The Texan Podcast - Weekly Roundup - March 13, 2026

Episode Date: March 13, 2026

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.Cornyn Backs Changing Filibuster to Pass SAVE America Act as Potential Trump Endorsement LoomsHere are the Primary Results for the Texas State Board of Education RacesAll Policy Propositions Pass on Texas Republican, Democratic Primary BallotsTrump Announces 'Shield of the Americas' Multinational Coalition to Eradicate Criminal CartelsDe La Cruz, Castro Weigh In on South Texas Family Released from Immigration Detainment'Trey's Law' Introduced in Congress to Null NDAs in Child Sex Abuse CasesTexas Airports Face Excessive Lines, Wait Times Amid Homeland Security ShutdownFive Texas School Districts Approve Daily Prayer Period Under New State LawTEA to Replace Fort Worth ISD Superintendent Amid State TakeoverTexas Attorney General's Office Investigates Austin ISD for Allegedly Allowing Male Student to Illegally Use Girls' Restroom

Buddy folks, it's McKenzie here with Mary Elise and Meredith on another edition of the weekly roundup. I think everyone is kind of taking, we have smaller crew this week, but I think in large part, that's due to everyone taking a little bit of time to take a deep breath after the primaries. We had a heck of a week last week. It's by far our biggest output in terms of content we publish, podcasts, you know, hours worked. It's like election weeks are always crazy. But in Texas, it's really the primaries that, you know, are the big dogs. here in the state. So ladies, how are we doing? Meredith, that was your first primary election

that you've covered. Walk us through how you're doing post-primary. Well, it was very interesting, like we talked about last time, I found it very exciting. And then it's just crazy once you're immersed in something, how much it, how important or interesting is to you and the things all a sudden that you're interested, like hearing and was Trump going to make an endorsement on something or whatever you're waiting for. And looking around and realizing maybe not, everybody else is super interested in, but you're like dialed in. But I will say that the Senate ongoing like discussion about that primary has actually reached other parts. I've been traveling a little bit. I've been in a few states last few weeks and Washington, Oregon and in Colorado

visiting friends and family. And I've been asked about it in every place somehow, oh, you're doing politics. Oh, you're in Texas. Oh, is it like whether it's Jasmine Crockett or New York or Paxton, like those those are making national like and these aren't, not everybody's super into politics, but it has come up in some discussions, which kind of makes me laugh. And it is interesting how people are interested in what's going on in Texas. Oh, yeah. I remember when I, before I moved here, I remember hearing about this lady named Connie Burton and like following her story on Twitter and her race and, you know, fast forward all these years later and, you know, here she is. Here I am working together. It's wild. But yeah, Texas is is a big stage in that regard. And I think

draw a lot of attention from folks, regardless of whether they live here or not. But it's easy to get addicted to the Texas political cycle and get into it and want to know the next big story, want to know what's going to happen and how things will wrap up. So I love hearing that. Marylees, how are you doing? I'm doing well, like Meredith is saying, it's easy to get kind of addicted to all the details and you go out in the real world and you talk to people and realize that their focus is less on some of the things that you've been paying attention to.

But it is true that the Senate race has been grabbing a lot of attention, I think, of just average Texans. I was talking to somebody the other day who definitely is not involved in politics and has no idea that there's a Texas Agriculture Commissioner race, which I don't think most folks do, just your average Texan perhaps. But they were asking about James Talariko and they were saying, oh, I've been seeing so many ads about how he's a Christian with this kind of progressive take. on Christianity and we're asking these different questions about him. And it was very interesting to

see because, you know, of course, we have been watching these candidates so closely. And we've been anticipating the different punches that are going to be thrown at them by the opposing party. And then it's very interesting to see kind of all that campaigning, all the different media that's gone out, like playing out in the real world and seeing how, you know, average folks are receiving it, etc. But of course, the US inter-aise, we have been waiting for this endorsement from President Donald Trump. We've had this piece in the queue for quite a while. How many days are released now? Have you, has it been six? Like, oh, no, it's been a week. It's in a week that this piece has just been sitting. Yeah, I think so. And President Donald

Trump and I have very different understandings of the word soon. I'm coming to realize. Oh, that's so good. So I don't think I'm refreshing truth social quite as often as I was in a couple of days leading it up following his announcement. But I'm still watching my phone pretty closely for that endorsement, as is a lot of the political world. But I think there's been a couple of developments that have kind of pushed off potentially his endorsement or that might be affecting it. I think that's in the first story that we'll be getting to. But yeah, just kind of sitting around waiting for that endorsement. because it really is going to change things because, like we said, he's planning to, he's planning

to endorse and then ask the other Republican candidate to drop out. So that'll, of course, really shake things up once it comes down to it, whenever that is, whenever soon is. I wonder because it was pretty clear when the initial announcement came from the president that that was his aim to endorse somebody and ask the other to drop out. It was pretty apparent that a lot of negotiating was happening behind the scenes, like as we were speaking with all of the different posturing from the candidates and the Trump, or the, you know, the Trump apparatus saying a bunch of different things. So it was clear kind of what was, there was a lot of conversation happening behind closed doors between some of those parties. It seems to have quieted down.

Now, of course, there are so many things happening, you know, that the executive has to take care of the country. Of course, we have a lot going on. But it still is interesting to see it kind of, it hasn't, it's cooled off slightly. It's still obviously in the news and it's still happening, or it's literally just this looming endorsement that will create an entirely different environment for a runoff like this. But it's really like it's it's wild. You saying President Trump and I have different definitions of the word soon as going in the newsletter. That's going in the newsletter. I already sent it to slack. It's my accomplishment of the week. Yeah. Well, let's go ahead and talk about that then because what's the latest update on where this endorsements? It's of course we

hear from Senator Cornyn who's being challenged by Attorney General Ken Paxton. And there's a piece of legislation that's kind of at the center of a lot of the conversation now about whether this endorsement will come down and who it will come down for. Right. Yeah, this legislation is the Save America Act, and we've talked about it several times because it's been in the works in Congress for quite a while. It's passed the House more than once, but hasn't ever gotten through the Senate. It's an election integrity-related bill. It's intended to prevent non-citizens from voting and federal elections, so requiring proof of citizenship to vote in elections.

And so this has been really at the center of the conversation involving this endorsement of President Donald Trump. So we'll rewind a little bit to the day after the primary. Trump came out with a truth social post and he said that he would be endorsing in the U.S. Senate race and that he would be asking the odd man out, the man that he didn't endorse to drop out of the race. Of course, that just lit the online political roll off fire. Paxton was interviewed on a radio show and was asked about this. You know, in the case that Cornyn is endorsed by President Donald Trump, would you consider dropping out? And Paxton initially said he wouldn't drop out if it came to Cornyn endorsement from Trump. I said he owes it to the people of Texas to remain in the runoff in the bid for U.S. Senate.

Shortly after that, a political story came out in which they spoke to Trump. And they told him, they reflected Paxton's words to Trump, and he said, quote, well, that's bad for him to say. And so, of course, he had some strong feelings about Paxton's response there to saying that he wouldn't be dropping out even if Trump requested that. Then Paxton came out with a new statement on the matter, which we covered at the Texan.com. He said he vowed that he would consider to dropping out of the race in the case that Trump endorses Cornyn. if the Senate leadership agrees to lift the filibuster and pass the Save America Act. So the filibuster has really been in the spotlight through this whole conversation surrounding passing the Save America Act and also this endorsement.

So Trump has just reiterated his desire to see the Save America Act. Past, he posts about it almost every day, encouraging Congress to get this across the line, get this passed. He's also indicated desire to see include a provision for banning gender modification procedures on minors. So this is really important for Trump. And after, you know, a lot of different thoughts came out after Paxton gave the statement and said that he would consider dropping out. And then some are wondering if that is delaying the endorsement and if that was perhaps a pretty good move on the part of Paxton because it really, probably appealed to Trump on the sense of kind of offering up his race.

The appearance that he gave is offering up his race for the good of passing the Save America Act from Trump's perception. Then Cornyn has been getting a lot of attention for, you know, his rule in the scent. Of course, he has a much more hands-on rule here. He's in the upper chamber as an elected official. So a lot of folks have been asking Cornyn if he's changed his mind about the filibuster, changing it because he's consistently held that he didn't think that changing it would be beneficial. Well, he came out with an op-ed on Wednesday morning, and he explained that he's changing course

on his previous approach to ending the filibuster, which was a negative one. He said, quote, for many years, I believe that if the U.S. Senate scrapped the filibuster, Texas and our nation would stand to lose more than we would gain. But when the reality on the ground changes, leaders must take start. and adapt. Senate majority leader, John Thune, his face, excuse me, increasing pressure from members, several different members, to either nuke the Senate filibuster, which requires 60 votes to defeat because there's only 53 Republicans in the chamber or to instill a talking filibuster. And Cornyn said in his op-head, after careful consideration, I support whatever

changes to Senate rules that may prove necessary for us to get the same American. Act and Homeland Security funding pass the Democrats' obstruction through the Senate and on the president's desk for his signature. Then he offered, suggested, you know, this could be a talking filbuster that removes, he said, the obstructionist free pass and makes them defend their indefensible views on the Senate floor, or it could be a different reform that kind of left it open. The other cities open, whatever changes aren't necessary. And Baxon, of course, responded to Cornyn through an ex post. A two have been in. jockeying a lot online, clipping back at each other through a lot of different ex posts or the past

couple days. Paxson said, John Cornyn did exactly what I predicted. In one week, I've made him more conservative than in the past 24 years. He said, the historic flip-flops, great and all, but why aren't you calling out your buddies like McConnell opposing the bill? Tell the American people who's opposing this. I will note that in the op-ed, Cornyn did call on, quote, the remaining handful of his Republican colleagues, quote, still holding on to that old position that I used to share to reassess the new reality and update their thinking. So we did call on his colleagues who might still hold that position that Cornyn has held for a while about not changing the filibuster. He's encouraging them to reconsider for the sake of passing this election integrity bill. We also covered that

there is a plan to bring the legislation to the U.S. Senate for next week without the talking filibuster because Senate majority leadership doesn't believe that there's enough votes to get it accomplished. Otherwise, like we said, we're just waiting for this endorsement, but of course it looks like it's going to be directly impacted by the success of the Save America Act. You know, we can't say whether this endorsement will come out before. The Save America Act is voted on or after. But as of now, you know, Cornyn has reversed course, and he's saying, that he'll support changes that may be necessary, and we'll see, you know, if any of his colleagues will follow him behind in that, support him in that, colleagues who may have held a similar

position to what he was holding before. And of course, there's a lot of analysis around this, around whether Paxton's move is going to maybe make Trump more prone to endorse him for U.S. Senate, or if, you know, Cornyn having a direct hand here saying he supports changes to the filibuster, how that's going to kind of impact his U.S. Senate adornments. Of course, we'll be watching this closely. We'll see what happens to the Save America Act. It's going to be wild. Well, Mary Lee, thank you.

And it always is interesting to see how a piece of legislation can, becomes the pawn for something like this. And sometimes it does, obviously everyone is kind of posturing in support of this piece of legislation. But sometimes it means that it is also going to meet its end in some way. And so we'll see what happens, but this is going to be very interesting to watch. So Mary Leasings for covering it for us. Okay, Meredith Phillips come to you. Let's talk about a little bit of primary news that we did not talk about it as extensively last week, but these races are very important.

The State Board of Education was a huge role in how education is carried out in the state of Texas. Walk us through the results in these races. Yeah, so there were eight out of the 15 seats for the State Board of Education up in for election this year. I'm not going to go through every one of them if you want to see the exact for each Democrat and Republican side for each of the districts. You can definitely go check our coverage out. I'm just going to kind of go through a couple of highlights that happened that stood out a little bit and focusing on like which where it leaned on the Texas partisan index Democrat or Republican. So District two, which is South Texas in the Gulf Coast, we saw Victoria Hinajisa

solidly get the Republican nominee with 59% in the GOP primary to defeat an incumbent, LJ Francis, who was only able to secure 14% of the vote. She was endorsed by Abbott and Hinajisa is, her husband is state Senator Adam Henehasa. And District 5 in Central Texas and Travis County, Austin area, it's a Democrat-leaning district. We saw that a former teacher, Allison Bush, led a six-kandidator. race. It was very heavy, heavy race there. She got 36% of the vote, so she is going to go into a runoff with former educator, Stephanie Limon Bazelin, who received the second highest amount with 21%. There are a few races that were just solidly over 65%. And those would be District 6th in East

Texas and northern Houston suburbs. And the Republican primary Conroe ISD trustee, Tiffany Nelson, had 65% of the vote. So she solidly secured that nomination. District 8, East Texas parts of Greater Houston region. An Abbott endorsed incumbent Audrey Young got 69% of the vote. And then in District 13, we see that Democratic incumbent Tiffany Clark got 71% of the vote. So these were just solid nominations that are headed to the November election. And then we also did see Julie Pickering and incumbent. She ran unopposed in the Southeast Texas area. And then another candidate who has a spouse that is in the Texas. Texas legislature was Mindy Bumgarner, who is the wife of state rep Ben Bumgarner from the

Flower Mound area, ran unopposed. So she's also headed towards that November election as well. So full coverage is on the Texan, nothing. There wasn't any flipped districts or anything crazy. A lot of the, like, what the layout of the board looks like is still remaining the same. So that's what happened in the primaries. Absolutely. Go read NERDIS coverage. And she has great insight on all of that. And quickly, Meredith, too, like, I want just you to run through quickly, like the State Board of Education's role in some of this and plug your newsletter while you're at it, too, because you talk about that in your newsletter. Yeah, good question.

So State Board of Education is one of, is a governing body that deals with educational issues. We have the Texas Education Agency. We also have the legislature, which discusses and makes policy and is also talking a lot about education as well. So my last news, um, news, news, newsletter report card. It's called on the board and I talk about, you know, what does the state board of education do? And so one of their main responsibilities is curriculum standards. They are in charge of making what is called the Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills or Teaks as they're referred to. And they're choosing what kids are learning in the classroom. And so I have some links in there and a Teeks guide that you can, if you're interested in that, getting into the nitty gritty with that,

you can kind of go see like, what is a third grader in Texas supposed to be learning and reading? and some of them are very easy to understand. Some of them have a little bit more lingo that's academic. But that's the big chunk of what they do. And we're going over some reading lists and vocabulary lists. That's kind of a contentious thing on the board of like, should they be saying, should they be deciding that every student in the state is reading this? Or should that be local control?

That's a big discussion right now. They also oversee the Texas Permanent School Fund, which our editor Rob had a great newsletter that I linked in as well with some of the history of how that started and where that came from. They review charter schools. They appoint board members to like military reservations. They just have some interesting responsibilities as well. And then they do some stuff with certification as well. So I kind of lay out in there.

This is what they do. This is what the T.A does. And this is the legislature. So yeah, go check that out. All right. Subscribe to the Texan. Go read all about it. Meredith, thank you. Okay, I'm going to quickly cover a story from our very own Hannah Brewer,

walking through the propositions that were on the ballot in both the Democratic primary and the Republican primary. So let's talk through the ones that didn't receive. And most of these propositions are on the ballot. These basically are referendums on where the party stands. So these are folks who are, you know, are involved enough in their political process to go and vote in their party's primary. And the party puts forward some ballot propositions to kind of test where their electorate is in the primary. So there were, you know, over a dozen propositions on both ballots. Let's walk through the ones that did not get the 90 plus percent support that we saw most of them get. This is, you know, these are usually items that are pretty popular among primary voters for their respective parties.

So on the GOP side, Proposition 3 said that Texas should prohibit denial of health care for any medical service based solely on the patient's vaccination status. Only 73% voted yes. So still a huge show of support for that, but it was the lesser supported proposition on the ballot for Republicans to choose from. Proposition 9, the Republican-controlled Texas legislature should stop awarding leadership positions, including committee and subcommittee chairmanship and vice chairmanship to Democrats. About 79% of the primary voters supported that proposition. Now, this is something that we've seen time and time again come to the forefront of the rules discussion at the beginning of each legislative session where, you know, in leadership to kind of weigh whether or not to allow Democrats to be involved in leadership

processes. They were previously allowed to be committee chairman, like actual chairman of committees, and now that kind of has swapped where there are different rules and vice chairmanship are where a lot of that is allowed or chairmanship of subcommittees. So interesting to watch all that go through. But, you know, that was one that was still heavily supported by Republicans, but a little bit less than some of the others. Proposition 4, where these are, you know, In order of how much they were supported or not supported, Texas should require its public schools to teach that life begins at fertilization. 85% supported that proposition. And Prop 1, Texas property taxes should be assessed at the purchase price and phased out entirely over the next six years through spending reductions.

And 88% supported that proposition. An interesting proposal. And of course, property taxes always been that the legislature is discussing, addressing, talking about in election cycles or legislative sessions, whatever. portion of the two-year political cycle we are in in Texas, property taxes are going to be talked about. And they still poll is one of the top two most cared about issues among the Texas electorate. For Democratic propositions, Prop 8, there's only one that kind of underperformed with the others. All the others were 90 plus percent support. This one was not. Prop 8, Texas should legalize cannabis for adults and automatically expunge criminal records for past

low-level cannabis offenses, 80% supported that. So still, again, big show of support, but interesting to see where there were some weak points for each party and, you know, showing where their elector it is going into November. You know, if you see a ballot prop in November, it's not a ballot prop, it's a totally different thing, and it really actually does carry a lot more weight in terms of how that's voted on. These are simply just a show of where the party's at, almost like a poll of folks who actually come to the ballot that allow for these parties to, um, advocate for legislation, you know, go back to in convention time, which we're not far away from, and ensure their platform is kind of in line with the priorities of the voters.

So that's the aim of some of these. And I encourage folks to go read Hannah's piece detailing all of these. It's very interesting to watch kind of, you know, the breakdown of where the support was. So go read Hannah's coverage. Mary Least for coming back to you. Let's talk about the president. He established a new coalition focused on targeting criminal cartels. else. Give us the details.

Yeah, so this new military coalition was established by President Donald Trump just a couple of days ago. It's between 17 countries and is dedicated specifically to eradicating criminal cartels. Now, this comes two weeks after a top drug lord was killed in Mexico by the Mexican military, but aided with U.S. intelligence. And then there's this whole wave of cartel violence that was issued in mercil. response. So Trump's proclamation is, uh, was announcing the new, it's called America's counter cartel coalition, but it's also known as shorter, easier to say, shield of Americas. So he announced it on Saturday morning when he's in Miami with a couple different leaders of these countries.

And he described at the heart of this 17 country pledge is quote, a commitment to using lethal military force to destroy the sinister cartels and terrorist networks. And so the leader of this special envoy for the Shield of the Americas will be Christenome. This follows her removal from the United States Department of Homeland Security. She was formerly the secretary of the DHS. And so now she's been appointed as special envoy for the Shield of the Americas. And then United States Senator Mark Wayne Mullen from Oklahoma, he was nominated as a new DHS Secretary to take Nome's place.

Trump said criminal cartels and foreign terrorist organizations in the Western hemisphere should be demolished to the fullest extent possible, consistent with applicable law. One of the first things that Trump did, and he did quite a few things on the very first day when he was elected president, he signed several orders. I remember that day, it was like several, many things related to immigration, border, which makes sense if you first stay in an office. I'm sure you come in with a lot of different things that you've been prepared to change for quite a while. But that aside, he assigned an executive order cracking down on criminal cartels and designating them as foreign terrorist organizations

or especially designated global terrorists. And so allowing different resources for that classification to be poured into countering criminal cartel activity. He described it as cracking down on the organization. quote campaign of violence and terror throughout the Western Hemisphere. The second point in this proclamation says that proclaims that the United States and its allies should coordinate to deprive these organizations referring to criminal cartels of any control of territory and access to financing or resources necessary to conduct their campaigns of violence. Then he talked about how the United States will both be training and mobilizing partner nation

militaries in order to create an environment that produces the most effective fighting force necessary to dismantle cartels and their ability to export violence and pursue influence through organized, excuse me, intimidation. And then his final point was talking about the responsibility of all the allies within this military coalition to, quote, keep external threats at bay, including the line of foreign influences from outside the Western Hemisphere. And so since Trump, issued that executive order back on January 20th. We've seen quite a number of alleged cartel members and their affiliates that have been detained or deported both by ICE, the United States, immigration and customs enforcement. We've seen a lot of that in Texas, of course,

with Texas being located where it is. This included a captured, suspected Seniloa cartel boss in early November, which we covered. And he was captured in Juarez, Mexico, but that involved U.S. assistance, Mexico assistance. And there was also an operation, well, I mentioned this a little bit earlier when I began the segment, but an operation was conducted by the Mexican military on February 22nd that took out that top drug lord in Mexico that I mentioned. He is known as El Muncho. And so then in response, like I said, the cartels began to,

to commit all sorts of crimes. They began to set fire to vehicles in buildings, including one that went particularly viral online was a Costco grocery store. They also blocked several roadways, which actually triggered increased security in Texas. Governor Abbott came out and said, okay, we're going to put some extra security resources

to responding to this, since it's so close to us that this cartel activity is happening and since their leader was just taken out. And there was also a shot, shelter in place warnings issued by the United States Embassy. So while Trump was speaking to several political leaders in Florida talking about this coalition, he said, we'll get rid of them. We need your help referring to criminal cartels.

This included some of the leaders that were there, not all 17 were there, but some of the leaders that were there included leaders from Argentina, El Salvador, Costa Rica, Bolivia, Panama, the Dominican Republican. excuse me, Dominican Republic. And so there are four countries remaining that have not been confirmed if they're participating in which ones specifically are participating in this coalition. But I'm sure that that will be really soon. And Trump also brought up when he was speaking with these leaders.

He brought up the war with Iran that's going on right now. He talked about the U.S. is, quote, amazing weaponry and kind of referencing that and how it will be applied with this military coalition and targeting the cartels. Yeah, you just spoke a little bit about Operation Epic Fury, which began in late February. That, of course, is still ongoing. And we've seen seven U.S. military members that have been killed as a result of this operation. And there's more numbers coming out about more military members that have been severely injured. But so we'll see where this coalition decides to take action first.

But right now they're kind of establishing this partnership with 17 countries, including the U.S., and they'll have Christy Noem at the front leading them. So we'll see where they take this. Absolutely. Mary Lees, thank you for your coverage. I'm going to cover another Hannah story here. This is an interesting one where we kind of see Republicans and Democrats, both on the same side of, you know,

an issue involving ICE and still sparring. So let's walk through this. This all starts with Congresswoman Monica Dela Cruz announcing on March 9th earlier this week about the release of Antonio Gomez. He's an 18-year-old from ICE detention center. And then shortly thereafter, Congressman Joaquin Castro announced the release of the other family members. These are McCallan residents, now McCallan residents who are said to have entered the country as asylum seekers.

They did enter illegally and were detained after a routine check-in appointment with ICE. The case through national attention from a lot of lawmakers around the country for both parties, And these are, you know, specifically because these boys are, you know, 12, 14, and 18. And they're reportedly Mariachi band members who were invited by Monica Della Cruz to play on Capitol Hill last year. So a direct connection to the Congresswoman's office. They entered illegally near Brownsville. Monica Zillacruz, you know, was, you know, waiting for the release of these, you know, these residents and definitely calling for their release. She was joined by the Republican McAllen mayor who said, once again, call me.

a rhino, not Republican enough, Democrat, or whatever you want. One thing you cannot call me is heartless. Will I support ICE and understand they have a job to do? I cannot accept some current enforcement policies. Congressman Castro also stated on X, you know, he did Democrat. The entire Gomez-Qaeda family did everything the right way. They applied and were granted asylum. They attended every court date and immigration check in and said, you know, calling out again, Monica Dill-Cruz, we see some inter-party or inter-party fighting here. Where is there, Congress, woman now. How are they good enough, safe enough, and excellent enough to perform at the Capitol and visit the White House, but still deserve to be locked up at Dilley?

Monica Gil-Cruz responded to this in the statement after she announced that the family was released. She kind of took aim back at Castro and other Democrats who were criticizing her throughout this process and said, while some were busy politicizing this family's situation, I was busy solving it. Today, as a reminder of why effective representation, in Washington matters. South Saxons deserve both a secure border and common sense policies, and I will always fight for both. So interesting to watch, you know, we've seen over and over again the politicization of the detainment of some of these folks who are coming into the country illegally. And of course, at a certain point, you know, folks either are kind of multiple ways to go about

this. You have asylum seekers who end up, you know, residing here illegally, but who entered initially illegally. And you have folks who remain here illegally. And that, It can be a fault line for Republican support for something along these lines. So we'll keep an eye on it and continue to watch. But interesting, nonetheless, to watch the South Texas communities rally around to this family. So go read Hannah's story and check that out at the texan.com. Mary Elise, let's talk to you about some more congressional news, legislation relating to certain abusive children has been introduced at the federal level.

And we saw a very similar bill pass in Texas. Walk us through it. Yeah, so this is legislation, like you said, we saw pass in Texas during the last legislative session. And so this is a bill that bans and voids the use of nondisclosure agreements in cases involving the sexual abuse of a child. So it's now been introduced at the federal level by Senator Ted Cruz. And so this, a similar version of this law made its way successfully through the Texas

legislature in 2025. It passed both chambers unanimously. So I can tell you a little bit about the contents of the bill. So the federal legislation, as was the Texas legislation, is known as Trey's law. The federal version, that stands for terminating restrictive enforcement of youth settlements. It's named after Trey Carlock, who's a Dallas man who died by suicide in 2019, after he settled a civil lawsuit that included an NDA against Kanak Camps, which is a global network of Christian camps based in Missouri, where he was allegedly sexually abused as a child. So the Texas legislation that is very similar to this, Trey's law,

was under Senate Bill 835. It was authored by state senator Angela Paxton. And then Governor Greg Abbott signed into law in early July. And Abbott had really praised the legislation and said it would allow survivors to, quote, speak out and seek justice free from fear and restriction. So Trey's sister, Elizabeth Carlock Phillips, has had a very active rule in both getting this legislation passed in Texas in other states and in having it be introduced at the federal level. We saw her speaking at press conferences alongside Cruz as he's introducing this. and then she was at several different committee hearings for this legislation in Texas, just sharing her brother's story, and of course coming from a very unique position,

being his sister and being able to describe the distress that he experienced and sharing different conversations she had with him, and just kind of this perspective of how this NDA involving the abuse really affected him mentally. So in a joint press release on March 3rd, Tracey, sister said, for decades, survivors of child sexual abuse have suffered in the shadows due to the misuse of NDAs and civil settlement agreements, terrified that sharing their story would lead to a lawsuit or other repercussions. And she said that the passage of this bill, if it passes, will say to every survivor currently living under a gag order. Your voice is yours again. You're free to speak about

what happened to you and what you have to say matters. And so within this legislation, this bill that's being considered at the congressional level, it says that enforcement of NDAs in these situations, these horrible situations of child sexual abuse, they said these NDAs interfere with reporting of activity to the various law enforcement agencies that would be reported to and then frustrates the enforcement of both federal and civil statutes. And then it said that it infringes upon victims key constitutional rights, including, quote, due process. of law, equal protection of laws, and then meaningful access to courts. Cruz said that we owe it to trade to ensure that the victims have the right to speak about

their experiences and that contracts are not used to silent survivors. He's been joined by a bipartisan group of co-sponsors in the U.S. Senate, so kind of a similar bipartisan effort here that we saw in the Texas legislature. He's joined by three different Democrats initially, who's, signed on co-sponsored. We saw Senator John Cornyn this morning announced that he is now co-sponsor of Trace Law in the Senate as well. We just talked about. He's grateful to his colleagues for joining him in this bill, and he's expecting to see it advanced expeditiously. It has been referred to the U.S. Senate Committee on Judiciary. We'll see where this winds up. If it's anything

like it was when it was in the Texas legislature, it'll face some pressure from different lobbyists, there will be some pressure behind the scenes. But my guess would be that for the most part, it'll have bipartisan support. Perhaps there will be a few tweaks or changes that don't need to be made to the bill. But like we saw in Texas, it had support from all members, you know, considering the contents of this bill, wound out to be a bipartisan issue. But it also did, and the Texas legislature faced some pressure from different lobbyists, different groups. So I'm sure it'll face similar pressure in Washington, D.C. There's always a fair amount of lobbyists involved in the creating of different bills.

But we'll see how Democrats and Republicans are able to kind of rally around this bill. We'll see if it winds up passing unanimously. Absolutely. Marylea, thank you. And go read our coverage of when it passed the legislature here in Texas as well. So interesting to watch and you can compare the contents of the bill. and Mary Lisa has a great job of laying all of that out. Mary Lisa, thank you. Meredith, coming to you here. Let's talk about this. It's been a saga. There's been headlines all week. It's a lot of back and forth, ping ponging between state leaders talking about Corpus Christi and Water There. What's going on?

Okay, so this is, there's a lot of background here, and it's included in the article. There's a lot of links to previous articles from the text and that kind of give you the timeline of what's happened. So, But it started from this week, this article where Governor Greg Abbott sharply criticizes the city of Corpus Christi for the way that they're handling this water crisis and has very harsh words and even warns about potential state intervention if they don't resolve this issue in a timely manner. So just a little bit of background, South Texas has attracted a ton of investment over the past decade. It's been reported like more than $57 billion in investment of some sort. And then we also know that the port of Corpus Christi's annual revenue increased by about 100 million between 2015 and 2023. So it's a huge booming area. Major companies such as Tesla and even recently ExxonMobil have expanded their operations in this area.

And they're drawn because of tax incentives and the energy pipeline infrastructure and this historically abundant water supply, which is dwindling and it's drying up. And so that's become this ongoing issue. So it's very strained. and they're currently at a stage three, what they call urgent drought status. And so it's interesting to read on their website what you're allowed and not allowed to do if you live in that region. And they have limits on when you can wash your car and how much you can use to wash your car or water plants or just different things that are allowed and not allowed. You can have a pool and you can have water in it, but you have to have a cover on it. And there's just a lot of really strict things going on there.

And they have two of their main reservoirs, the Choke Canyon Reservoir and the Lake Rue. Lake Corpus Christi. Their storage levels, they say, are at 8.7% as of March 10th. So it is getting shockingly low. So Abbott was at a campaign rally March 10th and he partially criticizes the way they've handled it. His direct quote was that he says, we've been actively involved in going back a long time. We provided them being the city, the state providing the city, with 750 million, three quarters of a billion dollars in funding for them to address their water problem. And then he gets more heated. You know what they did?

They squandered it and then they changed their plan and they were indecisive about what to do. So this dispute is about a proposed, like where he gets that figure of $750 million is about this proposed seawater desalination plant. There's a few of them, but there's one in particular that the city of Corpus Christi received initially in 2020, $222 million in financing from the state water implementation Fund for Texas, so Swift through the Texas Water Development Board. And then 2024, they received another 535 million. So that's where he gets that number from for Swift financing for what they call the Inner Harbor seawater desalination treatment plant. So Corpus Christi, the city council,

ends up in last September voting to terminate and end this proposed desalination project. They say that it was getting too expensive, that what it has started at, it was just ballooning to a larger price tag for the city. That meeting, I do have a link to that meeting. We reported on it. It was very contentious and actually ended in multiple arrests. So that was very, a lot of attention there. So very contentious all around over the years. And so one of the city council members at that time in September said that she received a call from Robert Black, who is the governor's chief of staff saying urging her to vote for this project, telling her to be a leader and vote yes on desalination. And saying that if she didn't support that or the city doesn't support it, they wouldn't receive

any future state funding, which she felt was wrong. And she considered to be a, she said, a threat to the people of Corpus Christi. So they vote to terminate and they don't move forward with that project. And so the city is putting out their own press releases. They put one out this last week on March 9th, responding to a news article that claimed they were running out of water and just claiming that is, their quote is, that is untrue. And they say that the coverage focused heavily on the potential catastrophe while omitting the cities, they said, nearly one billion investment in diversified drought-proof water infrastructure. So Abbott ends his warning with just, he says, we can only give them a little time before the state of Texas has to take over and micromanage that city and run that city

to make sure that every resident who goes to the water tap and turns it on, that they're going to be getting water out of their faucet, not because of what local leaders are doing, but because of what the state of Texas will do. So whether the state ends up stepping in or the city is able to resolve this on their own, Corpus Christi, it's a major issue. I've seen it when I was covering House District candidates that were running from that area. That was one of their top priorities that they wanted people to know

is that they really cared about the water in that area. So we'll see state, local, if they can work this out together or not. Always interesting to watch the state and locals kind of go at it in this way. So, Mary, thank you so much for covering that for us. Mary Lease, let's come back to you here. Let's talk about, you know, this lack of DHS funding that we've seen in the news over and over again. We talked about it multiple times, but it's starting to hit close to home here. Give us the latest on how airports specifically are managing the situation.

I care deeply about us. I'm flying this weekend. So what do I need to know? Well, I don't have the best news for you then. We can see, to be honest. Texas or airports are definitely struggling, particularly those in Houston, Hobby Airport in particular, has been facing very lengthy lines. So, of course, we've got spring rate going on.

So that over the weekend, that was a big part of the reason there was such a big influx in flyers, as well as, you know, we've got the Houston rodeo going on that usually brings in a fair amount of travelers. But the big thing here is that the DHS has been partially shut down since for the past, I think today would be day 27. So that means that TSA workers are going on day 27 without paychecks. So some of them are not showing up to work and airports are facing TSA worker shortages, staffing shortages, which of course is going to make the lines become much longer going to try to get folks through security screening, et cetera. On Sunday, the Hobby Airport in Houston advised passengers to arrive four to five hours early for their flights and then said

that you need to be prepared to wait for over 180 minutes for TSA screening. And of course, the lack of staffing was already happening, but it just became so much more evident with this specific time of the year. It just has a lot of crazy travel going on, especially Houston. And then in response to what they called excessive wait times, the Houston airport system went ahead and requested assistance from the TSA National Deployment Office. And so their role is essentially to help in situations such as this, to help airports are experiencing severe staffing shortages or an emergency or special circumstances that happen during peak travel times, help the airports manage that. And then since they received help from the national deployment officers,

Hoppy did update its advisory on Tuesday. So it does look like things are improving. On Tuesday, to reflect that customers should arrive three hours early for domestic flights and then four hours early for international flights. And then they didn't give an estimated time on TSA screening wait times. So this partial government shutdown did begin on February 13th. But as you're saying, it's just now kind of starting to affect the lives of average Americans. You show up to the airport, ready to get to where you're going, and you find out, oh, wow, I'm going to be in line for several hours.

I might miss my flight. This is anecdotal, but I had a relative flying to Hobby Airport the other day, and she met several people who were just walking out the doors, and they told her, you know, we've been waiting in line for security for so long that we've missed our flight, and we're essentially given up, we're going home. So that was pretty wild. That's the last thing you want to happen at the airport, especially if you're headed to your spring break travels. So what's going on here in Washington, D.C. is that we've got the Democratic members who are demanding that certain forms be made to ICE

to the Immigration and Customs Enforcement before DHS is fully funded. Some of them are requesting the ICE to not be funded at all. And of course, Republicans are refusing to accept this, and they just haven't been able to negotiate on this. to be able to come up with a funding package for DHS. And they are, this comes after, you know, this call for ICE reform comes after ice agents shot and killed two civilians in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Those were individuals who were engaged in protesting ICE illegal alien deportation efforts.

So Democrats are looking at this and saying, okay, we need to have some reforms. And some are saying that we need to just abolish ICE overall. So, yeah, the two parties are essentially continuing to. point fingers at each other, which is usually the problem when we don't have funding here is that the party's messaging afterwards becomes, you know, look, this is, this is a party that's causing this. They aren't willing to negotiate on this. This is their problem. We've seen, for example, National Republican Senatorial Committee said, stuck waiting in an hours-long TSA line, flight to later canceled, thank a Democrat for refusing to fund DHS. This kind of gives you the

idea of what the messaging has looked like from really both parties. as average civilians begin to feel the effects of this lack of funding. Lots of different lawmakers have weighed in on this, of course, Republicans, such as Senator John Cornyn is saying, you know, spring break travel is spiking, damaging weather events are more likely, and terroristic threats are on the rise. He said it's shameful that Democrats put Americans in his position once again to appease their progressive base, and then he urged them to stop the, quote, charade in advance this critical funding. And we saw Democratic Representative Veronica Escobar saying that she supports funding,

the TSA, FEMA, and then other agencies in DHS. But she said she cannot in good conscience to support additional money for ICE and Border Patrol, especially when the Trump administration has refused to answer our questions. And she said seems committed to furthering the fraud, corruption, lawlessness, and constitutional violations we've already seen on their watch. So it gives you a good idea of what Democrats approach to this is right now. They are set, excuse me, they did take a vote on DHS funding on Tuesday afternoon, but as was the sign written on the wall was that it was not going to pass when we saw it didn't pass because there was no legitimate negotiations happening.

It didn't look like they were anywhere close to coming to an agreement. United States Department of Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy weighed in on this. He said it's outrageous. TSA agents need to be paid for the hard work they do to keep us safe. So, of course, just the finger pointing. They're going after one another, but there's been no real resolution. Something I just ran across this morning was that an airport in another state had actually set up a program for flyers to gift cards to TSA agents so that they could pay for gas and basic groceries.

So TSA agents are really feeling this shutdown. So we'll see if this becomes a big enough impact that the Republicans and Democrats finally come together and are able to pass a funding package. But as of now, we don't have one. Absolutely. Okay, well, this just tells me I need to get to the airport in advance. Way in advance. I'm ready. Meredith, I know you're thinking the same thing.

We just got to get to the airport at the right time, stand in line, do or do diligence. My husband and out, we have TSA, like we have pre-check. we have clear, but I don't think that that will negate the issue at all. So doesn't sound like it. Good luck to anyone traveling. Mary Lee's, thank you for keeping us posted. Meredith, let's come. Oh, yeah, go ahead.

Pay attention at the airport because this is a funny story. I get at the airport so early, which I can do earlier. That's fine. But I'm like so into that. And last week, I completely missed a flight because I had my headphones in and I had told myself the wrong time in my mind. And I was just, oh, no. Getting stuff done.

and so in the zone and I had a crop milk food and had a coffee and I was a few dates away and completely missed a flight. So even if you could get to that airport early, I still need to I still got a focus. It was during the middle of a workday and Meredith was like, okay, guys, going to get into my gate. You know, she was messaging us and we go, okay, great. Like 30 minutes later, she's like, well, I just like missed my flight. We were like, how is that possible when you were so ahead of schedule and you were getting to your gate? But it happened. I think if you travel enough to you just kind of give yourself. more grace than you should. You're like, oh, like, I've got it. I know exactly where I'm going in my

head. I know exactly what time my flight, you know, takes off and what time boarding starts, and then all of a sudden something happens like that. You didn't even miss your flight in the traditional sense. You just missed it, like, out of a wild fluke. I'm like an over, like, over totally. I'm like, I'm like, everyone's like, you do not need to be that early, like, you know, so it was just the weirdest thing because I'm like, if anyone would miss it, it would not be me. It would not be you. No, I just need to be. Even earlier. And yeah.

That's the moral of the stories that Meredith's just going to get to the airport even earlier now. So folks who travel with Meredith, beware. Mary, let's chat with you now. Let's talk about public school districts required by law to vote whether or not they should adopt a period of prayer. Walk us through what happened here. Okay. So this is coming from a bill from the 89th legislature, Senate Bill 11. And it was requiring all school districts to take a vote on whether they were going to

adopt an optional prayer period that would be before school hours. And so, and it would also be, it was like designated as prayer or reading of the Bible or other religious texts. So the law states that students have this absolute right to individually, voluntarily, and silently pray or meditate in school, as long as it doesn't disrupt other school activities. And then they added that no one can require or coerce a student to engage in or refrain from such prayer or meditation during any school activity. It passed in the House 88 to 48 and in the Texas Senate 23 to 7. So it took effect on September 1st and they gave districts six months to take these

votes whether they're going to have this additional prayer period or not. At the end of all of it, only five districts were reported to have having accepted and had a approving vote to have this additional prayer period. It was Magnolia, Hitchcock, Keller, Alito, and Bullard. I SDs. And so they are going to have voluntary and implemented before school prayer times. So they're going to be looking to the Texas Attorney General's Office for some of their legal guidelines for how they're going to go about that, things like parental like permission slips. So this is a place where actually one of them in the article, one of the districts said that they're looking to the TEA and then we talked to the TEA and they were like, that's going to be the

text of this attorney general's office. So just making it clear who is in charge of this. all the legal stuff's going to go through the AG's office. And Ken Paxton, Attorney General Ken Paxton, has been encouraging districts to implement this time for prayer. He had a September 2nd press release right after the bill came into effect saying that in Texas classrooms, we want the Word of God open, the Ten Commandments displayed and prayers lifted up. Twisted radical liberals want to erase truth, dismantle the solid foundation that America's success and strength were built upon and erode the moral fabric of our society. So he encouraged that. But with only about a handful of districts accepting this, there were some statements from districts that decided not to approve it. And they had

some different reasons for it. So Cyprus, Fairbanks, ISD called the legislation political theater. And they mainly looked at the logistical concerns of supervising these spaces, parental consent, like staffing the prayer periods before or after school. And so those were some of the reasons they chose not to do it. Eagle Mountain, Saginaa ISD did reject the prayer period, but trustee Ron Franklin emphasized, he said, that students have always been able to pray on campus. And he said, I just want to make it clear we are 100% in favor of prayer in schools. We're not thinking about restricting it to just one class period. La Jolla ISD also voted to opt out of this prayer period. But the school board President Julian Alvarez wanted to also say that their vote at the with the school board aligned with

longstanding law students have already already have broad rights to voluntarily, well, to voluntary religious expression and we will continue to safeguard those rights. So some of those rejected votes were not necessarily because of the content, but just more of logistical reasons for that were, those were some of the things that they had stated. So Meredith, you killed it. Amazing coverage as always. Well, so we went to our Twitter section, shall we? I want to start with you, Meredith. What did you find this week that caught your eye? I'm excited about this. I don't exactly even know what this means. Like the note you have in this tweetery, I'm like, what is this? But I'm excited to learn. Okay. So, Bucky's had a better business bureau F rating. And I mean, you want to talk

about fake news. I feel like anyone in Texas that, and I'm newer to moving back to Texas, I've only, you know, lived here a handful of years over the years. And Buckees is just such a staple. Everyone loves it. They are known for their customer service, clean bathrooms. You don't, we might not like the food, but they are, it's like war, Texas lore of what you can get at Buckees. So anyway, it was just interesting to read the article. They were saying that they had complaints that they hadn't.

They were like to stay at the complaints. But I don't know. Just if you hear anyone, when anyone comes to visit, I feel like I do, if they have kids, especially, you'll take them to Buckees. it's like it's like Disneyland of Texas. Is that accurate? That's, yeah, that's not it. I mean, six flags, but yes, like Bucky is up there.

Yeah. People go and they're taking pictures with Bucky. They're buying stuff. They're getting food. I feel like getting gas is actually lower on one of the things that. No one really cares about that. So anyway, it's always been such a fun thing. And it just kind of made me laugh that people were outraged about this F rating

from the Better Business Bureau. How dare they? Truly. I think that it's like maybe people will start, instead of picketing Buckees, they'll picket the Better Business Bureau. That's really where I think the I are will be drawn. They were also saying in the article that Buckees is going out to Arizona, Ohio, like they were just listing out a ton of states that it's going to take over.

Yeah, it makes me feel like it's a little bit less special. Although I'm excited that when I visit family in Arizona now, I'll have a Buckees to visit. But it's still, I feel like it still feels a little. South. Like, I don't know what I would think about. I don't know if it all would make it to the Northwest. But when things from, I kind of like regional stuff that really is, I know it's good for the business, but I like it when it's really only, you can only go here or only go here. So. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I know. I do see them on Roger. Like they, it has entered other

states, but I can't even remember what they're there. I think it is like, you know, deep south states that border Texas. I think that's where they've kind of kind of headed to, which is, which is always fun. But we'll see. When I go to Buckees, my favorite, my favorite thing to get in Buckees. I mean, that's hard. Like, my husband loves the jerky. I love the cookie dough bites. Those are my favorite things. They're the cookie dough bites. They're so good. They're in the refrigerated section. And it's literally just like a little plastic cup full of cookie dough balls. And they're so, and they're to eat, not to not to bake, just to eat. And they're so good. Okay. I usually get, these are like, it's the worst. I mean, it makes your teeth hurt thinking about whatever you about to eat.

I like there's tea. Like, they're sweet. ice teas are really good. And then they have these dill pickle chips and then they have these strawberry like sour candies. I am a child when I want to make. Dill pickle chips are so good. Yeah. So good. Okay, Marylees, what do you got for us? Okay, well, Rodeo Houston is going on right now, which is pretty important. But I just saw that there is a bowl that has been inducted into the the 2026 Rodeo Houston Hall of Fame. Well, it's been inductions to the Hall of Fame, excuse me, but he's a inductee as of 2026 rodeo.

And his name is bodacious, which I thought was absolutely hilarious, because you see this bowl, and it's just freaking massive. It's just, its whole body is like rippling with muscles. It's just this beast. Its name is Bodacious,

which I think is just hilarious. But, yeah, just a fun fact from the rodeo. I think that the rodeo is such a fun time in Texas, specifically in Houston. It just, you know, they, you can just feel it. You can feel it in the atmosphere everywhere you go, and you definitely see that there's some out-of-towners here that are the walk-around H-DGB with the cowboy hats on and their boots on, and it's very fun.

So, congratulations to Bodecious. Congratulations to Bidacious. If you take anything from this podcast, it's congratulations to Baudacious. Those bowls are nuts, like, just wild. Yeah, they're beasts. It's amazing. I love watching. you guys both been to the Houston rodeo?

Mm-hmm. No. Yeah. I went once. Yeah, it is quite the spectacle. I've been to the San Antonio Radio. I've been to the Fort Worth Rodeo and the Austin rodeo, but I have never made it to Houston, which of course is the big one. Yeah. The Austin Rodeo is teeny tiny and so fun, but like very teeny tiny. Oh, is it small? Yeah, it's small. San Antonio is pretty big. And Fort Worth, of course, is like, it's Fort Worth. it's like it's legendary it's it they take it very seriously i yeah i'd been to houston i'd been to one in a couple in montana over the years but yeah the fort worth rodeo is like the most patriotic most

christian that you will ever good old boy i mean it is like oh i i and it's just it's it's a very cultural snapshot of what's happening in fort worth but it's very very funny if that's not where you grew up but the Houston was fun. I saw Zach Brown band there and that was a very great concert and it's really fun to watch. That's so fun. I saw Chase Rice at the Houston Radio and. Oh, gosh. Who was the tantrum.

So they're not, uh, oh gosh, hold on. Okay. Are they kind of like a. I need to hang up. We're going to get this. Is it like a Texas country band or what kind of country? No, I wish it was. Musical artist.

It's a band. It's not an individual. Fits in the tantrums. Oh, this isn't country. Oh, okay. No, it was not country. It was very, it was like out of my league. We're going to let it be.

People don't need to hear us sing or hum. I'll say that for another podcast. Exactly. Exactly. Thanks for listening to this episode of the weekly roundup, and we will catch you on next week's episode. Thank you to everyone for listening. If you enjoy our show, rate and review us on Apple Podcasts,

Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts. And if you want more of our stories, subscribe to the Texan at the Texan. 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 an email to editor at the texan.news. We are funded entirely by readers and listeners like you, so thank you again for your support.

Tune in next week for another episode of our weekly roundup. God bless you and God bless Texas.