The Brief: March 17, 2010
The violence in the border city of Juarez has offered Gov. Rick Perry another shot at the federal government and what he deems is its failure to secure the nation’s border with Mexico. Full Story
The latest Rick Perry news from The Texas Tribune.
The violence in the border city of Juarez has offered Gov. Rick Perry another shot at the federal government and what he deems is its failure to secure the nation’s border with Mexico. Full Story
Gov. Rick Perry said he's activating the "first phase of the state’s spillover violence contingency plan" in the wake of increasing drug violence on the Texas-Mexico border. But the next sentence of the press release says he's not telling anyone what the plan is, for security reasons. Full Story
With the violent Mexican drug war creeping ever closer to the U.S. side of the border, Gov. Rick Perry is calling again for the federal government to put unmanned aerial vehicles and National Guard troops on the Texas-Mexico border. Full Story
The weekend slaughter in Mexico of two U.S. citizens with ties to the consulate’s office in Ciudad Juarez has sparked outrage from Washington, D.C. President Barack Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton have publicly condemned the attacks that left a pregnant consulate employee, her husband and a Mexican national dead. Full Story
What do Texans think about the fiscal and economic model for the rest of the country? Do they agree with Gov. Rick Perry that the Texas way is the better way? Full Story
"You have to do a few things when you run for office in Texas," says one of Rick Perry's allies. "You have to debate. You have to release your tax returns. And you have to say you won't raise taxes." Bill White will surely debate the governor before November's general election, but at the moment he hasn't done the other two. The former probably won't sink him, but the latter could — by declining to drink the no-new-taxes potion, he's handing his opponent a weapon to use against him. Unless, of course, he's successful at changing the way the argument goes. Full Story
Thevenot on the non-stop wonder that is the State Board of Education and its latest efforts to set curriculum standards, E. Smith's post-election sit-down interview with Bill White at TribLive made some news and got the November pugilism started, Ramshaw on whether it makes sense for the state to call patients and remind them to take their pills, and on the state's botched attempt to save baby blood samples for medical research, Hamilton's interview with Steve Murdock on the state's demographic destiny, M. Smith on whooping cranes, fresh water, and an effort to use the endangered species act to protect them both, Grissom on potties, pickups, and other equipment purchased with federal homeland security money and Stiles' latest data and map on where that money went, Aguilar on the "voluntary fasting" protesting conditions and treatment at an immigrant detention facility, Kreighbaum on football, the new sport at UTSA, and Philpott on Rick Perry and Bill White retooling their appeals for the general election. The best of our best from March 8 to 12, 2010. Full Story
Lawyers for death row inmate Hank Skinner sent Gov. Rick Perry a letter yesterday asking him for a 30-day reprieve from Skinner's scheduled March 24 execution. The lawyers also asked Perry to order DNA testing on evidence that Skinner says could prove his innocence. Full Story
A group of elected officials and business leaders from the Texas-Mexico border today joined Gov. Rick Perry and U.S. Rep. Henry Cuellar in calls for U.S. Customs and Border Protection to deploy unmanned aerial surveillance drones to monitor the border. Full Story
The big three state leaders approved seven new security measures for the Capitol, and none of them are X-ray machines or metal detectors that the director of the top Texas police agency said are critical to keep the pink dome safe from armed intruders. Full Story
Democrat Bill White said he won't rely on "Soviet-style budgeting" and "hot air politics" if he's elected governor, and said the state should make education its first priority and would be better off with a governor who's got business experience when it comes to economic development. Full Story
The Cook Political Report isn't the only place that sees some chinks in Rick Perry's armor. Full Story
In the run-up to last Tuesday's primary, gubernatorial candidates of both parties courted activists by talking about topics that were near and dear to their hearts. For the general election campaign, as they compete for the votes of a broader electorate, Rick Perry and Bill White will likely shift the substance and tone of their stump speeches. Ben Philpott, covering the governor's race for KUT News and the Tribune, filed this report. Full Story
Our obsessive-compulsive election day and next day coverage: frenetically updated county-by-county maps and up-to-the-minute returns in every race on the ballot, Hu's awesome crowdsourced liveblog, Ramshaw on the twenty surprise outcomes, Aguilar on recount possibilities and dead incumbents, M. Smith on how judicial races turned out, Rapoport on changes at the SBOE and who was elected before the first vote was cast, Thevenot on whether the GOP has a problem with Hispanics, Hamilton on how the Tea Party fared, Grissom and Ramshaw on the legislative and congressional mop-up, Ramsey on what happens now, Stiles on how much candidates spent per vote; and my post-primary debrief with Rick Perry's pollster and George W. Bush's former strategist. The best of our best from March 1 to 5, 2010. Full Story
The Republican primary is over, and now the GOP is lining up behind the governor — even the KBH loyalist who implored us to RETIRE RICK PERRY. Full Story
Political strategist Matthew Dowd offers advice for Democrat Bill White as the general election race for Gov. Rick Perry's job gets underway. Full Story
Pundits and political observers may finally get what they’ve been wanting in Texas — a close race for governor. Full Story
Was Farouk Shami, in fact, "on fire"? The Democratic gubernatorial candidate burned through campaign cash, spending $135 for every vote he received in Tuesday's primary on the way to getting trounced by Bill White — more than any other candidate on the ballot, and by far the most of any losing candidate. By contrast, Democratic land commissioner hopeful Bill Burton spent only 2 cents per vote in a narrow loss to Hector Uribe, who spent only 7 cents per vote himself. All told, candidates spent, on average, about $14 per vote. Explore each campaign's bang for the buck in our latest data application. Full Story
For the fourth event in our TribLive series, I interviewed Rick Perry's pollster and George W. Bush's former strategist about the results on primary night: why the governor avoided a runoff, what KBH could have done differently, whether the Tea Party is really a force to be reckoned with, and how Bill White will be caricatured on the road to November. Full Story
Rick Perry leads Bill White by six percentage points in the first poll released after Tuesday's primary. Full Story