to emergency food programs or standing up new initiatives to counter the loss of federal dollars. That still won’t be enough.

According to Feeding America, the cuts to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program alone would eliminate 6 billion to 9 billion meals annually — roughly the same number of meals the food bank network provided last year. Those food banks would need to double their operations to close the gap SNAP leaves behind. “There is no world in which I can imagine we double ourselves, into perpetuity,” Joree Novotny, executive director of the Ohio Association of Food Banks wrote in a text message. Food bank leaders like Novotny said cuts to SNAP, which provides food aid to over 40 million low-income Americans, will exacerbate their already strained operations. They’ve been piecing together state and federal money to meet increased hunger needs post-Covid, when food prices soared by over 30 percent. Now, much of that money has dried up, and the Trump administration earlier this year canceled more than $1 billion in federal funds for food banks, including money to buy from local farms.

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Trump promised ‘no tax on tips.’ Then came the fine print.

Many service workers are eagerly awaiting no longer paying taxes on their tips. Yet the fine print in Republicans’ new law could limit savings for some waiters, bartenders and others. Among the particulars restricting the reach of the measure: Only the first $25,000 in tips are free from income taxes. Tipped workers will still face the 7.65% combined payroll taxes that fund Social Security and Medicare. And workers won’t be able to benefit if federal officials say their type of service job doesn’t qualify. “No tax on tips” started as a campaign promise by President Trump during a 2024 stop in Nevada, the state with the highest concentration of service workers who rely on tips. It is now a key element of the tax-and-spending megabill that Trump signed into law Friday. Even though it is one of the smaller pieces of the law in terms of dollars—accounting for $32 billion out of $4.5 trillion in tax cuts—it is one of Republicans’ top talking points.

The cut could save some service workers thousands of dollars a year in federal taxes. “It would be extra money,” said Yolanda Garcia, a barista at Resorts World Las Vegas. “It would help me buy more groceries, even a gallon of gas.” She estimates she usually gets $200 to $300 every two-week pay period from tips. If she makes less, taxes cut into her wages because she is taxed on an estimate of her wages and tips, she said. Some four million people in the U.S., or 2.5% of all workers, earn tips, according to the Budget Lab at Yale, a nonpartisan research center founded by former Biden administration officials. Some workers can make tens of thousands of dollars—or even more—in tips each year. To hold on to their gratuities, some workers already illegally skip reporting the income to avoid paying taxes on it. Workers are currently taxed on their tips as part of their overall income, which many complain forces them to skimp on such basics as food and gas as well as vacations. More than a third of tipped workers don’t make enough to pay federal income taxes, including many low-income workers with children and students who work in part-time tipped jobs. They wouldn’t benefit from the no-tax-on-tips deduction. Under Republicans’ policy, workers who do pay federal income taxes will be able to deduct up to $25,000 for tips. For someone in the 12% tax bracket making that much in tips, the change would deliver up to $3,000 in savings. The deduction would start phasing out once an individual’s income reaches $150,000, or $300,000 on a joint return for people who are married.

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One of the Supreme Court’s sharpest critics sits on it

Dissenting — again — on the last day of the Supreme Court’s term, in its most high-profile case, Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson did not mince words. She had for months plainly criticized the opinions of her conservative colleagues, trading the staid legalese typical of justices’ decisions for impassioned arguments against what she has described as their acquiescence to President Donald Trump. She returned to that theme again in the final case, ripping the court for limiting nationwide injunctions. “The majority’s ruling … is … profoundly dangerous, since it gives the Executive the go-ahead to sometimes wield the kind of unchecked, arbitrary power the Founders crafted our Constitution to eradicate,” Jackson wrote. Justice Amy Coney Barrett leveled an unusually personal retort in her majority opinion. “We will not dwell on Justice Jackson’s argument, which is at odds with more than two centuries’ worth of precedent, not to mention the Constitution itself,” Barrett wrote. “We observe only this: Justice Jackson decries an imperial Executive while embracing an imperial Judiciary.”

The extraordinary clash reflected deepening divisions on the court and the place Jackson has increasingly staked out as a leading voice of dissent, challenging the 6-3 conservative supermajority. She wrote more dissents this term than any other justice. Overall, she penned 24 opinions, second only to the prolific Clarence Thomas. Jackson also far exceeded her colleagues in the number of words she spoke during oral arguments. She uttered more than 79,000; Sonia Sotomayor, her liberal colleague, came in a distant second, at 53,000. In her third term, one legal expert said, she has carved out a space on the left similar to what Thomas has held on the right. Writing frequently, often dissenting, and sometimes willing to depart from her liberal colleagues. Tempers and disagreements often flared in the Trump-related cases that have filled the docket, with the majority repeatedly green-lighting some of his most controversial policies. The ruling on nationwide injunctions, which stemmed from a challenge of Trump’s ban on birthright citizenship, drew seven separate opinions. Clashes erupted during culture-war cases in which the court allowed states to ban gender transition care for trans minors and gave parents permission to opt their children out of classroom lessons that clash with their religious beliefs. Even a technical case on disability rights yielded five separate opinions — surprising given it was not the type of hot-button issue that would normally draw reams of writing from the justices. “We are seeing longer separate opinions, but also more diverse views than we have in the past,” said Adam Feldman of Empirical SCOTUS, who has compiled data showing the number of opinions the justices are filing is rising even when they agree.

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Democrats might be ‘overthinking’ strategy to recapture voters

Democrats are rethinking ways to recapture voters they’ve lost to President Trump in recent election cycles, and they may have been offered an important lesson in the New York mayoral primary. In various post-mortems and focus groups done on the heels of their devastating 2024 election loss, Democrats have thoroughly examined exit polls and voter demographics in search of the gaps in their party’s appeal. But Democratic strategist Chuck Rocha, who served as a senior adviser on Sen. Bernie Sanders’s (I-Vt.) presidential campaign in 2020, said Democrats are “overthinking” the solution by analyzing the voters who flipped sides or skipped voting during the last election. “It’s more simple than that,” Rocha said. “Just concentrate on people who are frustrated as hell and get both of them.”

Rocha pointed to the New York mayoral race as proof. He says progressive upstart-turned-party nominee Zohran Mamdani (D) was able to capture voters — including those who did not vote a few months ago in the presidential election — by talking about affordability and other tangible economic issues that appealed to them. Rocha said voters “want anything that’s different” from the status quo when it comes to the cost of living. “It shows how desperate people are,” he said. While many Democrats disagree with Mamdani’s politics, they say the campaign he ran shows the unwavering preeminence of economic issues. And Trump taught the same lesson in 2024, political observers say, by telling voters what they wanted to hear on the economy and his message on “draining the swamp.” “Donald Trump and Zohran Mamdani just showed, in very different elections, that economic issues are still king — and that you can appeal to a wide, bipartisan swath of voters by saying you’ll bring down the cost of living,” said Democratic strategist Christy Setzer. “Working-class voters have been drifting away from the Democratic Party on so-called ‘cultural’ issues for a long time, but they’re still very gettable through a clear message and from a compelling messenger.” According to exit polls, Democrats in 2024 lost significant ground with middle-class voters, a cornerstone of their traditional base, down 10 percentage points from 2020. At the same time, there is a decreasing sense of strong party leadership and little optimism about the party’s future, respective CNN/SSRS and AP/NORC polling out in May revealed. But Mamdani, a self-proclaimed democratic socialist, took aim at the Democratic establishment, calling for draining the swamp to make room for change. It was an echo of Trump’s messaging in his 2024 campaign.

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Trump says US will start talks with China on TikTok deal this week

U.S. President Donald Trump said on Friday he will start talking to China on Monday or Tuesday about a possible TikTok deal. He said the United States "pretty much" has a deal on the sale of the TikTok short-video app. "I think we're gonna start Monday or Tuesday...talking to China, perhaps President Xi or one of his representatives, but we would we pretty much have a deal," Trump told reporters on Air Force One. Last month, Trump extended to September 17 a deadline for China-based ByteDance to divest the U.S. assets of TikTok.

A deal had been in the works this spring to spin off TikTok's U.S. operations into a new U.S.-based firm, majority-owned and operated by U.S. investors, but it was put on hold after China indicated it would not approve it following Trump's announcements of steep tariffs on Chinese goods. Trump said the United States will probably have to get a deal approved by China. When asked how confident he was that China would agree to a deal, he said, "I'm not confident, but I think so. President Xi and I have a great relationship, and I think it's good for them. I think the deal is good for China and it's good for us."

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Lead Stories

House Republicans are pushing Trump's big bill to the brink of passage

House Republicans are preparing to vote on President Donald Trump’s $4.5 trillion tax breaks and spending cuts bill early Thursday, up all night as GOP leaders and the president himself worked to persuade skeptical holdouts to drop their opposition and deliver by their Fourth of July deadline. Final debates began in the predawn hours after another chaotic day, and night, at the Capitol. House Speaker Mike Johnson insisted the House would meet the holiday deadline, with just days to go after the Senate approved the package on the narrowest of margins and Vice President JD Vance breaking a tie vote. “Our way is to plow through and get it done,” Johnson said, emerging in the middle of the night from a series of closed-door meetings. “We will meet our July 4th deadline.” The outcome would be milestone for the president and his party, a longshot effort to compile a long list of GOP priorities into what they call his “one big beautiful bill,” an 800-plus page package. With Democrats unified in opposition, the bill will become a defining measure of Trump’s return to the White House, with the sweep of Republican control of Congress.

At it core, the package’s priority is $4.5 trillion in tax breaks enacted in Trump’s first term, in 2017, that would expire if Congress failed to act, along with new ones. This includes allowing workers to deduct tips and overtime pay, and a $6,000 deduction for most older adults earning less than $75,000 a year. There’s also a hefty investment, $350 billion, in national security and Trump’s deportation agenda and to help develop the “Golden Dome” defensive system over the U.S.. To help offset the costs of lost tax revenue, the package includes $1.2 trillion in cutbacks to the Medicaid health care and food stamps, largely by imposing new work requirements, including for some parents and older people, and a massive rollback of green energy investments. The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office estimates the package will add $3.3 trillion to the deficit over the decade and 11.8 million more people will go without health coverage. “This was a generational opportunity to deliver the most comprehensive and consequential set of conservative reforms in modern history, and that’s exactly what we’re doing,” said Rep. Jodey Arrington, R-Texas, the House Budget Committee chairman.

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The private sector lost 33,000 jobs in June, badly missing expectations for a 100,000 increase, ADP says

Private sector hiring unexpectedly contracted in June, payrolls processing firm ADP said Wednesday, in a possible sign that the economy may not be as sturdy as investors believe as they bid the S&P 500 back up to record territory to end the month. Private payrolls lost 33,000 jobs in June, the ADP report showed, the first decrease since March 2023. Economists polled by Dow Jones forecast an increase of 100,000 for the month. The May job growth figure was revised even lower to just 29,000 jobs added from 37,000. “Though layoffs continue to be rare, a hesitancy to hire and a reluctance to replace departing workers led to job losses last month,” Nela Richardson, ADP’s chief economist, said in a press release published Wednesday morning. To be sure, the ADP report has a spotty track record on predicting the subsequent government jobs report, which investors tend to weigh more heavily. May’s soft ADP data ended up differing significantly from the monthly jobs report figures that came later in the week.

This week, the government’s nonfarm payrolls report will be out on Thursday with economists expecting a healthy 110,000 increase for June, per Dow Jones estimates. Economists are expecting the unemployment rate to tick higher to 4.3% from 4.2%. Some economists could revise down their jobs reports estimates following ADP’s data. Weekly jobless claims data is also due Thursday, with economists penciling in 240,000. This string of labor stats comes during a shortened trading week, with the market closing early on Thursday and remaining dark on Friday in honor of the July Fourth holiday. The bulk of job losses came in service roles tied to professional and business services and health and education, according to ADP. Professional/business services notched a decline of 56,000, while health/education saw a net loss of 52,000. Financial activity roles also contributed to the month’s decline with a drop of 14,000 on balance. But the contraction was capped by payroll expansions in goods-producing roles across industries such as manufacturing and mining. All together, goods-producing positions grew by 32,000 in the month, while payrolls for service roles overall fell by 66,000.

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Justice Dept. explores using criminal charges against election officials

Senior Justice Department officials are exploring whether they can bring criminal charges against state or local election officials if the Trump administration determines they have not sufficiently safeguarded their computer systems, according to people familiar with the discussions. The department’s effort, which is still in its early stages, is not based on new evidence, data or legal authority, according to the people, speaking on the condition of anonymity to describe internal discussions. Instead, it is driven by the unsubstantiated argument made by many in the Trump administration that American elections are easy prey to voter fraud and foreign manipulation, these people said. Such a path could significantly raise the stakes for federal investigations of state or county officials, thrusting the Justice Department and the threat of criminalization into the election system in a way that has never been done before.

Federal voting laws place some mandates on how elections are conducted and ballots counted. But that work has historically been managed by state and local officials, with limited involvement or oversight from Washington. In recent days, senior officials have directed Justice Department lawyers to examine the ways in which a hypothetical failure by state or local officials to follow security standards for electronic voting could be charged as a crime, appearing to assume a kind of criminally negligent mismanagement of election systems. Already, the department has started to contact election officials across the country, asking for information on voting in the state. A spokesman for the Justice Department, Gates McGavick, said the agency “will leave no option off the table when it comes to promoting free, fair and secure elections.” Voting experts say the push by the Trump administration is alarming, particularly given that it has repeatedly argued, without reliable evidence, that the 2020 election that President Trump lost was affected by mass voter fraud. “The tactics we’re seeing out of D.O.J. right now are building on what we’ve seen from anti-democracy groups for years,” said Dax Goldstein, the program director of election protection at the States United Democracy Center, a nonprofit organization. “They’re rooted in the same lies about elections, and they’re all meant to create noise and fear and concerns about issues with our elections that just don’t exist. Our elections are safe and secure, and election officials are working to keep them that way.”

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One key to Houston ISD’s rising STAAR Scores? Holding students back.

Texas Monthly; Miles: Karen Warren/Houston Chronicle via AP; Score sheet: Getty Mike Miles is taking a victory lap. Last month, the Houston Independent School District’s state-appointed superintendent unveiled the district’s latest standardized-test results at a packed school board meeting. Since 2023, when the Texas Education Agency replaced HISD’s elected board and installed Miles, citing poor student performance, the percentage of Houston elementary and middle school students meeting state reading standards has increased by between three and twelve points per grade. Miles announced that the students raised their math proficiency by between three and fifteen points over the same period. The district showed the most dramatic success in two required high school courses, with the percentage of students meeting state standards rising by 17 points in biology and 23 points in Algebra I over the past two years. (In the other three high school exams—English I, English II, and U.S. History—HISD had modest gains.) For Miles, the STAAR scores vindicate what he calls the New Education System—a heavily scripted curriculum, with components written by AI, that he implemented at 85 “historically underperforming” schools for the 2023–24 school year. After the addition of 45 more schools to the program in 2024–25, around half of the district now follows the NES model. Miles pioneered the system at his Third Future charter school network in Colorado before importing it into the state’s largest school district. “This sort of growth has never been done in Houston, or in the state of Texas,” the 68-year-old Miles told the board with a triumphant grin. “This intervention is working. The transformation is working.” He singled out the meteoric rise in algebra and biology scores, calling the gains “incredible.”

In his enthusiasm, though, Miles glossed over a crucial fact: The two-year jump in algebra and biology scores was, at least in part, a result of systematically pushing students at NES schools into less rigorous math and science classes. These moves, some of which were previously reported by the Houston Chronicle, inflated test scores by forcing thousands of students at struggling schools to take STAAR exams a year later than their peers at higher-performing campuses. In interviews, district representatives acknowledged these changes but told me they were intended to benefit students rather than inflate STAAR scores. Chief academic officer Kristen Hole explained that NES students need extra preparation before taking algebra and biology classes. “We have a lot of English-language learners in the district,” she said. “One additional year of English acquisition for students can always be particularly helpful, especially in a topic like biology, where you have a lot of heavy vocabulary.” (Miles declined an interview request.) Until the state takeover, most students took both Algebra I and biology in ninth grade, while higher-performing students could take algebra in eighth or even seventh grade. That’s still true at non-NES schools, such as Lanier Middle School and Bellaire High School, which tend to have wealthier, whiter populations. But at NES schools, the course sequence has become much more rigid. Since the state takeover, access to eighth-grade algebra has declined at many NES schools. Two middle schools that joined NES in 2023 (Cullen and Fondren) did not offer an algebra course that year; three schools that joined in 2024 (Deady, Fonville, and Gregory-Lincoln) also did not offer algebra their first year in the program. At many other schools, eighth-grade enrollment in Algebra I dropped by more than half from its pre-NES figure. Hole wouldn’t answer a question about why the course is no longer offered but said the district is in the process of implementing an accelerated math curriculum for lower grades so that future students will be prepared for eighth-grade algebra. (Cullen resumed offering Algebra I in 2024–25; seven students took the exam this spring.)

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State Stories

Bud Kennedy: Ban Texans from running as Republicans — or voting? Behind the French fracas

The Texas Republican Wrestling League has returned for another season, with castoffs and outsiders grabbing at the seasoned old pros while everybody imitates America’s Bruiser-In-Chief. That is the best way to explain the events of recent days. A tag team of elected officials is retaliating against showoff Tarrant County party chairman Bo French, all for landing low blows against the senior faction. Texas is a two-party state. But now, it’s the MAGA Republican Party against the Even More MAGA Party. Texas’ MAGA Republicans passed school vouchers, strengthened the border, DOGEed the budget and did whatever President Donald Trump and estranged ally Elon Musk wanted. But that wasn’t enough. The Even More MAGA Party had to find something else to gripe about.

So now, eight months before a telltale party primary, the Even More MAGA Party is churning up opposition to incumbents over (1) property taxes, (2) LGBTQ whatever and (3) Muslim Americans, foreigners, Californians or anybody who looks New Around Here. French and his West Texas multimillionaire backers dominate the local organized party structure. They want to trap Republican elected officials in a leglock hold. Then they can declare some not MAGA enough and bar them from the March ballot. You think I’m kidding? The state party organization is about to file a lawsuit to bar some Republicans from even running for office. The same lawsuit would also let the party prevent Texans who don’t pre-register as Republicans from even casting a primary vote at all. See? This spiteful little club is at odds with elected officials, including many who have already been promised Trump’s endorsement. They even want to overturn current Texas election law. Is it any wonder that elected officials want to get rid of a showboating county chairman trolling America with viral shock posts on X.com? At @bofrenchtx, the Westover Hills Republican speaks Even More MAGA Party language. He says 100 million people in America are “third world” invaders and “savages” who should be deported. He calls his critics “retards.” He writes that “there are just some things where you can’t trust women” and that men “do the hard work” in society. French himself has conceded that it’s all for show. In October, he told a Dallas political website: “I tweet 50 to 100 times a day. Sometimes my tweets are absurd to demonstrate absurdity.” Sometimes they’re just absurd.

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Texas AG defends shutdown of midwife Maria Rojas' health clinics amid abortion prosecution

Accused abortionist Maria Rojas' refusal to answer questions during a civil court hearing in March should be enough reason to for a court to keep her health clinics closed, the Texas Attorney General’s Office said this week. In a filing in a Texas appeals court on Monday, lawyers for Attorney General Ken Paxton said a Waller County judge’s civil injunction closing Rojas’ clinics amid her separate criminal case should be upheld. Rojas’ lawyers in May appealed Judge Gary Chaney’s injunction, arguing that the attorney general’s office can’t prove that an abortion took place and that only one entity, the Texas Medical Board, has the power to seek an injunction.

The attorney general’s office stood by its evidence and argued that the appeal, if granted, would gut the office’s powers to enforce the law. “[Rojas’] theory would leave the attorney general powerless to prevent the loss of unborn life, limiting him only to after-the-fact remedies,” the agency wrote. The case is the first test of the criminal and civil powers granted to the attorney general’s office under the Texas Human Life Protection Act, the 2023 law that mostly banned abortions in Texas. Along with criminalizing abortions, the law made it possible for the attorney general’s office to seek civil penalties against medical providers. Rojas, a licensed midwife, is accused of providing abortions out of four clinics she owned in northwest Harris and Waller counties. She and two other men are also accused of conspiring to provide medical treatment without a license. Rojas and another man, Cedan Ley, are not licensed physicians and were alleged to have paid the second man, Rubbildo Labanino Matos, to have access to the ability to write prescriptions and perform other tasks.

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New regulations are coming for driverless cars in Texas. Here's what to know

Self-driving cars and trucks deployed on Texas roads will soon face stricter scrutiny and state oversight. That’s thanks to a new law signed by Gov. Greg Abbott that requires autonomous vehicle companies to get state approval before operating without a driver — and gives the Texas Department of Motor Vehicles authority to revoke that approval if companies don’t follow safety standards. The move comes as Texas has become a “global leader” in autonomous vehicle deployment, according to Jeff Farrah, the CEO of the Autonomous Vehicle Industry Association, a trade group. “Texas really stands out nationally when it comes to the level of interest from policymakers and regulatory agencies,” he said.

And it’s not just the Waymo cars that have become commonplace in Austin. In April, a company called Aurora started running driverless semitrucks on I-45 between Houston and Dallas. Another company, Kodiak, announced in May that it had deployed four driverless trucks in the Permian Basin. Several others have said they would pull their safety drivers from trucks by the end of this year. Although the law goes into effect Sept. 1, the new rules are not expected to be operational until “sometime in 2026,” said Adam Shaivitz, a spokesperson for TxDMV, in an email. Until then, the state has little authority to stop AVs from driving on public roads. In mid-June, a group of Central Texas lawmakers wrote to Tesla asking the company to delay its robotaxi launch in Austin until after Sept. 1 because of widespread concern over the safety of the company’s self-driving technology. Tesla’s self-driving system uses a camera-based technology, which differs from Waymo and other companies and that critics have warned is less safe. Tesla deployed its cars anyway and responded to the lawmakers via email that the company was “actively engaged in efforts by the Texas Legislature to update AV policy and will ensure that our vehicles and operational plans meet the planned statutory updates.” Nichols said the legislation passed with broad industry support. Companies were concerned that “if somebody else is a bad actor, it can hurt them all,” he said. “If someone’s out there harming the public, then the legislature will just shut the whole thing down.”

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North Texas newlywed released from ICE detention after more than 140 days

Ward Sakeik, a North Texas woman detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement in February as she was returning home from her honeymoon, has been released from detention. The decision comes after she spent more than 140 days in ICE custody. The 22-year-old woman of Palestinian descent is also “stateless,” creating a situation that a lawyer previously described to The Dallas Morning News as a “procedural black hole.” On Tuesday night, Sakeik walked out of the Prairieland Detention Center — an ICE facility located less than an hour’s drive south from her Arlington home — and into the embrace of her husband, 28-year-old Taahir Shaikh. It’s not immediately clear why she was released. The Department of Homeland Security didn’t immediately respond to a comment request from The News on Wednesday morning.

Eric Lee, one of her attorneys, said he can’t speculate on the reasons why and declined to disclose for now the terms of Sakeik’s release. But he said she doesn’t have an ankle monitor. Sakeik’s attorneys also called her release “sudden” in a Wednesday press statement. They said ICE had just attempted to deport Sakeik early Monday, despite a federal court order prohibiting her removal. They added that they were not informed about which country she would have been sent to. “There is no country to which she can be removed where she would not face extreme hardship because she doesn’t have citizenship anywhere,” said Chris Godshall-Bennett, another attorney for Sakeik. “I just think it really underscores the cruelty and the complete lack of regard for human dignity and the approach to immigration that this administration is taking.” Monday’s described deportation attempt would be the second time the federal government has allegedly attempted to remove Sakeik from the U.S. in June. Sakeik and her husband previously told The News that she was driven to a Fort Worth-area airport and was almost deported on June 12 to the Israeli border. But she said she was later told that the plan was canceled for several reasons, including the Israel-Iran conflict.

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Texas families sue to block Ten Commandments law

A group of multifaith and nonreligious Texas families filed a federal lawsuit Wednesday to block a new state law requiring classroom displays of the Ten Commandments from taking effect in September. The suit is the latest legal challenge to the law that is set to take effect Sept. 1 as opponents call the requirement unconstitutional. The 16 families who are part of the new federal lawsuit allege that students will be “forcibly subjected” to state-sponsored scriptural principles such as “I AM the LORD thy God” and “Thou shalt have no other gods before me.” “This simply cannot be reconciled with the fundamental religious freedom principles that animated the founding of our nation,” they argue in court documents.

They want the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Texas to declare Senate Bill 10 a violation of the First Amendment’s establishment and free exercise clauses — which protect the separation of church and state and religious freedom, respectively — and preliminarily bar it from taking effect. The families — who are Jewish, Christian, Unitarian Universalist, Hindu or nonreligious — said such displays “will substantially interfere with and burden” parents’ right to direct their children’s religious education and upbringing. Gov. Greg Abbott signed SB 10 into law last month aware that it would be challenged in court. “Bring it,” Abbott wrote in a social media post in May, when civil rights groups threatened to sue after lawmakers passed the measure. If left in place, Texas public schools must conspicuously display a durable poster or framed copy of the Ten Commandments that is at least 16 inches by 20 inches. The law specifies the exact wording that must be used and requires the text size and typeface be readable for a person with average vision from anywhere in the classroom.

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A voice for the 'marginalized:' Austin Catholics get new bishop

The newly appointed bishop to the Roman Catholic Diocese of Austin promised to lead with unity and to speak up for the “overlooked and the marginalized," including unauthorized immigrants, in his introduction to his new flock. "That's where the church needs to be to make sure that people do not forget those who are often forgotten," said Daniel E. Garcia, whose appointment by Pope Leo XIV as the sixth bishop of the Diocese of Austin was announced Wednesday morning. Garcia, 64, a native of Central Texas, will lead the diocese where he was first ordained in 1988 and where he rose to be an auxiliary bishop. He left in 2019 to become the bishop of Monterey in Central California. But the bishop’s eventual homecoming was so anticipated, the seminarians joked to themselves after his speech, that Garcia’s portrait already hangs front and center in the diocese offices from his first Austin stint.

Garcia said he was grateful to return home. His role, he said, would allow him to encourage people in their spiritual journey and to stand up for the church’s teachings, including the benevolent treatment of the vulnerable, like immigrants who lack authorization to be in the country. “There’s got to be a better way,” Garcia said of recent U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement raids on immigrants. ”I think those are the kind of things that we as a church should elevate and to say there's something wrong with this picture.” He said that fostering change would require building relationships with political leaders — a tricky question of balancing church teachings and peoples’ political opinions. “You can disagree on policy,” Garcia said. “But the church’s role is to let people know that we are all created in the likeness of God.” Shelley Metcalf, a diocese employee who worked with Garcia during his original stint in Austin, said she believes Garcia’s “great character” and humility will help him build bridges with political and community leaders to advocate for the marginalized.

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Texas State prepared to ramp up resources to stay competitive in Pac-12 Conference

Texas State president Kelly Damphousse woke up Tuesday morning feeling like a dog who had finally caught up to the car. The university’s pursuit of a spot in the Pac-12 Conference had been underway for nearly a year, starting with outreach to the league’s commissioner and two remaining schools last summer. As the conference rebuilt and new members joined, Texas State continued to network. Damphousse shared the school’s story with the other presidents, and Bobcats athletic director Don Coryell relayed Texas State’s history and vision to his counterparts around the league. After the Pac-12 announced a media rights partnership with CBS Sports on June 23, Texas State’s courtship kicked into high gear. Damphousse said the university confirmed the Pac-12's interest in a more formal way for the first time that evening, and a few days of negotiations yielded an official offer Thursday. Texas State accepted on Friday, and the system's board of regents finalized the move Monday.

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Why this Texas farmer thinks he can stop Greg Abbott's reelection bid

While better-known Democrats are jockeying to see who might run for governor in 2026 against Gov. Greg Abbott, a farmer in Northeast Texas is already jumping into the race, saying the party needs an outsider to win the contest. Bobby Cole, a former firefighter and a farmer from Wood County, has hired campaign staffers and launched a website, and is vowing to take back the government for working people of the state. “Republicans have spent 30 years in office, and working men and women have been having to pay the cost,” Cole, 55, said during an interview. “It has to stop.” He said rising property taxes, underfunded public schools and tariffs hurting farmers and consumers are just some of the reasons he’s taking a shot at running for office.

“We need more people like us — working people — in the government,” Cole said. Cole was a firefighter in Texarkana and later in Plano. He also maintains his family’s farm in Quitman, where they have 300 head of cattle and raise chickens. He retired from firefighting as a lieutenant in 2017. Abbott has been governor since 2014 and already announced his reelection bid for what would be his fourth four-year term. Abbott won his last reelection campaign, in 2022, beating Democrat Beto O’Rourke by 11 percentage points. U.S. Rep. Joaquin Castro, of San Antonio, and state Rep. James Talarico, of Austin, are among the Democrats looking at the race. “I’ll make a decision soon,” Castro said when asked on a gubernatorial run in an interview after a political rally in San Antonio on Friday with Talarico and O’Rourke. Talarico confirmed running for governor is a potential for him as well. He has also floated a possible run for U.S. Senate next year. "Everything is on the table right now," Talarico said. "I am trying to figure out how best I can serve."

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Prestonwood celebrates Trump and Supreme Court in morning worship

“This is a time for us to celebrate America,” Prestonwood Baptist Church Pastor Jack Graham declared in his all-white suit in a scene reminiscent of a Jesse Gemstone sermon in HBO Max’s The Righteous Gemstones. “Just because you love America doesn’t mean you don’t love Jesus more. And we do love Jesus most of all, but we love our country,” he said last Sunday at the suburban Dallas megachurch. As the worship team played the songs of the Army, Navy, Air Force, Coast Guard and Marine Corps to the sounds of explosions and jets flying overhead, those from the congregation who had served in each branch stood when their song was played. With American flags and official branch seals displayed on the screens, commanders from each branch stood on the stage and saluted the congregation. As they marched off stage, a men’s trio came forward to sing “God Bless America” as larger-then-life images of the American flag swirled across the wall-to-wall video screens behind them, as if they were draped in the flag.

It’s nearly the Fourth of July, so “God and country” services are on full display across the land — although few are likely as over the top as at Prestonwood, which also is known for its extravagant Christmas pageant with flying drummers suspended over the congregation. Remember it was in downtown Dallas in December 2021 when then-former President Donald Trump delivered the Christmas message at First Baptist Church of Dallas, using the pulpit to criticize his successor, President Joe Biden and warning, “Our country needs a savior right now.” Trump, of course, sees himself as that savior, as do so many of his followers. Whether at Christmas or the Fourth of July, these Christian nationalist-themed services are nothing new. When I first began leading worship in the 1990s at an independent fundamentalist Baptist church, I sang a song for the Sunday morning service comparing the U.S. military’s sacrifice to Jesus’ sacrifice, and then comparing our commitment to Jesus with our commitment to the United States. The worship of Trump and the United States is so over the top and obvious that it can be easy to condemn it as idolatry without reflecting on how its theology is built. But if we’re going to disarm Christian nationalism and turn authoritarian Christianity’s weapons of warfare into plowshares and garden tools, we’re going to need to be secure enough in our relationship with God and brave enough to question some of the underlying theological threads being used to sacralize harm.

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More accusations fly at Second Baptist

Defendants in the lawsuit brought by disgruntled members of Second Baptist Church in Houston have asked the state district court to move the case to a special court that deals only in business matters. On June 9, defendants of Second Baptist Church — Ben Young, Homer Edwin Young, Lee Maxcy and Dennis Brewer Jr. — petitioned for the case to be moved from the 55th District Court in Harris County, Texas, to the 11th Division of the Business Court of Texas. This court division was created in 2024 by the Texas Legislature to provide a specialized venue for commercial disputes presided over by judges with a smaller docket and judicial or litigation experience in complex commercial matters.

The plaintiffs, organized into a nonprofit called Jeremiah Counsel, contend the church’s longtime pastor, H. Edwin Young, manipulated huge changes in church bylaws without proper notice. Those changes gave Young and his successors as senior pastor nearly total control over the church’s governance, assets and decision-making. Using that power, Young named one of his sons, Ben Young, his successor without a church vote. But the lawsuit is about much more than pastoral succession; it is about who controls the assets of the church, which are said to be at least $1 billion. The lawsuit was filed April 15. No further significant court actions have yet taken place. On April 27, Ben Young addressed the lawsuit in his Sunday morning sermon. “The allegations concerning me and my family are simply not true,” Young said, according to the Houston Chronicle, which reviewed multiple audio and video recordings of the sermon. The Chronicle stated: “Appearing to read from a script on the front stage podium, Young announced that the church has sought legal help from high-profile evangelical attorney Jay Sekulow, who personally represented President Donald Trump during his first impeachment trial. (Sekulow now heads the American Center for Law and Justice in Washington, D.C.) Church members told the Chronicle that Sekulow has spoken at Second Baptist in the past,” the newspaper reported.”

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Dr. Phil’s Fort Worth media company files for bankruptcy

TV psychologist and talk-show host Dr. Phil McGraw’s Fort Worth-based Merit Street Media declared Chapter 11 bankruptcy on Tuesday and filed a lawsuit against its partner, Trinity Broadcasting Network. The bankruptcy was filed in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Dallas. A bankruptcy hearing is scheduled for 9:30 a.m. Thursday. The lawsuit alleges that its business partner, Trinity Broadcasting of Fort Worth, destroyed its television network and forced the bankruptcy declaration. According to court documents, Trinity Broadcast Network showed an “intentional pattern of choices made with full awareness that the consequence of which was to sabotage and seal the fate of a new but already nationally acclaimed network which has, since its launch in April of 2024, delivered its viewers with cutting edge reports, interviews, and in-depth analysis of national importance.”

The suit alleges that the network is going off the air because Trinity Broadcasting Network refused to honor its commitment and transfer its “must carry rights” and provide national distribution of programming for Merit Street. In June the Dr. Phil Show was placed on an “indefinite hiatus,” according to a LinkedIn post by a former employee. McGraw initially ended the show in 2023, shortly before announcing that he would start a new Fort Worth-based media company, Merit Street Media. The new show, “Dr. Phil Primetime,” launched in April 2024. In August 2024, 40 to 50 employees were let go as part of “ongoing consolidations of departments and roles in efforts to achieve efficiencies at the highest level.” According to the lawsuit, TBN saddled Merit Street Media with “unsustainable debt of over $100 million. In November, the Fort Worth-based Professional Bull Riders parted ways with Merit Street Media over a contract dispute involving payments of rights fees that were owed to the organization.

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National Stories

ICE shut down this Latino market — without even showing up

On a typical weekend, 20,000 people stream through the metal gates at Broadacres Marketplace, thronging the aisles of the outdoor “swap meet” to hunt for the best deals, savor snacks and sip micheladas under the desert sky. Until late June, Broadacres’ familiar bustle had cemented its place as the heart of this city’s Latino community. That has been replaced with an eerie quiet. Hundreds of booths stand barren behind a chain-link fence, mostly stripped to their skeletal remains and covered in fabric or tarp. Save for one security guard at the main gate, there’s no one in sight. Broadacres Marketplace announced that it would temporarily close on June 21 because of the threat of raids by Immigration and Customs Enforcement. In a statement online, the market’s management said the decision to close was made “out of an abundance of caution and concern for our community.” Broadacres’ owner, Greg Danz, is president and CEO of Newport Diversified Inc., a company that also owns two other swap meets in California.

“We don’t want any of our customers, vendors, or employees to be detained at our business or for us to be a beacon of shopping and entertainment while our federal government is raiding businesses and detaining its people,” the statement read, adding that management does not yet have a planned date to reopen. Over the past six months, the Trump administration has implemented aggressive immigration policies and enforcement, detaining and deporting tens of thousands of people since it took office. The mass deportation efforts have sparked protests nationwide and laid bare how devastating the arrests — and the fear of them — are in cities across the country. After Donald Trump campaigned on the promise to deport swaths of violent criminals, a small fraction of undocumented immigrants in ICE custody are known violent actors. Half of those in detention have neither been convicted nor charged with a crime, according to ICE data. Latinos, in particular, have been a prime target, heightening fears in the community, including among those who have legal status. The only other time in its nearly 50-year history that the swap meet closed for an extended time was for a few months in 2020 during the pandemic, according to two longtime vendors. Rico Ocampo, whose family has been selling goods at Broadacres for more than 20 years, said his parents financially rely on the swap meet. “As a family, we’re facing questions like: What are we going to do about the mortgage payment, with groceries? How are we going to recover from this?” he said. Ocampo, 34, said other vendors are most likely facing the same anxieties, while also managing real fears that they or their loved ones could get swept up in ICE raids. Earlier in June, ICE made arrests at the Santa Fe Spring Swap Meet in Southern California, which is under the same ownership as Broadacres, according to NBC Los Angeles. That has created fears that something similar could play out in Nevada.

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Wisconsin Supreme Court’s liberal majority strikes down 176-year-old abortion ban

The Wisconsin Supreme Court’s liberal majority struck down the state’s 176-year-old abortion ban on Wednesday, ruling 4-3 that it was superseded by newer state laws regulating the procedure, including statutes that criminalize abortions only after a fetus can survive outside the womb. The ruling came as no surprise given that liberal justices control the court. One of them went so far as to promise to uphold abortion rights during her campaign two years ago, and they blasted the ban during oral arguments in November. The statute Wisconsin legislators adopted in 1849, widely interpreted as a near-total ban on abortions, made it a felony for anyone other than the mother or a doctor in a medical emergency to destroy “an unborn child.” The ban was in effect until 1973, when the U.S. Supreme Court’s landmark Roe v. Wade decision legalizing abortion nationwide nullified it. Legislators never officially repealed it, however, and conservatives argued that the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2022 decision to overturn Roe reactivated it.

Wisconsin Attorney General Josh Kaul, a Democrat, filed a lawsuit that year arguing that abortion restrictions enacted by Republican legislators during the nearly half-century that Roe was in effect trumped the ban. Kaul specifically cited a 1985 law that essentially permits abortions until viability. Some babies can survive with medical help after 21 weeks of gestation. Lawmakers also enacted abortion restrictions under Roe requiring women to undergo ultrasounds, wait 24 hours before having the procedure and provide written consent, and receive abortion-inducing drugs only from doctors during an in-person visit. “That comprehensive legislation so thoroughly covers the entire subject of abortion that it was clearly meant as a substitute for the 19th century near-total ban on abortion,” Justice Rebeca Dallet wrote for the majority. Sheboygan County District Attorney Joel Urmanski, a Republican, defended the ban in court, arguing that it can coexist with the newer abortion restrictions. Dane County Circuit Judge Diane Schlipper ruled in 2023 that the 1849 ban outlaws feticide — which she defined as the killing of a fetus without the mother’s consent — but not consensual abortions. Abortions have been available in the state since that ruling, but the state Supreme Court decision gives providers and patients more certainty that abortions will remain legal in Wisconsin.

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After Trump cuts, what is left of George W. Bush's anti-AIDS program in Africa?

In just six months, the Trump administration has left one of the cornerstones of George W. Bush’s legacy hanging by a thread. Even though Bush’s program to fight the spread of HIV and AIDS in Africa has been credited with saving millions of lives, the Trump administration is making dramatic changes that will limit the reach of the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, or PEPFAR. On Tuesday, what is left of the slashed U.S. Agency for International Development, which administered much of the PEPFAR program through non-profits around the globe, was officially folded into the U.S. State Department. The move finalizes an executive order President Donald Trump issued earlier this year.

The administration is promising a more limited approach to fighting the disease in Africa in the future and has asked Congress to rescind $400 million that had already been budgeted for PEPFAR in 2024 and 2025. “It is something that our budget will be very trim on because we believe that many of these nonprofits are not geared towards the viewpoints of the administration,” White House budget director Russ Vought said of funding AIDS prevention work at a Senate hearing last month. “And we’re $37 trillion in debt. So at some point, the continent of Africa needs to absorb more of the burden of providing this health care.” But that has Bush, who has largely kept quiet during Trump’s second term, speaking out. He issued a recorded video message to USAID supporters on Monday, insisting that helping Africa was always intended to benefit the United States through diplomacy. “Is it in our national interests that 25 million people who would have died now live? I think it is, and so do you,” Bush told supporters of the program in a video message viewed by the Associated Press. The program isn’t being totally shuttered. A bipartisan coalition of supporters in Congress has helped save parts of PEPFAR. U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio has said the program will continue to treat existing HIV-positive patients and support HIV prevention measures for pregnant and breastfeeding women. But that leaves out millions more who other prevention programs had targeted through PEPFAR. Former President Barack Obama was even more forceful in a message to the same audience Bush was speaking to. He called the dismantling of USAID “a colossal mistake.”

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Harvard is staring at a billion-dollar budget shortfall from clash with Trump

Harvard University would face a budget shortfall of about a billion dollars a year if President Trump follows through on all of his plans and threats spanning research funding, tax policy and student enrollment, according to an analysis by The Wall Street Journal. That grim math helps explain why Harvard has taken steps toward negotiating with the administration after months of defiance. The Journal’s estimate, based on publicly available data, is for a worst-case scenario in which Harvard loses all federal research funding, federal student aid and its ability to enroll international students, and Congress hikes its annual endowment tax to 8%. A sustained shortfall of that magnitude would severely strain Harvard’s ability to manage its $6.4 billion annual operating budget. Though Harvard has a $53 billion endowment, more than 80% of the money is subject to donor restrictions, meaning it can’t be touched to patch budget gaps without inviting lawsuits. “They’ve got enough money to keep going for a while, but eventually they’re going to have to make substantial cuts,” said Robert Kelchen, a professor at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, who studies education finance. “You would change the future of the institution.”

The Trump administration has sought to make Harvard a poster child in its fight against institutions it says haven’t taken concerns about antisemitism and diversity programs seriously. Harvard has said it is working to promote intellectual openness in the classroom and to enroll students willing to engage across perspectives. Talks between the two sides were under way as recently as mid-June, according to a social-media post by the president. The Trump administration on Monday told Harvard the university had violated federal civil-rights law over its treatment of Jewish and Israeli students, risking further funding. Asked about the pressure on Harvard’s finances, a senior White House official said the school will receive no money “until it ends its discriminatory and deeply embarrassing practices. The private sector is welcome to step in and support Harvard.” The university said in a statement: “Harvard has made significant strides to combat bigotry, hate and bias. We are not alone in confronting this challenge and recognize that this work is ongoing.” Harvard has rejected Trump’s demands for change and twice sued the administration, challenging the withdrawal of research funding and the ban on international students. A federal judge has halted the ban, a decision the Trump administration has said it would appeal. Lawmakers were working this week to complete comprehensive tax legislation that included the increase in the endowment levy. Trump has also asked the Internal Revenue Service to revoke the university’s tax-exempt status, a move that could slow donations and slap the university with a costly property tax bill.

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Bryan Kohberger pleads guilty at hearing in Idaho college student murders

Bryan Kohberger pleaded guilty to four counts of first-degree murder and burglary in the November 2022 fatal stabbings of four University of Idaho students — Kaylee Goncalves, Madison Mogen, Xana Kernodle and Ethan Chapin — at an off-campus house. Kohberger, then a doctoral student in criminal justice at nearby Washington State University, was arrested weeks after the killings based on DNA and other digital forensic evidence collected by law enforcement, according to an affidavit. Opening statements were set to begin Aug. 18 after months of delays over what evidence should be admissible. District Court Judge Steven Hippler had also declined to rule out the death penalty as punishment. Hippler accepted a plea of guilty as part of a deal that would drop the death penalty in exchange for a life sentence. Kohberger, 30, avoided a trial and waived his right to appeal. While at least the family of one of the victims is supportive of such an agreement, another says it feels “failed” by state prosecutors.

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The potential sentence faced by Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs for his prostitution-related crime

The jury in the Sean “Diddy” Combs sex trafficking trial convicted him of prostitution-related crime but cleared him of sex trafficking and racketeering charges. Here’s what we know about the potential sentence: Will Combs spend years in prison? The three-time Grammy award winner was convicted of flying people around the country, including his girlfriends and paid male sex workers, to engage in sexual encounters, a violation of a 115-year-old federal law called the Mann Act, named for James Mann, an Illinois congressman. The law originally prohibited the interstate transport of a woman or girl for “prostitution or debauchery, or for any other immoral purpose.” It was later updated to be gender-neutral and for any sexual activity “for which any person can be charged with a criminal offense.”

In a court filing, Assistant U.S. Attorney Maurene Comey estimated that Combs’ sentencing guidelines, which take into account many technical factors, will likely qualify him for a prison term of more than four years. He’ll get credit for his time in custody since his arrest in September. Combs’ defense team believes the guidelines will be much lower, around two years. The maximum possible sentence is 10 years in prison, though U.S. District Judge Arun Subramanian will have much discretion. He proposed an Oct. 3 sentencing date. The government said Combs coerced women into abusive sex parties involving hired male sex workers, ensured their compliance with drugs like cocaine and threats to their careers, and silenced victims through blackmail and violence that included kidnapping, arson and beatings. The jury, however, acquitted Combs of the most serious charges — racketeering conspiracy and sex trafficking — which could have carried a sentence of up to life in prison. Combs defeated the racketeering charge. Authorities had accused him of running a criminal enterprise that relied on bodyguards, household staff, personal assistants and others in his orbit to facilitate and cover up crimes. It’s commonly used to tackle organized crime, with prosecutors using the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations act, or RICO, to take on the Mafia in the 1970s.

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Lead Stories

Senate passes One Big Beautiful Bill with host of Texas Republican priorities

The U.S. Senate passed a sweeping GOP tax policy bill Tuesday that represents the centerpiece of President Donald Trump’s legislative agenda. Republicans say the bill, which includes a number of specific provisions pushed by Texas’ Republican U.S. Sens. John Cornyn and Ted Cruz, will drive economic growth, promote domestic energy production and fund Trump’s immigration enforcement policies. Democrats described the measure as a giveaway to the wealthy and highlighted projections it would increase by millions the number of people without health insurance, due in large part to Medicaid changes. The Senate vote sends the bill back to the House where it faces resistance from some conservative deficit hawks, including U.S. Rep. Chip Roy, R-Austin.

Texas Republicans have focused on using the bill as a vehicle to reimburse the state for border security and immigration enforcement expenses it incurred during former President Joe Biden’s administration. Texas Gov. Greg Abbott has traveled to Washington multiple times this year to lobby for $11.1 billion to cover the cost of Operation Lone Star. As part of that initiative, Texas sent state troopers and National Guard soldiers to the border. It also placed physical barriers such as razor wire along the Rio Grande. Texas Democrats have criticized the operation as a failure. Republicans say the state should be reimbursed for doing the federal government’s job over the four years of Biden’s term. Cruz fought to preserve and expand the nationwide school choice program approved by the House that would provide a dollar-for-dollar tax credit for contributions to nonprofit organizations granting scholarships for K-12 public and private school students. Cruz pushed successfully to strip out language requiring eligible schools to maintain admissions standards that do not take into account whether students have an individualized education plan or if they require equitable services for a learning disability.

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House Republicans threaten to sink Trump’s megabill

House Republicans are already lining up to oppose President Trump’s “big, beautiful bill,” with conservatives and centrists blasting the legislation just hours after Vice President JD Vance cast his tiebreaking vote on the Senate version. At the moment, the number of House Republicans vowing to oppose the Senate version is enough to block the bill’s passage, unless there is again a last-minute scramble to negotiate with holdouts along with a successful pressure campaign by the president. Only three House Republicans need to oppose the bill to sink it. Rep. Ralph Norman (R., S.C.), a member of the conservative House Freedom Caucus, told reporters about an hour after the Senate bill’s passage Tuesday that he wouldn’t vote to move the president’s tax bill out of the House Rules Committee. The panel is debating whether to advance the bill to a vote in the full House. If it does ultimately make it to the floor, Norman would oppose the bill there as well.

“Our bill has been completely changed—from the IRA credits to the deficit,” said Norman, referring to the Biden administration’s Inflation Reduction Act. “This bill’s a nonstarter. We want to do this, but this bill doesn’t do what the president wants it to do.” Norman later said he believes there are enough “no” votes in the House to sink the bill. If House Speaker Mike Johnson fails to get enough members to back it, they will go to a process in which the House and Senate work to reconcile differences. That would likely blow through Trump’s fast-approaching deadline of July 4 to pass the bill. A crescendo of complaints began building across the disparate wings of the House Republican conference days before the Senate passed the bill, following an exhaustive 27-hour marathon of amendment votes. The legislation would broadly fund Trump’s biggest priorities including the extension of his 2017 tax cuts; no tax on tips and overtime; and a large funding boost to the president’s immigration and border policies.

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Powell confirms that the Fed would have cut by now were it not for tariffs

Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell said Tuesday that the U.S. central bank would have eased monetary policy by now if not for President Donald Trump’s tariff plan. When asked during a panel if the Fed would have lowered rates again this year had Trump not announced his controversial plan to impose higher levies on imported goods earlier this year, Powell said, “I think that’s right.” “In effect, we went on hold when we saw the size of the tariffs and essentially all inflation forecasts for the United States went up materially as a consequence of the tariffs,” Powell said at European Central Bank forum in Sintra, Portugal. Powell’s admission comes as the Fed has entered a holding pattern on interest rates despite mounting pressure from the White House.

The Fed last month held the key borrowing rate steady once again, keeping fed funds at the same range between 4.25% and 4.5% where it’s been since December. The central bank’s policy-setting Federal Open Market Committee indicated via its so-called dot plot of members’ projections that there could be two cuts by the end of 2025. However, Powell also said at a press conference last month that the Fed was “well positioned” to remain in a wait-and-see mode. On Tuesday, Powell was asked if July would be too soon for markets to expect a rate cut. He answered that that he “really can’t say” and that “it’s going to depend on the data.” Fed funds futures traders are pricing in a more than 76% likelihood that the central bank once again holds rates steady at the July policy gathering, according to the CME FedWatch tool. “We are going meeting by meeting,” Powell said during Tuesday’s panel. “I wouldn’t take any meeting off the table or put it directly on the table. It’s going to depend on how the data evolve.”

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How tech’s bold bid to curb AI laws fell apart

Republican leaders had appeared poised to deliver on one of the U.S. tech industry’s wildest policy dreams as the Senate convened Monday morning to begin a marathon voting session on the sprawling tax and immigration bill. Less than 24 hours later, the measure was dead. And Republican Sen. Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee was holding the knife. The night before, Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) had hammered out a hard-won compromise with Blackburn to preserve the essence of a moratorium on state laws regulating artificial intelligence. The deal came after 11th-hour lobbying by tech groups giddy at the prospect of rolling back regulations they viewed as obstacles to unfettered innovation. It wasn’t to be. The Senate voted 99-1 in the predawn hours Tuesday to strip the AI-law moratorium from the bill — a resounding defeat for the tech industry and a dramatic reversal of fortune for the provision’s supporters.

Blackburn — who has pushed bills to protect kids online and to protect Nashville’s country music industry from AI imitations — proposed the amendment to strip the provision at the end of a day-long pressure campaign Monday by its opponents. A defeated Cruz ultimately joined her, as did every senator except for Thom Tillis (R-North Carolina), who had recently announced he won’t run for reelection. The vote on the AI moratorium came as part of a 27-hour “vote-a-rama” on a slew of proposed changes to the so-called One Big Beautiful Bill Act, which carries much of President Donald Trump’s domestic agenda. The Senate approved the amended bill later Tuesday morning, sending it back to the House with the AI provisions no longer mentioned. Blackburn’s turnaround, insiders told The Washington Post on Tuesday, followed pleas from allies who feared the moratorium would jeopardize child safety regulations despite language in the compromise intended to exempt them. Republican leaders and tech trade groups had pitched a 10-year freeze on state AI regulations as necessary to pave the way for American tech firms to innovate and outcompete their Chinese counterparts. The idea echoed a 2024 proposal by the R Street Institute, a free-market think tank, which proposed a “learning period” moratorium on AI laws to prevent a “looming patchwork of inconsistent state and local laws.”

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State Stories

3 families say lack of air conditioning in Texas prisons caused their loved ones' deaths

The Texas Department of Criminal Justice (TDCJ) is facing more legal action over sweltering conditions in state prisons. The families of three inmates who died in 2023 are suing the department in federal court, claiming their loved ones died due to a lack of air conditioning in prisons. The families of Jon Southards, Elizabeth Hagerty and John Skinner say their loved ones had multiple disabilities, making them more vulnerable to heat-related illnesses. But the families say the TDCJ failed to provide them with cooled housing. The three were housed in different facilities: one in Gatesville and two near Huntsville.

WFAA, KVUE's news partners in North Texas, spoke with Southards' mother just after his death in 2023. She said her son was in prison for burglary, and he told her about the hot conditions just before he died. "I thought my baby would be rehabilitated. I thought he would serve his time, which, deservingly, he needed to," Tona Southards-Maranjo said. "Jon was not just my son. John was my best friend, my baby." KVUE reached out to the TDCJ for a comment about the new lawsuit. We received the following response: "Core to this department’s mission is protecting the public, our employees, and the inmates in our custody. It is a responsibility that the Texas Department of Criminal Justice takes seriously. The agency takes numerous precautions to lessen the effects of hot temperatures for those in our facilities. Over the last several years, the agency has worked to increase the number of cool beds available. TDCJ is dedicated to continuing to add air-conditioned beds in our facilities. During the 88th Texas Legislative session, TDCJ received a historic infusion of funding for major repair and improvement projects at facilities. Specifically, the agency received $85 million to install additional air conditioning. Additionally, TDCJ’s Legislative Appropriations Request for the FY2026-27 biennium includes an exceptional item request for $118 million for the installation of air conditioning. This would provide an additional 18,000 air-conditioned beds to the system. Earlier this year, a federal judge ruled that extreme heat in TDCJ facilities is unconstitutional, but he stopped short of requiring the TDCJ to add air condition to all its units due to the cost. The supplemental appropriations bill lawmakers passed this past session will include $118 million to help the TDCJ add 11,000 air-conditioned beds to prisons. But a bill that would have required Texas to add A/C to all prisons passed in the House this session, then failed in the Senate.

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Chip Roy is in the hot seat again on Trump's tax cut bill

Earlier this year, U.S. Rep. Chip Roy reluctantly voted for a Republican budget plan, saying while it didn't go far enough in cutting government spending, he had gotten assurances from President Donald Trump the cuts he wanted would be there in the end. Three months later, those cuts have not materialized. The U.S. Senate on Tuesday passed Trump's "Big Beautiful Bill," which includes expensive tax breaks and increased spending on the border and military in a package the Congressional Budget Office estimates would add $3.3 trillion to the federal debt over the next decade. Now, Roy and his allies in the House Freedom Caucus must decide between pleasing Trump or resisting the type of government spending increase they have long railed against.

Roy expressed his frustration in a social media post Monday night. "We’ve got to deliver for the President—but it has to be the right bill," the Austin Republican said, according to a post by his press team on X. "One that actually stops the spending, ends the inflation, and stops subsidizing our own destruction.” Since being elected to Congress in 2018, Roy has repeatedly threatened to block Republican budget packages he believes overspend, only to relent and cut deals with leadership to allow their passage. With Trump back in the White House and Republicans narrowly controlling both the House and Senate, Roy is in his best position yet to wield influence and bring down the deficit. In an interview late last year, he acknowledged the challenges in getting Congress to cut spending that members' states had come to rely on, while describing the national debt crisis in histrionic terms. “I know I can’t get everything I want, but I know I won’t get anything if just get in the boat heading to the iceberg," he said.

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Trump officials want to give TxDOT more power over highway expansions

The Trump administration wants to give Texas more authority – and require less transparency – as the state expands existing highways and builds new ones. In November, the Texas Department of Transportation asked the Federal Highway Administration to extend a special designation that lets it oversee its own compliance with the National Environmental Policy Act. NEPA requires the state to document community and environmental impacts of road projects. Now, TxDOT has submitted a new application, with changes that would give itself drastically more oversight and authority over its own federal environmental review. The draft rule would allow TxDOT to skip annual self-assessments and monthly reports that document the agency’s compliance with the federal law.

The application was revised after federal leadership “presented an opportunity to address unnecessary administrative requirements in a renegotiated MOU that preserves all of the legal requirements of the NEPA assignment program,” said Adam Hammons, a TxDOT spokesperson, in an email. He said that TxDOT was still subject to monitoring and audits by the Federal Highway Administration. If approved, TxDOT won’t have to inform community members of their right to sue the state agency or file a civil rights complaint with the FHWA, as dozens of people did in 2021 in response to the I-45 expansion in Houston. The new agreement also removes a requirement that TxDOT reevaluate old projects, meaning projects originally approved years ago could begin construction without public notice or input. “The Biden Administration added burdensome NEPA requirements like environmental justice initiatives that delayed progress on vital road and bridge projects,” said U.S. Transportation Secretary Sean P. Duffy when he announced the proposed changes. “If enacted, Texas’ new agreement will allow the state to tackle critical infrastructure bigger, better and faster.”

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100+ felony bonds reduced by Travis County Justice of the Peace

The release of an Austin man charged with capital murder after a Travis County Justice of the Peace granted him a significant bond reduction prompted a KXAN investigation. It uncovered that same judge has reduced or modified bonds for at least 100 additional defendants facing felony charges since she took office in January. Aden Munoz, 18, was arrested on Feb. 13 and faced a Capital Murder charge. An Austin Municipal Court Judge required him to post a $750,000 bond. Less than four weeks later, court records show another judge reduced his original bond to $5,000, and he was released from custody. Three days after Munoz was released from jail, the Travis County District Attorney‘s Office filed a motion to reinstate the original $750,000 bond, alleging a violation of Texas Code of Criminal Procedure Section 17.091, which requires the attorney representing the state receive reasonable notice of any proposed bail reduction and be given the opportunity to have a hearing on the proposed reduction for all first degree felony offenses as well as any offense listed in Article 42A.054 of the Texas Code of Criminal Procedure.

“No representative of the State was notified of any of these proceedings,” the motion stated. The order modifying and reducing the original bond to $5,000 was issued by Tanisa Jeffers, the newly-elected Travis County Justice of the Peace for Precinct 5, which serves downtown and parts of central and northwest Austin. She formerly served as an associate judge at the Austin Municipal Court before beginning her current term in January 2025. In Travis County, Austin municipal court judges provide criminal magistrate services and are tasked with determining bail amounts and bond conditions as appropriate during preliminary proceedings in felony and misdemeanor cases, according to the Interlocal Agreement between Travis County and the City of Austin. A Texas Justice of the Peace has jurisdiction to perform magistrate duties in Texas, however, the criminal workload for JPs in Travis County typically involves class C criminal misdemeanors and various civil law duties, according to the Travis County website. KXAN asked Judge Jeffers why the State was never notified of the bail reduction and what factors she considered before agreeing to a reduced bond of $5,000 for a defendant facing a capital murder charge.

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Cook Children’s Medicaid coverage remains in legal limbo

After a March brain surgery at Cook Children’s, 15-year-old Preston Benjamin-Sewell had to relearn how to walk, eat and talk. He was in the Fort Worth-based hospital for a little over a month and a half, a place he’s well acquainted with. The first several days were challenging, said Meghan Czarobski, his mother. Preston was bedridden and couldn’t do anything independently. “But once he gets up and going, nothing holds him back,” Czarobski said. “He just starts going. So, he went from, like, not being able to walk to, as soon as he got his footing, he was taking off.” The surgery was to help with seizures.

Preston has autism, an intellectual and developmental disability and a rare form of epilepsy called Lennox-Gastaut syndrome. He’s triple insured through Cook Children’s Health Plan, Blue Cross Blue Shield and TRICARE to help cover health care costs, Czarobski said. They’re at Cook Children’s frequently, but the family and others in North Texas are concerned about possible disruptions to their health care coverage, after state lawmakers didn’t take action to address the way the state awards Medicaid contracts. Texas’ Health and Human Services Commission announced in March 2024 that it was not awarding its multibillion dollar Medicaid contract to Cook Children’s Health Plan. Texas pays insurance providers, like the Cook Children’s Health Plan, who administer health insurance to children and pregnant patients on the Medicaid STAR and CHIP programs. Instead of going to Cook’s Health Plan and a handful of other similar plans in Texas, the Health and Human Services Commission awarded the contract to Aetna, United Healthcare, Molina, Blue Cross and Blue Shield for Tarrant County and five neighboring counties. Also excluded were health plans associated with Texas Children’s Hospital in Houston and Driscoll Children’s Hospital in Corpus Christi. The contract award for STAR Kids, which provides Medicaid benefits to children and adults 20 and younger with disabilities, including Preston, is on hold by court order.

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Texas mom charged with killing son on FBI’s Most Wanted list

More than two years after a 6-year-old Everman boy went missing, his mother has been added to the FBI’s Top Ten Most Wanted Fugitives List. Authorities have been searching for Cindy Rodriguez-Singh ever since she fled from North Texas to India with her husband and six other children on March 22, 2023, two days after she lied to investigators by saying the missing child was with his biological father in Mexico. Her son Noel Rodriguez-Alvarez is presumed dead, and Rodriguez-Singh has been charged with capital murder. The FBI’s Dallas office, Everman Police Department and Tarrant County Criminal District Attorney’s Office held a news conference Tuesday morning to announce that Rodriguez-Singh, 40, is the newest addition to the most wanted fugitives list.

Craig Spencer, former chief of police and current city manager and emergency management coordinator for the City of Everman, said somebody knows what happened to Noel, “and now they have 250,000 reasons to come forward.” “This designation puts the world on notice that Cindy Rodriguez-Singh is now one of the most wanted fugitives in America,” Spencer said. “You don’t end up on the FBI top 10 list by accident. This is as serious as it gets.” A concerned relative from out of town alerted Child Protective Services in March 2023 that Noel hadn’t been seen since the previous fall. On March 20, police went to the family’s home on Wisteria Drive to check on the child, but Rodriguez-Singh lied to them about his whereabouts. Investigators reached Noel’s biological father in Mexico on March 23, and he denied that the 6-year-old was with him. Federal authorities confirmed there was no record of Noel crossing the border into Mexico. Police tried to contact Rodriguez-Singh the following day, but were unsuccessful.

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Smaller nuclear reactors spark renewed interest in a once-shunned energy source

Bolstered by $3.2 million from a former Midland oilman, this West Texas city of 130,000 people is helping the Lone Star State lead a national nuclear energy resurgence. Doug Robison’s 2021 donation to Abilene Christian University helped the institution win federal approval to house an advanced small modular nuclear reactor, which might be finished as soon as next year. Small modular reactors are designed to be built in factories and then moved to a site, and require less upfront capital investment than traditional large reactors. The company Robison founded, Natura Resources, is investing another $30.5 million in the project. Only two small modular reactors are in operation, one in China and another in Russia. Natura Resources is one of two companies with federal permits to build one in the U.S.

“Nuclear is happening,” said Robison, who retired from the oil business and moved to Abilene to launch the company. “It has to happen.” Robison’s words are being echoed across the country with new state laws that aim to accelerate the spread of projects that embrace advanced nuclear technology — decades after the Three Mile Island and Chernobyl calamities soured many Americans on nuclear power. In the past two years, half the states have taken action to promote nuclear power, from creating nuclear task forces to integrating nuclear into long-term energy plans, according to the Nuclear Energy Institute, which advocates for the industry. “I’ve been tracking legislation for 18 years, and when I first started tracking, there were maybe five or 10 bills that said the word ‘nuclear,’” said Christine Csizmadia, who directs state government affairs at the institute. “This legislative session, we’re tracking over 300 bills all across the country.” The push is bipartisan. In New York, Democratic Gov. Kathy Hochul last month directed the New York Power Authority to build a zero-emission advanced nuclear power plant somewhere upstate — her state’s first new nuclear plant in a generation. In Colorado, Democratic Gov. Jared Polis in April signed legislation redefining nuclear energy, which doesn’t emit a significant amount of planet-warming greenhouse gases, as a “clean energy resource.” The law will allow future plants to receive state grants reserved for other carbon-free energy sources.

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Judge dismisses lawsuit against doctor in case of woman who gave birth alone in Tarrant County Jail

A federal judge has dismissed a lawsuit against a doctor accused of neglecting a woman who gave birth alone in her Tarrant County Jail cell. Chasity Congious has intellectual disabilities and multiple serious mental health diagnoses, according to court records. She gave birth unattended in the Tarrant County Jail in 2020, and her daughter, Zenorah, died in the hospital 10 days later. Congious' family received $1.2 million in a lawsuit against Tarrant County, the largest settlement in county history. After that settlement, U.S. District Court Judge Reed O’Connor allowed Congious’ mother to sue Dr. Aaron Ivy Shaw, the medical director at the Tarrant County Jail at the time Congious was incarcerated.

On Tuesday, O’Connor dismissed the lawsuit. Congious’ legal team failed to prove Shaw was “deliberately indifferent” to her medical needs, he ruled. “There is no doubt that this case is an abject tragedy,” O'Connor wrote. Deliberate indifference is difficult to prove, and requires a lot of evidence, O’Connor wrote. Shaw would have needed to do something like deny Congious care or ignore her complaints, he wrote. The lawsuit hinged on an email to Shaw that noted Congious was experiencing abdominal pain the day she gave birth. Previous medical evaluations determined Congious would not be able to recognize if she was having contractions and recommended induced labor for her, according to court documents. The court had previously dismissed the lawsuit against Shaw, but O’Connor brought it back after Congious’ attorney produced that email. That email was a warning Congious was likely in labor and Shaw did nothing about it, her legal team argued.

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Tarrant County approves $250K contract with law firm to fight racial gerrymandering lawsuit

Tarrant County commissioners approved a quarter million-dollar contract with a conservative law firm Tuesday to defend itself against a lawsuit over redistricting. The vote was 3-2, Republicans versus Democrats. Republican commissioners led an unusual mid-decade redistricting process this spring, redrawing the commissioners court precinct maps to add another Republican-majority precinct. They openly said they wanted to give themselves a larger majority on the commissioners court. Opponents to redistricting say Republicans created that extra conservative precinct by packing Democratic-leaning voters of color into a single district, diluting their voting power. The lawsuit, filed in June, accuses the county of unlawful racial gerrymandering.

The $250,000 legal agreement is with the Public Interest Legal Foundation (PILF), the same law firm Republican County Judge Tim O’Hare handpicked to lead the redistricting process. “This is essentially hiring the arsonist to put out the fire,” Democratic Commissioner Alisa Simmons said. She and her fellow Democratic commissioner, Roderick Miles Jr., voted against the contract. Miles criticized PILF for refusing to speak to the public or answer their questions at a series of public hearings about redistricting. “Residents asked questions and received no answers. Commissioners sought clarity and were met with silence,” he said. Simmons wondered whether hiring PILF could be a conflict of interest, if any of the foundation’s attorneys are called as witnesses in the lawsuit. Republican County Commissioner Manny Ramirez called that a valid concern and asked county attorney Mark Kratovil his opinion. The Tarrant County District Attorney’s Office — which represents the county in legal matters — doesn't have a problem with the contract at this time, Kratovil said. Whether there’s a conflict of interest or not will come up as the lawsuit progresses, he said.

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New Texas laws target roadside pet sales and puppy mills

Two new Texas laws taking effect later this year will tighten the leash on puppy mills and roadside pet sales by expanding local authority over outdoor animal vendors. With little government oversight, animals sold in parking lots and along roadsides often face poor conditions and neglect, typically at the hands of unlicensed breeders within large-scale breeding operations, colloquially referred to as puppy mills. But starting Sept. 1, House Bills 2012 and 2731 will allow counties near large metropolitan areas to ban animal sales in outdoor public spaces. These rules will also apply to counties along the U.S.-Mexico border with at least 200,000 residents.

According to Katie Fine, senior advocacy strategist at Best Friends Animal Society, the laws represent “significant progress in breaking the supply chain for puppy mills in Texas.” The organization works to end euthanasia in animal shelters across the nation. "These laws protect communities, empower consumers, and hold deceptive sellers accountable,” Fine said. "It is smart and responsible legislation that prioritizes public safety and transparency." Since 2007, only counties with at least 1.3 million residents could regulate outdoor animal sales in Texas. The new laws expand that power to counties with over 600,000 residents that border another county with more than 4 million people. Counties newly granted this authority include Fort Bend, Montgomery, El Paso, Cameron, Webb and Hidalgo. These counties now join Harris County and the cities of Austin, Dallas, San Antonio and Fort Worth — which have all banned roadside sales of dogs and cats.

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CBP plans to process migrants arrested in new Rio Grande Valley military zone, agency says

Migrants who are apprehended from within a newly established military zone on the border in two South Texas counties will be processed by U.S. Customs and Border Protection officials, the agency told Border Report on Monday. Last week, the Air Force announced that 250 miles of borderlands in Hidalgo and Cameron counties, which were previously managed by the International Boundary and Water Commission, are now part of an extended military base. The lands are now part of Joint Base San Antonio, a facility near 250 miles north of the border with Mexico. Hidalgo County Judge Richard Cortez told Border Report that the military will have the authority to withhold those for trespassing on military property, but that they would turn them over to other federal authorities.

Border Patrol spokeswoman Christina Smallwood said in a statement: “All 9 stations in the RGV Sector are equipped with processing facilities. RGV Sector also has a Centralized Processing Center.” Cortez emphasized that the land transfer was from one federal agency to another, specifically to create the new National Defense Area along the Southwest border. It was completed on Wednesday by the General Services Administration. Cortez says he was not informed prior to the land transfer. But much of the land in Hidalgo and Cameron counties are privately owned. In 2018 almost 300,000 parcels of land in Hidalgo County were privately owned, and 175,000 parcels of land in Cameron County were privately owned, according to a 2019 report by Texas Land Trends, of Texas A&M. That included over 5,600 parcels within a mile of the Rio Grande in Hidalgo County, and over 24,000 parcels within a mile of the river in Cameron County.

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The Dallas Morning News picks 28-year veteran journalist as its next newsroom leader

The Dallas Morning News has appointed Colleen McCain Nelson as its next executive editor, following a four-month search. Her tenure will begin on Aug. 11. A veteran with nearly 30 years of experience, Nelson currently serves as executive editor of The Sacramento Bee, and is McClatchy Media’s California regional editor, leading five Golden State newsrooms. She is replacing Katrice Hardy, who departed The News in February to lead The Marshall Project. Nelson is returning to lead a newsroom where she spent 12 of her formative reporting years covering local, state and national politics — winning a Pulitzer Prize in the process. She takes the reins at a time when the newspaper is reimagining its newsroom to be more competitive in the digital era, and to better serve a rapidly evolving North Texas region that’s becoming an epicenter of Texas’ growth.

“We conducted a nationwide search to find the best executive editor in the United States, and I am confident we found that leader in Colleen,” Grant Moise, publisher of The Dallas Morning News, said in a statement. “Colleen is an outstanding journalist, and has been at the forefront of journalism’s digital transformation. We can’t wait to welcome her back to The Dallas Morning News.” In 2010, Nelson and her News colleagues Tod Robberson and William McKenzie were awarded the Pulitzer Prize for editorial writing, recognition for a series of editorials that condemned the stark economic and social disparities separating Dallas’ thriving northern half and struggling southern half. Nelson’s arrival coincides with DallasNews Corporation’s drive to improve its financial health, with The News’ parent company having recently completed a $43.5 million deal to sell its printing and distribution operation in Plano. In an interview, Nelson said she is embracing “the chance to learn from such great journalists here. I have always admired the company’s commitment to the community… and I never stopped rooting for and reading The Dallas Morning News.

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National Stories

Mortgage refinance demand surges, as interest rates drop further

ortgage rates fell last week to the lowest level since April, leading current homeowners to seek savings. Applications to refinance a home loan rose 7% last week compared with the previous week, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association’s seasonally adjusted index. Demand was 40% higher than the same week one year ago. The average contract interest rate for 30-year fixed-rate mortgages with conforming loan balances, $806,500 or less, decreased to 6.79% from 6.88%, with points decreasing to 0.62 from 0.63, including the origination fee, for loans with a 20% down payment. That rate is 24 basis points lower than the same week one year ago.

“This decline prompted an increase in refinance applications, driven by a 10 percent increase in conventional applications and a 22 percent increase in VA refinance applications,” said Joel Kan, MBA’s vice president and deputy chief economist. “As borrowers with larger loans tend to be more sensitive to rate changes, the average loan size for a refinance application increased to $313,700 after averaging less than $300,000 for the past six weeks.” Homebuyers, however, were less driven by the drop in rates. Applications for a mortgage to purchase a home increased just 0.1% for the week and were 16% higher than the same week one year ago. “Purchase activity was essentially flat over the week, as overall uncertainty continues to hold homebuyers out of the market,” added Kan. Mortgage rates fell further to start this week, according to a separate survey from Mortgage News Daily. They were then flat Tuesday, following the release of job openings data which showed another increase.

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How holdout Alaska senator shaped Trump’s megabill

At 3 a.m. Tuesday, with President Trump’s sprawling domestic-policy bill in trouble on the Senate floor, no one had more leverage than Sen. Lisa Murkowski. With two GOP senators firmly opposed and Sen. Susan Collins (R., Maine) likely to vote “no,” the senior senator from Alaska was the pivotal vote for Trump’s legislative agenda. Murkowski, a patient and often inscrutable moderate Republican, was dead set on amending the bill to benefit her constituents and softening the blow from spending cuts in the package. By 5 a.m., Medicaid officials were on the phone with staffers representing Alaska’s other and more conservative Republican senator, Dan Sullivan, to iron out rural-hospital provisions that would help Murkowski get to “yes.” Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R., S.D.) could have chosen to shrink the bill’s debt-ceiling increase to sway Rand Paul (R., Ky.), or adjust the Medicaid provisions to woo Sen. Thom Tillis (R., N.C.) and Collins. Instead, he gave more to Alaska—and it worked.

At the end of a marathon voting session that lasted more than 26 hours, Murkowski offered a soft-spoken yes for the bill just before noon, bringing the total number of senators supporting it to 50 and allowing Vice President JD Vance to break the tie. Then she stepped outside the Senate chamber and said she hopes the House changes the bill she had just supported. “We do not have a perfect bill by any stretch of the imagination,” she told a clutch of reporters before heading off for a nap. Murkowski said that senators rushed too much because Trump created the July 4 deadline. In a subsequent statement, she said that while she protected Alaska’s interests, the bill was “not good enough for the rest of our nation.” House Republican leaders said they don’t plan to change the legislation and want it passed out of the chamber as soon as Wednesday—though the raucous nature of their members make the proceedings unpredictable. No members of the Democratic caucus supported the bill, and the wins for Alaska prompted Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D., N.Y.) to call the final legislation a “polar payoff.” Sullivan, who is up for re-election next year, brushed off the criticism. “I can see why he’s jealous of my hard work,” Sullivan said. “If he’s calling it the polar payoff, I’d call it the New York nothingburger.”

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Musk proposes a new political party, Trump suggests DOGE 'might have to go back and eat Elon'

Elon Musk’s feud with President Donald Trump — and seemingly any congressional Republicans who support the president’s massive tax cuts and spending package — has reignited, with the tech billionaire threatening to launch a new political party, and Trump suggesting Musk could be punished for his opposition. The dispute has laid bare not only the differences between the Republican president and one of his most vociferous one-time advocates, but also has reignited the possibility that the world’s richest man will — along with his billions — reenter the political spending arena.

Musk — who spent at least $250 million supporting Trump in the 2024 presidential campaign as the main contributor to America PAC — said in May that he would likely spend “a lot less” on politics in the future. But his recent statements seem to indicate Musk might be rethinking that stance. On Monday, the tech billionaire and former Department Of Government Efficiency chief lashed out multiple times at Republicans for backing Trump’s tax cuts bill, calling the GOP “the PORKY PIG PARTY!!” for including a provision that would raise the nation’s debt limit by $5 trillion and calling the bill “political suicide” for Republicans. After a post pledging to work toward supporting primary challengers for members of Congress who backed the bill, Musk responded “I will” to a post in which former Michigan Rep. Justin Amash asked for Musk’s support of Rep. Thomas Massie. Trump and his aides are already targeting the Kentucky Republican for voting against the measure, launching a new super PAC devoted to defeating him. Musk and Trump’s potent political alliance seemed to meet a dramatic end a month ago in an exchange of blistering epithets, with Trump threatening to go after Musk’s business interests, and Musk calling for Trump’s impeachment. Much of it has boiled down to Musk’s criticism of the tax cuts and spending bill, which he has called a “disgusting abomination.” Both the House and Senate versions propose a dramatic rollback of the Biden-era green energy tax breaks for electric vehicles and related technologies.

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Trump tours 'Alligator Alcatraz,' a day before its first arrivals are expected

President Trump visited Florida on Tuesday to tour what's been dubbed "Alligator Alcatraz," a controversial migrant detention center in the Everglades that officials say is poised to start filling its bed in a matter of hours. The president was joined by Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and other state emergency management officials as he toured the makeshift facility, which the state put together within days of receiving federal approval last week. "I thought this was so professional, so well done," Trump said after touring the center, which features rows of fenced-in bunk beds and a razor-wire perimeter. "It's really government working together."

The facility is situated within the Dade-Collier Training and Transition Airport, an isolated, 39-square mile airstrip located within the wetlands of the Big Cypress National Preserve, next to Everglades National Park. The site's nickname — coined by Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier — references its proximity to the predators of the marshy Everglades, from pythons to alligators to mosquitoes. "What'll happen is you'll bring people in there, they ain't going anywhere once they're there unless you want them to go somewhere, because, good luck getting to civilization," DeSantis said at an unrelated news conference on Monday. "So the security is amazing — natural and otherwise." Speaking to reporters before departing for Florida, Trump described the facility as "an East Coast" version of the infamous island prison off the San Francisco coast. When asked if the idea was for detainees to get eaten by alligators if they try to escape, Trump replied, "I guess that's the concept." "Snakes are fast but alligators — we're going to teach them how to run away from an alligator. Don't run in a straight line, run like this," he said, waving his hands in a zigzag. "You know what, your chances go up about one percent." The airstrip's roughly 11,000-foot runway has largely been used for training purposes, but officials say it will soon accommodate deportation flights. DeSantis has repeatedly said the state will deputize National Guard judge advocates to serve as immigration judges in order to expedite the removal of migrants — both from the facility and the country.

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Three shootings at Utah Hare Krishna temple raise concerns about hate, safety

In the heart of Mormon Utah, a Hare Krishna temple has stood as a beloved cultural landmark for more than three decades. Tens of thousands of locals flock to the ISKCON Sri Sri Radha Krishna Temple in Spanish Fork each spring for its annual Holi color festival, and children from diverse backgrounds enjoy field trips to the 15-acre property — which includes an AM radio station and an animal park with llamas, cows, peacocks and parrots — throughout the year. “We’re trying to do good and enrich the community pretty much 24 hours a day,” said Caru Das Adhikari, the temple’s founder and head priest, who once distributed copies of the Bhagavad Gita, a Hindu scripture, in the 1970s on the campus of Brigham Young University, the flagship university of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

But over the past month, three attacks on the temple’s building have left Utah’s Hare Krishna devotees concerned about the presence of hatred amid their otherwise peaceful coexistence. On June 18, Adhikari’s wife and temple co-founder, Vaibhavi Warden, heard a loud noise and observed smoke coming from the temple’s radio station roof. The next day, several bullet holes were discovered on various parts of the temple’s main structure, including on its hand-carved arches and through a second-story window that opens into the main worship hall. More gunfire followed later that night, and again on June 20, based on security footage reviewed by temple staff. No one was injured in the attacks. About 20 shell casings were recovered by Utah County police, who said in a statement that the shots were likely fired from over 100 yards away. Surveillance video from the three days captured a pickup truck approaching the temple grounds, stopping near its fence and someone opening fire from the vehicle before speeding away.

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Paramount to pay Trump $16 million to settle ‘60 Minutes’ lawsuit

Paramount said late Tuesday that it has agreed to pay President Trump $16 million to settle his lawsuit over the editing of an interview on the CBS News program “60 Minutes,” an extraordinary concession to a sitting president by a major media organization. Paramount said its payment includes Mr. Trump’s legal fees and costs and that the money, minus the legal fees, will be paid to Mr. Trump’s future presidential library. As part of the settlement, Paramount said that it had agreed to release written transcripts of future “60 Minutes” interviews with presidential candidates. The company said that the settlement did not include an apology. The deal is the clearest sign yet that Mr. Trump’s ability to intimidate major American institutions extends to the media industry.

Many lawyers had dismissed Mr. Trump’s lawsuit as baseless and believed that CBS would have ultimately prevailed in court, in part because the network did not report anything factually inaccurate, and the First Amendment gives publishers wide leeway to determine how to present information. But Shari Redstone, the chair and controlling shareholder of Paramount, told her board that she favored exploring a settlement with Mr. Trump. Some executives at the company viewed the president’s lawsuit as a potential hurdle to completing a multibillion-dollar sale of the company to the Hollywood studio Skydance, which requires the Trump administration’s approval. After weeks of negotiations with a mediator, lawyers for Paramount and Mr. Trump worked through the weekend to reach a deal ahead of a court deadline that would have required both sides to begin producing internal documents for discovery, according to two people familiar with the negotiations. Another deadline loomed: Paramount was planning to make changes to its board of directors this week that could have complicated the settlement negotiations. A spokesman for Mr. Trump’s legal team said in a statement that the settlement was “another win for the American people” delivered by the president, who was holding “the fake news media accountable.”

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