/https://static.texastribune.org/media/profiles/ramsey-ross_TT.jpg)
Ross Ramsey co-founded The Texas Tribune in 2009 and served as its executive editor until his retirement in 2022. He wrote regular columns on politics, government and public policy. Before joining the Tribune, he was editor and co-owner of Texas Weekly. He did a 28-month stint in government with the Texas Comptroller of Public Accounts. Before that, he reported for the Houston Chronicle, the Dallas Times Herald, as a Dallas-based freelancer for regional and national magazines and newspapers, and for radio stations in Denton and Dallas.
Both sides cite stats and research papers to support their positions, with Democrats saying the photo voter ID law will suppress minority voting, and Republicans saying it won't do anything but stop fraud. Whatever it is, it's on its way into the law books. Full Story
/https://static.texastribune.org/media/images/VoterID2.jpg)
Sam Kinch Jr., the founding editor of Texas Weekly and a former political and government correspondent for The Dallas Morning News, died shortly after midnight, according to a spokesman for the family. He was 70, and had been battling pancreatic cancer, emphysema and congestive heart disease. Full Story
/https://static.texastribune.org/media/images/saminoffice90a.png)
Donna Howard discusses Dan Neil's election contest. Full Story
Travis County Republican Dan Neil lost his first race for elective office in November by just 12 votes. Now he's asking the Texas House of Representatives to declare some of the voters in that election ineligible and to put him in first place and state Rep. Donna Howard, D-Austin, in second. Full Story
/https://static.texastribune.org/media/images/DanAndDonnaHouseFloor.jpg)
Republican Dan Neil discusses his election contest against state Rep. Donna Howard, D-Austin. Full Story
For the latest installment of our nonscientific survey of political and policy insiders on issues of the moment, we asked whether voter fraud is a policy issue or a political one, what should and shouldn't be on the governor's list of emergency items for the Legislature, how those designations should be used and whether the Legislature ought to be allowed to set its own early priorities. Full Story
/https://static.texastribune.org/media/images/inside_intelligence-logo_1.png){kind=logo}
Abortion politics is back on center stage, with Gov. Rick Perry putting it, voter photo ID, state support for a balanced federal budget amendment to the U.S. Constitution, eminent domain and a ban on sanctuary cities at the top of his list of priorities. Why? Full Story
/https://static.texastribune.org/media/images/20110122-CBM_3185.jpg)
When San Antonio Sen. Gregory Luna, a Democrat, was dying in 1999, he got the lieutenant governor at the time — Rick Perry — to agree to give him 24 hours notice before any Senate vote on a public school voucher bill Luna opposed. He would get to Austin, he said then, to be the deciding vote against that legislation. Full Story
Grissom on what happens — and doesn't — when police don't analyze evidence taken from rape victims, Dehn with video highlights of the Senate debate over photo voter ID, Aguilar on the more than three dozen immigration-related bills waiting for attention in the Legislature, M. Smith on what to do with empty school buildings, Ramshaw on what will happen to hospitals if Medicaid managed care is expanded, C. Smith on how the state's budget cuts could affect churches and other faith-based organizations, Philpott's report for the Trib and KUT News on how the tight state budget could affect mental health care, yours truly on why the initial budget proposal isn't really a plan for state spending, Stiles with a searchable database of the latest campaign finance reports, and Galbraith on the rising use of coal and wind to generate electricity in Texas: The best of our best from January 24 to 28, 2011. Full Story
/https://static.texastribune.org/media/images/Tribweek_1_24_2011.jpg)
Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst appointed senators to committees late this afternoon Full Story
/https://static.texastribune.org/media/images/_KCB7421.jpg)