Reporting and commentary on the Legislature, campaigns, and elected officials
A loud minority of parents is making life miserable for Texas school officials—and shouting down the kids who speak in favor of lessons about the history and persistence of racial discrimination.
The first edition of our GOP primary scorecard.
After amateur sleuths claimed to have identified the serial killer, Texas's junior senator once again weighed in on the famous meme.
Who can be sued under Senate Bill 8? What is the “shadow docket”? When will the Supreme Court rule on the merits of the law?
Any Texas woman who thought her right to a safe, legal abortion would last forever sorely underestimated the opposition. For decades.
The incident serves as a reminder that, over the past two centuries, hundreds of migrants and Texans of Mexican descent have been murdered.
In many of Texas’s rapidly growing exurbs, such schools have been fast-tracked to keep pace with exploding student populations.
The certified public accountant is running for lieutenant governor again and hopes Beto O’Rourke will top the ticket.
The president has named academics from UT and A&M, as well an Austin CEO, to his science and technology advisory council.
Not only does TX-33 in Dallas look like a snake eating its own tail, it also packs non-Anglo voters into one district more tightly than before.
Sissy Farenthold, who died Sunday, believed persistence and anger could change Texas.
He isn’t as strong a candidate in 2021 as he was in 2018, but Beto O’Rourke is still the Democrats’ least bad option to challenge Greg Abbott.
GOP mapmakers have two new congressional seats to play with as the redistricting process commences, but ensuring they both go—and stay—Republican will be challenging.
Lawyers say changes to Texas's embattled foster care system that took effect this month are "revolutionary."
Barriers reminiscent of the Trump era are sprouting up in Hidalgo County.
The party assumes people of color will turn the state blue. But most Tejanos consider themselves white. And more are voting Republican.
Despite one of the state’s highest vaccination rates, the rural South Texas county is struggling to reach the goal of herd immunity.
Texas was once a model of how to safely and economically move away from mass incarceration. Now the old politics of “law and order” are back.
Attorney and former Texas Solicitor General Jonathan F. Mitchell is known for his ability to identify legal loopholes where no one else does.
With taxpayer money now committed to the project, alongside private pledges, the oil billionaire’s push to create a conservative think tank on the Austin campus nears the goal line.
The former Bush adviser pledges to help Texas Democrats win in 2022—including, possibly, by putting his hat in the ring.
School board meetings in Texas's most Republican large county have devolved into shouting matches about curriculum, leaving many teachers worried about the academic year ahead.
Our diverse big cities and suburbs are driving the state forward. Our leaders need to let Houston be Houston and Beaumont be Beaumont.
Three failed candidates, including Beto O’Rourke, lead ambitious voter-registration efforts. And they're assuming no changes are needed in their positions.
COVID outbreaks, covert vacations, anger at President Biden, and the other rich subplots in House Democrats’ attempt to block a restrictive state voting law.
Bell County struggles with misinformation and conspiracy theories as the deadly Delta variant spreads like wildfire.
Local officials in South Texas are scrambling to figure out what the governor is building in their communities.
Buried in the GOP proposal is a requirement that could—whether by intention or just sloppy legislative work—disenfranchise thousands of voters.
Primary challengers say Texas’s governor is weak. The failure to pass new restrictions on voting, a GOP priority, will add fuel to their criticism.
At a conservative gathering in Texas, two Florida Men are the winners, while the movement itself seems adrift.
Out of options in Austin, House Democrats fly to Washington, D.C., where they plan to press Congress to pass federal legislation protecting ballot access.
The next party leader could continue to wage war on errant Republican elected officials or oversee a détente.
GOP challengers have announced bids against Greg Abbott, Ken Paxton, and Sid Miller, while a forlorn Democratic party casts its eyes on Matthew McConaughey.
The outlandish conspiracy theory has made legions of believers into political activists. And the Texas GOP benefits from that.
Texas Democrats felt slighted by the president’s campaign in 2020, but Emmy Ruiz and Natalie Montelongo have given them a voice in the White House.
Governor Greg Abbott said the Lege has done everything necessary to prevent future blackouts. We ask four experts whether that’s true.
A wild year begat an even wilder legislative session. Lawmakers faced blackouts, a pandemic, and their own worst impulses. Amid the chaos, we plucked out the leaders—and the losers.
The Dallas businessman has a talent for alienating powerful Republicans, but he’s running on a platform that embraces their scorn.
Fearing primary challenges, GOP lawmakers focused mostly on wedge issues such as guns and abortion, rather than the COVID-19 pandemic and the failure of the state’s electric grid.
After weeks of debating how to best combat the voting-restriction legislation, Democrats find a rare, though likely temporary, victory.
Before a Democratic walkout blocked the passage of an "election integrity" bill in the Texas Lege, members of the partnership had split over how to respond to the legislation.
Lyndon B. Johnson rehearsed his speech in the bathroom, the new fountain doused the guests, and the booze flowed freely.
Greg Abbott signed a bill banning abortion once a heartbeat can be detected and letting Texans sue those who “aid and abet” a woman getting the procedure.
The closest vote of Texas' legislative session concerned face coverings and the ability of the governor and county officials to deal with a future pandemic.
Members of the minority party knew they didn’t have the votes to kill Senate Bill 7, but won a few useful amendments behind closed doors.
In her new book ‘On Juneteenth,’ the Pulitzer Prize–winning historian takes on the Texas holiday that has gone national.
He challenged a reporter to perform the calisthenics, then decided to do them himself.
A House bill doesn’t identify the capital city by name, but would make it the lone municipality in Texas whose noise ordinances are set by the Lege.
A recent analysis found Texas’s senior senator is the most prolific tweeter in Congress.
After Donald Trump’s endorsement, Susan Wright separated from the pack in the crowded congressional special election.
