Rick Perry has forged a coalition of economic, religious and social conservatives that helped him become the state's longest-serving governor, poised to run a national race.

Call it the Justin Timberlake Treatment: The Legislature has found itself boxed in as it searches for a way out of the budget divide.

We've updated our elected officials directory this week to include the names and e-mail addresses of legislative staffers in the 82nd session now that the House Research Organization has released a complete list.

On Monday night, former mayors Henry Cisneros, of San Antonio; Laura Miller, of Dallas; Kirk Watson, of Austin; and Bill White, of Houston offered advice about the future of the Capital City.

The growth of the state’s Hispanic population and the rise of immigration as a political issue put Texas Republicans in a tight spot — especially the ones with statewide aspirations.

How did the candidates on the ballot last year compare in their political spending on advertising, polling and staff? Use our interactive bubble chart to explore category data released recently by the Texas Ethics Commission. 

Gov. Rick Perry’s focus on sanctuary cities — cities that don't allow their police officers to enforce federal immigration laws — could offer him safe passage through the contentious immigration debate. But it will be tricky. 

2010 didn't turn out like it looked a year ago. Unexpected people showed up. The political environment bloomed red instead of blue. The Tea was strong. And big shots turned into paper tigers. Here are some of the political personalities who mattered.

If we ever hope to see the change we desire, we have to continue to support our candidates — even after a terrible loss. The alternative is to simply give up, and just as that was not acceptable for Republicans when they found themselves on the losing side, it’s not acceptable for us.

For lower-ranking Republicans who would like to be higher-ranking and Democrats who barely remember ever having a shot at winning a statewide office, U.S. Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison's inscrutability about her future plans is getting to be a bit much.

On April 15, 2009, Rick Perry positioned himself for the first time as the defender of Texas against Washington oppression — and the 2010 race for governor was decided.

Our wall-to-wall Election Day coverage — complete results up and down the ballot and county by county, the all-hands-on-deck Trib team on the Republican tsunami, my conversation with George W. Bush's media adviser and Rick Perry's pollster about what happened on Tuesday, Stiles and Ramsey on what 194 candidates spent per vote this election cycle, Hu on how the GOP rout will affect the substance of the next legislative session, Hamilton on the Texas Democratic Trust's unhappy end, Ramshaw and Stiles profile the new arrivals at the Capitol in January, M. Smith on what's next for Chet Edwards and Ramsey and me on six matters of politics and policy we're thinking about going forward — plus Thevenot and Butrymowicz on a possible solution to the high school dropout problem: The best of our best from Nov. 1 to 5, 2010.

For the 15th event in our TribLive series, I interviewed the former George W. Bush and John McCain media strategist and Rick Perry's pollster about what happened Tuesday night: how the Republicans took back the majority in the U.S. House and upped their number of seats in the Texas House by 30 percent, what that portends for the next two years in Austin and Washington, D.C., and whether the governor is really running for president.

More than in any past campaign, Rick Perry showed himself to be adept at what you might call the friendly attack, striking on one level while making nice on another. He did it to the press, and he did it to the federal government.

As Gov. Rick Perry won another four years in office last night and his Democratic challenger, Bill White, conceded defeat, both men hinted at what they might do next. Ben Philpott of KUT News and the Tribune reports.

Rick Perry won his third full term as governor of Texas on Tuesday, defeating former Houston Mayor Bill White by a convincing double-digit margin and positioning himself for a role on the national stage. And he led a Republican army that swept all statewide offices for the fourth election in a row, took out three Democratic U.S. congressmen and was on its way to a nearly two-thirds majority in the Texas House — a mark the GOP hasn't seen since the days following the Civil War.