Public blasts Texas agencies, regulators for poor communication and oversight at wildfire hearings
Thursday’s hearing marked the end of the Legislature’s three-day marathon of public hearings. Full Story
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![Craig Cowden gives testimony to the house committee investigating the Panhandle wildfires Thursday, April 4, 2024 in Pampa.]()
Credit: Maria Crane/The Texas Tribune -
Texas National Guard member charged with human smuggling after high-speed chase near the border
Authorities said the 26-year-old turned around at a Border Patrol checkpoint and fled from police in Kinney County. Full Story
Credit: Eddie Gaspar/The Texas Tribune -
Texas wind energy firms need more technicians. Can they drum up student interest without state support?
The wind industry promises attractive salaries. But a lack of training programs and waning political support make it difficult to find new recruits. Full Story
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![Texas State Technical College Wind Energy Technology instructor James Chung, center, helps Steven Vasquez, left, and Shayne Howard, right, troubleshoot during a lab on logic gates Tuesday, March 5, 2024 in Sweetwater.]()
Credit: Eli Hartman/The Texas Tribune -
Texas counties, cities embrace new child care center tax credit even though few providers qualify
Child care centers are struggling to make ends meet, and a new voter-approved tax credit is a first step toward boosting the flagging system, advocates say. Full Story
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![Kindergarten students are loaded into a van by Pita Espinosa so they can be driven to their elementary school from the Learning Tree childcare center in Yoakum, on Sept. 13, 2022.]()
Credit: Annie Mulligan for The Texas Tribune -
Utility pole inspection company declines to testify at Texas Panhandle wildfire investigation hearing
The Texas A&M Forest Service concluded that a fallen decayed utility pole caused the Smokehouse Creek fire. Full Story
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![State Rep Ken King, R-Canadian, speaks during an investigative house committee hearing on the Texas Panhandle wildfires Tuesday, April 2, 2024 in Pampa. In late February, the largest wildfire in Texas history raged across the panhandle, burning just over a million acres.]()
Credit: Maria Crane/The Texas Tribune -
How a fraction of voters decide who runs Texas
In Texas, who’ll run the state is usually decided in the primary. Because of gerrymandering and noncompetitive elections, few people participate. Full Story
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Texas, Biden administration take their battle over new immigration law to federal appeals court
A panel of the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals will decide whether to keep in place a lower court’s block of Senate Bill 4, which makes illegally entering Texas a state crime. Full Story
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![Texas Department of Public Safety officers patrol along the border wall after the U.S. Supreme Court let a Republican-backed Texas law known as SB 4 take effect, allowing state law enforcement authorities to arrest people suspected of crossing the U.S.-Mexico border illegally, in El Paso on March 19, 2024.]()
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Texas, U.S. reach $6.6 million settlement over 2019 Deer Park chemical fire
Attorney General Ken Paxton said the settlement will reimburse the state and feds for damages to natural resources. Full Story
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![Firefighters struggle to extinguish the towering flames pouring out of ITC’s tank 80-8 on the afternoon of March 17, 2019. The fire would blow through the entire “2nd 80’s” section of the facility.]()
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Influential conservative PAC targets Phelan, other House Republicans
Club for Growth announced it will spend $4 million on a TV ad targeting five anti-school voucher Texas House Republicans. Full Story
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![House Speaker Dade Phelan in his office in Beaumont on Jan 26, 2024.]()
Credit: Mark Felix for The Texas Tribune -
Texas counties facing surprise surcharge from voter registration software vendor
Votec, one of only three companies certified to manage voter registration data in Texas, is facing a financial squeeze and asking counties for a 35% surcharge. Full Story
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![Voter registration forms at a registration event in Austin, on Sept. 27, 2020.]()
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Eclipse fever hits Texas towns as residents and officials prepare for a crush of visitors
Llano residents are told to stock up on groceries. A Sulphur Springs church is renting its parking spots. And everyone’s watching the weather forecast ahead of Monday’s eclipse. Full Story
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![Hundreds flock to Mission San José in South San Antonio on Oct. 14, 2023, to witness the annular solar eclipse as the moon’s shadow swept across Central Texas.]()
Credit: Eddie Gaspar/The Texas Tribune -
Texas emergency director calls for firefighting air force after historic Panhandle fires
A special legislative committee is investigating what caused the Smokehouse Creek fire, the largest in state history. Full Story
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![From left, Texas A&M Forest Service Fire Chief Wes Moorehead, Director of Texas A&M Forest Service, Al Davis, and Chief of the Texas Division of Emergency Management Nim Kidd, sit before a House Committee investigating the Panhandle wildfires Tuesday, April 2, 2024 in Pampa. On Tuesday, testimony focused on topics relating to the largest wildfire in Texas history.]()
Credit: Maria Crane/The Texas Tribune -
UT-Austin announces round of firings in latest step to comply with Texas’ DEI ban
The firings come after state leaders criticized universities for not doing enough to enforce the ban. Students say UT-Austin has already overcorrected. Full Story
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![Students pass in front of the Jackson School of Geosciences and Gates-Dell Complex at the University of Texas at Austin on Feb. 22, 2024.]()
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T-Squared: The Texas Tribune has won its first National Magazine Award
We were recognized — along with our partners ProPublica and FRONTLINE — for our investigation into the law enforcement response to the 2022 mass school at Robb Elementary in Uvalde. Full Story
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More than 200 migrants arrested after rushing an El Paso border gate
Gov. Greg Abbott said Department of Public Safety troopers had been instructed to “arrest every illegal immigrant involved” in the March 21 breach in which National Guard members were allegedly assaulted. Full Story
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![Members of the Texas National Guard work with Border Patrol to coordinate migrants who crossed the border from Mexico and forced their way through concertina wire while they wait to be processed by border patrol as they are stopped on the U.S. side of the Rio Grande, in El Paso on March 21, 2024.]()
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U.S. Rep. Colin Allred voted for TikTok ban despite continuing to use the app
Allred is the delegation’s most prolific user of the app. He said he voted for the legislation because of national security concerns. Full Story
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![U.S. Rep. Colin Allred, D-Dallas, attends the first U.S. Senate debate in Austin on Jan. 28, 2024. The Texas AFL-CIO COPE Convention hosts this 75-minute debate ahead of the March 5 primary elections.]()
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Years ago, Texas hustled to get kids on state health care. Now it’s kicking them off.
Texas’ recent unwinding of Medicaid and CHIP has been criticized, dropping more than a million people eligible for the health insurance programs. Decades ago, Texas officials got kids health insurance in record time. Full Story
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![August Johansen looks through the glass door of the birthday venue while cradling a balloon on Dec. 9, 2023. He had inoperable brain cancer and depended on Medicaid to pay for full-time home nursing care from a private agency to help his mother take care of him throughout years of health crises. But in December, he became one of 810,000 children dropped from Texas’ Medicaid program in the previous five months, but was reinstated through his mother's efforts.]()
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1.7 million Texas households are set to lose monthly internet subsidy
The Affordable Connectivity Program provides a $30 monthly subsidy to help low-income households pay for internet service. The program is slated to run out of money at the end of the month. Full Story
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![A colonia, unincorporated neighborhoods that lack basic services such as street lights, proper drainage, paved roads or waste management, is seen near Edinburg on March 25, 2020.]()
Credit: Verónica G. Cárdenas for The Texas Tribune -
As Texas students clash over Israel-Hamas war, Gov. Greg Abbott orders colleges to revise free speech policies
The governor singled out pro-Palestine groups and said they should be subject to discipline. Full Story
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![Governor Greg Abbott condemns the recent attacks on Israel during a community gathering in support of Israel at the Congregation Agudas Achim in Austin on Oct. 9, 2023. Abbott also announced efforts for Texas to support Israel, which included funding for increased security at Jewish and Israel-related locations such as synagogues and schools and an Executive Order directing all Texas state agencies to refrain from purchasing goods produced in or exported from the Gaza Strip.]()
Credit: Evan L'Roy for The Texas Tribune -
House Speaker Dade Phelan’s immigration record central in bid to oust him
The Beaumont Republican’s foes are trying to paint him as soft on the border, even after last year’s passage of far-reaching laws and record border funding. Full Story
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![State Rep. Dade Phelan, R-Beaumont, announces he has the votes to be elected the next speaker of the Texas House at a press conference at the Capitol in Austin on Wednesday, Nov. 4, 2020.]()
Credit: Miguel Gutierrez Jr./The Texas Tribune
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