The Texan Podcast - Weekly Roundup - June 27, 2025

Episode Date: June 27, 2025

Show off your Lone Star spirit with a free "Remember the Alamo" hat with an annual subscription to The Texan: https://thetexan.news/subscribe/The Texan’s Weekly Roundup brings you the latest news in Texas politics, breaking down the top stories of the week with our team of reporters who give you the facts so you can form your own opinion.Enjoy what you hear? Be sure to subscribe and leave a review! Got questions for the reporting team? Email [e-mail] — they just might be answered on a future podcast.Gov. Abbott Issues Last-Minute Veto of Texas’ THC BanAbbott Calls July Special Session Including THC Ban, Human Trafficking Affirmative DefensePatrick Blasts Abbott's THC Ban Veto, Suggests Governor Wants to 'Legalize Marijuana'Texas Lawmakers, Officials React to U.S. Strikes on IranTwo of Eleven Iranian Nationals Arrested Over Weekend Found in HoustonU.S. Department of Justice Closes Investigation into Muslim-Centric EPIC City, No Charges FiledTexas Court of Appeals Rules Against San Antonio Taxpayer-Funded Abortion TravelTexas Higher Education Coordinating Board Directs University Presidents to Identify 'Non-Resident' StudentsSen. Joan Huffman Announces Bid for Texas Attorney GeneralACLU of Texas Seeks Legal Challenge to Texas' 'Parental Bill of Rights'Sen. Robert Nichols Announces Retirement from Texas Legislature After 20 YearsKarmelo Anthony Indicted on Murder Charge for Fatal Stabbing of Austin Metcalf in Frisco

Well, howdy folks, it's Mackenzie Cameron and Mary Leis. It's the three amigos this week. And Brad is off doing who knows what. He's posting rebuttals to meme accounts, it seems. Which he does even when he is working. Yeah, yeah. It's been entertaining for us. For sure.

I don't know if he's enjoying that as part of his vacation. Yeah. Yeah. It's been entertaining for us. For sure. I don't know if he's enjoying that as part of his vacation. Right. Again, like this is all worth saying all these things, but he's on vacation. Like he is taking so much deserved time off. I think the question is, um, how much time off is he actually enjoying? Because he's still tweeting. Yep. Cameron and I have a tally going of how many times he'll call or text us. I have to update you since we haven't talked over the past 24 hours about it. Yeah, exactly. I know. I need to update it too.

I kind of lost count though. I do have, he did send me a document about an hour ago, but I was in the middle of, again, a lot of other things and there was no contextualization of the document. It just said, it was just a document. Yeah. And it's a long document. I opened it and I'm like, I don't have time for this right now. And I have not returned to it. Okay. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Well, he reached out to both of us or all three of us in a group text yesterday. Yes. So that's already one. He's reached out to me individually. So we had an over under of nine and a half. Yeah, it's going to be over. It's, it might already be

over. Yeah. Yeah. Mary Lee's has Brad bugged you at all while he's on vacation. Yes, Brad has absolutely been reaching out. I should keep tally as well. I thought it was pretty funny. He can't he can't stay away from, uh, Texas sludge and politics for too long. No, he's an addict, but I think being able to tweet about it and not have to do all of the heavy lifting of like writing and I don't know all the follow-up that comes with break, like it's fun for it's the fun part for him.

So I think it, I mean, that's what he said on the phone the other day it was yesterday I don't even see I can't even remember it's like it's all squished together but I think it was yesterday he was saying that it's it's all the good parts of his job that he enjoys the most without well but he can still be on the golf course you know and hanging out with Winston yeah doing what he's doing. So. Throwing back a few brewskies. Throwing back a few. With the boys.

Yes, exactly. A few brewskies with the boys. That's right. Um, well Cameron, we've been holding down the office. Yep. We'll continue to do so. Um, and you're, you have like one day off next week and I'm very excited about it. Not to air out your laundry on the podcast, but I'm very excited about the fact that Cameron

has determined that it might be worth taking a day off. Not just to move. I think that's... Yeah. Anyways, lots of thoughts there. I have no grievances whatsoever. I'm very excited about that possibility, but we're chill about it. Yeah, we're chill.

And by we, I mean me. Yeah. Yeah. You're always chill. I'm super chill on the exterior. What's going on inside of my head? Oh, you know, I'm still confused about that. So aren't we all, aren't we all well, active readers get a little bit of an insight. Again, subscribe to sex and get access to redacted. Get a little bit of an insight into camera.

You have to reach to the end to where it gets real schizophrenic. That's so good. Oh my gosh. Because the first half is very analytical, you know? For sure. What the happenings are, what people are saying at the end, very abstract. No holds barred. Yeah, exactly. So sometimes I'll be like halfway through redacted and I'll be like, Cameron, like we need to make this point or this thing. And you're like, you're not there yet. And I'm like, Oh, got it. I need to just wait a minute.

And then it's just 400 words later. You're like, just, just be patient. Mac. And I'm like, okay, got it. And I should know my lesson by now, but I still do that like once a month. I'm like, Hey, it's okay. Yeah. I surprised myself sometimes reading back what I wrote, but sometimes I'm like three quarters of the way through and I'm like, there's no's okay. Yeah. I surprised myself sometimes reading back what I wrote.

But sometimes I'm like three quarters of the way through and I'm like, there's no way he gets, and then you do get to it. Yeah, exactly. Well, let's talk, speaking of confusing, let's talk about Sunday night. Sunday night. There's a lot of news being broke at midnight on Sunday night, which was wild. I obviously, that was the veto deadline that we were waiting to see. Okay, governor, what are you going to veto?

What are you going to let slide through? SB3, the THC ban here in Texas was top of mind for folks. It's your beat. You've been covering it from the get-go. Um, and he vetoed because the governor vetoed SB3. Walk us through that night and what happened. Yeah. And I think everyone knows by now what SB3 really is about banning the manufacturing,

the sale of Hemp Drive THC products. There was a lot of debate, a lot of reformulations of the bill throughout the legislative process. It eventually got passed, but like you mentioned, just hours before the midnight deadline, it was coming close. Governor Greg Abbott put out the veto. And what was interesting is, I don't think we have it actually on the docket today,

there was a lawsuit that was filed preemptively to SB3 because there was not really much known about which way Abbott was going to go on this. He wasn't very forthcoming on on his thoughts on the THC issue. People had asked him on multiple occasions what he was gonna do. He was saying, oh there's thousands what he was going to do. He was saying, oh, there's thousands of bills I have to consider. I'll be hearing from both sides. He eventually came down on the veto side of things. Right after the veto was announced, we got the Texas Hemp Business Council, obviously, pro-vito saying Governor Greg Abbott showed real leadership today.

The hemp industry and Farmers of America said Abbott's veto demonstrates his intentional thoughtful commitment to protecting public safety as well as his commitment to the future well-being of Texas farmers, small businesses, and the workforce dependent upon the legitimate hemp industry. But one of the leading advocates for SB3 was Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick, holding a number of press conferences during the 89th session. He did not mince words in his response.

I'll just read a brief excerpt here. He said, quote, throughout the legislative session, Governor Abbott remained totally silent on SB 3, the bill that would have banned dangerous THC products in Texas. His late-night veto on an issue supported by 105 of 108 Republicans in the legislature, strongly backed by law enforcement, many of the medical and educational communities, and the families who have seen their loved ones lives destroyed by this very dangerous drugs leaves them feeling abandoned. We'll get to the press conference later in the podcast, but that's just a small taste of a lot of the feelings that Dan Patrick had on this veto coming out.

There's been lots of polling as well about how it seems like there's a majority of Texans that support this veto being opposed to banning THC products. But then again, it's a hard issue to poll because of how the questions are formulated can lean people towards either side of the issue, something I believe Brad wrote about in his newsletter, the issue with survey questions and writing those. So you know, you asked for my personal experience about what I was doing before the veto came down. I was just sitting at my dining room table at my computer, refreshing X, waiting for things to come out on TLOs,

waiting for the proclamations and the lists of all the vetoed bills and bills that were signed. So I was locked in. It was dark in my apartment. Only thing shining was the laptop screen. Way past your bedtime, way past my bedtime, but, uh, yeah, this, this issue though, uh, is going to be brought up again during the special session. I think Mary lease is going to get into that, which that is another piece of the news that broke midnight Sunday was right after this veto got announced.

We quickly found out that the governor found that to be the appropriate time to make a big announcement and call a special session, which Mary-Lise, you are covering for us. Walk us through what exactly the special session will look like, or at least what we know right now. Yeah, so what just when we thought that it was over, Governor Greg Abbott called a special session. I believe it was about an hour after that SB3 veto that everybody was paying attention to. So they will gavel back in for special session on July 21st. So we've got a couple of weeks here. He specified six bills that he is going to prioritize during the special session and of course includes SB3, what Cameron is just talking about.

And then we've also got SB2878, SB648, SB1278, and SB1253. And so those are really all unrelated. They have to do with a lot of different topics. One of them has to do with cement kilns. One has to do with regulating water projects. One big one that folks were watching, they saw him veto and a lot of things were swirling around on X when they saw this, SB1270, that has to do with affirmative defense in cases of human trafficking.

And actually, there's this interesting moment where the news of the veto came out and someone I think was a reporter posted that on X and then Governor Craig Abbott himself actually responded to that post and he said something along the lines of, oh, I threw this in the special, we're going to figure out the details of this. I saw someone joking about, wow, would you have ever imagined that that's the way the governor would announce a special? Because this was before we knew that the session was happening. So he announced, I think it was within an hour or two of that, that we would have a

special session starting on July 21st. And his press release said that he identified several bills, which are those six that we just listed, that were vetoed or filed without signature that will be placed on the special session agenda. And he talked about, he didn't necessarily say that the 89th regular session was a waste of time or anything, he said, we delivered results that will benefit Texans for generations to come. He talked about Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick, Speaker Dustin Burroughs, Texas House, Texas Senate,

and the work, the hard work that went into sending critical legislation to his desk. He said, this session has seen monumental success, but there is more that we can do. He also noted that during the regular session, he signed a total of 1,155 bills, then he vetoed 26, and then he also mentioned that he approved the budget in there. And then he also mentioned that he approved the budget in there. So we haven't seen Speaker Burroughs comment on this, Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick yet on this special session, but it is absolutely happening on July 21st. So we'll be gaveling back in before we know it.

I know. It's wild to think about a session happening again so quickly. Yeah, Cameron. People might be listening and thinking cement kilns, why is that on a special session? Totally. But for dedicated Texan weekly roundup listeners, they know the cement kiln issue has been bubbling up this entire session. We have extensive reporting on it. Brad's been covering it. It is a fascinating issue between local and state authority within the legislature over

this cement kiln production. And so, yeah, if people are interested, I encourage you go to thete Texan.news, type in cement kiln in the search bar. There's lots of stories that we covered here so you can familiarize yourself before the special session starts. And we promise you will not be disappointed. No promise cement kilns are not as boring as they sound. It is certainly an important issue. And I mean, like looking at a calendar, looking at a bill calendar and seeing,

okay, dozens of bills, you can pick out the ones you know are going to be spicy with debate. Yeah. Even bipartisan debate, like changing the definition or any social issue, any social issue, like the definition of male and female and state code, you know, prayer in school, like whatever it is, you're like, obviously that's going to be hotly debated. Yeah. People, when this bill was on the calendar, were like, oh, the cement can't, oh, it's coming. And it was, it's just so funny. It was looped in with all these other bills

that were obviously hot topics, and it provided some very interesting debates. So definitely go check out Brad's reporting on that and listen to the weekly roundup where Brad and Cameron went back and forth on all sorts of different details. But Mary-Lise, thank you for that. It'll be fun to be back

in session and so quickly. Although I'm sure there's mixed feelings about coming back in this session, but I'm excited. Yeah, it's gonna be fun. I'm excited. It's gonna be fun. Okay, well, let's talk then Cameron about the Lieutenant Governor had very, like you already said, not mince words, but there are some very interesting things he had to say at a press conference the day following this veto from the governor on SB3, the THC ban. Tell us what happens. Well, this was a highly anticipated press conference because Dan Patrick has been getting increasingly animated at these press conferences. People remember there was a moment where he

tossed some of these THC products into the press gaggle, which created a viral moment. So there was a lot of people showing up to this one after the veto to see what was going he did not hold back. He said that in essence that Governor Greg Abbott is seeking to legalize recreational marijuana. He said quote, whether it's unintentional and he didn't think it through or whether it's intentional that's the result of the deal. And then he went through really argument by argument what was presented in the proclamation by Abbott because it was quite a lengthy statement that was put out as part of that Abbott wrote that there was quote valid constitutional challenges that could be levied against SB3 if in that other states such as Arkansas have been unsuccessful

implementing that ban that in what's interesting is that proclamation was written before there's been a recent ruling that is going to allow this Arkansas ban to go in effect. They are different bills and how they manage the hemp industry. But I would use that as a way to highlight the legal issues that were occurring. He also wrote, quote, as a former Supreme Court Justice and Attorney General of Texas, I know that Senate Bill 3 is vulnerable to the same legal attacks.

Patrick said flat out, how does he know that? Went on to say, the idea that we can't ban the product has already been upheld by the higher courts on multiple occasions. There's no justifications for saying that we can't ban it. Patrick went on to say that he was puzzled by the veto. He also mentioned that he spoke with Abbott leading up to the decision saying that Patrick shouldn't

worry about the bill, that your bill is fine, and then Patrick went on to say quote, we get this proclamation from him last night after midnight and he parachutes in at the last moment with arguments that we do not think are valid. And so what's funny is well well, during this press conference, he said on multiplications, I'm not mad at the governor. I'm not mad. We should have had a tally going for how frequently he said that. Yeah. So he was, this has been a big issue though, for Patrick in the face of a lot of the polling that has been on the other side of Patrick on this. Then with this proclamation, vetoing SB3 again in the face of how

Patrick has voiced his concerns about the hemp industry. It kind of puts Patrick in an awkward position here, but he stood tall on this. Like Mary-Lise mentioned, SB3 is going to be taken up in the special session. So we'll see what happens in regards to how different the first offering of SB3 will look during the special as compared to the real outright ban that it ended up being at the end of the session. Also there was lots of different iterations of SB3 that were offered during the 89th session. We'll

see if any of those get brought back up, whether it's going to include beverages or inhalables or differences in the percentage of THC that will be allowed in the products or how the packaging is going to be used or the age limits, whatever it is. Lots of possibilities with SB3, but a lot to be determined here. And, you know, we've got to wait till July, what is it? 21st. 21st for the special, but lots of attention still being paid to this bill. Absolutely. And during session, would it be fair to say the House, the committee substitute that the House brought forward for SB3 when they initially were trying to get this bill

passed through their chamber was a little bit more potentially in the vein of what the governor is now eyeing. Yeah, because it did allow for some different, there was quite a bit of difference between the outright ban and what the then what the house offered initially, but then, again, that all got scooped out, scooped out with this floor substitute that was offered in ended up passing. So yeah, that's the thing about following these pieces of legislation once they hit the floor is you can anticipate for one thing happening and then something completely different can happen. You know, you sit there reading a 30-page bill and then an hour before they're headed to the floor,

there's rumors circling that a floor substitute is going to be offered and then like, okay, you have to reset and think, okay, if this floor substitute passes, it can completely change the aim of the legislation. And so it really takes paying attention and seeing what's happening, trying to anticipate what's going to happen. So totally. We'll see what happens. You know, there have been multiple House members who've come out, I think most publicly drew Darby, a very rural Republican, come out, came out and said a lot of us voted for SB3 because we were scared. It was made very clear to us by the lieutenant governor that House bills would die if we did not vote for SB3.

I did see that as well. But I also saw someone else. Yeah. Are we thinking of the same person? Yes. And I cannot remember which member it was. I'm referencing a Tony Ortiz from current revolt tweet saying, um, he spoke to three house members who said they received no such ultimatum. Right. Very interesting. I don't know if he was saying that in jest because of the way he phrased it, saying, spoke to three several house mem- Yeah.

Three several house. But, um, I think he's being serious that he might've reached out to some people. So, yeah. Well, does that also could be explained, which there's so much here we don't know, but that could be also explained by certain members being potentially, um, marked as safe by losing a governor. Like, yeah, they're going to vote for this. So I'm not worried about them and others, um, knowing that they're kind of on the fringes

and potentially no votes and saying, Hey, I got on the phone. Let's split some pressure on this. Well, we did see some reaction from individual house members after the veto I'll mention here in Charles Schwartner. So the veto was the wrong decision. Uh, representative Tom Alverson who did off center shortener and then house member all of our sent all house member, all of our sin. He offered the floor substitute, um, to SB3, which he said he was

disappointed with the veto. And then Brian Harrison, who voted against the THC ban, said the veto was necessary. So we see House members on either side of the issue here, voicing their thoughts on the veto. Absolutely. We'll keep an eye on all of it. It's and I want to go back to the press conference. I think it's important to note that this is one like the first time we've really ever seen the lieutenant governor talk about the governor in this kind of way publicly. He usually is very, Dan Patrick is not one to pull punches, but he has been very, even in the past in instances where he is disagreement with the governor, very careful in what he says and his approach and, um, tends to be pretty differential to the state's

executive. And this was, while, um, I'm sure there would be arguments made that he, you know, still tried to maintain that kind of deference. This was a no holds bar. This is what our private conversations were. This is how I feel about the issue. I'm incredibly disappointed. He's trying to, you know, legalize recreational marijuana. Like these were strong, emphatic statements from the lieutenant governor. And we're all watching this like in disbelief, fully knowing how important this issue is to the Lieutenant Governor and still in disbelief that he's going this hard at the Governor in this press

conference. Yeah, it was, it was interesting because you typically think the two are on the same side of an issue and there's coordination going on behind the scenes but didn't appear that way. On this one. Yeah. And he even mentioned the homestead, the property tax fight from last session which he was very held a lot of his, I think, angst with the governor close to his chest and directed a lot of his ire at the speaker last session between the homestead exemption and exemption and compression. He brought in the governor on that issue in this

press conference saying, Hey, last session, you know, you didn't want to do a homestead exemption. So very interesting to watch. This is Aaron Davis, uh, from tech scav tonight. Um, she put out a statement that she received from Abbott's press secretary. This is from June 23rd. I'll just read the statement here. Quote, Governor Abbott has always shared the lieutenant governor's desire to ensure that THC products are not sold to our children. And I'm sorry, it's loaded. Is that the dangerous synthetic drugs that we have seen recently? Our band SB3 was well intentioned, but legally flawed.

And this is why he is putting on the special session agenda so that it can be fixed, improved and signed into law. We should not risk years of potential legal battles. We, when we can fix the bill and protect kids now, governor Abbott looks forward to working with the legislature to pass a strong bill that is on a strong legal footing. So I think that is just kind of a reiteration of what was said in the proclamation that Abbott saw some legal issues with SB3 as it was written, which is why I put it on the special session.

You know, he could have not put it on. Totally. He still wants it addressed. He still wants it addressed. The address will just be maybe in a fashion that the lieutenant governor and the governor have to figure out how to navigate. And the speaker's been very silent, very curious what's going on in his mind over in the house.

Okay. Let's go ahead and jump in to Mary Elise. The other huge piece of news, obviously from over the weekend, the president announced Operation Midnight Hammer on Saturday night and Texas lawmakers have had mixed responses. Give us the rundown. Yeah, so a busy weekend, of course, because politics is always spinning its wheels. President Donald Trump announced Operation Midnight Hammer on Saturday, and it was an attack on Iranians' nuclear facilities. It was an attempt to eliminate three of their key nuclear facilities to prevent them from

being able to have nuclear capabilities. Trump says that they were obliterated and there's been different reports about that, but that is a report from the White House that they've been nearly obliterated or severely damaged. But of course, Texas lawmakers, Texas officials have varying opinions on this, as they would. We saw that a lot of Republican members through their support behind Trump and said, Hey, this was a great move on behalf of the United States. We have such great American warriors. This was such an incredible operation. Governor Greg Abbott was one individual that was really quick to post on X that he supported Trump's

decision to bomb those nuclear sites. He released a statement that said, it kind of focused more on, okay, this was great. The United States was able to accomplish this. Now we need to focus on remaining vigilant to secure our homeland. He said to ensure the highest level of safety in our communities and out of an abundance of caution. Texas is elevating the readiness of our Texas Department of Public Safety troopers and Texas National Guard to ensure that our state is fully prepared to address any threat. He's likely thinking about the potential for Iran activating terrorist cells within the state, or just kind of bracing for Iran's response to this. Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton also commented on the strikes. He said that he's proud to stand with Trump and ensure that the murderous Iranian regime

never obtains a nuclear weapon. He said he's very grateful for President Trump and the brave men and women that are in our military defending our great nation. Congressman Michael McCaul on the federal side of things. He's chairman on the House Committee on Foreign Affairs. So his statement on this is particularly important in this issue. He applauded Trump's action. He said, President Trump gave the Iranian regime every chance to pursue diplomacy and spare their people further devastation. And he said that instead they chose to escalate their nuclear ambitions, announcing a new enrichment site just last week.

Congresswoman Lizzie Fletcher, a Democratic member, expressed concerns about Trump's exercise of his official powers. And this is something that some Republican members also expressed, not necessarily Texas Republican Congress members, but so this is Congresswoman Lizzie Fletcher and she said, President Trump's decision to order direct military action in Iran without authorization from Congress violates the Constitution. She said that she talked about how she believes that the Congress has given the power to declare war, not the president. And she believes that's for a reason to prevent any president from acting unilaterally, impulsively, or thoughtlessly when it comes to war or actions that could lead to it.

So of course, there's a negative response and a lot of Democratic members had a similar response to Operation Midnight Hammer. But she did say that she's grateful that no US military members were harmed during Operation. I think that's of course something that everybody was able to unite on, whether they thought that the strikes were warranted or not, everyone appreciated that our men and women came back safe. Representative Chip Roy posted kind of an interesting statement.

He talked about he's thankful for our military, thankful for a president who puts America first. And then he said, I do have very serious questions. For now, more appropriate via immediate briefing and not Twitter or X. And if you want to hear more about kind of the federal side of this conversation, check out the 40. I do mention in the 40 that they will have a briefing tomorrow, a confidential briefing with Speaker Mike Johnson and just so they can be given all the confidential details having to do with this operation where it currently stands a

conflict in the Middle East. And one other text sent out to mention is Congressman Greg Kassar and he condemned Operation Midnight Hammer, said this was an illegal action by President Donald Trump. This will drag us into another endless foreign war. So this this piece is just chock full of responses. You can go check it out for the full list. But they will be receiving that briefing on Friday, which will be interesting to see then what their responses look like after that. If any of them kind of change their stance, you know, it'll be interesting to see what

Congressman Chip Boy has to say after the briefing. So absolutely. And while to watch, I mean, just this news cycle, it literally Saturday, Sunday has been our entire news cycle this week. Like what happened on Saturday, what happened on Sunday, speaking both nationally and internationally and here in the state has really been driving everything that is being talked about and reported on. So Mary Lee, thank you for that. And we're going to continue talking about this following that operation.

Nearly a dozen Iranian nationals were arrested. Give us the details. Yeah. So the department of Homeland security, uh, announced that over the weekend they had arrested 11 Iranian nationals, two of whom were in Houston. And they also said that they were allegedly illegally present in the country. And of course, this just comes in the very tales of the Operation Midnight Hammer, you know, everyone's talking about this and DHS announced that they had arrested these Iranian

nationals. So yeah, two of these were arrested by Immigration and Customs Enforcement branch in Houston. So they were found in Houston. Those were the two in Texas. The others were in various states across the nation. One of them, the DHS, alleged that he was carrying a nine millimeter pistol when he was detained. And they said he had actually been previously arrested by Harris County police for assaulting a family member. His wife had alleged that he had been threatening her family in Iran, DHS reported.

And he had actually been ordered to leave the country in 2019 Which was his third year in the United States But he had been able to stall his deportation by filing a motion to dismiss that decision But he is currently in custody with ICE We also saw one individual that One of the two that was found in Houston he had been ordered to remove to be removed from the United States in 2005 and his charges included driving with a suspended license and then twice he had been charged with drug

related crimes and he had been told to leave the country in 2013 and he's also now in ICE custody pending his removal proceedings. The DHS Assistant Secretary commented on this. She said, we have been saying that we're getting the worst of the worst out and we are. We don't wait until a military operation executes. We proactively deliver on President Trump's mandate to secure the homeland." And so of course, this got a lot of attention in the wake of this operation. It's definitely something that was on everybody's minds was how many Iranian individuals are here, and maybe how many of them are considered terrorist cells that may activate in the light of us striking their facilities.

Because we saw also the DHS had put out a terrorism advisory bulletin warning that there may be Iranian attacks from kind of within the country. But yeah, so these two of them from Texas as these operations with arresting nationals often are just considering its location. Absolutely. Well, Mary-Li, thank you for your coverage of all of that. It's special between the special session and this and SP3. There's just, y'all are covering it like champs. So thank you.

Cameron, we're going to take a little bit of a right turn here. Okay. Left turn, right turn. I don't know. We're going to take a turn. We're going down a different road. Different road. The DOJ has ended its investigation into Epic city.

If folks are unfamiliar with Epic city quickly tell folks what it is, but walk us through this development. Well, Epic City is a Josephine based development. It's attracted quite a lot of controversy. It's going to be, it's a planned like residential sort of community. It's promoted itself as being Muslim-centric with schools, a mosque, community centers, over a thousand homes, you know, providing utilities, everything in this one sort of development here. And it was back in May that we saw saw there was already a lot of controversy around this, but in May, Senator John Cornyn requested that both U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi and Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights Harmeet Dhillon said, quote, explore whether the proponents of the

proposed development are abiding by existing federal and state prohibitions on the enforcement of Sharia law. And so he announced that this investigation was going to be launched and the Dallas Morning News was able to obtain a letter from the investment partner of Epic City Community Capital Partners wherein the letter states that it has affirmed that all will be welcome in any future development in that the CCP unfortunate acronym. Yes, exactly. Different CCP. Yeah, plans to revise and develop marketing materials to reinforce that message consistent with its obligations under the Fair Housing Act. Based on this information, the department is closing its investigation at this time. And so

again Dallas Morning News was able to obtain this letter no lawsuits or charges against Epic City or community capital partners but there's still a lot to be unearthed here with Epic City because there's been ongoing investigations by Governor Greg Abbott directing investigations into this development. Also, Attorney General Kim Paxton doing something similar. I'll read one rebuttal to a lot of these accusations. Dan Cogdale, who is, if people remember that name he was defending Paxton during the impeachment trial he's also now representing Epic City so very interesting here he called many of Abbott's actions quote hate

speech said this during a press conference back in April and he said he is ashamed of the falsehoods that Abbott's office has been putting out. It's nonsense. So Cogdell's comments accompanied with this letter from the DOJ announcing they're dropping the investigation. We'll see what comes out of the state-level investigations But again, with a lot of these stories, there's still a lot to be uncovered. Um, with SB3, with Epic City, there's still a lot of runway to go with, uh, what's going to be happening. And these are the kinds of issues that make their way into campaigns. And of course the corn and Paxton of it all is really interesting.

Like you were talking about. So lots to be uncovered here and goes to show, you know, Dan Cogdell lawyers are, you know, going to represent their clients. And it's very interesting, but those names matter, right? Who's on these different suits matters. And it's very interesting. Well, Cameron, thank you. Welcome. Mary-Liess, we're coming back to you. A court ruled against taxpayer funded abortion travel that was occurring in San Antonio. Give us the details. Yeah. So the state of Texas has successfully sued the city of San Antonio to prevent it from

using taxpayer funds for abortion travel. And this was following their appropriation of $100,000 for what they called the Reproductive Justice Fund. This was a lawsuit filed by our Attorney General, of course, Ken Paxton. He responded to this move by the City of San Antonio in April. He was arguing that this effort of theirs, this attempt of theirs, would help residents in defying our Texas law that bans elective abortions. And he said that it would, quote, enable abortion tourism. And this is also kind of interesting timing because we just saw Governor Greg Abbott sign

Senate Bill 33 into law, which is by Senator Donna Campbell. And this bill banned taxpayer funded abortion travel, using any sort of taxpayer funds to assist women in getting an abortion. So whether that looks like helping with the logistics, you know, the traveling part of it or helping the childcare, food, lodging, etc. And so then this law is going to be effective in September 2025. So just kind of interesting overlapping there. So a little bit of background on San Antonio's reproductive justice fund. It was made in September 2023, and they allocated $500,000 to it. And this was to respond to the states for life laws that were taking effect after the overturning of Roe v. Wade, which was I believe

Yesterday or the day I think was two days ago was its three year anniversary of the overturning of Roe v. Wade and Then about a year and a half later at City Council then voted to add this extra $100,000 to its fund I mean the vote was six-5, so it was pretty much an agreement there. One of their Council members had described it as crucial to support the residents' rights to make reproductive health care decisions, including abortion. Paxton had filed this suit in April, and then what he called an erroneous trial court decision in the case, that occurred and then he issued an appeal.

And so what this new development is, is that the Texas's 15th court of appeals ruled in favor of him determining that the city of San Antonio cannot use taxpayer funds for abortion related services, abortion travel. Within the court documents, it talked about that the city was aiming to fund downstream reproductive and sexual health care services. They said that it is undisputed that the services may include out of state travel for abortions and they found that it's additionally unconstitutional

and that San Antonio and the public in general will not be harmed by being required to follow the Texas Constitution. That's from the court documents there. And Paxton commented on it. He said, forcing Texas taxpayers to subsidize abortion tourism is a profound insult to our state's pro-life values and our laws protecting the unborn. We have more coverage on this from Kim Roberts. She's been following this for a while. So you can check out this piece, but also I'd encourage you to go look at Kim Roberts' coverage as well because she's this, this effort on behalf of San Antonio and Kim Paxton. Absolutely. And I encourage folks always to follow Kim Roberts coverage.

Kim Roberts has all sorts of good coverage. Great coverage. Great coverage. I always read Kim Roberts reporting. I always read Kim Roberts reporting too. Mary Elise, thank you for covering that. Um, Cameron, let's talk about a state agency that made an announcement regarding illegal students who are illegal immigrants.

Tell us about this. So this announcement, not much of an announcement, but a letter that was issued by the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board. This was a letter sent to college presidents requesting identification of students who are quote not lawfully present This comes after a federal judge struck down the Texas Stream Act Texas Stream Act For those who are unfamiliar essentially allowed in-state tuition for non-resident students

Based on some parameters that were worked into this Texas Dream Act. But there was a DOJ lawsuit that was done in coordination with some state officials that ended up repealing the Texas Dream Act. So now university presidents are going to have to attempt to identify which of these students who are not lawfully present in the country within the state who are receiving in-state tuition so they can start paying out-of-state tuition I guess. I don't know how they're gonna work this out but again many of these stories just going to be follow-up stories to it. I'll mention before we move on there was a letter that was published by a number of

House Democrat members asking for this higher education coordinating board to create a new classification for these students. With this letter, it appears they are not going to do that. So we'll update people as more information comes out. As we do. This is a story Cameron went down many rabbit holes on. So go read his coverage. Absolutely. Cameron, thank you. Let's talk Mary Elise about some campaign news. A third very high profile candidate has jumped into the race for Texas

attorney general, tell us about her. Yes. Senator Joan Huffman has announced her bid for Texas attorney general. She was somebody that had been rumored to join, so this was expected news for some folks. But she announced her candidacy for this role on Monday afternoon. She talked about her extensive experience in criminal justice, her 17 years serving in the Texas legislature. She mentioned specifically her work on the budget. She talked about in her announcement, she said, I will be elected

attorney general because I'm the best qualified, most experienced candidate who understands intricacies of every function of state government. And like you mentioned, she's a third high profile Republican candidate that has thrown their hat into the ring for this race. So she'll run against her colleague, Senator Mays Middleton, who's spoken about on this podcast before in his bid for attorney general. And then also Aaron Reitz, who was a a former Department of Justice employee with President Donald Trump's administration and then also former staffer for Paxton and Senator Ted Cruz. So stiff competition there and this race is definitely getting a little bit crowded.

She talked about how she was also an assistant district attorney in Harris County. She said the busiest office in Texas prosecuting serious felony crimes She mentioned her time as a state district court judge She said that while she was there she heard every type of felony crime including death penalty cases And then she mentioned the state's budget. She's been working on that for the past four years mentioned the state's budget, she's been working on that for the past four years. She authored a lot of Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick's priority bills during the 89th legislature, the regular session, legislative session. And one big thing that she really took the lead on was bail reform.

So while she was there during session, the legislature did approve this constitutional amendment that she proposed, which was SJR 5, and it gives judges the discretion to hold certain violent suspects without bail. And Holly Hansen has been covering that very sensibly, so definitely look at her coverage about that. Also in Huffman's announcement she said you want an experienced attorney not someone who's never seen the inside of a courtroom or is simply a young politician climbing the political ladder. Of course could be assumed she's kind of taking a shot

there at her two opponents you know saying, making a point about her time inside of the courtroom that she's a very experienced politician. She talked about how the attorney general is a lawyer for the state and then every state agency in addition. And she kind of tied that into her work with the budget saying, I know the ins and outs of every facet of state government. A more formal announcement can be expected, her office said. Reitz did respond to Huffman's announcement in a slightly humorous manner.

He said, I welcome Joan Huffman to the race for Texas AG. The liberals now have their candidate. While I agree with her that our nominee should have seen the inside of a courtroom. Her attack on me as a young politician is totally misleading. With my hairstyle, I could be at least 70." And then he said, I will not exploit for political purposes my opponents, youth and inexperience. So already they're going at it going back and forth here. And we already saw the rights is coming swings, coming out of the gate, ready to roll. So this will be super fascinating to watch it unwind.

But now we've got Senator Joan Huffman in the race. That's right. Very, um, Reagan, uh, Reitz was just copying the Reagan playbook there, right? I will not exploit my opponent's youth and inexperience is literally a quote from Reagan in a presidential debate. What was it like 80, 80 problems? I think it was probably a second 84. I think probably.

I'm not sure. I just thought Mondale. I think that was my anyway. Um, but yes, literally a direct quote there, which is pretty funny. Very interesting to watch all of this go down. And of course, um, Representative Mitch Little, uh, had an interview this week that was kind of leaving the door open for a potential run for him for attorney general. There are a lot of senators who have their eyes on this role. We have two in the race already.

Two thirds of the, of the big names in the field are Texas senators. So, um, and there are plenty that have their eye on it, but I think a lot of them have opted to run for reelection and kind of bow out of this conflict so. Yeah, much of the time with these campaigns it's all about timing. All about timing. Yeah. Amen Cameron. Well oh and Holly Hansen's coverage. Mary Lee's mentioned Holly Hansen. I also always read Holly Hansen's coverage. I got alerts on for Holly Hansen. Yeah, you gotta keep an eye on her coverage too. Kima? Kima. Never know what's happening there. Well, what happened this week? It'd been a while and here we are back talking about Kima. Never a dull moment. If you don't know what we're talking about, you should go check out Kima.

Cameron, let's talk about a civil rights group planning to launch a lawsuit against a new Texas education law. So the ACLU of Texas, they announced they are planning to launch a lawsuit against a new Texas education law. So the ACLU of Texas, they announced they are planning to launch a lawsuit challenging the recently signed parental Bill of Rights, that's SB 12. Won't get into all the nitty-gritty details of what it does, essentially revoking some of the DEI duties, addresses social transitioning, prohibiting that, the restriction of sexual orientation and gender identity, which the ACLU of Texas is taking issue with.

They announced they are planning to launch a lawsuit. It wasn't actually filed, so I wasn't able to dig into some of the arguments they were making. They just called it one of the most extreme education bans in the country Senator Creighton who was the author of SB 12 did post a response saying that he's confident SB 12 will withstand any legal challenge So we'll see what if and when the lawsuit is filed We will be able to dig in and put a follow-up story to this to see what are the arguments that are going to be presented follow-up story to this to see what are the arguments that are going to be presented in regard to the issues they take with SB 12. So we'll have some follow-up information once things start to become revealed here.

Oh, follow-up information, Cameron. I'm going to be looking for it. Mary Lee is coming to you. Senator Robert Nichols made a very big announcement this week. Give us those details. Yeah, Senator Robert Nichols announced that he'll be retiring after two decades in the Texas Legislature. So really big announcement there for his, just considering the time that he's spent there and the influence he's had, familiar face in the Texas Legislature for sure. He announced that he does intend to continue serving the people and communities of Senate District 3 until the end of his current term, but he will be retiring. He was first

elected to represent Senate District 3 in 2007. So he served through nine legislative sessions. And there are a few moments that we list in the article about some of the kind of notable moments where he strayed from party line votes. In one case, he voted against a bill that was seeking to punish companies who boycotted Israel. And then he was also the only Republican senator that voted against Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick's efforts related to restricting Democratic members' ability to break quorum. And that was in the 2021 House Quorum bus. So just some notable moments from his career there. He talked about in his announcement that he felt truly blessed to have had the honor to represent the people of both East and Southeast Texas in the legislature.

He said, by the end of my term, I will have served 20 years in the legislature and an additional eight and a half years serving the state as a transportation commissioner under both Governor George W. Bush and Governor Rick Perry." And he noted that he appreciated their trust in him. And then immediately after his announcement, nearly immediately after Nichols announcement on Tuesday. East Texas State Representative, House Representative, Trent Ashby announced that he would be running for Senate District 3 and the House District 9,

which he represents right now, does overlap with that SD3. So he launched his campaign nearly immediately. His website went live and he honored Nichols and his announcement He said for nearly two decades Senator Nichols has been a steady and respected voice for East and Southeast, Texas I talked about different ways. He's exemplified what it means to be a public servant So Nichols talked about the kind of one interesting statement he said towards the end. Just adding that he's appreciative to spend this time in public office. He said that

it's always been his goal to make things better, to stop bad things, to do it in a way that I thought was right, never forgetting who I represented and to work at it long enough but not too long," he said. It has been one of the greatest honors of my life to represent the people of East Texas and the Texas Senate. So his retirement, it's imminent, but he, you know, definitely he didn't give an exact reason for why he's retiring, right, but he did note that he wanted to make sure he didn't work at it for too long, that he never forgot who he represented, but didn't spend too much time there. So he's definitely, there will definitely be members that miss his presence. I mean, being there for 20 years, that's a big difference

for the legislature, but he is retiring. And that's that for state Senator Robert Nichols' tenure in the Texas Senate. End of an era. Absolutely. Marylis, thank you for your coverage. Campaign announcements happening all the time. Wild. And it feels like in even more of a flurry than in previous post-session summers. So not that we didn't have an impeachment and all sorts of crazy things, multiple special sessions happening last time that kind of... It was quiet last time. Yeah, so quiet last time.

Cameron, really quickly, let's talk about a story that certainly has gripped a lot of national tension. The killing of Austin Metcalf in Frisco has caused certainly a social media firestorm and there's an update this week. Yeah, I won't be able to get into all the details here. I don't do that as well in the piece. I just covered the latest update, which was the Collin County District Attorney announcing that Carmelo Anthony has been indicted on first degree murder charges. I provide his entire statement in the piece,

people want to read it there. I provide some just very broad details of the case. Like you mentioned, this has been highly scrutinized, speculated about incident, lots of national coverage, but with this, this is the first time we've written about it. I'm sure we'll be providing some updates as they come along. This is just the first time here at the Texan, we have something for people to check out. I include a lot of links if people want to click through to those and get a deeper dive into the background of this incident. I encourage you to do so. Uh, but that's the latest update. The latest update, Cameron.

Thank you. Um, okay. Well, let's move on to the Tweetery section here. Never a dull moment. Um, and Cameron, I want to, I want to start with you here because this has been something I'm not fully following, but I found out about and have been following more so. Yeah.

So walk me through what's going on with the liver King, the liver King, Brian Johnson. So there's two Brian Johnsons in this health space. If you know Brian Johnson, the liver. I thought you were going to say in this house. And I was like, okay, Brian Johnson, the liver King. And then there's Brian Johnson with a Y who's the don't die guy. I don't know who's the like the longevity you don't know about him. I know some but I don't know him. Okay the blueprint diet. No no clue. Oh my god he has a there's

I think there's a Netflix documentary on him. Was he a scammy kind of guy or is he like a health and wellness kind of? Well they're all kind of scammy. Okay got it got it got it got it. But so liver king he's a apparently he's a Texan and he traveled from his home I believe it's down in San Antonio somewhere traveled up to Austin and was arrested by Travis County law um, uh, law enforcement here in Austin, cause he was making terroristic threats against another Austinite, Joe Rogan.

I truly did not believe we were blessed with liver King's presence in Texas until this story. Um, he posted a video saying, Joe Rogan, I'm calling you out. My name's liver King, man to man. I'm picking a fight with you. Is that how he sounded when he said it to you? I don't think I've ever watched a single video by the Liver King. When the videos of him come across the timeline, I don't put the volume on.

So I'm always reading the captions, the closed captioning of what he's saying. Again, in another video he said, Joe Rogan, we don't have to make videos to pretend anymore. Oh, here's an ad popping up on the story. All of this is happening. We're coming to you. I've challenged you man to man to a fight. So so post a video of him crawling on all fours Yeah, as if everything else wasn't yikes as well, it's all yikes it's all yikes Yeah, but you know, I thought if we're talking if we're trying to be more Texas focused on our Tweeter e section. What's better than the liver king Texan coming after Rogan, the Texan being arrested, uh, by Austin police. This is a, these are incredibly viral characters.

Incredibly viral. Isn't liver king also, um, I mean, his whole, his whole shtick was that he eats, is it liver exclusively or is it just like a carnivore diet? No, it's just like a carnivore. With a lot of organ meat thrown in. Yeah. And he was like, and I look this way without any steroids, without any supplements, without any of that, and then it comes out that none of that was true.

None of that was true, yeah. And then here he is making these crazy threats. Well, this is what social media does to people. Yeah. Makes them crazy. Makes them, that's so true. To varying degrees of insanity. Yes. Some people go the way of the liver king.

Some people are just scrolling the timeline. Yeah. I hope to stay can, uh, scrolling the timeline. Yeah. Not that that doesn't make you crazy as well. Um, okay. Well, Cameron, thank you. We'll keep an eye on this.

All of this. I don't know if we'll cover this at the Texan, but on the weekly roundup. Fair game. Fair game. Mary Elise, let's come to you. Okay. Well, I'm really excited because I just found the Texas tied to this, but, um, I don't know if y'all are familiar with this song.

Well, okay. Maybe I'll explain why I'm bringing up the song before I say it. President Donald Trump was at this NATO conference and one of I forget which leader it was, but one of the one of the top guys was speaking to Trump and he described him as the daddy of NATO and that he's kind of got all of these just little nations beneath him that just look up to him. And it was kind of an awkward moment, I think, for everybody involved, but it was also pretty funny.

And later a reporter brought it up when they're asking questions of Trump and it was pretty funny to see Secretary of State Marco Rubio behind him just lost it laughing. It was also funny because he was clearly trying to hold it together. He's Secretary of State, but he had the giggles and it was just because a reporter said she was like, you know, so-and-so called you daddy and she was speaking in this accent that made it like 10 times funnier anyways, but then Trump returns from NATO meeting with NATO and the White House releases

this video to the song of hey daddy by Usher and It shows Trump, you know getting off the, a little clips from him at this conference. And it's just like so wild. This is coming from the official White House account. And you're probably wondering what the Texas tie is here. Usher, the author of this song, is from Dallas, Texas. He was born in Texas.

So that's kind of- What a stretch. Everything comes back, Texas. He was born in Texas. So that's kind of, you know, everything comes back to Texas, but that's my riveting tweetery for y'all. That was riveting. And Cameron, but Cameron did say your Texas angle was quote, a stretch. So some hate coming on over here from Cameron.

Also, since when did the tweeter need to be so Texas centric? When did that become the expectation? I thought tweeter was just like something we thought was interesting that week. Well, if we're trying to rack up points for the SEVS award. But did SEVS say that Texas was part of the prep, that prerequisite? I guess you didn't read the press release from... I thought I did. I guess you didn't read the press release from... I thought I did. I definitely did. Okay.

Okay. We'll see. We'll see week two. Oh man, maybe I dug myself a hole again. Maybe that's what's happening here. Well mine is Texas centric without even meaning to be for that purpose, but I want to talk about a couple of instances of legislative infighting, my favorite topic of conversation.

Of course, there is no love lost between former speaker, Dade Phelan and Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick. If you don't know what I'm talking about, property taxes, Concarry, the grid, memes, impeachments, impeachment costs. There's so much there in elections, primaries, money spent. Like there's, we could go on and on and on about this. Um, and of course speaker Destin Burroughs now holds the gavel, different leadership in the house.

But after the veto of SB3, um, Phelan certainly took to Twitter to let his, uh, opinion be known. I thought this was very interesting. He said a veto of SB3 was the correct call by governor Gray Abbott. The legislature should support, um, the King for Texas version, Ken King's version that we were talking about earlier, the house version, um, a reasonable regulated approach, which protects minors and avoids government overreach, another push for a total ban would maintain the undesirable status

quo. So certainly taking a moment to say, Hey, the lieutenant governor's wrong. I agree with the governor. This is my opinion. Very interesting to watch. Another moment of, um, some legislative infighting here. Um, after Senator Huffman announced that she was going to running for AG, um, representative Matt Schaefer, who's no longer part of the legislature. He retired after last session, um, made his opinion known here. Very interesting. He said the entry of Joan Huffman into the Texas AG race will energize the

second amendment community and make sure she, to make sure she doesn't win. Senator Huffman's backroom obstruction of pro second amendment bills, and overt support for second amendment restrictions will cost her many votes. Ben- Interesting. Katie- Very interesting. And this all goes back a lot of this to constitutional carry, which we have lots of coverage at the Texan about but I always think it's interesting when these Members go out and kind of make their Interpersonal

inner-chamber Gripes known. Yeah, I love it moving the private to the public. Oh bring it on. Yeah, I just love it So most of the time we're just speculating. Yes about About what's happening. Totally. You know, trying to read into things like, what do they mean by this? And you may know. You hear whispers behind the scenes about things. But when somebody enters a race that there is, where there are very prominent and public disagreements over policy and then there's the reminder, hey remember when that happened? You're like, that's right. That did happen, which is always interesting. Okay. Well, um, a little behind the scenes here at Texan. We've had a very interesting podcast set up with Mary Elise being remote. We are very hopeful that this all went well. TBD. Hopefully this is our first recording and only recording, which if it is not, then we are, well, by we, I mean, Jayden is in big trouble in terms

of editing. So we are going to go, hope that everything uploads the way it needs to. Mary-Li, she's been a trooper. And we'll talk to everybody next week. I'll be here. That's good. I'm glad because no, you won't. No, yes, you will.

On Thursday, you'll be here. No. Friday is the 4th of July. No, for Thursday, you're off. Cameron. Oh, yeah. So you actually are off. We'll talk about this. Yeah, we'll schedule. We'll schedule around. Anyways, folks, thanks for listening and we will catch you next week. Thank you to everyone for listening. If you enjoy our show, rate and review us on Apple Podcast, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts. And if you want more of our stories, subscribe to The Texan at thetexan.news. Follow us on social media for the latest in Texas politics.

And send any questions for our team to our mailbag by DMing us on Twitter or shooting us an email to editor at thetexan.news. Tune in next week for another episode of our weekly roundup. God bless you and God bless Texas.