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.
Plus, Lubbock becomes Texas's largest "sanctuary city for the unborn."
Plus: Texas transplants Elon Musk and Joe Rogan attract yet more controversy, Ted Cruz gets into it with ‘The Daily Show,’ and Selena Gomez explores her dark side.
The lieutenant governor is no stranger to forcing votes on controversial issues, but a new gun bill the House passed has concerned some members of his Senate caucus.
State officials didn’t make an effort to count every Texan, falling short of the census numbers needed to run up the score on California and other states.
As vaccination rollout in their country has been slow, wealthy Mexicans have spent thousands on expensive trips abroad to get inoculated.
Amid a slate of culture war offerings, lawmakers are set to discuss Medicaid expansion and accessing COVID-19 relief funds for schools.
“Ladders and walls go together like peas and carrots,” says one McAllen Border Patrol agent.
A large majority of Texas Republicans believe the unsupported claims of leaders that the 2020 election was stolen. But some in the party think “election integrity” legislation could backfire.
Michael Wood, a Marine reserve major, believes enough voters in the Fort Worth area share his views to push him into the runoff in a very crowded field.
A few of Texas's big businesses have publicly criticized efforts to make voting more difficult. But many more, fearful of Republican retribution, are trying to keep their heads down.
The Pearland native went viral this week for her poised and powerful testimony against anti-trans bills.
The state’s top elected official used to have limited sway. But Abbott has steadily seized authority from the Legislature and governing boards—a process accelerated by the pandemic.
Veteran Austin journalist Bill Minutaglio’s latest book is a crowd-pleasing account of heated political battles in Texas over the past 150 years. But does it get the big picture right?
For rural families who lack reliable, high-speed internet, Zoom-style instruction is a luxury.
Provisions of Senate Bill 7 would require some naturalized citizens to prove their right to vote.
In Houston’s Third Ward, where some residents’ homes were extensively damaged, a fight for repairs has reached a breaking point.
Many industries bear a portion of the blame for the failure of Texas’s electric grid. But one seems to be escaping strict requirements to better prepare for future storms.
You ain’t a cowboy till your stunt double’s been bucked off.
A guide to the key players in the 87th Legislature who are trying to stuff ten pounds of “priorities” into a five-pound sack.
Governor Greg Abbott has identified passing “election integrity” bills as one of his priorities for this legislative session, but the man in charge of ushering such legislation through the Texas House seems not up to the task.
The lieutenant governor has long responded to crises with more talk than legislation. But is something different this time as he deals with the aftermath of the blackout?
The lieutenant governor wants to require state pension and education funds to divest from financial giants that are trimming their investments in oil and gas—but he hasn’t thought through the potential consequences.
Political insiders say the police chief’s move to Miami follows a turbulent year in which his hopes of being elected mayor began to look delusional.
Houston has become a hot spot for pandemic removal proceedings. For tenants such as Evelyn Powers, relief has been hard to come by.
Public Utility Commission chairman Arthur D’Andrea apologized to investors last week for the “uncertainty” around its profits.
Fed up with DNA tests and expensive investigators, some adult adoptees are fighting the state for access to their original birth records.
They fear that the end of the mask mandate and the influx of spring break crowds is a recipe for danger.
The bankruptcies and staggering electricity charges are beginning to arrive. Could it go from bad to worse?
State leaders have pointed fingers at everything from windmills to the bureaucrats at ERCOT. But the real issue is the electric grid’s reliance on a lightly regulated natural gas production industry.
The vast majority of Texans have yet to receive a single dose of vaccine, but the state is done imposing public health measures.
In a speech at the Conservative Political Action Conference, Texas’s junior senator tossed red meat but was overshadowed by the former president.
Luke Coffee, a director and actor who appeared on NBC’s ‘Friday Night Lights,’ found QAnon during the pandemic and then spent a month trying to evade the consequences of the path it led him down.
When several women spoke out against a powerful man in the former ghost town of Terlingua, the backlash was fierce.
Our governor and lawmakers want to blame everyone but themselves for the February blackouts, the latest crisis of their own making.
The Houston-based energy economist is our blackout Cassandra. Will state officials finally heed his advice?
Texas Monthly talks to the ERCOT chief about why the blackouts happened and what needs to change now.
Those in charge of Texas’s deregulated power sector were warned again and again that the electric grid was vulnerable.
Austin’s mayor, Steve Adler, and the state’s junior senator, Ted Cruz, are the latest Texas politicians to take ill-considered vacations.
May you make direct eye contact with your neighbor during your yard pee.
As multiple crises unfold across the state, photographers captured Texans doing their damnedest to keep warm and safe.
An energy expert explains why some four million Texans suffered a barrage of winter storms without heat in their homes.
Some Texans have long argued for leaving the Union. State representative Kyle Biedermann’s recent agitating about doing so is attracting an eager audience.
Lone Star State leaders have worried about transplants importing West Coast values and politics here. But they’ve largely ignored the more pressing challenges newcomers are bringing with them.
