A Texas Austerity Crisis Is Playing Out City by City, School by School
Texas’ local governments are facing growing fiscal pain. What’s that mean for the 2026 elections—and the 2027 session?
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Politics ⋆
Come and Take Them, Dan Patrick
An Abilene public school librarian has a message for the lieutenant governor and his book-banning crusade.
Immigrants Keep Saying She’s Ripping Them Off. Why Won’t Texas Stop Her?
The attorney general’s office once aggressively pursued fraudsters targeting immigrants. Not on Ken Paxton’s watch.
‘Suicide by Cop’: How a Poorly Defined Term Shifts Accountability for Lost Lives
Austin officers killed an unarmed 17-year-old at a park last month in what the chief swiftly deemed “suicide by police.” Some call the concept a type of “junk science.”
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Politics
Who Pays for the High-Powered Grid that Data Centers Need?
Texas would make large AI hyperscalers pay for the wires that connect them. Whether they must also pay directly for the broader grid work needed to serve them is still an open question.
University of Houston Is Gutting Its Gender and Sexuality Classes. That Won’t Stop Texas’ Crusade Against Higher Ed.
College administrators wrongly hope that anticipatory obedience will satisfy a GOP-run Texas Legislature that is increasingly hostile toward education.
In Congress, Christian Menefee Says He’s Fighting for ‘the Least, the Last, and the Lost’
The latest politician to represent H-Town’s historic 18th Congressional District talks about his recent primary against Al Green, ICE, voting rights, and the U.S. Senate race.
Border and Immigration
Indigenous Group Sues to Stop Big Bend Border Wall on Religious Grounds
The lawsuit seeks an immediate injunction, arguing that CBP construction and surveying activities in Big Bend violates the Religious Freedom Restoration Act.
American Skater
A Venezuelan immigrant tries to make a home in San Antonio in exclusionary times.
ICE Never Stopped Chasing People in Cars in the Rio Grande Valley
Immigration agents sped after a vehicle through a residential neighborhood on the same day of the agency’s traffic stop pause, reportedly endangering a mother and son—before pulling a gun on and briefly handcuffing a U.S. citizen.
Culture
‘Cocks Not Glocks’ at 10
A decade on, the iconic campus protest has come to symbolize a time of relatively free expression.
An Ode to Austin’s Unsung Proletariat
A new novel about workers at an organic grocery store asks us to consider questions of labor and dignity in the Texas capital.
Cycling the Rio Grande as Trump’s Wall Looms
“We’re gonna be riding around areas where most everybody thinks it’s unsafe, and you’re gonna see that there’s really nothing to be worried about.”
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September/October 2026
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