The Texan Podcast - Daily Rundown - October 21, 2025

Starting point is 00:00:00 Howdy, folks, today is Tuesday, October 21st, and you're listening to The Texans Daily Rundown. I'm the Texans assistant editor Rob Lauchess, and here is the rundown of today's news in Texas politics. First up, there are 437 bond proposals on the ballot for November 4th across the state, almost two-thirds of which are related to water, sewage, drainage, and road infrastructure. Roughly 25% of the proposals are building bonds, almost entirely from independent school districts. The remaining 10% are for public safety, parks, flood control, or transportation projects. Visit the texan.com. News for a deeper look at the November 2025 bond proposals across the state. Next, Austin voters will weigh in next month on a proposed

Starting point is 00:00:54 20% property tax hike in the city's rate. But the city's quest to cover a budget shortfall while expanding services for the homeless is facing headwinds from a bipartisan coalition of activists and residents. The Save Austin Now PAC, co-chaired by former Democratic congressional candidate Stephen Brown and former Travis County Republican Party chairman Matt McCoviac, is one of the groups actively campaigning to defeat Austin's Proposition Q, which will add at least $300 to the city property tax bills next year for the average homeowner with a property value of $500,000. McCoviac told the Texan that Proposition Q would make Austin more unaffordable for individuals and families. Under Proposition Q, the city property tax rate will rise from under 47 cents per

Starting point is 00:01:45 $100 of valuation to over 57 cents. Area property owners will already see a higher tax bill next year due to rate increases approved for Austin Community College, the city's hospital district, and Travis County. In other news, the state of Texas found 2,724 potential non-citizens on its voter rolls after a review conducted by the Texas Secretary of State. Secretary of State Jane Nelson announced on Monday the first day of early voting for the November 4th election that her office had identified identified over 2,700 individuals registered to vote in Texas who are potentially not U.S. citizens. This came after she gained access to a federal citizenship database, the U.S. Citizenship and

Starting point is 00:02:31 Immigration Services' Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements, or Save program, which Nelson used to cross-reference the voter rolls. The online service was made available to the Texas Secretary of State after an executive order issued by President Donald Trump in March. which laid out a variety of directives and requirements to state agencies related to securing elections across the nation. Also, the Texas State Commission on Judicial Conduct issued a public reprimand for a Harris County Criminal Court judge who signed a false bench warrant and sent a death row inmate for medical testing alongside members of the public. According to the reprimand published Monday, Judge Natalia Cornelio of the 351st Criminal District Court in Houston

Starting point is 00:03:18 demonstrated bias in the case of Ronald Lee Haskell, who was convicted in 2014 for the murder of six people, including four children. In July 24, Cornelio signed a bench warrant for Haskell to have him brought from a high security unit for death row inmates to the Harris County Jail for a court setting at midnight on July 22nd, 2024, a court setting which never occurred. Instead, Haskell was kept in the Harris County Jail until Cornelio's orders sent him to a private medical facility for a brain MRI on July 30th. Photographs submitted by the Harris County District Attorney's Office last year show Haskell entering a waiting room with public citizens who were unaware of their proximity to the convicted killer. Neither Cornelio nor Haskell's attorney notified the Harris County District Attorney's

Starting point is 00:04:08 office about the move, but the state's automatic victim notification system sent an alert to the only surviving victim who then notified prosecutors. Last but not least, Dallas Mayor Eric Johnson has urged members of city committees to join a federal immigration agreement after police chief Daniel Como declined a $25 million offer. The memorandum sent by Johnson was issued in response to Como saying during a community police oversight board meeting on October 14th that the department refused an offer to join the 287G Federal Immigration Enforcement Agreement. Johnson's memo, address to public safety chair Kara Mendelson, and government efficiency chair Maxie Johnson, describes the federal program as a force multiplier that allows, quote,

Starting point is 00:04:57 the Dallas Police Department to deploy additional resources to reduce violent crime at a lower cost to taxpayers. Thanks for listening. To support the Texan, please be sure to visit the Texan. News and subscribe to get full access to. to all of our articles, newsletters, and podcasts.

The Texan Podcast - Daily Rundown - October 21, 2025

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