The Texan Podcast - Weekly Roundup - March 15, 2024

Episode Date: March 15, 2024

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.This week, the team discusses:The U.S. Senate introducing the Laken Riley Act to detain and arrest illegal immigrants who commit crimesOne Customs and Border Patrol agent and two National Guardsmen killed in a helicopter crashAn El Paso judge blocking Attorney General Ken Paxton’s lawsuit against Catholic nonprofit Annunciation HouseA judge blocking the Biden administration from redirecting funds away from border barrier constructionPaxton’s new legal advisory on school safety with information on new state lawsPaxton calling to increase crime reporting requirements for district attorneysThe 5th Circuit Court of Appeals affirming the need for parental consent for minors receiving contraceptivesA 150-year-old contract between the City of Palestine and Union Pacific RailroadA federal judge ruling against a standard from the National Labor Relations BoardThe Texas Education Agency appointing conservators to oversee a public charter school network

Happy Friday, folks. Senior Editor Mackenzie DeLillo here, and welcome back to the Texans Weekly Roundup. This week, our team discusses the U.S. Senate introducing the Lakin-Riley Act to detain and arrest illegal immigrants who commit crimes. One Customs and Border Patrol agent and two National Guardsmen killed in a helicopter crash. An El Paso judge blocking Attorney General Ken Paxton's lawsuit against Catholic nonprofit Annunciation House. A judge blocking the Biden administration from redirecting funds away from border barrier construction. The Attorney General's new legal advisory on school safety with information on new state laws. Paxton calling to increase crime reporting requirements for district attorneys. The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals affirming the need for parental consent for minors receiving contraceptives. Thank you.

Thanks for listening and enjoy this episode. Howdy, folks. It's Mackenzie here with Cameron, Brad, and Matt on another edition of the Weekly Roundup. Gentlemen, we already started our morning chatting about we're recording on March 14th, Pi Day. Yep. Big day, apparently. Yeah, there's been lots of discussion about our favorite pies and really what is a pie, ultimately. Matt, can you quickly share with us the hot pie, cold pie situation, the theory? Well, my great-grandfather had a philosophy that he adhered to, and that was that uh there there's two top types of pie uh hot or warm pie and cold pie

so anytime anybody asked him what his favorite kind of pie was is pretty much any kind of pie whether or not it's warm or cold it's all good so a cold pie would be like a chocolate pie? Yeah, or like a key lime pie. Oh, coconut cream? Coconut cream, one of my favorites. There are pies that fit in both categories. There are.

Yeah, like a pumpkin pie? Oh, how could I forget? Pecan pie can be eaten both ways. Love pecan pie yeah pecan pie yeah and i like cherry pie hot or cold but if you warm it up you've got to have ice cream with it if you have a cold do you not have ice cream with it it's kind of weird to have cold pie with ice cream, don't you think? Is baked Alaska, is that a pie? I don't qualify it as a pie. That's a good question. I don't qualify it.

You don't? Isn't that a January 6th guy? Baked Alaska. Am I confusing that? I have absolutely no clue what you're talking about camera yeah cameron do you know i've heard the name i've heard the name got it but my question before we started recording interesting yeah was is cheesecake a pie or a cake and apparently it doesn't fall into either category.

Wow. Yeah. So. Based on our debate or Google? Well, Matt sent me some info. Got it. Because apparently he's looked into this. And Southern Living Magazine.

An authority on the subject. Exactly. Yeah. They say it doesn't fall into either category. So I have to on the subject. Exactly. Yeah. They say it doesn't fall into either category. So I have to, you know, they're the leading authority on this issue. I would assume so. Yes. Well, now that we've talked all about that. Well, Brad, Brad, what was that pie you really liked from Gus's in downtown Austin that you talk about? Oh, yeah. It's been a while but there's a pie that you talked about often i haven't heard you recently but chest pie say dank chest pie yeah what is chest pie sugar pie basically

sugar pie interesting that's like when i first went to kansas for school in the cafeteria they would serve butter bars had never heard of a butter bar before but it's basically just sugar just sugar just just some sort of baked like almost looks like a brownie, but it's like a lighter. It's not chocolate. It's just sugar. It was delicious. That sounds delicious. Yeah.

But like unexpected. So chest pie, it's butter, white sugar, vanilla, eggs, a lot of eggs, evaporated milk, cornmeal, distilled white vinegar. Interesting. That's the filling. I'm fascinated by that. milk, cornmeal, distilled white vinegar. Interesting. That's the filling. I'm fascinated by that. Well, we just have to try it at some point. I could talk about this forever.

I'm trying to think. Pumpkins are my favorite. Pecan is probably my favorite, though. I love pecan. It's so good. I was just going to say, if any of our listeners are pie fans like us, please send us in your recommendations for favorite places to go get pie. I thought you were about to tell them to mail us pies. They can do that too. And mail us pies. Mail us pies.

There's tiny pies here in Austin, but the, what is that cafe in Marble Falls? Marble Falls pie. Blue Bonnet Cafe. Blue Bonnet Cafe. Yes. So good. A classic. An absolute classic. Ugh, now I'm hungry. Dang it.

Until it's lunchtime. It is. We're getting there. Well, it's like an hour and 40 minutes until lunchtime. Well, any time could be lunchtime. It is. We're getting there. Well, it's like an hour and 40 minutes until lunchtime. Yeah. Well, any time could be lunchtime. Just like any time could be pie time. Amen, brother. Okay.

Well, let's go ahead and jump into the news here, folks. Cameron, we're going to start with you. Some federal news. The U.S. Senate has introduced the Lakin-Riley Act. Tell us about what this bill does. That's right. As our listeners are sure to know by now about Lakin-Riley's story, she was abducted and killed by an illegal immigrant named Jose Ibarra. On February 22nd, Riley was a nursing student at University of Georgia before she was discovered dead with visible injuries after

the campus police was called and they began a search for her. What this Lake and Riley Act will do is it will require ICE to arrest and detain illegal immigrants who commit acts of things such as burglary, theft, larceny, shoplifting. They will be detained and arrested before they are removed from the United States. So they do not commit any further crimes. This act will also give authorization to state attorney generals to bring civil actions against the U.S. Attorney General or the Secretary of Homeland Security if they do not enforce immigration laws. I thought that was a very interesting tidbit to include in this act. As we've seen, there's been battles between state

governments and the federal government over the enforcement of immigration laws. We saw a Lake and Riley Act pass in the House as well. So there is an opportunity for something like this to reach Biden's desk. And we saw President Biden mention Lake and Riley during the State of the Union address last week. There was an interesting back and forth between President Biden and Georgia Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene, where Greene was yelling from the audience there. She was yelling out, say her name. And then Biden ended up raising a pin that said Lincoln Riley's name on it before he had continued on to say she was killed by an illegal. And because of this mention of her being killed by an illegal, Biden has since gone on what appears to be an apology tour with a variety of different media outlets. And it's been an interesting dynamic in terms of his use of the word illegal and the pushback he has gotten from not just the media, but the Democratic base. So it'll be interesting

to see if now that both the Senate and the House have passed this Lake and Riley Act, if Biden does end up signing it. Absolutely. We'll keep an eye on it for sure. Thank you, Cameron. Matt, coming to you, you covered a tragedy at the southern border this past week when a helicopter crashed, killing three passengers, including National Guard soldiers and a Border Patrol agent, leaving one in the hospital. Give us an update on this story. Two members of the Army National Guard and one Border Patrol agent were killed when a National Guard helicopter operating under federal command in support of Customs and Border Protection went down near Rio Grande City, Texas last Friday. CBP agent Chris Luna and New York National Guard Chief Warrant Officers Cassie Frankinoski and John Garcia were pronounced deceased at the scene. A third soldier, whose identity has not been released, remains in critical condition at a hospital. A video of the crash was obtained by CBP

that was reportedly filmed by the Mexican drug cartel. Cartel members could be heard laughing in the footage as the chopper went down. That footage is being used to help determine what the cause of the crash was. CBP officials issued a statement mourning the loss of Luna, saying the entire agency is praying for his family, including a wife and two children. President Joe Biden also issued a statement saying their sacrifices in defense of the nation will not be forgotten. And the president added that the cause of the crash remains under investigation. Several soldiers have died in recent years in connection with operations relating to the southern border. In 2022, we reported on Texas National Guardsman Evan Bishop

drowning while he was attempting to rescue two drug smugglers from the Rio Grande and another committed suicide near El Paso. Now we'll keep an eye out for the report on what ultimately caused this crash when it ultimately becomes available. Certainly and absolutely a story we'll keep an eye on. Matt, thank you so much. Cameron, we're coming to you. We have an update on Attorney General Ken Paxton's lawsuit against Annunciation House, an El Paso charity that he accused of facilitating illegal immigration. Give us the details. Yeah. So a judge at El Paso has blocked Ken Paxton's lawsuit against Annunciation House. Like you said, he had suggested they were aiding and facilitating illegal immigration into the country. And when Paxson filed this lawsuit, in the announcement, he had said that he was attempting to retrieve documents from Annunciation House to investigate how they were dealing with migrants coming across the border. In his lawsuit, he was attempting to

revoke Annunciation's house authorization to do business in Texas and actually liquidate their assets. And what was interesting is in this opinion by the El Paso judge, he really questioned Attorney General Kim Pason's motives for attempting to investigate Annunciation House. Because throughout this lawsuit, it's been a few weeks since we first reported on this, Annunciation House has reiterated that they haven't done anything wrong in this instance in the case that Ken Paxson is accusing them of facilitating illegal immigration. And what was interesting as well is in Annunciation House, their statements on the issue, they had said the Attorney General only gave them one day to turn over a large swath of documents and that the attorney general did it without explanation.

So there's been lots of things going back and forth in terms of this investigation that AEG was attempting to embark on with this Catholic charity down in El Paso. And one thing that is important to mention as well is in the first story that we reported on is there is a lot of information out there from the Center for Immigration Studies in terms of how the federal government gives grants to many of these, not only just NGOs more generally, but religious charities that do deal a lot with the migrant situation. So there is money from the federal government coming into Texas to deal with illegal immigration and the migrant situation. And we will see if anything will come of this because the judge says that if Paxson wants to investigate and retrieve these documents

from Annunciation House, that Paxson will have to go through the proper legal channels to do that. For a long time, I thought Annunciation House is where I needed to go if I mumbled on the podcast. Sometimes I feel that way, too. Thanks, Cameron. Matt, we're coming to you with more border news. In one of the many ongoing legal battles between the state of Texas and the federal government over the border crisis, Texas has prevailed at trial in one case and won an injunction against the Biden administration. Give us the details. Normally, one would not think of the Texas General Land Office as being at the center of the border crisis.

But at the Texan, we've continually reported on how the agency, now under the leadership of Commissioner Don Buckingham, has taken a front row seat on efforts to secure the southern border. In this case, the GLO brought a lawsuit against the Biden administration for their plans to repurpose federal funding appropriated by Congress specifically for the construction of new border walls and barriers, with the intent of using that funding for a variety of non-wall-related expenditures. The General Land Office, which was joined by the state of Missouri eventually in the suit, contended that the executive branch has no constitutional authority to repurpose money that Congress appropriated for specific reasons, and federal judge Drew Tipton agreed.

In his opinion issued this past week, Judge Tipton pointed out a DHS study entitled Wall's Work, which had found that Wall's helped cut back on illegal immigration, drug smuggling, and other transnational crime, and determined that Texas had standing to sue the federal government because not building more walls would mean more crime and thus a higher cost imposed by the state, among other reasons. With that finding, Tipton issued an injunction, but set the effect date to March 14th, giving the federal government approximately a week to appeal the decision,

which the deadline is now today. And as of yesterday, I have not seen an appeal to a higher level court. And so if they are not successfully able to appeal to a higher court, which in this case would be the Fifth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals, and if they don't issue a higher level stay of this order, then sometime today, the Biden administration will be banned from using those particular funds, some $1.4 billion, I believe, for another purpose other than constructing border walls, border barriers, fencing, buoys, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. Now, there are some of the funds that can be used for fixing existing walls, but the bulk of the funds are specifically earmarked for that purpose.

Now, I think it should be fair to point out that the order doesn't require the Biden administration to spend the funds building walls, but if they do spend the walls or spend the money, it can only be spent on walls. So to check out the full details of the case, head on over to the Texan and check out our story. Yeah, a wild, wild, tangled web of details, Matt. Thanks for untangling it for us. Cameron, we're coming to you now. The Attorney General has released an advisory on new laws and regulations related to school safety.

Tell us more. Yeah, so Attorney General Kim Paxton, again, he issued this new advisory that was related to school safety, providing updates and resources for schools, teachers, parents on new legal requirements to protect students from potential threats. And a number of new laws were passed during this last legislative session that were related to school safety, with many coming as a response to the Robb Elementary School shooting in Uvalde. And some of these new laws and regulations include things such as armed security officers being present at each school district campus during school hours, a law related to providing advisories and audits on school security to the OAG. There was an advisory that also highlights new requirements for responding to emergencies, which includes the implementation for a plan to deal with active shooter situations. This is more poignantly important just because we had saw the critical action report that

came out from the DOJ in terms of things they saw as failures by the Uvalde police response to the Robb Elementary School shooting. So I thought that was very interesting as something that was highlighted in this new advisory. And one other thing worth mentioning is there is a law enforcement division for the OAG, and there's going to be additional training provided to them, including a virtual training simulator that prepares responders for real-life incidents. So lots of new laws and regulations related to school safety, and we've been seeing a lot of this swirling. Like I mentioned, the DOJ critical action report in there is also a grand jury investigation into Uvalde police response

to that Robb Elementary School shooting. Absolutely. And definitely a topic that the legislature spent a lot of time discussing this past cycle. Cameron, thank you so much for your coverage of that issue. Bradley, we're coming to you. This is the second pod in a week where we come to you like halfway through the podcast. What an abomination. Let's talk about the Attorney General again. He's making all sorts of news this week, announcing a new proposal concerning the state's rogue DA law that we've heard so much about previously. What are the details? The proposed rule, which must have 30 days notice before it's posted in the register,

would require district attorneys in counties at or above 250,000 in population to file new annual and quarterly reports on crimes, prosecutions, cases opened, all that kind of stuff. I also would establish a definition for violent crime in other terms so that it can be well established in law and cited when making determinations related to this rogue DA law. And it also lays out fines for noncompliance. The Office of the Attorney General described it as, the information collected under the proposed rule will assist citizens in determining whether their local elected officials are inadequately prosecuting certain categories of crime, releasing dangerous criminals back into the community, engaging in selective prosecution, or otherwise failing to uphold their obligations. The rule was posted on March 8th first, and then after a 30-day period,

it'll become cemented in the state register for the Office of the Attorney General and therefore a kind of rulemaking that the agency does for jurisdictions under it. Now, we alluded to this earlier, and certainly this was a huge topic of conversation we've covered time and time again since this became an issue here in Texas more specifically. Run us through and remind us what this law relates to. So the Texas legislature last year passed House Bill 17 in response to decisions made in some of the state's largest cities to either reduce or entirely eliminate the prosecution of certain offenses, coupled with the more frequent recommendation of low cash bail or personal bonds to violent offenders. Now, it provides for the removal of a district attorney through a citizen petition to a judge for determination of the alleged violation.

Specifically, it is trying to weed out the adoption or enforcement of a policy that refuses to prosecute a class or type of criminal offense under state law or instructing law enforcement to refuse to arrest individuals suspected of committing a class or type of offense under the state law. Overall, it's related to these district attorneys, you know, deciding not to seek charges for certain crimes or certain kinds of offenders, namely, you know, indigent, usually, um, poor, um, often, you know, minority statuses is prioritized in these determinations. And, uh, we see, you know, violent offenders released on, on personal bond or low cash bail. Now that's done by judges, but district attorneys have a role in that. They recommend, they make recommendations to the judge who can either agree to it or not. But, you know, in, in these larger, more progressive cities, we're seeing, you know, offenders let out after committing an offense who then go on to commit another,

either equally as bad violent offense or worse violent offense. And so that's what the law was passed to kind of weed out. And Paxton sees this kind of rulemaking as a way to maximize the effectiveness of this, quote, rogue DA law. It'd be impossible to count the number of times we've heard statewide Republicans mention rogue DAs in the last couple of years here. So very notable. Brad, thank you so much for your coverage. We appreciate it. Cameron, coming to you, a three-judge panel affirmed that parents have a right to be informed if their child requests or is given access to contraceptives. Tell us what happened here. Yeah, so the U.S.

Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed a district court ruling that parental consent is required for minors in Texas to receive contraceptive drugs or devices. And this stems from a lawsuit from an individual here in Texas, Alexander DeAnda. He challenged the Secretary of Health and Human Services Administration of Title 10 of the Public Health Services Act. And the Title 10 program, which was first introduced in 1970, provides clinics with grant funding in order to distribute contraceptive products. And this is related to other family planning services that these clinics might provide. And some of these services could include the use of contraceptives. And so he was challenging this because in his lawsuit, he is a Christian and was wanting to raise his children in a way that they were to practice

abstinence and refrain from sexual intercourse until marriage. And he wanted to be alerted if his children were ever requesting or were given these types of interventions. And so the first ruling we saw was from U.S. District Judge Matthew Kazmarek. He had previously ruled that Title X does not or does violate parents' rights in state and federal law. And then the Fifth Circuit Court, like we've mentioned, affirmed that decision, finding that Title X does not preempt Texas's law. So this is an interesting ruling just for the fact that we are seeing state laws being able to be enacted in the face of some federal regulations. And we saw Everybody Texas, they helped run a Title 10 administration to these clinics, and they said they are still trying to understand the full implications of the opinion, and they will continue to operate under previous guidance at this time.

So there's still going to be some management of the decision in this opinion and how clinics will react. And everybody, Texas, is two words, right? That's the play on. Okay. I was like, is that the play on or is that what Cameron is? Just Cameron. No, it's two words. Every space body.

Got it. Thank you for the clarification. Yeah. Awesome. Cameron, thank you for your coverage. Bradley, you wrote a piece this week on an odd contract dispute between a city in Texas with a familiar name and a railroad company. What are the details? So the latest update in this multi-year court case, and there's a federal court case that's kind of done now and a state court

case that the latest development happened. The city of Palestine filed a motion for rehearing in the years-long legal fight over a 150-year-old contract with the Union Pacific Railroad. The original contract back in the 19th century is a shop agreement that promises a certain level of employment and tax remittance from the railroad in the given city in exchange for bond issuances from the locality to finance infrastructural improvements. It kind of reminds me of the, you know, the chapter 313, now the Jedi program, these tax abatements in exchange for operations in a certain locality, slightly different, but it's generally the same kind of thing. And interesting how the more things change, the more they stay the same. After some mergers and acquisitions, the Palestine outfit for the railroad there and the related contract ended up in the union pacific's possession and this is like two three times removed from the original

uh railroad that that minted this agreement with palestine but it requires you know operations in town you know employment things like that. And the railroad has been trying to get out of it for a while because they view it as inefficient and a waste of resources. Palestine also, according to them, doesn't have the space or infrastructure necessary to expand the operations. And so they want to move elsewhere. And so they've been trying to get this contract voided. And that's been going on for literally decades. There was a law passed by the Texas legislature back in the early 1900s that required these agreements to be honored even after the acquisition by a

company that didn't sign it. Now that law was repealed in 2007, making that kind of moot and leading up to these new lawsuits trying to void the contract. But back in the 50s, there was kind of a mediation done, a settlement agreement that adjusted the original contract. And that was done by the Missouri Pacific Railroad, which then was purchased by the Union Pacific Railroad. And so now the UP has this contract in its possession and the federal courts ruled that the 1950s agreement is void. But Palestine is still trying to preserve it under in state court, under state law. So we'll see how that goes. It's an odd blend of this weird contract law that is obscure and very old with preemption, which we've heard a lot about. But in this case, it's federal preemption over state law. There's more details in the story. You can read about it there, but definitely a weird story, but something, you know, obviously Palestine really cares about.

Yeah. Bradley, would this be something that the Texas Railroad Commission would deal with? No, not at all. I don't think. I was more facetiously asking you, so you hesitating and saying you don't think made me question the validity of my of my joke i don't i don't well the reason i'm kind of hesitant is i don't remember if there were any there was any preservation of the railroad oversight when the railroad commission became the oil and gas regulator right i suppose it's possible i just don't know yeah i don't think it did but i i don't think it did matt's shaking his head okay i think if the three of us here on this podcast agree that that's not the case, then it is law. Yeah, let's put a disclaimer here that this is not legal advice.

It's not investing advice. Do not take our word for it, but we're pretty sure. Whatever it is, make sure you hit the over on the number of years. It lasts four. Oh, brother. There's some investing advice. Thank you, Bradley, for the investing advice and the coverage. We appreciate it.

Cameron, coming to you. Gentlemen, we are making quick work of our stories today. Labor unions. We're talking a lot about the border, talking a lot about Paxton. We're going a different direction right now. A little bit. A little bit. Labor unions constantly evolving. This is a constantly evolving story. Tell us about a recent ruling related to this issue.

Yeah, we see labor unions pop up in the news every week, it seems. And I've been trying to follow the issue as best as I can. And I came across this early this week. standard that was set by the U.S. National Labor Relations Board that would have classified numerous companies as employers of specific contract and franchise employees, thus obligating them to negotiate with unions representing them as workers. And so this new joint employers rule was said to be too broad and violates federal labor law. The initial complaint was launched by the Chamber of Commerce, who jointly filed it with a variety of other businesses and organizations. They were asking the court to vacate the rule because they

said it was based on a, quote, flawed premise that is contrary to common law principles. And that initial complaint went on to state that if the new rule were to go not valid because it would classify certain companies as employers of contract or franchise workers, even when they had no significant control over their workers' employment conditions, stating that, quote, that reach exceeds the bounds of the common law and is thus contrary to law. So when thinking about how this ruling would play out, think about a local McDonald's or Subway restaurant. Those restaurants are usually owned by a franchisee. And so those franchisees then hire employees, and those are franchise employees. They're not employees of McDonald's Corporation. They're employees of that franchised restaurant. And so this rule would have classified those franchise workers as part of McDonald's Corp,

and thus being able to unionize. But this new ruling says they cannot enjoy that joint employer relation. So this will be interesting because we have seen that the Labor Board plans on appealing to the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals. So this could lead to more discussion surrounding the issue, especially as we've seen, like we mentioned at the top of the story, unions continue to be in the news. We've seen even here in Texas, lots of media outlets have attempted and successfully unionized. And with this ruling saying that franchisee workers are not going to be able to enjoin a joint employer standard, it could set an interesting precedent moving forward. Wow. Spicy stuff, Cameron. It doesn't seem like that on the surface initially. But it is.

But it could have long-standing effects. Yeah. I would recommend folks go read the story and the header image is like a sign for the board, like the buildings. Yeah, it's not an exciting image. It's not an exciting image,

but it's an... Go read the story. Yeah, it's an interesting story. It's an interesting story for sure. Cameron, we're sticking with you. We have so many things to talk to you about today. Yeah.

I hope you're not, that you're not getting hoarse from all this talking. No, this is exciting stuff. The TEA has appointed two conservators to oversee the financial stability of IDEA public schools following years of investigation. Give us an update. Yeah. So there's been years of allegations of financial and operational impropriety at these IDEA schools. And IDEA, with this conservatorship, they put out a statement saying that they are planning

on returning $28.7 million in grant funding to the U.S. Department of Education through December 2026. And the statement also went into that since the investigation was initially launched, it had added new board members and executive leadership and quote, strengthen internal controls and auditing procedures. And so digging into this a little bit, so some background. I came across in 2021, IDEA had parted ways with both its CEO and COO after an internal investigation found, quote, misuse of IDEA resources. And there was another story that I came across where there was, during the course of this multi-year investigation, there was at one point

a agreement within Idea Schools that they were going to spend up to $15 million on leasing a private luxury jet for executives. So as you can see, there's been some internal miscalculations on how to handle funds. And the TEA apparently during their course investigation agreed with the misuse of these funds. They've appointed two conservators to oversee the financial and operational situation here at IDEA schools. So hopefully these two conservators can get things figured out because this charter network includes 143 schools and more than 80,000 students. So lots of schools, lots of kids. Hopefully they can get this financial situation figured out. And it is a situation to be sure. Cameron, thank you so much for your coverage and definitely another story to go check out at the texan.news. Okay, before we move on,

I'm going to highlight a few stories here from our team all over the state. We have Holly Hanson, we have Kim Roberts, we have Seth Moorhead all over the state, and we certainly want to bring a lot of attention to their work. We, if y'all were not paying attention to Texas politics last week, of course, the primaries were the big deal, the biggest story of the year so far politically, lots going on. And Holly wrote a piece this week, she wrote several pieces this week recapping different races that were on the ballot, particularly focusing on Houston and Harris County, but certainly races all across the state. And one that I want to mention, this is the headline,

Democratic runoff set to replace Representative Jarvis Johnson in Houston area House District. I did not know as much about this race before chatting with Holly and working on this piece as I would have liked to. This is House District 139. And we have a few candidates here vying to replace Johnson, Angie Thibodeau, and Charlene Johnson or Ward Johnson. Now, if Johnson sounds familiar, this is the candidate running is the ex-wife of the outgoing incumbent who is running for state Senate. Wild. And Johnson, Jarvis Johnson, has declined to endorse his ex-wife.

So certainly a very spicy situation here and lots of interpersonal political dynamics at play. I just did not realize how spicy this race was, and certainly a runoff that we will be watching very closely at the Texan, not to mention the race for state senate that Jarvis Johnson is currently engaged in. So we'll keep an eye on that. But Holly has a great write-up of that story at thetexan.news. Another story, a local story from Kim Roberts, incumbent Tarrant County tax assessor collector defeated in Republican primary. folks who had the position has had some pretty notable people holding that spot and different,

just because of different traditions that the office holds. A lot of Tarrant County residents and Tarrant County GOP activists are very familiar with the person who holds this role. Rick Barnes, the former Tarrant County Republican Party chairman, defeated incumbent Wendy Burgess. Burgess has held different positions in the county and locally herself and then went on to be tax assessor collector. Notable that Barnes ran against her. in this race, but a very notable situation where Barnes used to be the chairman who was helping Burgess run her race in some ways and support Republican candidates by and large. This was a big upset locally. Before Wendy Burgess took the seat, it was held by Ron Wright, certainly a big name locally in Tarrant County, who then became a congressman, passed away several years ago from cancer.

So this is certainly an office that holds a lot of reverence in Tarrant County locally and fascinating to watch an incumbent lose her spot. A familiar name here in coverage from Seth Moorhead. Allen West wins Dallas County GOP chairmanship amid DFW local primaries. A name we're very familiar with here at the Texan and for those involved in Texas politics is Allen West. Of course, Allen West is a former Florida congressman. He was the former Republican party of Texas chair. He was a gubernatorial candidate, ran against Abbott in the wave of primary challenges against Abbott a couple of years ago, an Army lieutenant colonel. Fascinating to watch him kind of be back in the forefront of the political discussion, at least in Dallas County, be an incumbent there.

Wild. Allen West is back and back in an elected position. Yeah. I even knew about Allen West before I came here. Oh, totally. He's a big name. And it's been very interesting to watch his career projection from going from a very prominent congressman with a big platform on Fox News doing his thing in the Tea Party wave to really holding kind of random offices for someone of a profile like his in Texas. So it's been fascinating to watch.

And certainly that gubernatorial race was a spicy one, very, very spicy. So fun stuff from Seth. Yeah, something I wanted to talk about as well is we didn't write about it this week yet. Maybe we will. Cameron looks at me. UT Austin, not UT Austin, University of Austin. They held a debate. Yes.

Inaugural debate. And you were at it. Yeah, this past weekend. During the debate, they had one of their professors, Morgan Marietta, he debated Richard Albert, who's a professor at UT Austin. That's why I got them messed up. They were discussing the topic, is the U.S. Constitution broken? And it was a very interesting debate, very well run event. You know, it's right here on Congress, this University of Austin. And it's just brand new as well. So it was very exciting,

got to meet a lot of really interesting people. And the setup they had was very well done, professionally filmed. Everyone can catch the live stream, actually. They recorded it and put it up on X and on YouTube. And I would encourage everyone to check out the debate, not only for the discussion on the U.S. Constitution, but following that, they actually had Robert F. Kennedy Jr. there to speak with an individual who was formerly affiliated with the ACLU. And they talked all about the issue of free speech in the current climate, especially with how things are being handled on social media with TikTok and X and things of that nature. So it was a very interesting discussion.

I have to say it was very well done. And everyone there was just very nice to talk to. And, yeah, I encourage everyone to go check out the live stream. That's awesome. And for those who are not familiar with the University of Austin, they are launching an effort to combat what they see as a very one-sided approach to higher education nationally all over the country. And so their attempt is to make higher education a place where there's diversity of thought. Folks who would not ever be invited to maybe a traditional university or college in the U.S. would be invited to speak here.

I think that there has been a lot of critique from conservatives and folks around the country saying, hey, universities are not a place where ideas can be really fleshed out, where diversity of thought is encouraged. And the University of Austin is attempting to combat a lot of that. Yeah. And one of the people I was sitting next to, I struck up a conversation with them and they said, there's lots of interesting people here. And I said, what do you mean? What do you mean interesting? And she said, well, everyone here has heterodox opinions. I was

like, oh, that's an interesting perspective. Because that's sort of what they're trying to promote is that diversity of thought, where there's other forms of diversity that are being promoted on college campuses. They're really a University of Austin trying to bring both sides of an issue together and have a civil discussion about it. So I enjoyed the evening there. It was fun. It's such a Cameron place, such a Cameron event. We love to see it. Okay. Well, let's move on to our Twitter-y section here, gentlemen. Brad, I think you have a couple here. So why don't you start with your first one? So in House District 108, there has been a recount requested by challenger Barry Wernick, who lost quite narrowly by about 520 votes to Morgan Meyer, the incumbent, in NHG 108 last week. That was last week, right? Yeah. Yeah. Yes, it was. Um, but Warnick said that, um, quote, this is not a challenge to overturn

the election results. It is an effort to expose flaws, if any, inherent in the current election systems and to protect future elections. He specifically cited some occurrences involving Heider Garcia. I think he used to run Tarrant County elections, right? Now he runs Dallas County elections. And he said, quote, my supporters became aware that our elections administrator,

Heider Garcia, made the decision to use software not lawfully certified for the ES and S EMS central accumulator. I have no idea what those acronyms are, but the Central Accumulator computer that aggregates votes in this election, and he will do so again in May. Details of this failure have been noted by Texas examiners and have been known since 2019. So he's asking for a manual by hand recount of the race. 500 votes is a small margin to win or lose by. But in terms of a recount, it's pretty big.

Especially in a house race. So the odds that the outcome changes in this is probably pretty slim. But I guess it'll be interesting to see if they find anything, um, or if it's basically given the all clear, um, you know, I guess we'll find out on another front. I noticed a, uh, joint op-ed that was released by four democratic Texas senators, each of whom is district is located at least partially on the southern border. Judith Safarini, Senator Hinojosa, Senator Blanco, Senator Lamontia. They penned this joint op ed on border, has a lot of points. It seems like kind of a middle ground, or at least an attempted

middle ground on strategy between what state Republicans are doing and what national Democrats are doing, or really aren't doing on the border. And one thing that stuck out to me, there are a number of things in here, interesting kind of policies. First of all, they say that they reiterate opposition to a border wall they prefer more of basically what they call a virtual wall with cameras and sensors and things like that but the thing that stuck out to me most was um about the commercial truck inspections that have been, I think they're still going on, or at least they have been at certain times ramped up to find, you know, to look for smuggling,

whether it's drugs or human smuggling. And they kind of thread a needle on this. They say, quote, a more efficient and effective commercial truck inspection process could enhance border security by deterring smuggling. The state's attempts to inspect these vehicles at the border have been inefficient and costly.

Obviously, you know, state Republicans would disagree with that assessment, but it's interesting them seeding the idea, at least as an appropriate one, an appropriate response. Maybe in their mind, it's not being effectively executed enough, but, you know, the idea of

an enhanced inspection process that has been, you know, criticized a lot at the national level and celebrated, especially, you know, more at the local level or at the state level among state Republicans. um and celebrated especially you know more at the local level or at the state level among state republicans but um i'm not sure if this is going to turn into anything when we hit session next year but we'll probably see some some bills to these ends filed and you know there's at least four democrats in the senate that are you, at least trying to thread a needle on this issue instead of just railing against the Republican response from Governor Abbott and other GOP officials. So. Brad, do you think this response from Democrats is a response to how

voters are viewing the top issue for them going into the election? Because we've seen immigration now be the top issue for voters. Is this a response to how voters are feeling? I think so, yeah. And, you know, to be fair, I think the senators are also feeling that. I don't think this is just, you know, pure cynicism. I think they're a lot of border Democrats are frustrated with what's going on. They might and obviously do have different opinions on how to fix it than Republicans. event, pre-session event last year, we had representatives, uh, Terry Canales and Eddie

Morales, both border Democrats talking about it and openly criticizing the administration for how they're handling things at the border. Um, well, Brad, I'd point out, too, a county sheriff in a very large county, Presidio County, that's longtime Democrat elected sheriff. And he's in Senator Blanco's district, the Republican U.S. Senator, just slamming the Biden administration over handling of the southern border. And, of course, the Tri-County Big Bend area that includes Presidio County isn't really the hardest hit like you see down in South Texas, you know, at Eagle Pass and all that sort of stuff. But they do see their fair share of transnational crime that's increased. And, you know, Dominguez talked about, you know, what he hears and sees impacting his fellow law enforcement officers across the state. So, you know, that's something coming to bear on the mind of these senators like Blanco,

you know, whenever you have their own party sheriffs in their districts, you know, turning against the administration over the border crisis. Yeah. Another example that I saw today of how serious the problem Democrats realize they have with the border issue in November. Colin Allred, the Democratic nominee for Senate, running against Ted Cruz, he released a press release that said, titled, Allred earns backing of union that represents customs and border protection officers.

Sounds a lot like he just got endorsed by the National Border Patrol Union. Well, he didn't. I haven't seen it explicitly, but I'm sure they're backing Cruz in this race. The National Treasury Employees Union that, quote, represents federal employees, including 29,000 Customs and Border Protection employees, they endorsed All Red in this. So you see an interesting bit of spin here to try and make it look like, you know, the Border Patrol officers themselves are backing All Red because Democrats realize they have a problem with the border. And, you know, it's what the Biden administration is doing or not doing is very much affecting state democrats here in texas and we see it in the op-ed them drawing a bit of a distance from that and we see it here with all red trying to you know apply this bit of spin on on this endorsement this is a thought i'm having now brad i teaser brad and i are releasing

something next week. Keep your eyes peeled or your ears peeled, whatever it is. But on we chat a little bit on a new product about what we think this presidential cycle could mean for like if it's more similar to 2020 or 2018, 2022, like what we kind of think the trends are. And maybe the border in Texas is kind of what turns the tide a little bit for Republicans and creates more turnout in a way that's untraditional because we have a Democrat in the White, it's not a midterm with a Democrat in the White House, right? But in my, I don't know, my hypothesis is changing a tiny bit there that I said earlier this week, Brad.

So I'm curious to see how that all turns out, especially when you have Texas being a place where Democrats do have to reckon with their party at the national level and very much address issues in Texas that are not traditionally accepted by Democrats, whether that's border issues that are top of mind for folks all along South Texas, or you have gun issues that are very much a cultural thing in Texas, right? Texas Democrats have a lot to contend with that other states with Democrat lawmakers, they just don't have the same makeup. It's a very different situation than maybe, you know, Democrats in California. My takeaway from your spiel there is that you just reneged on your take already. I didn't renege. Man, you're not sticking to it. That's bull, first of all. And second of all, you're just antagonizing me because we were too nice to each other on the podcast.

Well, just wait until everyone sees the cold open. Now we just told everybody what's coming. Well, a teaser. A teaser, as it were. I was going to say the American Conservative actually just published an article on their site about how federally this is sort of a Flight 93 election redo. And for those unfamiliar, the Flight 93 election was like a seminal essay that was published in 2016 by Michael Anton, sort of attempting to convince Republicans and those on the right who might have been hesitant to vote for Donald Trump, that to kind of put aside some of their reservations and that we're in this ground shifting moment in terms of political, the political landscape in America.

And so American conservative is saying we're in a similar situation again. And so it'll be interesting, you know, if we're teasing stuff, like you guys are teasing your new podcast, I might be teasing something like this. Teasing something else, that's right. And a new product we'll be offering as well. So listeners, keep your eye out for that. Absolutely. Keep your eyes and ears out, listeners.

That's all we're saying. Might be a few days away from some fun stuff. Okay. Well, let's go ahead and move on to the other Twittery sections. Brad, thank you so much. Good fodder. Good discussion. Cameron, what do you got for us?

So the U.S. Census, they released a new population estimates for the year 2023. And Texas, all over it, again, seems like everyone wants to come to the Lone Star State. And Florida as well. And Florida. People are moving to Texas and Florida, especially the top 10 counties with positive net domestic migration in 2023. Texas and Florida across the board. There was one county in Arizona that was mentioned. But what was interesting is a top 10 county with negative net domestic migration was Dallas County, which actually saw people leaving Dallas County. So I thought that was very interesting. There has been

population change, of course, in Texas. And of the 10 fastest growing in the South, six were in Texas, Kauffman, Rockwell, Liberty, Chambers, Kamal, Ellis. And so we're seeing, you know, more and more people come into Texas. And this census information is just interesting because with more people, it's going to, there's going to be more services that are demanded. And so we'll see if this affects legislation in the upcoming session, just because, like, for example, Harris County added over 53,000 residents and was the largest gaining county in the nation. And so big cities in Texas are getting bigger. Austin is getting bigger. So we'll see if the changing and growing demographics in the state will be reflected in legislation. Yeah, absolutely. Good one, oversaw the launch of the third Starship Super Heavy, which for those of you who've been following along, he's got ordinary

sized rockets that he puts Starlink satellites up into orbit with and all that stuff but he's trying to build like the the one to make humanity multi-planetary the Mars mission capable which these these rockets the super heavies are like just as big as a skyscraper it's like 5,000 tons and the first two

exploded one exploded pretty soon. The other one got off for a minute or two. This one, though, third time's a charm, was absolutely incredible. Starship went up into space. It cruised around the world.

It reentered the atmosphere. Apparently, it had a heavy air quote, for those who can't see. Heavy landing. So I'm not entirely sure. I wasn't able to confirm before we started recording that, you know, it hit the ground and went kaboom. But hugely successful flight. I mean, just, you know, think about this.

This thing is as big as a skyscraper taking off and flying around the world and then coming back down like where it's just absolutely incredible achievement, making headway into actually doing a, you know, having a rocket capable of going to Mars. So anyway, I was watching all the footage of it this morning. And by golly, the next one that they launch, I am going to go down there and see it in person. I've got to go see this. By golly, Cameron. By golly. Matt, have you checked out Walter Isaacson's biography of Musk? No.

Oh, my. You should check it out. If you're interested in really getting in the head of Elon, it is so interesting because it's not just SpaceX. It's Tesla. It's the Boring Company. It's his. It's the Boren Company. Yeah. It's his solar company. In this biography, it details his childhood and his initial launch of all these companies and how he really railed against federal manufacturing process for pieces of these rocket ships. And just fascinating to get into his head. So if you're interested or if our listeners are interested, I'd encourage you to check it out.

I think there are three guarantees in life. I sound like Bradley, but death taxes and Matt finding a way to talk about space on the pod. Well played, Mackenzie. Well played. Thank you. Thank you so much. Okay. Oh, yes.

I have one. I have two, actually. The first one is going to be very quick. I need to say this. There was a story from a San Antonio paper. It basically said, hey, look at this photo of a tiger in a lake. Whoa. It's here in San Antonio. There's a $10,000 reward if somebody can capture this tiger.

Wait. They said just anybody? Just go out and catch a tiger? Yeah. Well, the paper didn't say that. A post said that. Yeah, yeah. The original post from a tiger? Yeah. Well, the paper didn't say that. A post said that. Yeah, yeah. The original post from a citizen said that.

Oh, wow. Turns out this photo, an alarming photo of a tiger just hanging out in a swampy lake. Yeah. Imagine going out to drop a line in the water and you see that thing pop up. Yeah, like, man, I'm fishing for something. My gosh. But it's like a beautiful Bengal tiger and started spreading like wildfire on social media. There's a tiger loose in San Antonio,

which had happened in Houston in 2021. Like a few years ago, a tiger was loose in Houston and it was like legit. It actually happened. Apparently these photos have been used to create similar news stories. Like people online have posted this photo in Louisiana and other parts of the country to try and get, you know,

something going and saying there's a tiger loose in our city, but it's not true. Oh, it's fake news. It's fake news. What? The Crown posted a headline that says, no, there isn't a giant tiger swimming around this Texas lake. Wow.

So bummer. I got really excited. I love wild animal stories, so I was really excited. Not necessarily excited that there was a tiger on the loose, but bummer. No, right as you said the reward amount, I started Googling net guns and, like, tactical gear. I was going to go catch it. I know. Yeah, a citizen was saying he'd give him $10,000 to catch the tiger.

He's the one who started the rumor, so fake news. Also, big thing online this week, Kate Middleton. Oh. Cameron. Yes. Do you think she's missing? Or do you think she's just recovering from her surgery? Well, I don't know how deep you want to go on this.

I know. We're already over an hour. So let's do like three minutes on this. Do I think she's missing? Yeah. No, I think they know where she is. Okay. My question is, is she alive? Is this a cover-up? Do you think she's in a coma? It could be. Is she conscious? Do you think she's angry and something bad interpersonally is

happening between her and William and she's not cooperating with palace authorities? Well, I did see there was a soft launch of the mistress of William. A soft launch? Not by the palace. No, by media. They're trying to introduce this person as. She's been around for a long time. See, I don't know these things. That's why I need you here.

I'm telling you. This has happened for a while. Yeah. But the photo caused a lot of uh conversations online you know they're she definitely gone girled oh man have you seen that movie no i have not but i know the premise okay yeah yeah but no i think they know where she is her state of being that's up for question i know it's nerve-wracking. It feels very suspicious.

It is. Because the initial statement said she's having abdominal surgery and will be back doing royal duties sometime after Easter. So I was basically like, guys, everybody chill out. It's not after Easter yet. We still have a lot of time. Let's not be conspiracy theorists. But the photo. But then the photo came out that was photoshopped or ai

it was one of the two or both could be both with her kids yeah it looks crazy yeah and then they were like oh here's a photo of her in the car with william but her face is turned away from the cameras have you seen that one i haven't oh cameron is very suspicious that they're trying to like give us which then people are like okay did she just have surgery she's on some sort of medication or steroids and recovery yeah so she's like swollen and it doesn't look like herself which is but also that could be a very easy thing for the palace to come out and say hey she's not feeling she's still not feeling well like leave her alone but they're not doing that they're just trying to feed weird photos to the masses well the photo just blew up this whole week it was yeah crazy the citizen journalists that were like there was circling

there was overlays of pictures there there was a lot of investigation i know did you see the meme where they took the movie poster for Weekend at Bernie's and they changed it to Weekend with the Royals and they've got her in the middle and they've photoshopped out her face for Bernie. Oh, gosh. They're propping her up. I have not. I have not. I have not.

But that sounds just like the Internet. I'll say that. It sounds just like the Internet. I'm really trying to find this photo. Okay, Raul, I'll find it and show it to you. Okay. But, yeah, there's one of, it's of her driving in the car out of their house. And tinted windows.

You can very clearly see William's face and very clearly cannot see hers. Wild. Okay. Gentlemen, thank you for obliging. Like I said, already delightful conversation as always. Folks, thank you for listening 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 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.