The Texan Podcast - Weekly Roundup - October 17, 2025

Episode Date: October 17, 2025

Show off your Lone Star spirit with a free "Remember the Alamo" hat with an annual subscription to The Texan: https://thetexan.news/subscribe/The Texan’s Weekly Roundup brings you the latest news in Texas politics, breaking down the top stories of the week with our team of reporters who give you the facts so you can form your own opinion.Enjoy what you hear? Be sure to subscribe and leave a review! Got questions for the reporting team? Email [e-mail] — they just might be answered on a future podcast.Texas Rep. Gina Hinojosa Announces Democratic Challenge to Gov. Greg AbbottCompeting Evidence and Unlikely Allies: The Robert Roberson Saga ReviewedIllegal Alien 'Asian Boyz' Gang Member Arrested Following Shooting of Texas WomanTexas House and Senate Create July 4 Flood Disaster Investigation CommitteesTexas Attorney General Nears Lawsuit Against East Plano Islamic Center Over 'EPIC City' DevelopmentSeven Texas National Guardsmen Returned from Illinois After Allegedly Failing Physical Fitness StandardsTexas Agriculture Commissioner, USDA Scrap Over New World Screwworm Response Strategy

Good morning, everybody. Welcome to this week's edition of the Texans' Weekly Roundup Podcast. I almost get twisted saying that every week, but I made it through. Yes. And now we're going to have a seamless podcast. Cameron, how are you doing? I'm good. And it was a wild first half of the week.

How many times did we publish? 22 times through Monday and Tuesday. So it's been a busy week. things calmed down today and tomorrow certainly there was a big football game last weekend oh yeah the Red River game yeah yeah yeah where'd you watch it at I actually did not get a chance to watch it because I was at the SREC meeting that's right yeah so and we talked about that on preview to that on the last podcast and how it ended up was yeah five of the ten members that were up for

censure got censured speaker Burroughs was not among them and then And we can check out the play-by-play in fourth reading this week, my newsletter. But there was not much appetite for trying to deny ballot access, which was one of the penalties for censure that they were taking up until they got to Jared Patterson. And then things kind of swung oddly a certain direction until the anvil, you know, the Anvil came. down from the White House and they went into executive session a member of the White House political team Matt Brousseau called in and warned them not to not to enact penalty three against anyone. Yeah.

Otherwise they would, you know, have their funding at risk. They would be at war with the White House and things. It was unclear and they probably ultimately weren't the votes to get to the three-fifths necessary in order to enact penalty three. But I was in the room, and when Patterson came up, you could feel the wind shifting. And so it was certainly a possibility that they got to three-fifths, 39 votes to enact that. That would spark a whole chain of events of legalisms and a lawsuit. A lot of consequences falling from that. But ultimately, it went about as probably expected.

Three of the people, two of the people who got censured, Dade Fieland and Stan Lambert, are not running again. I saw Dade Feelein put out a tweet that was the DJ Collet, another one gif, because this is the second time he's been censured. He wears it as a badge of honor. A third member, Gary Van Deaver, who was censured, has not decided whether he's running again or not. So you might have, in effect, three of the five censures against people who aren't running for re-election.

Yeah. The other two are Jared Patterson and Angela Orr. It doesn't matter. I don't know. No. Maybe it does. Maybe it doesn't. You know, both of those candidates in their respective primaries will claim to be and are, it's not just claiming they are Trump-induced candidates.

Right. So maybe that doesn't, you know, maybe that nixes any potential. fear against them in the primary. Or maybe we see some contentious primary fights. I think we'll probably see some, a lot of attention paid to both those races. Yeah. So despite not seeing the action on the field, you're seeing the action. Yes.

Back to the original question. Yes. I did not see Texas's glorious victory against Oklahoma. But you have more than enough action watching the central vote. Yes. And I guess, you know, we'll just end that, that discussion point with, you know, are the horns back? Are they back? Are they back?

They were so done earlier, and they might be back now. State Representative at Gina Hinoza's event, her campaign launch event for Texas Governor, it was a great event. It was a great event. It was packed. The energy was very excited. That was just the general feel in the room. there were a lot of people there. It was a long drive, though, I will say. I did at one point get stopped by CBP, had to have my car inspected.

Like, it wasn't my car alone. It was a standard protocol. But, yeah, so that was interesting. It was quite the drive, and it was an interesting event to be at, for sure. The people rallying around Tinoa were very thrilled and supportive, and so it was great to just be there on the front lines, watching that. Let's start with, let's get to the stories. First, we'll talk about the filing period, the finance reports that we saw from Q3. I won't go through all the races. Oh, she got booted again.

I won't go through all the races. Mary Lease keeps getting kicked out. And maybe it's penance for her saying up in relation to Brownsville when it's very much not up. Anyway, Cameron, so the Q3 reports were filed yesterday. We got a good look at pretty much a first look at where this top of the ticket race stands in terms of financials, at least holistically. We clearly had before a lot of money being pumped in by Cornyn and Cornyn's allies. We had Paxton's picture, but now we have an initial look at the top two Democrats, top three Republicans in this race. And there are some caveats, but I'll run through the numbers right now and we'll discuss it a bit. So Cornon raised $900,000

and he has $6 million cash on hand. So he's got a sizable cash on hand. Wow. Advantage over every other candidate to be expected he's the incumbent. Right. Now note that Cornyn is claiming $3.3 million raised. Where he gets that is

the $900,000 that he raised into his campaign account plus the amount of money that was raised into what's called a joint fundraising committee which is, as I understand it, a combination fundraising account where you have a few entities, one of them is Cornyn, another one could be, let's say, Texas GOP, another one could be the NRSC, all raising money into this account that then has specific requirements of use. So, like, it's not all going into Cornyn's campaign account. Okay. And, but they're counting it as fundraising anyway. So, like, I, I, I believe some of it will be sent to NRC.

Now, they may have to spend it on behalf of Cornyn, and I think that's true. So they're kind of, they're counting it as, it's basically money Cornyn brought in, even though it's not all money Cornyn brought in, but it is all money that I believe is supposed to be purposed for Cornyn. Okay. So there's some funny math going on. I first saw this start to happen with Ted Cruz last year. And the reason they do this is optics.

They want to show that they were. the highest raiser in the race, particularly the current one, the primary. So, Cornyn did this funny math to get to 3.3 million. Otherwise, he would be outraised by Ken Paxton. And Ken Paxton's numbers were $1.3 million in receipts, and he has $3.1 million cash on hand. So in these numbers, we're just talking about the campaign accounts. There's also a lot of stuff going on with Super PACs. That's all outside of this. That's independent spending. So, Right off, based on the campaign accounts, Paxton outraised corn. Interesting.

What does that tell you? That bodes poorly for the incumbent. Now, it doesn't mean, like, this race is still a long way to go. Who knows what happens? But it's just, it's a bad optics look for either of them to get outraised by the other. Right. Right. So.

Can you, I don't know if it shows in what was released here, is this money being sent by small dollar donations? Is this one person sending $100,000 or how does it sort of break down that way? Well, on the federal side, there are contribution limits. So, you know, on the Republican side, they're a lot less reliant on true small dollar donations. If you look at, let's say, James Tallerico, Colin Allred, they have a lot more small dollar donations because they have Act Blue, which is a very prolific fundraising apparatus where you have activists from all over the country.

They'll set up a $5 donation every month. Yep, yep, and they're very effective at it. Republicans are less, that's less important for them because it's, their base is more, this is kind of changed, I think, with Trump's sum. Traditionally, they get, you know, max out contributions, which are, I believe, $2,700 per election. But that only applies to individual. campaign donations, people can send much more money to the PACs. The super PACs, there's no limit, I don't think. But then you can contrast that with Texas

where there's no limit. So you have Abbott pulling a million dollar donations. It's a lot harder to raise a lot of money on the federal side. It just is. So, which is why you see the super PACs being such a big factor. Okay, so that's those two. Cornyn has almost double Paxton's cash on hand. Then we saw Wesley Hunt. and he jumped into the race on October 6. The reporting period for Q3 ended on June, or on September 30th. So much shorter time period to raise the money or reported. Well, he was still a congressional candidate then.

Now, obviously, everybody knew he was at least looking at this and then he jumped in. But it's not like he gets the jumped into the race bump that a lot of candidates do in this report. It will be in the next report. because he wasn't a declared candidate for Senate yet. Now, he pulled in $366,000, and he has $1.5 million cash on hand. I expect that to jump substantially when we see the next report, because he will have the new candidate bump. Now, on the Democratic side, in this report,

both these candidates got the new candidate bump, because where Cornyn had already been, of course, running for real. election and Paxton announced in April their bumps came on the Q2 report in this in this report Colin Allred reported $4.9 million in receipts I don't think all I think his contribution amount was lower than that at 4.2 so I think you can you can have transfers in that still counts as a receipt but it's not a contribution okay James Tallarico he raised 6.2 so He outraised Allred.

Wow. All of them. Yeah. And I haven't looked at the details yet, but there's going to be some discrepancy on what the average donation is. Campaigns love to talk about this. What's the average donation? They want it to be as low as possible because that signals more people are giving them money. Right.

But the Bernie Sanders sort of strategy. Yes. Yes. Now, the other part of this, cash on hand numbers, Colin Allred has $1.8 million. Talarico has 4.9 million cash on hand. What's that tell you? Other than there's just an advantage left in the bank for Talarico. Allred's burn rate is pretty high.

Burn rate is the amount of money that you spend versus your receipts in a given filing period. And so Allred burned through quite a bit of money in this report. Now, he's been in the race since July 1st, whereas Talarico announced last month in September, I think it was. So, Talarigo's been in the race a lot less time than Allred. But even so, he raised $6.2 million. Yeah. So earned versus unearned media being represented here. It seems as though Allred is spending a lot of money on digital advertisements,

wearing them, whether it be on television or Internet advertising. And that reflects what Allred's strategy was last time around, which was heavy on paid media because he didn't have the persona to, get a bunch of earned media. No, he got earned media. It wasn't like there was none. Right. But he's not on Joe Rogan.

Right. There's not TikTok compilations of his speeches on the Texas House floor. Right. So that's kind of a rundown of this race. We're going to see a lot more money come in. You know, people are projecting $75 to $100 million. Wow. In comparisons to, you.

U.S. Senate races you covered in the past. Is this more or less, is this comparable, the amount of money that's being thrown into the race so far? It's certainly more in a Republican primary. And now we have a heated Democratic primary because the one last year that Allred won against Roland Gutierrez wasn't much of a primary. This is definitely going to be a primary. So on the primary side, yes, a lot more money than we've seen in the past.

Allred raised $80 million. I think it was in his race last year. So we're a far cry from that. Ted Cruz raised almost as much, if not more. I forget how much. But it was a lot of money. I think we're on pace for probably above average what we see with these races because the primaries will cause so much spending.

And then let's say you get Ken Paxton against James Talarico. Democrats are going to go hell for leather to try and flip the seat. right you know if corn is the nominee they're not going to mail it in entirely but they know that their chances of winning are a lot less and they're betting on paxton being vulnerable what why do you say that's the sort of way you see the race potentially shaking out in terms of how the different republican candidates could change the type of campaign that the democrats run well democrats feel like ken paxton is a beatable opponent whether he is or not is

nobody knows it's a question nobody knows the answer to I think polling has shown he's more beatable than Cornyn but that doesn't make him beatable and of course you know the last few cycles we've seen polling this early in the race

showing you know the Democrat with a within the margin of error right and then we see the result and Ted Cruz wins by what was it nine points 2018 being the exception right which is

Democrats are betting on replicating 2018 as a cycle and even taking a step further in trying to flip the seat. Well, do you see this midterm cycle being comparable to that 2018 cycle that you just mentioned in terms of the political dynamics within the country? I think the broad factors make it a lot more comparable than last year because you've got it's a midterm which cuts against the party holding power in Washington generally, which the Republicans now.

It was the Republicans in 18. You know, the next step is Democrats are betting that Paxton, if he's, they're betting on him being the nominee, and they're betting that he has the same like Ted Cruz-like effect of 2018 where you either love Ted Cruz or hated him, which, and that made him divisive. Divisive and less able to get crossover appeal. Right.

So they're asking, they're betting on that. So if you stack those facts, factors on top of each other. Yes, it has the potential to be more like 2018. However, this state has also been getting redder. Right. And so they're betting a lot on that, on these factors compounding to totally reverse that. Yeah. Is there anything you've seen, I know we're going a little off here, but anything you've seen in terms of polling, because like you mentioned, this has, there's an interesting parallel here with the Congress. maps, right, where Republicans are betting on Hispanics continuing to move to the right.

But as you've talked about plenty of times on the podcast, that's really a move to the right because of Trump. And so is there any polling you've seen recently, anything that you've heard about how this Hispanic coalition that has been moving to the right, how they might vote in a midterm with Trump not on the ballot? So since 2016, Republicans have been making gains among Hispanics across the country particularly though in South Texas that's really ramped up the last two cycles with Trump

either on the ballot or really in heavily involved in the race yes so there's that there was polling that I saw that came out the other week last week that showed among Hispanics who

voted for Trump in a last cycle in the election against Kamala Harris that in the number that would vote the opposite way for Harris in this in a hypothetical matchup this September this year a hypothetical rematch it was about a 12% difference so the amount of Hispanics that voted for Trump

that would stick by Trump drop by 12%. Interesting. So that was a pretty big factor in my mind about where this thing's going. Now, the thing about economics is in the economic factor in campaigns. You have no idea what it's going to be like.

Yeah, we don't know what it's going to look like in six months. Maybe it totally flipped on its head, and you have an entirely different dynamic. But right now, it seems Republicans are losing some of the support, but also part of that is to be expected because they're in power now, and so they're the ones that are being blamed for the bad things that are happening. right right um yeah i think we any other any else you want to no i think i think that was all really interesting and i i think it's going to this both the republican primary in the senate and

the democrat primary are going to be really heated really interesting races to follow because of all the factors you mentioned all the money that's being thrown into the race on both sides the political dynamics with the voters is that shift going to continue is it going to change what it's going to be the political climate at the time when people are headed to the polls. I think seeing where things are at right now and where things potentially could be, it's going to be important to follow where those shifts occur. So, yeah, I think that's all really interesting stuff. All right, we'll move on. Miralee. Now let's talk Hinojosa and her candidacy. I know Governor Abbott's team is very glad to have a candidate or an opponent now so they can focus their

efforts on one person. What was Hina Hose's pitch when she announced this run? Well, she announced it yesterday morning in this two-minute-long launch video, and a lot of the same message was echoed at her campaign event that I went to last night that we were speaking about earlier. She said, this was her word. She said, I never wanted to be a politician. I was just an angry mom.

but I've seen firsthand how Governor Abbott's rich donors run Texas at the expense of our schools, our communities, and working families. I'm running to put Texas families first, fight for our kids, and hold the powerful accountable. She said Texans deserve a governor who will work for them, not the billionaire class. So she talked a lot about specifically she honed in last night, kind of explaining more in detail what she means here, that she wants to really focus on public school education, fully funded public schools. She spoke a lot about how Governor Abbott had pushed for and was successful ultimately

in passing the School Choice Education Savings Account Program. She talked about how she believes that's going to totally be destructive to our public schools. And she said at one point, she said, where Texas needs an education governor, and she said, I will be that governor. she had a whole lot of endorsements that she rolled out immediately as she announced her campaign for Texas governor yesterday. There were over 30 of her Democratic colleagues. There were four state senators and then there's seven congressional members. These included Representative Lloyd Doggett, Greg Kassar, Jasmine Crockett, big names, Veronica Escobar, Sylvia Garcia,

Vincent Gonzalez, and Julie Johnson. So they all threw their support behind her ready for Texas governor. Another interesting one in that was someone who did endorse and then someone who didn't. Yes. Con Allred endorsed her. James Talarico was not on the endorsement list, who is a course a house colleague with Inahosa. That was fascinating to see. Yeah, I saw a lot of different speculations about that online, but. Yeah, what do you think, does that indicate anything to either of you guys his name not being on that list uh i think there's some internal political feuding going on and maybe just maybe less political and more just personal oh okay um i'm not i don't remember if hana hosa was on the endorsement list for talarico i don't recall that

uh but if let's say she didn't you know that would probably be a pretty big data point for why he did not endorse her yeah for governor so um that speculation totally I bet it's it's some internal thing you know yeah well it's interesting how if there's personal disagreements and they show up in the public sphere like this and they show up as endorsements or non endorsements right and it leaves the media and the public to speculate which makes it tough there's always a reason yeah but there's always there's always a reason it's just a question of what it is sorry to cut you off me at least what were you saying no That's okay. Very insightful. Another candidate that announced for Texas governor before Hinojosa

Democratic candidate is Andrew White, son of the late governor Mark White. He said in a statement shortly after Hina Hosa announced, White said, I like Gina. She's a progressive. He represents her district well, but this is a statewide race. He said Democrats need a candidate who will bring together progressives, moderates, and independence to be Greg Abbott. He said, I've been an entrepreneur for 30 years, Greg's not ready for me. Of course, Tinos has been at the forefront of primarily education-related policy fights. I mean, when we were covering the house floor, you'd see her whenever there was a topic related to education, specifically public school funding, she was there at the back mic, making herself heard debating with, you know, opponents with the opposite

at Mike. She was really ardently opposed to the very hot button school choice issue, of course, that she mentioned a lot last night at her event. I'm just wondering because I remember, like you mentioned, and Hosa was the person on the mic every time an education bill came up on the floor. And so it sounds like she's making education the focal point of her campaign, at least in the kickoff here. Yes. In your mind, Brad, you can jump in on this too. Is education as a number one issue for a candidate, sort of a winning formula? Or do you think they need to focus on a variety of different issues?

Or maybe where does education rank in some of the polling you guys have might have seen in terms of the electorate and where they rank that is most important to them when they head to the polls? Education is always very high up the list on issues of importance for voters. The question is, is it the thing that tips the scales on their decision-making one way or the other? And for some of them, absolutely, right? This is the top issue. You know, we've seen that we talked about abortion a lot as an issue, and it always ranks fairly high. But it doesn't have enough oomph to cancel out. border security and immigration as an issue.

So obviously those, but those issues cut multiple ways, right? And it depends on the way you frame the question and all that. But yes, I mean, betting your, um, betting your campaign and candidacy on education as a centerpiece. Yeah, absolutely. Um, the thing is, though, Abbott will have his education stuff that he'll talk about like the ESAs.

Yeah. What were... Question is, where do voters fall on that? Yeah. Who knows? Yeah. Well, and especially after it's implemented, it'll be interesting to see how that affects voters to see,

once it's actually in effect in everybody's lives, to see what the response is then, because it could be totally different than where it's at right now. Something else I wanted to add related to, and this kind of ties into, you know, what she's focusing her campaign on. Definitely last night at the event, she was saying, I'm going to be the education governor.

They actually had a student come up. If I'm not mistaken, it was a girl who had gone to the same middle school as Hino Hosa, and she was the one that actually introduced her to the stage. I believe she's pretty young. So that was really the focus last night as she's launching her campaign. Something interesting, the contrast here, maybe of what Hino Hosa's opponents will be saying about her, there was a sign up on a U-Haul truck outside the event propped up. so as everybody was walking in, they could see it.

It said, it focused on these policies. It said, Gina Hino says, two dangers for Texas, and then lists these things that it's saying that she supports, defunding the police, child sex change surgeries, easy bail for violent criminals, men and women's sports, and open borders. So quite the dichotomy there between this sign and what she was saying inside focusing on totally different issues than what they're talking about here.

But that's probably at least emblematic of what some of her, what some of our opponents will come up with to argue against her form. Yeah, it's going to be, I mean, Hinajosa's role here to play is the foil. She is there to draw the fire from Abbott. That way he doesn't use his resources elsewhere, right? And those resources would go to down ballot. Down ballot, you know, specifically judicial races. That's something that's top of mind for Republicans, particularly in Harris County, next year.

It may go to helping certain candidates in primaries right now. Kelly Hancock comes to mind in the comptroller's race. So the more Abbott has to spend on himself, the less he gets to spend on others. And while there is, of course, a ripple effect of Abbott spending money on himself, that then helps other candidates. If he puts, you know, let's say, let's say it's Chip Roy versus Nathan Johnson, and it's a bad cycle for Republicans, and you have a good, high-quality candidate in Nathan Johnson as a Democratic challenger, if Abbott spends a bunch of money specifically for Chip Roy with his name blasting it out, that helps Chip more than just saying, hey, Greg Abbott's a great governor vote for him for governor, right? So it's either a direct or an indirect effect.

And one has more effect than the other, of course. And that would play for any of the candidates. Let's say it's Mays Milton or Aaron Wrights or Joan Huffman. Abbott being able to or having to spend it on himself helps Democrats, even if it's a slight assistance, right? Well, I think this is going to be really interesting, just like really zooming out here. And for Democrats just generally, we have the interesting race for the U.S. Senate in this primary with All Red and Tala Rico.

Now we have Hinejosa jumping in to run for governor. And Texas has been sort of a testing ground for Democrats in terms of the types of campaigns are running and really throwing a lot of money into these races. And I'll be interested to see if there's different campaign strategies that I'm Um, from, you know, there was the all red, uh, last cycle, Tala Rico. He has really leaned into the social media aspect and, uh, really generating buzz online. I wonder what Hina Hose is going to do, uh, is she's going to follow the all red plan or

the Tala Rico plan or she carves out a lane campaign strategy lane for herself, that she does something different or maybe focusing on different types of issues. Um, so I think it's really fascinating if you're just interested in political strategy, all these different races here. Well, and can the Democrats have some form of organization here? Or is it going to be disjointed a bunch of campaigns doing their own thing? Well, it's going to depend, I think, on who's the top of the ticket and what they push for. The other thing I'll note about Hinojosa is, and I'm probably going to write a piece on this, when I have freaking time. She, just like Talrico, and if I recall correctly, just like Allred, mentioned in their ads, billionaires.

Yeah. And so they're trying to make this messaging the people, which is them, their side against the billionaires, which is the Republicans. Right. I will say it's a bit of irony that Hinajosa's launch event that you were at Mary Elise was organized in conjunction with tech. Majority Pack, or Blue Texas, which is a project of the Texas Majority Pack, which is funded in large part by George Soros, a billionaire. Interesting. And so, obviously, both sides have their billionaires. Of course.

Yeah. And neither side can claim to be innocent of that. Yeah. But one side is the one that we're seeing really push that messaging. And, you know, maybe it works. maybe, you know, the misdirection does work for voters. Well, we've seen the No King's protests sort of focus on a similar type of message, right? They're supposed to be one this weekend, by the way.

Oh, is there? Yeah. But I'm wondering about this, too. You mentioned that poll about Hispanics, if they were to go back and do the presidential election, 12% would have shifted. Does Hinojosa being a woman, being a Hispanic woman, does that play into what you saw, like I mentioned in that polling? Does that indicate something for her? Like she might have some energy there?

That's part of the strategy. A friend of mine on the Democratic side was telling me about this was months ago before we had any real decisions on who was running for what seat or what race in Texas from the Democratic side. And he was telling me that he really thinks that there's an opportunity to give Abbott a run for his money if there's a Hispanic. And not just any Hispanic, an authentic Hispanic, like someone who speaks Spanish, not someone who is Hispanic, but is only an English-speaking person. His theory is that that authenticity will basically cut back against the gains Republicans have made among that constituency. And it's a bet, right? It's a wager. Who knows if it pays off?

But that's part of the thinking here with Hinoosa. Well, I think it's, and we saw in the ad, I forget the phrase she used, but like the very first thing she says is a Hispanic phrase. Mary Least, do you remember what it was? I don't want to, I don't want to butcher it because I do not speak Spanish, but the meaning of it was fight back in English. Well, those are factors to consider because of the demographics within the state. Yeah. And so, again, zooming out, seeing the different strategies, Democrats are employing the types of candidates, they are recruiting to run in these races. So, uh, no te poides was the phrase.

Okay. Yeah, but I, it's, again, just really fascinating for people who are interested in the sort of political strategy and how Democrats are going to try and position themselves for the future, right? Yeah. So it seems, last thing I'll say on this is. it seems like there there is deliberate intent being made here on choosing who goes where and who runs for what right yeah we'll see if if it pays off for them and a long way to go between now and then thank you Mary Elise I want to mention one more thing on potential themes the US Supreme Court heard the oral arguments in Louisiana v. Calais

this week and it was interesting because this case is interesting because it could open a whole new round of redistricting and if the ruling happens soon which I doubt it will I bet it will come next year like most of these decisions do you could see an upending of redistricting law as it sits now particularly with section two which protects I think it's about 15 16 Democratic districts in southern states. And so if Republicans get their desired ruling in this case, you could see more redistricting that Nets Republicans with 16, so let's say 16 more seats in Congress.

Now, it's not that simple because, as always, with redistricting, where you take from, you have to also give. And where you give, you have to also take. So you'll see a lot more competitive. districts among the currently red ones, if that happens. And who knows, based on electoral factors, if those are held by Republicans. So there's a lot of ifs and butts here. But if the Supreme Court does go the way of Republicans, then we may see another round

of redistricting, including in Texas. And you may see that not just for congressional seats, but also state legislative seats. It's possible. It's being talked about. It doesn't mean it's going to happen. And then listening to the oral arguments, you know, I don't sit and cover SCOTUS all day every day. So I can't say I have a great feel on everything, every little nuance of that discussion.

But it sounded like votes were probably there, five votes were probably there, for some sort of change on Section 2. Interesting. Who knows? Long way to go. I think before they actually. actually make a ruling on this, like I said, probably next June was when they released these. But that could have a lot of big ramifications politically for the state in across the country.

And then also you have the Texas redistricting lawsuit going on right now that we should have a ruling in a week or two, I'd say, after that trial concluded on whether to preserve or toss the new congressional map in Texas. So I want to touch on that before we got off the campaign topic. Cameron, coming to you. You wrote a really good piece on the Robert Roberson saga. This week was supposed to be the week that he was executed. That obviously did not happen. And I think we talked about that last week on the pod. Or did that happen Friday?

No, it happened the day of our recording. Okay. Yes. So we did talk about that on the pod last week. but you did kind of a whole roundup of and review of where this thing is gone from and where it is now. Yeah. Give us the top lines of this article. Yeah, well, I've been writing about this since September of last year when the letter from this bipartisan letter came out from Texas legislators where they were urging clemency for Robert Roberson.

Because at the time, the board of pardons and paroles was going to make a decision. on his, at that time, he had an execution date coming up. So that bipartisan letter came out, urging clemency, Board of Pardon Paroles, did not issue clemency. Then it just started a cascade of different legal maneuvers, press conferences, different coalitions forming within the legislature itself on either being pro-retrial or pro-conviction. So it's been a saga, and I cataloged that,

in this article. What I'll touch on here is, like you mentioned last week, we talked about how the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals just a week before this second date of execution was set to take place. They put a stay on that and remanded it back to Anderson County Trial Court where they're going to reopen the case and determine if a retrial is necessary. So that decision by the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals was really a huge win for the pro retrial side because Robert Roberson was convicted back in 2003. So there's been 20 years of appeals where his attorneys, his advocates have not been able to find reprieve from the judicial system. So this was really the first big moment from the justice system to say, okay, there needs to be

another look at this. And the reason why they were saying there needs to be a second look, is in these opinions, they were really harping on a previous case called ex parte Rourke, where in that case, the individual that was convicted based upon shaken baby syndrome, it was reversed and was given a retrial and was found not guilty in that case. So there's a lot of interesting things going on in terms of The evidence that was presented at trial, differences of opinion on the evidence in the 20 years of appeals since that conviction, the different coalitions that have formed in the legislature. I'm actually working on a larger piece about that right now that should be out within the next week or so. But this is a case that's going to continue to provide new information.

for people who are interested in it because of it being sent back to this trial court where they're going to have to make a decision is a retrial necessary where they're going to be looking at this junk science law and determine does it apply in the case of Robert Roberson? Thank you, Cameron. It was a good piece. Everyone should go check it out and then wait with bated breath for your next piece. Yes.

Deep dive on the evidence. I'm reading. I'm reading through hundreds and hundreds of pages of trial transcripts right now. So people, be patient with me. He's reading through that, so you don't have to. Thank you, Cameron. Mary Lease, let's move on to your article. An illegal alien in gang members' arrest was highlighted this week in Texas.

What are the details? Yeah, there was an illegal alien and a gang member. He's a member of the Asian Boys Street Gang. He was arrested and charged for unlawful possession of a weapon. And this was just after what folks are alleging, he did murder to Texas women in Victoria. His name is Savin Singh. He's also known as Two-Face. He was arrested on October 3rd after what they called a brief manhunt, the Department of Homeland Security.

And this was after a shooting incident that left one woman deceased in a neighborhood in Victoria. and then he was located by law enforcement just about a mile away from the crime scene. They had found at the crime scene a cell phone that was at the shooting, and they say it allegedly contained photos of saying holding an extended magazine and Glock pistol.

This was, there was a witness who had initially identified saying as the suspect responsible for the, for shooting the woman. And then law enforcement, when they did find him, he was in possession. they say of a loaded Glock 17, 9mm pistol in a shorts, along with a loaded 31 round extended magazine. So his charges, among the charges that he's facing,

one is related to him being illegally present in the United States. He had been ordered to leave, actually, in 2016, as an aggravated felon by an immigration judge, which was 34 years after his entry into the United States from Cambodia. Lots of different comments within this story, from different officials that worked on, you know, tracking him down. But he is currently in federal custody. And then if he is convicted, he'll face up to 250K in penalties and then up to 10 years in federal prisons.

Thank you, Mary Elise. Sounds like a bad dude to say the least. Cameron, let's go over to you. There was an announcement from the speaker and the lieutenant governor this week about, or the last week, I forget, all blowing this together, about new committees, investigative committees on the flooding. Great. Give us the details. Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick, House Speaker Dustin Burroughs, announced the formation of investigating committees to examine the deadly July 4th flooding disaster that devastated Central Texas this summer.

they released parastatements where these committees, two separate committees, one in the Senate, open in the House, they are going to be looking into Camp Mystic and trying to understand what led to the deaths on July 4th because there's been some recent controversy about Camp Mystic planning to open back up. and some lawmakers have been pushing back on their insistence to do this because during the 89th special sessions, there was a number of bills passed in response to try and help mitigate any future disasters that might occur. Because at Camp Mystic, there was 27 children and counselors that had their lives taken from them because of this flooding. So in these investigative committees, they are planning to call individuals, representatives from Camp Mystic, testify about what happened during this flooding disaster.

So this is definitely something we'll continue to cover once these committees get kicked off. And hopefully we can update people on any new information that comes out. Yeah, I think there's going to be a lot of a few hearings on this stuff. and obviously a lot more answers left to be found on this tragedy. Thank you, Cameron. We're going to stick with you. There's been a development on the investigation of a Muslim-centered community here in Texas. Everyone knows it probably Epic City.

Yep. What's the story now? So the story now is Texas Attorney General. He had launched an investigation, and he is now following up with the Texas State Securities Board. to begin reviewing those findings that he said he found during this investigation so that he can now file a lawsuit. So it's sort of one step in this process, the investigation, the review of the evidence, asking the state security support to review it so he can launch a lawsuit.

So one of those steps in that process there. But just for some background for people, because I'm sure everyone is aware, like you mentioned, of the epic city it's in the Dallas fort worth area and it's become pretty controversial among both state and federal officials the u.s. department of justice actually said they would be closing their investigation into epic city and its development partners capital community capital partners uh they said this um i believe it was back in june but that was from the feds at the department of justice. The state, the Attorney General, Governor Greg Abbott, they've been focusing on this as well. I think it's an interesting comment from Governor Greg Abbott, who called into question the legality

of the development at one point saying, quote, the proposed community will never see the lie today. So that's the highest elected official in Texas saying something like that. Now we're seeing the Attorney General follow up on his investigation. An interesting wrinkle to this is Dan Cogden. who was a legal representative in the Texas House Border Manager's Paxton impeachment trial. He has called some of Abbott's characterizations of the community, quote, hate speech. And he is actually a representative of Epic City. So some interesting internal political dynamics there in terms of Paxon being involved and Dan Cogdale.

And one other interesting factor I think for people to pay attention to here is Abbott signed a bill, house bill 4211, which will prohibit managing entities from discriminating in matters related to ownership interests in a way that would violate Texas fair housing laws. And he said explicitly in the press release, he named Epic City when he signed this house bill saying it was targeting banning Sharia compounds in Texas. And he called Epic City a bad actor. So lots of focus being paid to Epic City here. This is just with the Attorney General's latest update. The next step in terms of a state investigation into this community. Thank you, Cameron. Mary Alias, over to you.

Texas National Guard has grabbed attention nationwide. Not probably in a good way for them. No. What is it, is it, is it term fat gate now? Yeah. Give us the details of this. They got fat shamed. I think that's what some people are calling it. So this has been an interesting wrinkle in the whole deployment of Texas National Guard situation. It was, you know, pretty much a much more stricter tone surrounding the situation before when we're dealing with, you know, these lawsuits that are being filed by these states against. the Trump administration saying you can't deploy Texas National Guard and other guards

to come into our state to respond to crime and anti-ice protests. So that was all happening. But then the news broke that after some of our Texas National Guard were deployed specifically to Illinois, seven of them were found to be not meeting mission requirements and were effectively booted from the assignment. The lead up to this, we saw a photo that went very viral, posted of some of our Texas National Guard, stepping foot out of their vehicle into Illinois, where they were sent to protect. And a lot of people were laughing at it and saying that, you know, they're just, they were saying that the individuals are ridiculously out of shape to be in the position that

they're in. So that went very viral. Lots of jokes being made surrounding that. and we were able to confirm in the Texas military department that there were seven members after that who during the what they call the pre-mission validation process, they were found to be not meeting mission requirements and they didn't explain exactly what those mission requirements are, but they were replaced and then returned to home station. And then they added this little bit,

the Texas National Guard Echoes Secretary Hed, Seth's message to the force, our standards will be high, uncompromising, and clear. And they were referencing a speech that had been given by Secretary of Defense, Pete Heggseth, when he gathered the nation's top military commanders in late September. And he had announced there that he would not be tolerated when he called fat troops and that the military would meet the highest male standard only of physical fitness. And so shortly after this photo had gone viral, The military news website first reported this, they posted this article detailing the removal of an unspecified number of guardsmen.

So that was when the news first broke on October 12th. And then Heggseth actually shared the article via an ex post, and he just said simply, standards are back at the Department of War. One other thing that will add in here is a statement from the National Guard Bureau. they said with no explanation as to what they were specifically referencing, but the assumption was that it was about this situation of seven guardsmen. They said all National Guard soldiers and airmen are required to meet service-specific height, weight, and physical fitness standards at all times. When mobilizing for active duty, members go through a validation process to ensure they meet requirements. On the rare occasions, when members are found not in compliance, they will not go on mission. So definitely an interesting wrinkle here in our Texas National Guard deployment.

Thank you, Mary-Alease. Yeah, it's when I first saw the headline about it, I just thought, oh, my gosh, this is going to go over very poorly. And it has. It has very well, much so. But it was, like you said, only seven. Seven members sent back, and so far, nobody else. But we'll see how it develops from here. Thank you, Mary Lees.

Cameron, last one we're going to hit. There was some slap fighting going on between one of the state's top officials and one of the U.S. government's top officials on the topic of agriculture. Both are Texans. Give us the details of this. So the New World Screw Worm has been reported 70 miles from the southwest border. And what remind us what the new world scruberman is. It is a parasite that can have detrimental effects to livestock and wildlife to the point of death.

It can cause insurmountable amounts of damage to the cattle industry, which is why it has become such an important issue to those in agriculture, both in the state and at the federal level. I go into all those details in the piece of people who are interested. Lots, you know, hundreds of millions of dollars being put into trying to combat this parasite. Well, there's been some discrepancies from the state and from the federal response. Sid Miller, the Texas Agricultural Commissioner, he has been really adamant about one of the strategies he wants to employ is this fly bait strategy, essentially setting out traps that would collect and kill these parasites, this New World Screw Worm. The federal authorities, USDA, Brooke Rawlins, have not adopted that strategy, instead opting for a sterile fly strategy where the sterile fly breeds with the new world's grew worm and renders it inert, not able to breed in and quells the population. So what we've seen recently is Sid Miller has gone and deployed some of the, fly bait traps in Texas he mentioned in an interview with RFD TV that he placed some of

these in Houston in some other areas well that elicited a response from the the USDA because headed up by Brooke Rollins headed up by Brooke Rollins because Sid Miller said he hasn't been getting the buy-in from the USDA on his plan and so in the USDA response, I'll just read it here, saying to RFD TV, saying the federal agency, quote, can no longer keep wasting its time in personnel to deploy Commissioner Miller's infamous traps, which USDA has deployed, tested, and has proven ineffective. In one month, USDA's traps in Panama caught thousands of New World Screw Worm Flies. Commissioner Miller's traps caught one single, one single New World Screw Room Fly. It's a very long response I included in the piece. I did, uh,

reach out to commissioner Miller for a comment on that statement and as part of that he said he is continuing in to hopefully work with the USDA on this issue he did mention there was a technical issue with the traps initially but has been fixed much more diplomatic very diplomat his first comments yes but it is illuminating to the point where it give some insight how there's a difference in the response to this parasite between the state and the federal authorities. And with how devastating it can be, hopefully, there is some sort of resolution found between the federal and the state response to it.

Thank you, Cameron. And you can check out an interview with Nate Sheets, the challenger to Commissioner Miller, where he talked about the screw room, along with a bunch of other things. You can also check out your interview with Commissioner Miller. where you talked about the New World Screwroom, along with a bunch of other things. Both were good interviews and worth your time. So find those on the Texan.com news websites or any of our podcast apps. All right, let's go on to Tweeterie.

Mary Elise, let's start with you. I put for Tweeterie an interesting endorsement that landed this morning for one of the candidates in the Congressional District 18 race for Amanda Edwards. It was Beyonce's mother who issued. this endorsement, which I think is interesting, because I remember when she's, she's been involved politically for a while, but she was at Kamala Harris's rally, gave a speech, as did Beyonce. So just kind of an interesting colliding of the pop world in politics, which happens more frequently than it ought to, probably. But it definitely, interesting and kind of a fun

endorsement for Edwards in that race. Absolutely. Camer, what do you got? There was a scoop in Axios that Democrats are targeting John Federman's seat, potentially, in 2028. Democrats or progressive Democrats? Well, the piece doesn't specify where on the spectrum these Democrats are. But it's interesting, just for the fact that Federman, I was talking about this earlier. that his star has really risen over the past year when he was elected. You know, initially it was this candidate who had just gone out of the hospital for a stroke,

going through a debate with Dr. Oz and the whole circus around that. If people remember watching, I remember watching that debate and was like, man, this is crazy. But in the months and years now that since he's gotten elected, He has taken some interesting stances on a few issues, not really much in alignment with how you mentioned the progressive bases. But what's interesting is in this article, when Axios was reporting on the story, they asked Federman for comment, and he just texted back, enjoy your clickbait. And then when they asked for a follow-up, he said, please do not contact. And they also mentioned that Fetterman, even though he is positioned on some issues being very much in alignment with Republicans or with the president or things like that, he posted an article that showed he only voted with the president 6% of the time. So he's still voting in alignment with Democrats at 94% of the time.

So it's not like he's, you know, some right winger or some conservative or something. It's just on very specific issues he has disagreed with the Democratic base. And to the point now, it looks like they're going to try and oust them in 2028, at least that's the scoop here that Axios has. Interesting. Very reminiscent of the Republican Party side. Yeah. Culling of the moderates. Right.

Both parties have their internal fights, obviously. Thank you, Cameron. I have, oh, yes. So we first, Cameron's intro in this podcast was about, first question was about the football game that happened. And one of the best is, obviously, it doesn't have anything to do with the Red River Shootout, but one of the best accounts to watch on Saturdays is the Texas A&M police Twitter account. Yeah.

And one came across on Saturday that was hilarious. They tweet out basically incident reports in tweet form, and some of them are pretty comical. Some of them are just standard, you know, college kid was inebriated and got into a fight and got removed, whatever. This one was a lot funnier. Public intoxication, Aggie Park, contacted subject, eating a sandwich with a water jug of whiskey. blood alcohol content was 0.337. The legal limit, mind you, to drive is 0.08. Well, maybe he was trying to dammit it down with the sandwich, you know?

Yeah. He was trying to soak up some of that alcohol so he could actually walk away. How are you standing up at? Well, he was sitting down? Yeah. He was trying to recover. Well, I guess I assume he's. eating his sandwich sitting

classic college station and then he was released to EMS which that one yeah he needs some fluids other than whiskey you know yeah I have some family members I have some family members that worked as

EMS as EMS is in the college station and they had the most wild stories especially on game days it was just there's always something that happens somebody replied to the tweet and said, is this really the number or a typo? I need clarification, because I don't think 0.337 can be real.

The A&M Police Department replied, it is correct. That is why EMS was called. Somebody else asked what kind of sandwich? That's the question. Yeah. Yeah. They did not answer that. No, I'm sorry.

I wish I had an answer for you on that one. But if you're bored on a Saturday and you want some entertainment, some cheap entertainment, free entertainment, go follow the Texas. A&M Police Department Twitter account. How is the football team doing? A&M is really good. They're top five, I think. I think they're number five this week. Yeah, they're playing very well.

So he wasn't drinking to kind of drown out of his sorrows about the team. Maybe he was celebrating. Maybe he was celebrating. Yeah. I don't know. You know, number five team in the country and playing very well. Might Aguiland claimed to be. the flagship football team of the state of Texas?

Well, I'm sure there are a lot of people who listen to this podcast who would say yes. And there are a lot of people who listen to this podcast who would say, heck no. Heck no. But I just think it's interesting, though, this guy, like, he had a plan in mind, you know, because he had to get the whiskey from the liquor store, but then pour it into a water jug. And so there was some pre-planning going on because he was like, you know, I'm going to be on the move. I'm going to be on the go. I need something with a handle.

that's not going to attract too much attention. So he gets the water jug instead. And so there was some forethought here. It just, you know, went a bit off the rails, it seems. I mean, that's a lot of whiskey. Which would explain. Where was his friends? Maybe it was going to a party or something?

I don't know. I'm trying to rationalize it. A lot of questions left unanswered here, that's for sure. But I hope that person isn't out of the hospital. and not suffering from alcohol poisoning. Actions have consequences. We need a follow-up, what is it, the battalion, who's the stood-of-newspaper. We need the battalion to do a follow-up on this guy.

What happened before, during, and what was the outcome? Yeah. What ended up happening with this guy? I mean, unfortunately, I don't know if you could do a feature piece on this guy because he wouldn't remember anything going to happen. So there you go. Good football humor to end the podcast. Thanks y'all 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, subscribe to the Texan at the Texan. News. Follow us on social media for the latest in Texas politics and send any questions for our team to our mailbag by DMing us on Twitter or shooting us an email to editor at the Texan. Tune in next week for another episode of our weekly roundup. God bless you and God bless Texas.