The Texan Podcast - Daily Rundown - December 20, 2024

Starting point is 00:00:00 Howdy folks, today is Friday, December 20th, and you're listening to the Texans Daily Rundown. I'm the Texans Assistant Editor Rob Lausches, and here is the rundown of today's news in Texas politics. First up, the Texas House Criminal Jurisprudence Committee held a hearing with death row inmate Robert Roberson subpoenaed to appear, but just hours before the hearing was set to take place, the Texas Office of the Attorney General cast doubt on his appearance. On the evening prior to the committee hearing, Attorney General Ken Paxton sent out a press release that included a motion for a protective order against the committee subpoena, effectively blocking Roberson from appearing. The press release states, quote, In addition to presenting serious security risks, the subpoena is procedurally defective and therefore invalid as it was issued in violation of the House rules, the Texas Constitution,

Starting point is 00:00:57 and other applicable laws. The motion also requests the court to delay any court hearing until after January 13, 2025, because the OAG will be out of the country. Next, a bipartisan group of state lawmakers are seeking ways to crack down on the hiring of public school contract employees who may pose a danger to students following scandals involving inappropriate sexual behavior. Texas Senator Paul Betancourt told the Texan that lawmakers are looking for ways to increase scrutiny of any personnel that are hired directly or indirectly at the state's schools. Filed last week, Senate Bill 571 would allow contractors whose employees will be physically

Starting point is 00:01:38 present at schools to access an interagency registry. The registry, which is still under construction, could flag potentially dangerous employees, but only when one of the participating agencies includes misconduct records. In other news, Louisville Independent School District will be closing five elementary schools at the end of the 2024-2025 school year in response to declining enrollment. The school board had discussed the possibility of merging or closing some of the district's schools since October as it has tried to address the district's financial challenges. The final decision was made during the December 9th board

Starting point is 00:02:15 meeting after much deliberation. Louisville ISD's enrollment peaked in 2017 with 53,000 students, but is projected to stabilize at 45,000 over the end of 10 years. The district currently has capacity for more than 60,000 students, leading the board to seek solutions via right-sizing the district's facilities. Last but not least, while billionaire Texan Elon Musk continues to launch rockets at his South Texas starbase, new lawsuits from environmental groups are launching allegations against the space exploration company, and now a state regulator tasked with approving permitting for the operation. The South Texas Environmental Justice Network,

Starting point is 00:02:56 in partnership with the Carrizo Comecrudo tribe of Texas, has filed a lawsuit in a state district court of Travis County against the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality over the agency's approval of the water deluge system used to cool the SpaceX Starship rocket at takeoff. The groups allege the Clean Water Act requires TCEQ to use a permitting process that provides opportunity for public comment. They also allege that by sidestepping this process, SpaceX will not be subject to rigorous public or technical review, and thus, the agency is argued to be placing the environment at risk. P.S. If you're looking for a good Christmas gift for someone special who's addicted to Texas politics, consider a gift subscription to The Texan. With all the craziness this year and

Starting point is 00:03:45 the certainty of more to come in 2025, access to breaking articles and regular newsletters, breaking down political happenings in the Lone Star State and beyond is the perfect way to show your appreciation. Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to all of our listeners. The Daily Rundown will be taking a little break, but The Texan will still be putting out articles and podcasts over the next week and a half. Thanks for listening. To support The Texan, please be sure to visit thetexan.news and subscribe to get full access to all of our articles, newsletters, and podcasts.

The Texan Podcast - Daily Rundown - December 20, 2024

There aren't comments yet for this episode. Click on any sentence in the transcript to leave a comment.