Reporting and commentary on the Legislature, campaigns, and elected officials
At the former president’s Saturday evening rally in Conroe, even candidates whose opponents he’d endorsed were out in full force.
The relative unknown has spent $1.4 million on her primary against Greg Abbott—on par with Allen West, a serious challenger. But why?
So far, no major backer has publicly abandoned him. But one group has suspended TV ads on his behalf, and a major paper has endorsed his primary opponent.
The allegation isn’t true. But that isn’t stopping some politicians and right-wing activists from running with it.
With an obscure change in Mexican trade policy, the cash-strapped border town started seeing more visitors.
The rising GOP star's district was redrawn to protect him—but it might instead have created a problem for the representative.
One year after the deadly blackout, Texas officials have done little to prevent the next one—which could be far worse.
The Jackson County lawman is running to represent southeast Texas on a Trump-style “America First” platform. There’s only one problem: Trump endorsed his opponent.
The daughter of Mexico City missionaries and former public radio reporter thinks the El Paso congressman can’t reach Republicans—and she believes in miracles.
Don Huffines, Chad Prather, and Allen West had plenty to say about the governor’s failings—all in perfect unison.
Scandal-plagued incumbent Attorney General Ken Paxton faces a Bush, a congressional performance artist, and a former state Supreme Court justice.
The representative from the Houston suburbs faced down the mob on January 6, then voted along with its desires.
Our leaders aided and abetted Donald Trump’s attempts to overturn the election more than those in any other state.
There was a lot of great coverage of happenings in Texas this year. Our staff selected its favorite stories.
The attorney who successfully argued Roe v. Wade died Sunday at age 76, leaving behind a powerful legacy for Texas women.
After the ‘Del Rio News-Herald’ shuttered last year, Frank Lopez Jr., who broadcasts as “US Border Patriot,” found a national audience.
Last February’s deep freeze and the blackout that followed were brutal. But without the selfless actions of countless Texans, the situation could have been much worse.
Houston housing director Tom McCasland bravely spoke out against suspicious city hall deals—and paid the price.
A year ago, in this very space, we referred to 2020 as “perhaps the craziest, stupidest, Bum Steeriest year in Texas Monthly’s history.” The unspoken assumption—or perhaps it was a desperate wish—was that 2021 would prove to be at least marginally saner than that misbegotten election year. And how
An A-to-Z list of 25 Lone Star State residents who disgraced themselves last January 6.
Ted Cruz had a very, very, very bad year. Maybe he’ll blame it on his daughters.
Six years after he became governor, we still don’t know what Greg Abbott wants to accomplish—except, as this year made clear, to hold on to office, no matter how many Texans get hurt.
Nearly 12,000 registered voters have received letters demanding proof of citizenship as part of Texas’s newest effort at “voter list maintenance.”
The leader of the Harris County government seemed to have weathered a controversy over a contract for vaccine outreach, but in mid-November the district attorney issued subpoenas concerning the bidding process.
Sunday night the actor announced he won’t challenge Greg Abbott. So what will he do?
Members of the Chin ethnic group have found good jobs in the oil fields, and many are voting Republican.
In the wake of the deadly Travis Scott concert, Bayou City and Harris County politicians have formed a circular firing squad.
The former mayor of San Antonio talks about his political future, Beto O’Rourke’s gubernatorial bid, and why Democrats are losing ground in South Texas.
John Scott, a conservative attorney who briefly represented the Trump campaign in a Pennsylvania lawsuit, says he does not believe voter fraud affected the results of the 2020 election.
The first Latino selected to lead the agency talked about how the Trump administration might have affected last year’s count and how the census handles race and ethnicity questions.
The former congressman from El Paso talked to Texas Monthly about why he thinks he can beat Greg Abbott, whether he regrets his 2020 presidential campaign, and whether his politics are too liberal for Texas.
Federal agencies have long struggled to stop illegal fishing and drug smuggling in the Gulf of Mexico. In recent years, it’s only gotten worse.
Mainly what we already knew: Democrats will have problems in the state in 2022 and Austin is liberal.
In the two months since the virtual ban took effect, the number of abortions in the state has plummeted.
No county in Texas has arrested more migrants under the governor’s plan to crack down on the border, and it’s created a judicial crisis.
In the beginning, Greg Abbott took a hands-off approach that kept Texas ahead of other large states in mitigating cases and deaths. But when he tried to appease right-wing Republicans, the story changed.
When I got pregnant in the summer of 1969, abortion wasn’t an option, and neither was keeping the baby. The trauma that followed is still with me today.
The Del Rio–raised law enforcement official chatted with ‘Texas Monthly’ about the situation in his hometown and immigration enforcement across the state.
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.
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.
