The Texan Podcast - Weekly Roundup - May 2, 2025

Episode Date: May 2, 2025

Show off your Lone Star spirit with a free "Remember the Alamo" hat with an annual subscription to The Texan: https://thetexan.news/subscribe/Learn more about the Data Center Coalition at: https://www.centerofyourdigitalworld.org/texasThe 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.Donald Trump Endorses Speaker Dustin Burrows, All Pro-School Choice Texas House Republicans House conservative press conference'Life of the Mother Act' Clarifying Texas Abortion Law Passes Senate UnanimouslyAbbott Condemns San Marcos City Council's Israel-Palestine Ceasefire ResolutionTexas Lottery Commission Faces New Lawsuit Amid State ScrutinyTexas Lottery Commission Bans Online Ticket Sales Through Courier ServiceTexas House Passes Phelan Bill Requiring Disclosure of ‘Deepfakes’ in Political Advertising'Dramatic Drop' in Border Crossings Reported in March12 of 100 'Worst of the Worst' Criminal Illegal Aliens Arrested by Texas ICEInternational Student Visas Restored at Texas UniversitiesTexas House Committee Considers Expanding Requirements for Non-Citizens Seeking In-State TuitionTexas House Gives Unanimous Approval to ‘Uvalde Strong Act’

Well, howdy folks, it's Mackenzie here with Brad and Cameron, just the three amigos, back like the old days. I miss this. Hope Mary Elise heard hears that. I miss this. Having her around, it has much improved the podcast. you know? Bringing a new voice to the discussion. You just wish it wasn't here. No.

I didn't mean for it to come off that way, but it makes me feel nostalgic. Nostalgic. That's right. No. The times pass. That's right. The good old days. You need to have a jar where every time you say that, you put a nickel in or something.

Do I get to keep the money? No. Just donate it to charity. Well. By charity I mean my wallet. I was gonna say we gotta start up an office snack fund. Oh yeah it's a good idea. Yeah. Yeah. Oh Perry's, a little Friday Perry's fund. Okay. Everyone gets the same discount off their pork chops at the transgressor. Yeah. Which in this case would be me paying full price over here. Okay. Well gentlemen thanks for joining me. Happy to be here. Okay. Let's jump into it. Bradley, a big endorsement dropped into Texas politics this week.

Give us a recap. So I got wind of a meeting between Governor Abbott and the House Republican caucus along with Speaker Dustin Burroughs on Monday night. Couldn't figure out what the heck it was about. Nobody Burroughs on Monday night. Couldn't figure out what the heck it was about. Nobody would budge on the topic and so I but you know it's a meeting right like could be something turned out to be something pretty big. Governor Abbott I was sitting outside the meeting room, the Ag Museum, where they met and members filing in. Then Governor Abbott goes into the room and it was real quick. It lasted like five minutes. That was it.

But I got a text during it that he relayed to the caucus that Donald Trump has endorsed every single one who voted for the ESA bill, SB2. Now that's not that notable because he had promised that. He had said that the day of the vote in the caucus meeting that morning. So that wasn't much of a shock, but I think the biggest news in this is he also endorsed Burroughs not just for reelection, but as speaker so that's pretty big for

the the Speaker of the House and You know we saw Trump not get involved in the speakers race despite a lot of pressure to and also a lot of pressure not to and We saw his son Donald Trump jr. come out against Burroughs and for cook that was only a few months ago not long ago at all and now here we are the president giving the most coveted endorsement in Republican politics to the whole the entire group of members whether they're super conservative or more moderate,

everyone who voted for this bill gave them an endorsement. Now, I think it's worth mentioning Abbott relayed that to the membership. He didn't have Trump call in and say it like he did at the beginning of, on ESA Day that morning. But that was the message delivered to the caucus itself. Only two members didn't get it, former speaker Dave Phelan and state representative Gary Van Deaver, because neither of them voted for the ESA bill. There's a lot of talk about neither of them running for re-election. We'll see if that happens.

Who knows? election. We'll see if that happens, who knows, but that is a pretty big factor in all of this in the broader fight over what passes, what dies in the legislature this session, and then what happens in the fallout following, right? So I know a lot of the members that were members either in leadership or leadership adjacent who came out just beaming, brimming ear to ear about it. And there were members in the kind of opposition group who came out frustrated and were very irritated about it. So obviously the endorsement comes on a single issue and I think this is an example of Abbott showing the influence he has with Trump himself.

You know, there's been a lot of talk about Lieutenant Governor Patrick being the key to Trump endorsements in Texas, and that's true to some degree. Well, now Abbott's in the mix too. And so, a bit of a rivalry there. I'm not sure if they're gonna, you know, I don't think they'll lose sleep over it, over that coral if there is even one but is an interesting factor and now, you know when the primary wolves come calling next next year for a lot of these House Republicans Almost all these guys can now say

I'm in Trump endorsed and we saw how effective that was in the primary last year. It totally changed the dynamics in many of these races. Yeah, we saw yard signs that literally had the candidate's name and then a picture of Trump saying, Trump endorsed. Yeah. And so, yeah, I think that'll be

really interesting to see. And then apply that to the speaker's race for next session if there is one, right? This makes it less likely that there is even a speaker's race. Now a lot of time left we'll see what happens but also Trump can change his mind. True. He has also shown the willingness to endorse two candidates in

the same race. That's something to watch in the US Senate race, right? But Trump did that in Arizona for governor. He endorsed one candidate, then Paul Gosar, I think. Andy Biggs. Andy Biggs jumped in, congressman, and he endorsed Andy Biggs too. He did a double endorsement. So the rare double. It is very possible that this stuff changes down the real line, but you know, my big takeaway was members who were feeling good in the opposition

going into that day came out feeling very frustrated and then on the other, on the flip side, leadership and other Republicans who were feeling pretty glum about the session so far and the time they have left are now feeling good. So, and of course this all comes on the heels of the previous speakership where Trump was very adamantly opposed to speaker, Dave Phelan engaging very heavily in his

primary race. So very different ballpark for this one. Absolutely. Okay. Well, let's also talk on that note then about some of the opposition and how they've navigated session recently, specifically opposition to House leadership. There was a press conference recently. Give us the rundown.

So the opposition conservatives, however we want to call them, we've talked about the motion to vacate a lot and what that did and that kind of put Harrison on it. Not kind of put him on, Brian Harrison on an island from these other members. These conservative opposition members, they are pushing for the advancement of Texas GOP priorities. On Thursday morning they held a press conference and it listed out I think it was 83 bills that meet the priorities. Now it used to be that if I remember correctly a couple

sessions ago that RPT priorities were eight items and they were pretty limited. They were like specific issues but now you have a bunch of bills that are all different that apply under the same priority. There's just not a lot of consolidation there. But these members are pushing those. They said they're having daily meetings. Tony Tinderholt kind of led the press conference, but there was about 10 of them there.

Harrison was not there. And they were saying, there's still time. Let's push these through. There's still time for boroughs to gain, essentially, they didn't say that specifically, but essentially gain our support. But they listed out 83 items and said put the ball in Burroughs' court, basically. Another thing that was a theme in this press conference was aiming fire at Ken King, who

is the state affairs chair. And I listed out yesterday all the Senate priority bills and where they stand in the House, because the Senate has passed them all. And 10, let's say a good number, are stuck in state affairs. Now, after I tweeted that, we saw one of them, and I think a couple others maybe, one of them being the THC ban, that got out of committee on Wednesday evening. So things have started to move. I don't think my tweet did it, but Patrick has been pushing hard to get stuff moving. Let's get it to conference and we can hash it out there, right? I guarantee you that's the line of thinking with this THC bill. We'll see if the bill, Cameron and I disagree on this,

whether that bill, that version is viable to point of order on the floor. We'll see if the bill, Cameron and I disagree on this, whether that bill, that version is viable to a point of order on the floor. We'll see it tested for sure. Democrats are gonna call it your main this point of order whenever it reaches the floor I'm sure and we'll see how that pans out but it went from a 15-page bill to 125 pages. It's a big bill now. Yeah and so they were trying to just get anything out. Get whatever they think can pass to pass and then let the chips fall where they may in conference. I think we'll see that strategy replicated with a number of priority bills but state affairs has been one of

the big choke points for a lot of this. And part of it is its jurisdiction is so broad. And that means that a ton of bills go through. You know, you have everything from social issues like, what was it, library drag ban go through there, I believe. But then have maybe that was that's probably pub ed Issues like that social issues and you have like the power grid electricity issues. It's just really broad so there's a lot of bills that go to state affairs and then a lot of stuff dies because There's you know, they've run out of time either they

You know pass pass other stuff first and then when they're up against the clock, stuff is gonna die, right? Or they don't wanna pass things. I'm sure it varies based on bill. Was there main contention during the press conference that things are being held up in committees or that the structure of how bills are coming up

on the floor is flawed? Because at least from what I've seen, people have been upset about the front loading of all these resolutions and memorials and things at the beginning of session, when they should be taking up actual legislation. Well, I mean, you gotta keep in mind, there is the deadlines, right?

The moratorium on passing things on the floor, bills before 60 days in the session right so of course for 60 days they're gonna do a bunch of resolutions after that though they've still done resolutions and I think they do like limited to five per day then they get to the floor calendar I think the big frustration has been if you look at the calendars that the House has voted on for the most part, you know, maybe excluding the property tax one, it's not, they're not really like super red meat bills at all. They're pretty mild and standard like just policy stuff, you know, nothing that really catches headlines yet, other than ESAs of course.

Is that an intentional strategy to put the more hot button stuff towards the end of session? Well, my read on it, and this is just my read, I don't have actual inside information on this, my read on it is the House is relying on advancing Senate bills later on. So right now they're up against the House passage deadline, which is the 15th. And after that point, you can't vote any more House bills out. So they're getting all of their bills that they want to prioritize in whatever manner it is through the door and over to the Senate. And then they'll start dealing more and more with Senate bills. And they voted some Senate bills out, especially when it's a substitute for a House bill. That's what they did with SB2, right?

But I think they realize that it's a lot easier to get something through the Senate back through the Senate in a short amount of time and so they're they're trying their plan is to just run with these Senate committee substitutes when they get them and so there's a lot the runway is longer on those because it's a Senate bill. The deadline for house bills being heard for the first time in the house I believe we're two weeks away from it essentially. It's a Senate bill. Okay. The deadline for house bills being heard for the first time in the house, I believe we're two weeks away from it essentially. It's the 15th. It's the 15th. So that is when you can no longer,

that will be a big day. That's where you'll have bills up against a deadline or the midnight deadline for a hot minute and it'll be something else. Yeah. Well, Bradley, thank you. We're gonna stick with you here because Mary-Lise obviously not here right now

doing some fun things with her family. So she covered the abortion issue in large part this session. Give us her update from this last week. So the Life of the Mother Act clarifying the state's abortion laws has passed the Texas Senate with alterations that rallied more unity behind the bill after a committee hearing revealed tense disagreements within both the pro-life and pro-choice camps surrounding legislation. There was a lot of disagreement within those camps about, you know, should we support this? Should we oppose this? Is this good?

You know, on the Democratic side, it's, is this good enough or should we want more? Should we push for, you know, repeal of the abortion ban? On the other side, it's, should we clarify this or does the clarification inadvertently increase the ability to get an abortion in the state rather than fixing parts that aren't clear. Ambiguity, yeah. So there was a lot of fight back and forth on that. They managed to, I guess, you know, settle things on both sides through a committee substitute.

And they passed it out of the Senate, 31 and nothing, despite especially Democrats speaking against it, not against it specifically, but saying, you know, we still need to improve our abortion laws, which in their opinion is eliminating the restrictions. So it passed 31-0, now it goes to the House. I think we'll see this. There will be some more fight, I think, but I think we'll see this pass, I think both,

especially with Lieutenant Governor pushing for this. That's gonna give Republicans in the House more cover to vote for this if they want. Yeah, talk to us about the committee substitute. So the changes that were made in the sub maintain the language of life-threatening injury alongside serious risk of substantial impairment of a major bodily function

to describe the medical conditions accepting doctors from the abortion ban. That is an example of what some of these on the pro-life side argue, opponents are critics argued that expands you know what is allowable as an abortion for you know life-threatening injury. Basically, oh you can, a is allowable as an abortion for a life-threatening injury. Basically, oh, you can, a doctor can assert that really anything is a threat to someone's wellbeing, right, and so then they can provide an abortion. That was their argument.

The Republicans for this argued that's not the case. It's an imperfect law, but you know, that's all the case. It's an imperfect law but you know that's that's all laws right so they'll have to we'll see whenever it passes and what the final version is whether that holds true we'll see it in practice. The other clarification the other change that made was clarifying that the health care provider does not need to wait to treat a pregnant woman until she is physically suffering or harmed. That's addressing the pro-choice concerns that doctors may wait until it's too late to treat the woman if they have to only act under life-threatening conditions. You know, there's a lot of

cases of doctors letting an illness get worse and worse before actually aborting the child or in some cases the child who had died in the womb. There was some of that too. So a lot of argument about whether this is who's at fault for this. Is it the lawmakers fault for not being totally clear, or is it the doctors for trying to find any reason to be hesitant to treat under this law, you know being afraid of lawsuits. So a lot of back and forth on this but it moves to the house and there we'll see where it goes from there. And when we talk about a committee substitute as well just for clarifying that term that is when when the bill's heard in committee there are changes that

are made in committee that then make it to the floor so that's what we're talking about here it's not the original filed version it's essentially an amended version we just call it the committee substitute. Bradley thank you. Cameron we're going to come to you here Abbott issued a letter to the San Marcos city mayor after the city council plan to take up a resolution related to the Israel-Palestine conflict. Fascinating. Bring it down for us. Yeah. So this was something that wasn't on my radar until I saw this letter published

by governor Greg Abbott and this resolution is calling for an arms embargo on the state of Israel and an immediate permanent and sustained ceasefire in what they call occupied Palestine. And in the letter published Tuesday, Abbott called the resolution quote pro-hamas before writing that quote Texas will not tolerate anti-Semitism." And this letter was sent directly to the city of San Marcos Mayor Jane Huxen. And what is interesting in this resolution is it actually breaks down some of the money that has been sent to Israel from Texas and it says here $4,434,675 from San Marcos residents taxes have been sent. And Abbott's letter explains how Texas government code prohibits state and local government entities from entering into contracts worth $100,000 and he says

like the city of San Marcos unless the company verifies it does not and will not boycott Israel during the contract term. This requires requirement stems city of San Marcos unless the company verifies it does not and will not boycott Israel during the contract term. This requirement stems from previous legislation aimed at countering the BDS movement against Israel. And so Abbott writes quote, the proposed resolution seems calculated to violate this law by calling for San Marcos to limit its commercial relations with Israel. This public expression of a desire to do what state law prohibits is unacceptable." And he goes on to say that, if the city council adopts this resolution, the office of the

governor will not enter into any future grant agreements with the city and will act swiftly to terminate active grants for non-compliance. So very pointed letter from Governor Greg Abbott on this issue concerning the City Council on this resolution. Actually back on April 15th the City Council took nearly three hours of public testimony on this resolution before agreeing to move forward with a future vote to adopt it on May 6th. And as I was digging into this, actually came across a letter from Senator Donna Campbell, who wrote to Hudson and also copied Attorney General Kim Paxson on this letter, where she was reaffirming her commitment to Israel and to say, quote, warn that state funding could be at risk if this resolution were to be adopted.

So we have Senator Donna Campbell sending a letter. Previously, we have this new letter from Governor Greg Abbott, and Abbott has routinely been a staunch advocate for the state of Israel. Same with both the House and the Senate passing resolutions post October 7th, um, to reaffirm reaffirm support for Israel. So, uh, lots of Israel support coming from elected officials in the state.

And they have, this is just a next step from governor Greg Abbott, sending this letter to directly to a city mayor, uh, in regard to the conflict. That's yeah, pretty interesting stuff. Speaking of interesting stuff. Let's talk about the lottery commission back in the news facing a Yeah, it's always the news, especially this session. Yeah, tell us what's going on. Well, there's so much coverage and criticism and political backlash with the Texas Lottery Commission. Now they're facing down a lawsuit and this lawsuit

was filed by lotto.com where the agency's rule prohibiting lottery couriers from operating in Texas, the lawsuit states, the commission changed rules on the fly and without due process, has made up other new, quote, rules illegally and unconstitutionally targeting LTC's SessLotto.com business, and has all but hounded Lotto.com and other responsible lottery couriers out of business in this state. And so people know that the Lottery Commission is up for sunset. There's been a number of committee hearings where state lawmakers have presented information regarding ongoing investigations with these lottery couriers and potential illegal activities and all sorts of things. I've covered it extensively. People want to dig into it.

It really is a fascinating story. But that's the latest update here because this lawsuit was just filed. We still are waiting for updates on investigations that have been launched by Governor Greg Abbott, Dan Patrick, Attorney General Kim Paxton. So we're kind of in this holding pattern in terms of the discovery period with all these investigations and lawsuits and things. And I'm sure we're gonna get a lot more information in the coming weeks and months. This is one of those issues that obviously brought to light in large part during the

legislative session due to some legislative priorities but will continue because of these investigations and legal challenges to be in the news and there'll be lots of coverage over like you said months and months going forward. Yeah this this issue is far from over. Yeah. This is the tip of the spear. Well, let's continue talking about some commission news here. This, uh, the agency is making a change to courier service ticket sales.

Tell us about it. Yeah. So there was a meeting that was scheduled, um, this week to take up a number of different things. And during this meeting, uh, Lottery Commission, they unanimously voted to ban lottery couriers in the state from selling tickets online. And this is important for the reason that a lot of what you just mentioned in terms of the growing issues surrounding the agency is because these lottery courier services allow for people to purchase tickets on an

app and those apps are managed by a third party service that purchases the ticket, reads the number, collects the winnings, distributes the winnings. And a lot of the issues that have bubbled up recently is because there's these independent organizations or groups of people that have purchased large amounts of tickets essentially gaming the lottery system here. And so this is the lottery commission in one sense trying to take more command over how ticket sales

are operating in the state, but for some it's a little too late. Since there's been already so many issues occurring, you know, I detail a lot of the trying to bail out a sinking boat. Right. So there's been lots of comments, especially from the lieutenant governor about potentially just banning the lottery outright. He's done some on the ground investigations going to these locations where the lottery terminals are being housed and they're often behind walls and you go, you know, people can watch these videos for themselves and see like,

oh it's a game shop but no one's in the store, there's one person behind the counter and then behind the scenes there's like five to 10 of these lottery terminals just printing out tickets. And so it's just such a well also speaker burrows was asked I Think over the weekend in an interview his thoughts and he said I'm not there yet about banning the lottery. Oh, okay, but he didn't say No way. Yeah, right, right There's still more time for things to fall apart further for sure

And you know, he might be like many of us just waiting for more information to come out from these investigations. Are these large bulk ticket purchases just isolated incidents or is this a systemic issue? So I think everyone is just sort of waiting for more information to come out from these investigations. Absolutely. Cameron, thank you for your coverage. We're going to take a quick break

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This was a very interesting time for this debate to happen Wasn't necessarily expected in the same way because the previous day not much happened. Yeah. Well, yeah. Yeah, I was it was quite the entertaining exchange Exchanges exchanges exchanges times right many dozens feeling brought up his house bill three six six which coincidentally is the same number of votes by which he won his runoff he would go on to basically admit that indirectly admit that he picked that number and reserved that number for himself as speaker after he won the race. Which I believe the first line of questioning at all on the bill was from Representative Tony

Tinderhold who questioned him on that bill number saying hey weren't these other bills you know 365 and 367 filed while you were speaker so this one was set aside like you had the power at the time to do that and Speaker Phelan was very reticent to say anything confirming that. Yeah, he was coy about it, but Let's call a spade a spade here But so the bill HB 366 it passed on third reading on Wednesday by a vote of 102 to 40 all the NAVOs came from Republicans and generally on the

Considered on the right the right half of the Republican caucus And the So there's a lot of debate over this the reason you mentioned the previous day that there wasn't a lot of debate was they quickly Went through and nobody was so Some of the the conservative opposition members were wanting to question feeling like they ended up doing they weren't at the back mic ready to go And they weren't paying it. They were probably busy with other stuff right organizing on something else and then the bill comes up and I was

watching this happen. They all realized, oh crap, you know, it's up. And they start running to the back like they don't get there in time. And the they say anyone opposed and they ring the bell and they all vote and it passed. Notably, it lost, I think, four votes on third reading that had on second reading. I haven't looked to see who those were, but it did lose four votes. The margin ended up being what? It was like 40 members voting against? Yeah, 102 to 40. Yeah.

Yep. So this bill would require anyone who produces paid political advertising with an altered image using generative artificial intelligence knowingly for the purpose of influencing a campaign to disclose that the image is not real. There's been a lot of talk about this being about memes. It's not about memes. It's not. This is about mailers that were sent into Phelan's district against him that had his head on Hakeem Jeffrey's body hugging Nancy Pelosi. Another one on Rafael and Chia's body during in a picture during the Democrats 2021 quorum break. That's what this is about. Now there was a lot of interesting debate to follow on the parameters of this bill and the actual language and what may or may not fall under it but that is the intent.

That's what Filin drew this up to address. He argued that, you know, it's simple truth and advertising legislation, right? And I think everyone would be pretty upset if we were in a campaign and someone sent a photo in like that. Now, there were counterarguments that from opposition members that they got fake mailers sent in against them. And some of those were paid for either directly or indirectly by the speaker or at his allied groups. So this is just like, they're both yelling at each other over the same stuff that their

respective sides, whether they directly had a hand in it or not, did. The mailer that I mentioned that was sent into Phelan's district was a club for growth. And they're notorious for taking the gloves off and just swinging left and right when they campaign. They're the ones with the more outlandish campaign ads. That's their role. That's what they do. But just so unclear, there's a difference between what this bill does in identifying a paid political advertisement and then just someone on X who creates a meme, just a single

individual. Right. Right. So first I'll add that the the bill carries with it a class A misdemeanor punishment, which is up to $4,000 fine and or a year in jail time. And so that was a lot of the contention here. The original bill was really broad. They this committee substitute, and this is where a lot of the questioning was about who falls under this was it has it lists out three different categories of criteria one is is an officeholder for for people that this bill would apply to first one is is an officeholder a candidate or a political action committee The second one is has spent at least $100 in profligating the whatever the altered image is. Which is what a lot of the concern was surrounding. Correct, yep. And the third one is has put this

out in traditional mediums like broadcast TV or whatever. So on that second point and also I should say, if you have a disclaimer saying this is an altered image, that's that writes you out of the bill. Like you're not you're you're exempt from this prohibition. Like that's exactly what it's trying to get you to do. So this but the second category, anyone the argument was, Mitch Little raised this quite a bit. If you are someone who creates an AI-generated image and posts it on Twitter, and then let's say you boost it with 100 bucks, does that count?

There's a fair argument to say that it does. And I don't know one way or the other. That's what the argument was about on this. And they went back and forth, and they had one of the most interesting exchanges I've seen in a long time, and both of them were just sitting here watching as a third party. Both of them were pretty good in the exchange. And it ended really fascinatingly with Little saying, I think you're realizing that when

you live by the sword, you die by the sword. And Phelan responded, well, I didn't die by the sword because he survived. So it just from an entertainment perspective, this exchange was fascinating and very entertaining. And insightful. Like there are so many, and that's what's interesting about some of these debates is oftentimes folks will get up on a mic and it'll be a little bit tainted just because there's emotion involved or it's a difficult conversation or they're just going to be against the bill because it's against the bill. A lot of these conversations on the mic yesterday, which you would never guess based on looking

at Twitter, were super interesting and substantive about how this bill would actually affect office holders, activists, grassroots organizations, PACs. It was very insightful. Well, and Shelley Luther got up and she questioned primarily on the punishment, like is a year in jail worth this? That seems a little too tough for me. As somebody who has been?

Sent to jail, because she was sent to jail in 2020 when she didn't close her her hair salon, so Went back and forth eventually it passed and Now it goes to the Senate But I think the thing that's lost in all of this and that'll be interesting to see what happens with that bill because it is feelings bill Dan Patrick obviously does not have any love lost for Dade Felix and vice versa. You know there's a lot of argument during this either

insinuated in the in the argument on the floor or said in the background oh Felix is just doing this because he's pissed off that these mailers were sent in against him. Probably true to some degree, it's not entirely true. And the other side, the people who support this bill have said, well, they just, they took advantage of, their people were using these, this carve out, these generative AI images to hit Republican incumbents in the primary and they just want to keep doing that. So this old debate, what is a transparency bill? It really is. Put a disclaimer that is really simple. Put a disclaimer on a fake image that you have made. But it's a lot more complicated because of the

punishment, the guideline, the parameters of this but then you throw in the Senate what do they do? I think the thing that's getting lost in all of this is the Senate has a bill and passed a bill that does the same thing. It has it is written differently there the language is the verbiage is different. Who authored the bill? Nathan Johnson. Lois Cole Coors co-authored it. Passed 31 to nothing. 30 to nothing. Same penalties?

Depends on the section. They have both Class A and Class B, depending on which part of the section you fall under. Interesting. If I could just make one, just bring up one question. Is I, at least, because you've been following this much more closely, but at least from my outside observation of the arguments against this bill, it seems like people are just worried that independent actors online, just a random person making memes, could potentially come under financial penalty or jail, a penalty of jail for making memes. Is that something, is a valid worry that just a random person...

I think it's a valid question to have because the bill has written is not entirely clear now I think it is pretty clear that Phelan has said that his intent is not to apply it to that but that which does matter that matters and it matters to an extent right so a lot of this would be hammered out in the application, right? And we'd see the flaws and the benefits of it. Also, does it have any effect? Does it actually get, we see a lot of these,

Phil's got a couple other bills actually on the floor today dealing with this. But these text messages, out of state donors, he's got bills dealing with that. Is it even possible to enforce this? Well that $100 limit is the concern. Where an activist, like let's say an activist does make a meme that is fake, AI generated, what have you, and they boost it. They paid $100 for access to Photoshop or something. That's written out, I believe. Oh, I believe yeah yeah I think they put in there it doesn't count for

like production it's all okay right whatever that whatever medium that comes in yeah those are the concerns a hundred dollars in advertising goes in so fast unbelievably fast right and so but, how many instances are there of activists boosting their own memes, right? Like, that's entirely different conversation, but that was a lot of the concern, is saying, hey, this threshold, this $100 threshold is really not that high.

Well, and you bring in the aspect of social media incentivizing people, their users, to boost tweets so they get more interaction. You know, so like someone could unintentionally, just because they're trying to get more eyeballs on a meme they made, you know, be in violation of this law. I mean just sitting here looking at it from the outside I Wonder what the thinking was not just limiting this to campaigns and packs Now the one question is we see 501c4 is increasingly involved in this political stuff this mudslinging so that wouldn't fall under a pack

So you probably have to write that in, but, you know, there's a fair question about whether it applies to someone like that. And you can alleviate that concern by actually limiting it to those, to people that are actually involved in the campaign. Right? Not just third parties on the outside

that are slinging memes at each other. You know? So, it... not just third parties on the outside that are slinging memes at each other, you know, so it is a very fascinating debate when you actually peel back a bit and get involved in nitty gritty instead of just shouting from the rooftops, personalities, or whatever it is, absolutely. Losing your mind on Twitter, right? Like, there are fair points to make on both sides and it's a fact actually very interesting bill. I also think that there would be you know of the fort like I think all 40 were Republicans who voted against the bill which is notable. I just had trouble. I just malfunctioned.

But that is that's notable as well and I think that there would have been which they didn't need they had plenty of people voting in support of the legislation yeah but there if there were a couple of changes that were made or some things that were hashed out I think it would have been an entirely different conversation I think a lot of the folks who voted against the bill aren't against the idea in theory it was application potential vagueness that they felt existed within the personalities of the person who is I'm talking about the people who are winnable right or that they think maybe the

Penalties were too high. Yeah. Well, I mean there are others that argued just in the first place. This is a violation of free speech Yeah, and I was sure You know the other side I didn't mention really any Democratic reaction to this they all voted for it, but Christian Manuel who is the to this. They all voted for it, but Christian Manuel, who is from Jefferson County, he's Phelan's district neighbor, Democrat, he gave an impassioned speech for this and really most of it was talking about how much their county was just bombarded with political advertising and mudslinging and the effect it had on Phelan's wife and his family you know there was the incident where some kook showed up at his house and I don't know if he tried to break in or he was just

menacing but some crazy guy did that and you know, they feel instead on the manual said this as well, you know, like we sign up for this as politicians, but our families don't. So there's a lot of there were a lot of non-part Like a lot of really good substantive conversations there were also a lot of very personal and emotional parts of this whole debate to and I mean your speech being the apex of that portion Yeah, and you saw it on the other side too, but I Guess the other question is would Abbott even Sign this. Yeah, it's a good question. That's something he might be pressured from I guess the other question is would Abbott even sign this? I don't know.

It's a good question. That's something he might be pressured from the right not to do. I don't know. We'll see. Yeah. TBD. Well, it's worth going and reading the piece. It's worth going and watching the debate.

If you have any interest in it, it was very fascinating and partially just because we're nerds on this kind of thing, but also because I think we've been, uh, in want of some of these floor fights and debates. And I also think this is a piece of legislation that is actually applicable to just the average person who is online potentially. Yeah, potentially. And so it's in your comment about Abbott, would he even sign this? You know, it's, it'd be interesting to see it get to that point because we saw the ascendancy of this sort of Trump movement be on the back of meme making and things of that nature. And it's in a, and it also brings in, like you mentioned, uh, uh, free

speech elements and the AI, um, industry and, uh, yeah, it's a very nuanced, complicated issue. Um, yeah, it's, it's just fascinating to see, you know, through an election integrity in that from the, you know, supportive side, and it's just all very interesting. Well, Bradley, it's, it's just fascinating to see, you know, through an election integrity in that from the supportive side. And it's just all very interesting. Well, Bradley, thank you, Cameron. Let's talk new border numbers are released this month. Give us the rundown.

So US customs and border patrol released numbers that show record low border crossings in March. Uh, CBP acting commissioner, Pete Flores said in the release quote, US Border Patrol's apprehensions along the Southwest border for the entire month of March 2025 were lower than the first two days of March 2024. And on the 1st of April, CBP actually detailed this quote dramatic drop in border crossings were around 7,180 as compared to 155,000 per month average from the previous four years.

This decrease was further highlighted by the numbers that showed a quote 95 percent drop from the previous administration's average daily encounters of 5100 per day compared to just 230 per day currently. Flores went on to say quote the message is clear. The border is closed to illegal crossings. And for those still willing to test our resolve, know this, you will be prosecuted and you will be deported. And so this comes as we've seen a number of state and federal officials visiting the border in February to tout the increased efforts underway with increased attention being given to coordinating between the US and Mexico governments to resolve the issue

of illegal immigration. As everyone knows, President Donald Trump has implemented a number of policies and executive orders in an effort to quell the illegal immigration issue and bolster border security. It's worth mentioning here as well, the Texas House, they recently passed their $337 billion buy-in budget, which included more than $6.5 billion in border security funding for multiple state add a little wrinkle to this conversation is Governor Greg Abbott actually made a formal request to Congress asking for Texas to be reimbursed

for the border wall construction under the Biden administration. So as we're seeing Trump now in office in these first 100 days, dramatic drop in legal border crossings, but we're seeing the Texas proposing a budget to increase border security and then like I just mentioned Abbott still awaiting an answer to being reimbursed for passport or wall construction under the Biden administration. So just an update on border crossings for people listening. Thank you Cameron. We're gonna stick with

you here. The White House published a list of the worst of the worst criminal illegal immigrants arrested. Break it down for us. So this is a story published by Mary Elise here. And she writes in her article that in a news release titled, quote, in the first 100 days, the Trump administration has taken killer rapists off our streets, where images of the 100-day detainees were listed online in chronological order by the date of their arrest, as well as displayed on the White House lawn prior to a press conference held by White House Press Secretary Caroline Levitt, Bordesard Tom Homan. And of note here, six of the illegal immigrants included in the quote, worst of the worst,

were arrested by Houston ICE authorities, five by Dallas ICE, one by Austin Ice. So again, the Trump administration, they have continued to beat the drum on carrying out these deportation efforts, example with the story I just talked about with the dramatic drop in illegal border crossings, and then once again here with the more targeted arrest being taken against the worst of the worst illegal immigrants in the domestic United States. So more updates and action by the Trump administration in these first 100 days. Absolutely Cameron. Thank you. Guess what? We're sticking with you again. Okay. Okay. There's been an update to a previous story about international student visas being revoked at Texas universities.

What's happening now? Well, this is a really interesting story just for the fact that there's been changes in a policy by the Trump administration, or at least a perceived change, because as I'll get into into there's been some disagreements on that but some of Texas's most prominent universities including UT Austin, Texas A&M had reported that dozens of international students had their records terminated with the student and exchange visitor information system and actually more than a hundred and seventy at the UT system

alone so a large number here. And for those unfamiliar, the Department of Homeland Security manages this SEVIS system, which oversees these visas issued to international students attending American universities. And so this was actually done on the back of multiple executive orders by the Trump administration, and it's overseen by Secretary of State Marco Rubio. But now,

according to Politico, a U.S. Justice Department attorney was actually reading from a written statement during a court hearing where they said ICE is developing a policy that will provide a framework for the service record terminations until such a policy is issued. The service records for plaintiffs in this case and other similar situated plaintiffs will remain active or shall be reactivated if not currently active. So that statement there is important because there's been a number of lawsuits challenging these student visa terminations and we actually saw after that announcement or at least reading from that statement UT Austin has since

had multiple international student visa holders have their status reactivated. Similarly, 12 international students had Texas A&M who had previously had their legal status revoked were reinstated. This happened at a number of other Texas universities, including Rice University and the University of Houston. But there was actually a comment that was issued by DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin who said, quote, we have not reversed course on a single visa revocation. What we did is restore service access for people who had not had their visas revoked.

So just an interesting policy, let's call it an adjustment, where some visas were revoked, some were reinstated. It seems like the Trump administration is trying to find the legal pathway for the policy they're attempting to implement here. As with any sort of larger plan for these mass deportations, there's going to be things that have to be worked out in the courts. And that's sort of the process

they're going through now. And there's going to be these downstream effects as the process moves forward. So just a bit of a update for people who have been following the story of visas being revoked. This is just an update to a story. I go much more in depth in some previous stories I've written about this regarding the use of the different Section 237A4Cs, which is part of the Immigration and Nationality Act. I go in depth with that. If people are interested, they can check it out on the Texan.News. The Texan.News.

Cameron, thank you. Bradley, we're going to come to you. The House passed a bill intended to address the problems that caused the 2022 Uvalde massacre. What does it say? So the Yuvaldi Strong Act, HB 33 by state representative Don McLaughlin, tasks the Texas Department of Emergency Management with designing a uniform chain of command response plan for active shooter incidents. It also permits inter-jurisdictional mutual aid agreements and creates a grant program worth $25,000 for the purpose of active shooter preparedness accreditation.

Essentially it's a bill hoping to make law enforcement agencies more prepared for active shooter incidents and the biggest thing is creating this uniform chain of command when the incident happened in 2022. One of the big breakdowns was you had all these different law enforcement on site and nobody really took charge. The first one on site was the ISD police chief and so he was the point person for it and then of course he didn't send his officers in. There was a lot of debate about why that was. There's lawsuits going on involving that. But overall there was just a lack of clarity over who should lead the response. response and so this is an effort to try and fix that and ensure that whoever it is is on site knows who's in charge and acts decisively rather than being passive. So the legislation passed 147 to 0 on Monday. 81 legislators

across both parties signed on to the bill as co or joint authors. McLaughlin, who was the Uvalde mayor when the massacre happened, he said, This bill fixes what was broken. We owe it to the families in Uvalde and to every family in Texas to make sure no child, no teacher, and no community ever faces that kind of failure again. The fallout from that, of course, I mean, 19 children are dead, two teachers are dead, and that's never not going to change. But there is a fallout in terms of lawsuits against the police officer, or the police, ISD police chief, the city of Yvaldo just settled with families of the deceased children for $2 million. This is, you know, that community is wrecked forever. And this is, this bill is a part of trying to put things back, put the pieces back together and nothing will truly do that but hopefully with this with this chain of command, particularly

the chain of command part, there's something there to keep that from happening ever again. Some sort of prevention. Absolutely. Bradley, thank you. Cameron, questions concerning providing in-state college tuition to non-citizens were discussed in a House Committee this week. What happened? So the Texas House Committee on Higher Education considered a bill this week to tighten requirements and expand liabilities for students who are, quote, not a citizen or permanent resident in the U.S. and are seeking in-state tuition at a Texas University. This is House Bill 232, which is authored by Representative Cody Vesute. And the committee substitute, which was presented

during the hearing, was laid out by Representative Terry Wilson. And during this layout, he presented the issues concerning the Texas Dream Act, which extended qualification for in-state tuition by non-citizen residents who lived in Texas for three years before graduating from high school, lived in Texas the year before enrolling at a university in state, and signed an affidavit declaring their intention to apply for permanent residency. And during the layout, Wilson explained that, quote, the affidavit only requires the applicant to declare their intention to apply for legal status.

They may never apply, and there is no requirement for them to pay back the investment made by Texas if they are never granted legal status or their choice to remain. This is not fair to taxpayers. So what the committee substitute seeks to do is remedy some of these concerns by requiring a quote domicile intent where a student must either provide documentation of an active application for permanent residency

or file an affidavit stating that they intend to apply quote as soon as the person becomes eligible if the student is 17 years of age or younger. There's some additional statutes in this bill that would require if a Texas university misclassifies a person as resident, then the person may be requested to pay back the difference in tuition. There was lots of concerns that were brought up by other members on the committee,

especially regarding the economic impact concerns. There was questions regarding how extensive the requirements were going, but there was lots of testimony provided by the public as well. But what was interesting, I cannot find any public support for the bill during the public testimony. So, yeah, that's just a little interesting thing for people there. If they're interested in learning more about it, I detail it much further in the piece and they can go read it and check it out.

Cameron, thank you. Let's move on to our Tweetery section. Bradley, what you got? So we had our first shakeup in a statewide 2026 race. It doesn't involve a candidate getting in. It involves a candidate dropping out. John Bash who had launched a run for Texas Attorney General as Ken Paxson is running for Senate, he has dropped out. He lasted less than a month in the race and he was actually the first person to announce. Notable he's not a legislator, he can fundraise however much he wants. Legislators cannot jump in a race. They can't fundraise until

after session. So I made his Middleton jump in. He's a legislator. He's got self-funding capabilities so it's different. But I got word that that bash was dropping out on Wednesday afternoon. I was trying to source it and back and forth I couldn't get it confirmed and then he just he just tweeted it out. He just tweeted it out? I sent that in a group chat to a couple friends that exact. But anyway, Bash, the reason he he dropped out actually seems kind of serious. He said in the tweets, Today I made the difficult decision to leave the race for Texas AG. On Friday our family had a health scare that threw into sharp focus how I should prioritize my time right now.

And that is not running for office. Interestingly enough, he then went on to say, The other candidate in the race, Senator Mays Middleton, has served Texas honorably in the legislature. And I know him to be a good man. I will be rooting for the next AG to represent our great state with distinction and to continue the impactful work of General Ken Paxton. Notable in that when Middleton jumped in the race, Bash sent out a pretty pointed tweet accusing him of wanting to impeach Ken Paxton and various other things And now this is a much different tone tone and I

Think the first one was pretty clearly written by a campaign operative and this is actual bash. So Regardless now the attorney general's race is a one man show for the moment. Although I'm sure we can expect more people to jump in, especially after session in a month. So there you go. Thank you Bradley. Cameron, what you got? Well the signal story has another wrinkle. It's the ongoing saga here. Signalgate.

Signalgate. Well, National Security Advisor Mike Walz and his deputy Alex Wong will be leaving their posts in the Trump White House. This is according to multiple sources familiar with their departure. I'm reading from a CBS News story here. The Signal Gate story with the Atlantic's Jeffrey Goldberg being added to the chat, attack plans, battle plans, war plans, people leaving the Pentagon, advisors to Pete Hegseth, Pentagon, advisors to Pete Hegseth, multiple signal chats being discovered on personal computers and things like this is a big story.

But I think it's interesting now with Mike Waltz leaving as there was previous comments by a number of different people in the Trump administration like reaffirming their support for Mike Waltz remaining in his post but now it seems like he's gonna be leaving and I don't know that again like with many of the stories we've covered today this is this is not gonna be the last we hear of signal gate this is gonna be is not going to be the last we hear of SignalGate. This is going to be something that continues to be in the news. I'm sure there's going to be more developments in the next few weeks. If Mike Walz is leaving, who knows

if there's going to be other departures as part of the Trump administration. So we'll see what happens. This is just the latest big development here. Absolutely. Cameron, thank you. I want to bring up, it was from last Friday. So this is, this is a little delayed. It's a week old news here, but I think it's worth talking about regardless. Cause it's made my day when I saw it.

Um, and this is all documented and shared by Scott Braddock of the Quorum report. But an eighth grader was testifying before the Texas House Transportation Committee, chaired by Chairman Craddock. And the hearing would went late into the evening, or in fact early into the morning, like 1 a.m. Okay, so the young man gets up there and gives his testimony. And at the end, he goes, this may not be, this may be the first time anyone's asked you this, but Mr. Chairman, will you write me a note of excuse? Like, will you write a note that can help excuse me

from school because I'm not going to be able to make it back in time. And I think it was a Thursday night and it went late and I believe he lives up in North Texas and so getting back to school in time for the next morning would not work but the committee just erupted and again these people are have been there for hours that's 1 a.m. they're exhausted they're at the Capitol the rooms full of different folks activists lobbyists citizens concerned citizens and they just erupted with laughter and the chairman was like absolutely we'll get you a note. It was a very sweet moment, but it's worth going and checking out. It was just like

adorable, the sweetest little moment. And I think that's what's so fun about Session is some of these little things happen if you're watching Transportation Committee at 1 a.m. You can catch something random like this happening and you can just see people in the background kind of whispering to each other and just relishing in the novelty of the moment. It was really adorable. That's fun. Okay. Anything else, boys, before we peace out? That's all for me.

Okay. Well, the house floor is going to town, so we'll jump off. Check it out. Indeed. Brought in his Easter brunch suit. That's right. Well, folks, thank you so much for listening and we'll catch you next week. 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,

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