TEXAS

After Decades in Power, Texas Republicans Campaign on Affordability For years, Greg Abbott built his political brand around border security, school choice, public safety, and an increasingly aggressive conservative agenda. Legislative sessions revolved around immigration, Operation Lone Star, parental rights, and repeated clashes with the federal government. Affordability existed in the background, although it rarely occupied center stage. Now it does. Abbott's reelection cam

Thinking About Selling Homemade Food in Texas? Know the Rules First Selling homemade food in Texas falls under one of the state's fastest-growing small business laws. The Texas Cottage Food Law gives home cooks a legal path into business while drawing firm boundaries around products carrying greater food safety risks. Lawmakers broaden those opportunities in 2025, yet meat, poultry, seafood, raw milk, and several other products remain outside the law. Confusion follows when l

Henry Cuellar and Vicente Gonzalez identify as Democrats, and Americans generally respect how people identify. Their party affiliation says Democrat, and nobody needs to deadname either congressman a Republican. Their congressional voting records, unfortunately, keep complicating their promise to democracy. Three neighboring congressional districts in South Texas share similar political terrain. Their populations are overwhelmingly Hispanic, their communities live with the re

Texas drivers love a technicality, and the five-day grace period on vehicle registration is the closest thing the state offers to a built-in alibi. The catch involves a detail most people gloss over: those five days are working days, not calendar days, which means a sticker that expires on a Friday effectively buys almost nothing extra before the following Friday rolls around. The rule comes from Section 502.407 of the Texas Transportation Code. The window starts the day afte

Starr County officials confirmed the county's first case of New World Screwworm on a calf in the western part of the county over the weekend. County Judge Eloy Vera reported that a resident north of Roma flagged a possible case Saturday, and state officials confirmed the case the same day. Vera plans to meet with the Texas Animal Health Commission on Monday to determine next steps. The parasite behind the outbreak, Cochliomyia hominivorax, disappeared from the United States d

Greg Abbott spent years courting data center developers with tax exemptions and a permissive interconnection framework, treating incoming investment as an unconditional good. As recently as late 2025, he described Texas as the "epicenter of AI development." In June, he sent a formal letter to the Public Utility Commission and ERCOT directing both agencies to immediately shield residential ratepayers from data center infrastructure costs. By July 1, at a campaign event in Bull

Sean Teare serves as the Harris County District Attorney in Houston, a Democrat elected to oversee prosecutions across the county. Before taking office, he spent close to twenty years in law enforcement, including more than a decade teaching cadets at the Houston Police Department Academy. That background now places him at the center of two competing investigations into a federal agency operating largely outside his jurisdiction. He told CBS News this week the vehicle-stop ta

Operation Slowdown returns to Texas roads from July 18 through August 2. The Rio Grande Valley will see additional state troopers and local patrol units on the road during this period, along with expanded radar enforcement. TxDOT partners with law enforcement agencies across Texas to increase speed limit enforcement during this two-week window. Officers will spend extra time on the roads and issue citations to drivers who exceed posted limits. Local agencies access this enfor

Somebody's mother taught her children to keep their hands where officers could see them, to speak slowly, to do exactly what the badge said and nothing more. That lesson used to buy safety. Renee Good followed it. Alex Pretti followed it. Ruben Ray Martinez followed it, brake lights lit, car barely moving, hands where anyone could see them. All three ended up dead anyway, and the country owes their families more than a press release calling it self-defense. "Comply or die" is

Odds Increase Again for Historic Super El Niño by Fall El Niño behaves like a temperamental child, and the tantrums cross oceans, hitting every continent downstream. The name comes from Spanish-speaking fishermen who noticed warm currents arriving each year near Christmas and called the pattern for the Christ child, a reference for a system with the power to upend weather across the world. When El Niño escalates, the disruption escalates alongside, and this year's version sta

Mission Regional Medical Center faces a state investigation over allegations that it marketed birth tourism packages to foreign nationals. Governor Greg Abbott sent a letter Tuesday afternoon ordering the Texas Health and Human Services Commission to investigate the Mission hospital over reports that it advertised "birth packages" abroad. The directive targets whether the hospital profited from offering birth packages to South Texas and refers the matter directly to HHSC. Abb

For many Texans living in rural counties, statewide offices often feel distant from everyday life. Yet one of the least-discussed statewide positions is the Texas Commissioner of Agriculture, which oversees programs that directly affect food security, rural development, school nutrition, water conservation, and the economic future of small farming communities. That is why Democratic nominee Clayton Tucker has drawn attention from rural advocates. A fifth-generation Texas ranc

LULAC Disputes ICE Account of Fatal Houston Shooting Lorenzo Salgado Araujo was picking up his construction crew before 7 a.m. on Tuesday, when an ICE agent shot him on Canal Street in Houston's Magnolia Park. He died at Ben Taub Hospital with CPR already underway in the ambulance. Federal officials say he tried to run over an officer. His family says he spent thirty-five years in this country building homes for other people. Ronaldo Salgado, one of Salgado Araujo's sons, con

Threatening the President Carries a Lighter Sentence Than Threatening an ICE Agent Congress classified threatening the life of the President as a federal felony in 1917, and the statute has outlived eleven administrations without a single rewrite of the core language. Title 18, Section 871 criminalizes any knowing and willful threat to kill, kidnap, or inflict bodily harm on the sitting president, the president-elect, or a former president within a defined protection window.

There are some people you meet at political conventions whose influence extends far beyond the ballroom walls. Meeting Carlos Eduardo Espina at the Texas Democratic Convention was one of those moments. Finding him, however, proved to be an adventure in itself. While most of the convention trainings took place in the main conference areas, Espina's session seemed tucked away in a corner of the convention center, almost hidden from the bustling flow of delegates and activists.

Governor Greg Abbott has stayed quiet on a debate invitation while his Democratic challenger keeps talking. Texas Rep. Gina Hinojosa, the Austin Democrat trying to unseat him this November, has accepted a one-hour debate slot for Oct. 15 in Fort Worth, hosted by NBC Universal Television Stations Texas and Hearst Newspapers Texas and set to air in both English and Spanish. It's the first real test of whether Abbott will face her directly, and it comes eight months into a campa

2026 Democratic Convention For readers unfamiliar with the convention, it is a statewide gathering where Democrats from across Texas come together to discuss party priorities, adopt resolutions, receive training, hear from elected officials and candidates, and organize for future elections. Delegates, who are selected through the party process at the local and state levels, represent their communities and play an active role in shaping the future direction of the party. Being

For more than a decade, immigration agents largely avoided entering places of worship to make arrests, under a "sensitive locations" policy formalized by ICE Director John Morton in October 2011. The Department of Homeland Security rescinded that policy on January 21, 2025, removing the restriction entirely. Sister Letty Ugboaja's detention this past Sunday, while walking to morning Mass in McAllen, shows what enforcement looks like without it. Sister Letty Ugboaja returned h

A man who has not set foot in Hidalgo County voluntarily in thirteen years is finally coming back, and not by choice. Omar Guerrero, 49, was arrested in Mexico on Tuesday and is now in U.S. custody, according to a news release from the Hidalgo County Sheriff's Office. District Attorney Toribio "Terry" Palacios said Wednesday that Guerrero will be back in the county within two days, the result of a joint effort between the DA's office, the sheriff's office, the U.S. Marshals,

Webb County Judge Tano Tijerina filed for Congress in December 2025 with no campaign experience above the county level. Four months later, he had outraised an eleven-term incumbent, landed a spot on the NRCC's inaugural priority list, and picked up a public nod from one of South Texas's most active Republican organizing groups. That is not the trajectory of a first-time candidate finding his footing. His feet are firmly planted on solid ground. Per FEC filings, Tijerina raise