EMILY’s List, the influential group that works to elect Democratic women who support abortion rights, named Hidalgo as its 2021 “EMILY’s List Gabrielle Giffords Rising Star Award” winner, a designation that brings with it exposure to national donors and other powerful Democratic constituencies.
Abby Livingston
Abby Livingston joined The Texas Tribune in 2014 as the publication's first Washington bureau chief, and departed August 2022. In this role, she covered members in the Texas congressional delegation and campaigns back in the home state. A seventh-generation Texan, Abby grew up in Fort Worth and graduated from the University of Texas at Austin. Prior to the Tribune, Abby worked for NBC, CNN, National Journal and Roll Call. At the Tribune, she won the 2017 National Press Club Award for Washington regional reporting and the Society of Professional Journalists' 2018 Sigma Delta Chi Award for Washington correspondence. Abby is a contributing writer to the Almanac of American Politics and frequently appears on MSNBC, CNN and Sirius XM radio. She also had a role on an episode of "The Bold and The Beautiful." In keeping with the Trib’s great history of hiring softball stars, Abby is a three-time MVP (the most in game history) for The Bad News Babes, the women’s press softball team that takes on female members of Congress in the annual Congressional Women’s Softball breast cancer charity game.
Posted in
Criminal Justice
Freshman GOP Texas congressman made a personal pitch to Joe Biden: Let me help with criminal justice reform
U.S. Rep. Troy Nehls, the former sheriff of Fort Bend County, made the request after Biden’s joint address Wednesday night. Biden’s answer: “I’ll reach out to you.”
Posted in
Politics
Bipartisan group of Texas lawmakers announces legislation to ease crowding at border facilities
The bill backed by U.S. Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, and U.S. Reps. Henry Cuellar, D-Laredo, and Tony Gonzales, R-San Antonio, would create four new processing facilities for asylum seekers and add to federal staffing along the border.
Posted in
Politics
Republican U.S. Rep. Kevin Brady will retire from Congress at the end of his term
The Montgomery County Republican has served in the U.S. House for more than two decades.
Posted in
Congress
MLB took its All-Star game out of Georgia to protest voting restrictions. Now Ted Cruz wants to strip it of its anti-trust immunity.
MLB’s anti-trust exemption reduces the possibility of a competing league from emerging and threatening its status as the preeminent professional baseball league.
Posted in
Winter Storm 2021
John Cornyn and Eddie Bernice Johnson jointly file legislation to help weatherize Texas’ electrical grid
The two Texans’ new bill would authorize the federal government to offer grants to states in support of weatherizing the state’s electrical grids. It comes in response to February’s deadly winter storm and sweeping power outages.
Posted in
Politics
After saying he has “no plans” to run for governor, Beto O’Rourke quick to clarify he might
“Nothing’s changed and nothing I said would preclude me from considering a run in the future,” he told the Tribune.
Posted in
Congress
Pork may return to the menu in Congress. Will Texas partake?
Budgetary earmarks, a maligned spending practice banished a decade ago, appear poised to return under Democratic control of Washington D.C. Some Texas lawmakers welcome their revival, while others are pledging to abstain from their use.
Posted in
Politics
Ted Cruz has rejected most of Biden’s cabinet picks so far. John Cornyn has taken a different approach
Texas Democrats accused the two Republican senators of “putting Party and politics over country and the welfare of all Americans.”
Posted in
Politics
South Texas emerges as political hotbed after Democrats underperformed there in 2020
Democrats will have to defend three seats in the region. And two of those seats could draw heated primary races, too.
