The Texan Podcast - Daily Rundown - July 25, 2024

Starting point is 00:00:00 Howdy folks, today is Thursday, July 25th, 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 National Association for Gun Rights prevailed in a lawsuit against the federal government this week after a district judge found the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives unlawfully issued a rule to ban Forced Reset Triggers, or FRTs, vacating the rule and issuing a partial injunction protecting the plaintiffs from its enforcement. As described in the 64-page opinion, Judge Reed O'Connor of the Fort Worth Division of the Federal Northern District Court explained that an FRT, quote, is an assembly that

Starting point is 00:00:51 allows the trigger of a semi-automatic weapon to reset quicker than it otherwise would using the standard trigger return spring. Due to the swift trigger reset, a firearm equipped with an FRT enables the user to fire at a faster rate than with the traditional trigger. In contrast, the ruling explained that federal statutes under the National Firearms Act and the Gun Control Act prohibit the ownership of modern machine guns or their key parts, which the law defines as, quote, Any weapon which shoots is designed to shoot or can be readily restored to shoot

Starting point is 00:01:25 automatically more than one shot, without manual reloading, by a single function of the trigger. Next, SEALs, special operators, and other service members of the United States Navy have received forward-looking relief after a settlement agreement was approved by a federal district court in North Texas this week. The lawsuit was brought in November 2021 after the represented service members sought a religious accommodation from being required to take a COVID-19 vaccine in order to continue serving in the U.S. Navy. In January 2023, the Secretary of Defense rescinded the vaccine mandate as required by the National Defense Authorization Act, passed in December 2022. In other news, a Texas House Select Committee heard testimony on Wednesday about foreign ownership of land in the state by hostile nations,

Starting point is 00:02:16 laying the foundation to pass legislation that stalled out in the lower chamber last session. State Representative Cole Hefner was appointed chairman of the committee when Speaker Dade Phelan created the House Select Committee on Securing Taxes from Hostile Foreign Organizations back in May. Hefner said in the committee, quote, I know we had some bills last session that did not have this vetting process, and I think the Speaker of the House is taking the right approach here, getting as many different areas of interest so that we do address these serious threats, but we do it in the right way while protecting our private property rights. Also, the U.S. Department of Justice has indicted a Chinese national with involvement in a conspiracy to import fentanyl precursors into the U.S. Minsu Fernando Fang is charged with a four-count indictment of involvement in a scheme aimed at, quote, the importation of what is believed to be the largest amount of fentanyl precursors found in the Southern District of Texas, and one of the largest in the country.

Starting point is 00:03:16 The now-unsealed charges allege that Fang and his associates shipped over 2,000 kilograms of fentanyl precursor chemicals from China into the United States and then to Mexico in approximately 100 separate shipments between August and October 2023. In addition, agents from the Federal Bureau of Investigations and local law enforcement officers arrested 50 Houston-area residents Wednesday in relation to a fraudulent bail bond scheme that allowed suspects accused of violent crimes to remain on the streets of the city. The arrests reignited criticism of Harris County's criminal justice practices and prompted calls for closer scrutiny of bail bond providers. According to an indictment filed with the federal court, beginning in 2021,

Starting point is 00:04:01 defendants working for or with Able Bonds of Houston created or co-signed fraudulent bond agreements that allowed non-qualifying suspects to obtain pretrial release. In addition to the 50 arrested, officials are seeking three fugitives, Tawana Jones, age 44, Pamela Yoder, age 60, and Amir Khan, age 60. Last but not least, as public schools get ready to serve students again next month, students in several Central Texas districts will get to enjoy locally raised beef in their school lunches. Bernard Beef in Coriel County will supply locally raised ground beef to Lampasas, McGregor, and Crawford independent school districts. Blair Bernard, the owner and operator of the cattle company, is happy to be part of the effort to provide better nutrition to local school children. Although it is only a small part of the cattle operation, Bernard says she is happy to

Starting point is 00:04:56 give back to the community through the schools. 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 - July 25, 2024

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