The Texan Podcast - Daily Rundown - June 25, 2026

Starting point is 00:00:04 Well, howdy folks? Today is Thursday, June 25th, and you're listening to the Texans' Daily Rundown. I'm the Texan senior editor Rob Lauchess, and here is the rundown of today's news in Texas politics. First up, State Representative Brent Money joined the Texans reporter Mary Aliso Barr at the Republican Party of Texas' 20206 state convention. To discuss the convention, Sharia law in Texas, legislation to treat abortion as equal to other forms of homicide and the state, and more, visit the texan.com news or wherever you get podcasts to listen now. Next, during the 89th legislative session, state lawmakers approved Senate Bill 2337 requiring proxy advisory firms to disclose when their recommendations are based on non-financial factors or, quote, conflict with other proxy advisory services.

Starting point is 00:00:58 SB 2337, authored by State Senator Brian Hughes, was penned in response to firms that have based their recommendations on promoting environmental issues, diversity, equity, and inclusion policies, or other political considerations ahead of purely on shareholders' financial interests. The world's two largest firms, institutional shareholder services, and Glass Lewis, which reportedly control 97% of the proxy advisory market, each filed lawsuit seeking to block implementation of SB 2337 last year. During an interim hearing of the Texas Senate State Affairs Committee this week, committee chair Hughes said that in recent years, proxy advisory firms had taken a, quote, very partisan political edge. He noted that both ISA,

Starting point is 00:01:46 and Glass Lewis had been invited to provide testimony to the committee, but that ISS declined and Glass Lewis did not respond. After it became clear that Glass Lewis had not sent a representative to testify, State Senator Paul Bettencourt said the committee should consider issuing subpoenas. In other news, the Supreme Court of Texas set the defamation case of former State Representative Frederick Frazier against his former opponent, Paul Chabot, for oral argument on November 4th. Shabot challenged Frazier in the Republican primary in 2022 for Texas House District 61 in Collin County. Frazier prevailed in the runoff election, but was indicted by a grand jury in June 23 on two charges of impersonating a public servant. Shabot had alleged in February 22 that

Starting point is 00:02:35 Frazier, a former McKinney City Council member and Dallas Police Department officer, identified himself as a code compliance officer and persuaded a local business to tear down Shabot's signs. Frazier pleaded no contest to the charges, received probation, and was ordered to pay restitution to Shabot. Frazier filed a defamation lawsuit against Shabot. He claimed that Shabot had made false and injurious statements across social media platforms and on a website, www.fraiser.com. Shabot moved to dismiss the lawsuit under the Texas Citizens Participation Act, an anti-strategic lawsuits against public participation, or slap law, passed in 2011 to protect citizens from retaliatory lawsuits seeking to intimidate or silence them on matters of public concern. The trial court denied Shabot's

Starting point is 00:03:26 TCPA motion, and the Dallas Court of Appeals affirmed the trial court's decision. Now, Shabot is asking the Texas Supreme Court to reverse the lower court decisions and decide several issues about how the lower courts ruled, especially the Dallas Appeals Court. Last but not least, engineer Marcus Stuckett will take over as head of the Harris County Flood Control District on Monday, as the county races to meet deadlines to avoid losing millions in federal disaster recovery funds in February. The Harris County Commissioner's Court appointed Stuckett to replace outgoing Flood Control District Executive Director Tina Peterson on Thursday. Stuckett is a licensed professional engineer and certified floodplain manager, recently served as Associate Vice President, at Pape Dawson Engineers, and previously worked in the Flood Control District in several roles, including as Engineering Division Director. As head of the district, Stuckett will be tasked with meeting the February 28th, 2027 deadline for Community Development Block Grant Disaster Recovery Funding for 11 projects. The $322 million, approved by Congress, is administered

Starting point is 00:04:36 by the Texas General Land Office, and earlier this month, Land Commissioner Don Buckingham warned the county that they were unlikely to meet the deadlines. After months of contentious meetings at which commissioners and county judge Lena Hidalgo sharply questioned Peterson over project delays, Peterson submitted her resignation during a commissioner's court meeting on June 11th. Thanks for listening. To support the Texan, please be sure to visit the texan.news to get full access to all of our articles, newsletters, and podcasts.

The Texan Podcast - Daily Rundown - June 25, 2026

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