T-Squared: Our latest newsroom hires
Emily Foxhall, Laura Garcia, Michele Gonzalez, Julia Guilbeau and Stephen Simpson are the latest additions to the Tribune’s news and events teams. Full Story
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![The exterior of the Texas Tribune office in downtown Austin on Nov. 5, 2019.]()
Credit: Miguel Gutierrez Jr./The Texas Tribune -
Watch: Panhandle cotton farmers, rural economies struggle under “exceptional” drought conditions
“A year like this, where everything is disaster, is just, I’d say, devastating,” cotton farmer Steven Walker said. Full Story
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Credit: Jillian Taylor/The Texas Tribune -
Texans are dying on state highways every day — especially in rural “dead zones”
Fatal crashes in rural areas accounted for 51% of Texas’ 4,489 traffic fatalities in 2021, even though only about 10% of the state’s population lives in a rural area, according to data from the state’s department of transportation. Full Story
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![EMT Ronnie Robison calls the Woodland Heights Medical Center to tell them to prepare for an opioid overdose patient at the Lufkin facility Friday, Dec. 16, 2022. Robison has to call on a certain street of highway before a “dead zone” of no cell service or they will not be able to warn the trauma team to prepare for their patients.]()
Credit: Annie Mulligan for The Texas Tribune -
House committee votes to release Trump tax returns over objections by U.S. Rep. Kevin Brady
Brady, the top Republican on the House tax-writing committee, urged the committee not to release the former president’s records just before it deliberated on what to do with them. Full Story
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![U.S. Rep Kevin Brady, R-The Woodlands, in his office in Washington on Nov. 17, 2022.]()
Credit: Eric Lee for The Texas Tribune -
Army Corps of Engineers withdraws plan to dredge Texas Gulf Coast Superfund site for oil tanker traffic
The reversal follows a challenge by Earthjustice and Gulf Coast community groups alleging flaws in the corps’ environmental review of Matagorda and Lavaca bays. Full Story
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![A tanker ship sails into The Port of Corpus Christi in 2018.]()
Credit: Eddie Seal for The Texas Tribune -
Federal report identifies cause of 2019 Port Neches chemical plant explosion
The U.S. Chemical Safety Board found that TPC Group LLC failed to identify problem areas where dangerous chemicals might cause explosions and didn’t implement a safety recommendation that could have prevented the blast. Full Story
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![A process tower flies through air after exploding at the TPC Group Petrochemical Plant in Port Neches. An earlier massive explosion sparked a blaze at the plant on Nov. 27, 2019.]()
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Ex-Fort Worth cop sentenced to nearly 12 years for manslaughter of Atatiana Jefferson
A jury found Aaron Dean guilty of manslaughter last week for the fatal shooting of Jefferson, a 28-year-old Black woman, while she was babysitting her nephew in a family home. Full Story
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![Aaron Dean, a former Fort Worth police officer, enters Tarrant County's 396th District Court on Dec. 15, 2022. Dean was sentenced Tuesday to more than 11 years in prison for the 2019 manslaughter of Atatiana Jefferson in 2019.]()
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On the day of the Uvalde shooting, her school bus became a makeshift ambulance
Sylvia Uriegas transported children who were wounded inside Robb Elementary School to the hospital. The terror of that day still haunts her. Full Story
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![Sylvia Uriegas]()
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A Texas superintendent ordered librarians to remove LGBTQ-themed books. Now the federal government is investigating.
The Education Department’s Office for Civil Rights has opened what appears to be the first-of-its-kind investigation into the Granbury Independent School District after it banned school library books dealing with sexuality and gender. Full Story
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![The superintendent of the Granbury Independent School District, Jeremy Glenn, second from right, at a school board meeting in March. He was secretly recorded ordering librarians to remove LGBTQ-themed library books.]()
Credit: Shelby Tauber for ProPublica/The Texas Tribune/NBC News -
Records reveal medical response further delayed care for Uvalde shooting victims
Previously unreleased video, audio and interviews show for the first time how the medical response faltered after police finally confronted the Robb Elementary shooter. Full Story
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![The scene outside Robb Elementary School minutes after officers killed the shooter who had been occupying two adjoining classrooms.]()
Credit: Helicopter footage gathered by the Texas Rangers and obtained by The Texas Tribune, The Washington Post and ProPublica. Graphics by Imogen Piper/The Washington Post -
Texas elections secure despite COVID-related “irregularities” in 2020, audit finds
Four Texas counties were evaluated in a 359-page audit released by Secretary of State John Scott on Monday, two weeks before he steps down as chief election official. Full Story
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![Secetary of State John Scott watches as a testing crew use voting machines during a state-mandated logic and accuracy test at the Hays County Government building in San Marcos on Sept. 21, 2022. The goal of the test was to identify errors in the counting process.]()
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U.S. Supreme Court allows rapid removal of migrants to continue as legal challenge plays out
Title 42, an emergency health order invoked at the start of the pandemic, allows immigration agents to quickly remove migrants from the country. It was scheduled to be lifted on Wednesday. Full Story
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![Hundreds of migrants wait in line along the banks of the Rio Grande to seek asylum in the U.S., Monday, December 12, 2022.]()
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Texas power grid expected to withstand extreme cold this week
The Electric Reliability Council of Texas expects sufficient electricity generation as much of the state will plunge into frigid temperatures. Full Story
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![A power substation in Northwest Austin during a winter storm on Feb. 3, 2022.]()
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More Texans give away campaign donations from Sam Bankman-Fried and other FTX affiliates
In November, The Texas Tribune reported that Beto O’Rourke had given back a $1 million donation that Bankman-Fried had donated to his campaign. Full Story
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![U.S. Congressman-elect Greg Casar, D-TX, speaks to reporters after a press conference with other incoming CPC members at AFL-CIO Headquarters in Washington, DC, on Sunday, Nov. 13, 2022.]()
Credit: Shuran Huang for The Texas Tribune -
Oyster harvesters hit hard as Texas closes reefs for conservation and public health
Oyster harvesters on the Texas coast are facing twin threats to their way of life: The state shut down reefs to prevent overfishing and following recent reports of illness after people ate Texas oysters. Full Story
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![Alex Gutierrez, an oyster fisherman, poses for a portrait while conducting routine maintenance on his boat after the Texas Department of State Health Services ordered a recall for oysters harvested in the area of southeastern Galveston Bay in San Leon, Texas, U.S., on Thursday, December 15, 2022.]()
Credit: Callaghan O'Hare for The Texas Tribune -
Ahead of legislative session, voters say state government mostly ignores the most important issues facing Texans
The survey asked voters how they think corporations are handling six social issues. More than any issue, respondents said businesses were doing “too much” responding to LGBTQ rights, with 36% holding that view. Full Story
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![The Texas Capitol on Aug. 13, 2021.]()
Credit: Sophie Park/The Texas Tribune -
To ease looming West Texas water shortage, oil companies have begun recycling fracking wastewater
Oil and gas companies are increasingly reusing “produced water” as West Texas aquifers are being depleted and the practice of injecting wastewater into disposal wells triggers more earthquakes. Full Story
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![Fracking's water demand requires the construction of ponds like these, which store millions of gallons of fresh water. Aug. 21, 2013.]()
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Anticipating a surge in border crossings amid cold temperatures, El Paso declares a state of emergency
With Title 42 ending Wednesday, El Paso officials expect the number of migrants crossing the border could double. Declaring a state of emergency should open more options to provide migrants shelter from below-freezing temperatures. Full Story
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![Hundreds of migrants wait in line along the banks of the Rio Grande to seek asylum in the U.S., Monday, December 12, 2022.]()
Credit: Ivan Pierre Aguirre for The Texas Tribune -
Why are pregnancy and childbirth killing so many Black women in Texas?
A decade ago, Black women in Texas were twice as likely as white women to die from pregnancy and childbirth. Today, not much has changed. Full Story
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![A father touches a pregnant belly as Vice President Kamala Harris speaks with doctors, nurses, doulas, and healthcare professionals during a tour of the University of California Medical Center in San Francisco on April 21, 2022. Harris visited the EMBRACE program of prenatal and postnatal care for black women.]()
Credit: Terry Schmitt/Pool/Sipa USA via REUTERS -
Federal health order allowing rapid removal of migrants must end Wednesday, court rules
The Biden administration attempted to end Title 42 earlier this year before a federal judge blocked the move. A different federal court has now ordered that the federal health order be lifted. Full Story
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![Migrants are picked up by Border Patrol, after a group of hundreds of people crossed the Rio Grande to seek asylum in the U.S. on Dec. 12, 2022.]()
Credit: Ivan Pierre Aguirre for The Texas Tribune