The Texan Podcast - Daily Rundown - September 8, 2026

Starting point is 00:00:04 Well, howdy, folks? Today is Tuesday, September 8th, 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, the 26 Republican National Convention will be held in Dallas on Wednesday and Thursday of this week, with major speakers including President Donald Trump, Vice President J.D. Vance, Governor Greg Abbott, U.S. Senate candidate and Attorney General Ken Paxton and more. Follow the Texans reporters Meredith Dyer and Isaiah Mitchell on social media for live updates on the convention. Next, the Tarrant Appraisal District, or Tad, Board of Directors, adopted a new reappraisal plan for 2027, 2008 that will again instruct the chief appraiser to reappraise properties in odd-numbered years rather than annually. The reappraisal plan was amended

Starting point is 00:00:59 to include a reference to Senate Bill 973 by State Senator Sarah S. which amended the Texas Tax Code section dealing with periodic reappraisals. Quote, the plan may not include a standard or timeline that prevents the chief appraiser from appraising property as necessary to comply with the requirements of Section 23.01A. That section states that all taxable property is appraised at its market value as of January 1st. In 2024, the Tad Board adopted a new reappraisal plan directing the chief appraiser to not reappraised properties in 2025 and then to move reappraisals to every second year. Local real estate broker Chandler Crouch, who protests appraisals on behalf of Tarrant County residents,

Starting point is 00:01:45 did an analysis of how the appraisal freeze affected homeowners in the area. He found that 190,000 single-family residential homes in Tarrant County were overvalued in 2025. In other words, had the Tad Board not frozen their values, those homeowners would have seen a decrease in their proposed market value and potentially a decrease in their overall tax bill. At the August Tad board meeting, chief appraiser Joe Don Bobbitt said that residential properties are currently appraised at approximately 85% of market value, so he anticipates a 15% average increase in residential appraised values in the coming year. In other news, a man from McAllen received a 30-year prison sentence for his role in leading an alien smuggling ring, which involved recruiting teenagers,

Starting point is 00:02:33 drivers who fled from law enforcement and, in one case, suffered a fatal crash as a result. Jose Manuel Silva Lopez was sentenced to 360 months in federal prison on September 3rd for coordinating human smuggling from the summer of 2023 to the fall of 2024 on 21 occasions. Assistant U.S. Attorney Devin V. Walker argued during Silva Lopez's hearing that he had placed his drivers in substantial danger throughout this scheme, creating a risk of death or serious bodily injury as he recruited the teenagers and gave them instructions to flee from the police when being pursued. One incident resulted in three deaths, one of whom was the driver, after the latter lost control of the vehicle while trying to avoid a traffic stop being conducted

Starting point is 00:03:19 by law enforcement. Walker said that Silva Lopez failed to show any remorse over the deaths. That crash occurred as an underage driver had just picked up the aliens from the Rio Grande River, which was customary in the smuggling operation before the drivers dropped them off at a number of stash houses within the Rio Grande Valley. The drivers would be directed by Silva Lopez to specific geographical points along the river to pick up the aliens for transportation to their drop-off point. Last but not least, Texas Railroad Commissioner Jim Wright joined the Texans reporter Isaiah Mitchell to discuss the history of the state's oil and gas industry and its oldest regulatory agency, energy infrastructure and the Permian Basin Reliability Plan, and more. Visit the Texan. News or wherever you get podcasts to listen now. 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. podcasts.

The Texan Podcast - Daily Rundown - September 8, 2026

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