April 26, 2026: All Newsclips

Lead Stories

A shooter throws Trump’s night with the press into chaos

President Trump was ready to put on a show. On his way to the White House Correspondents’ Dinner Saturday evening, the president told associates that he was excited to deliver his speech, calling it the “hottest ticket in town,” according to a person familiar with the matter. He and his advisers had packed his prepared remarks with jokes, including jabs at members of his own cabinet such as Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Trump’s attendance, his first as president, marked an uneasy truce with a press corps that his administration had spent years antagonizing and sometimes even threatening with rhetoric and legal action. The dinner—known in media circles as “nerd prom”—is an annual black-tie event at the iconic wing-shaped 1960s-era Washington Hilton that brings together some of the biggest names in journalism and politics. While past presidents had routinely attended, Trump didn’t participate during his first term.

click here for more

Instead of taking the mic as planned, Trump would be whisked offstage by Secret Service agents after shots rang out near the cavernous ballroom. Suddenly, what was meant to be an evening of celebration devolved into chaos. Some in the room, from cabinet secretaries to aides and reporters who had been shaken by two prior assassination attempts on Trump, left grappling with the new reality that such violence has become a regular occurrence. High-profile guests walked the red carpet and posed for photos Saturday evening, including White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt and her husband, as well as Secretary of State Marco Rubio and ESPN’s Stephen A. Smith. The entourage of administration attendees included Vice President JD Vance, FBI Director Kash Patel and multiple cabinet members, who mingled with business executives, lawmakers and celebrities. Traffic was limited on the streets surrounding the hotel, made famous as the site of an attempted assassination of Ronald Reagan and a common meeting place for world leaders and D.C.’s elite. Guests in tuxedos and gowns entered the hotel through checkpoints on the surrounding streets by showing a dinner ticket or a copy of an invite to one of several predinner receptions. Attendees were able to access the Hilton’s lobby and lower levels without going through security scans, only passing through magnetometers as they entered the ballroom where the dinner was held.

Republicans are worried the redistricting fight is backfiring

Republicans are increasingly worried that a battle President Trump started last summer to redraw congressional district lines has backfired and may hand more seats to Democrats. At best, some Republicans say, the effort will produce only a small gain in the number of GOP House seats instead of the firewall the party was hoping to build to stave off defeat in the midterm elections. Some in the party said on Wednesday that Trump and his aides had miscalculated by pressing Texas last year to undertake an unusual, mid-decade effort to draw new House district lines to the GOP’s advantage, which prompted several Democratic-leaning states to redraw their own maps in response. And some questioned why Trump’s political machine didn’t spend more resources on Tuesday’s election in Virginia, given the narrow outcome.

click here for more

Voters in Virginia on Tuesday passed one of the nation’s most aggressive gerrymanders that, should it survive court challenges, would put Democrats in position to win 10 of the state’s 11 House seats and leave the party with a slight overall advantage in the nationwide redistricting war, which so far has yielded new House maps in seven states. A redistricting approved by California voters last November could add up to five Democratic seats. “We should have anticipated and played three or four moves ahead. We should have known that there was going to be a response to Texas,” said Rep. Don Bacon (R., Neb.), who is retiring after this year. He added: “We’ll pay for it in November.” Rep. Suhas Subramanyam, a Virginia Democrat who championed the new districts in the state, said: “People are fed up with this administration, especially in Virginia. Trump is historically unpopular there.” He said the vote reflected “the desire to even the playing field.” The chess match isn’t over, and it is impossible at this point to predict exactly how many seats will change hands. The battle turns next to Florida, which is slated to take up a redistricting plan next week that could add Republican seats. Louisiana and potentially other GOP-leaning states could also draw new maps if given the green light under a Supreme Court case regarding racial considerations in redistricting, for which a ruling is expected by the end of June. But the state of the redistricting battle, as of now, has left many in the GOP frustrated.

Texas Democrats attempt to avoid distractions following internal fight over party leadership

Democrats in Texas are excited and engaged for the general election in November and actually have hope that the party will be able to make some gains. Even Republican Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick has warned that the GOP could have a tough time holding the Texas House if Republicans don’t stick together and show up at the polls. That’s why many Democrats were surprised when a handful, three dozen or so, signed onto a public letter demanding party chair Kendall Scudder not run for reelection. It seemed to backfire and led to hundreds of others to sign another letter coming to his defense. “I will say after that came out, the letter that seems to be largely disgruntled former staff members, the grassroots of this party really rallied. And I’m so grateful that nearly 1,000 folks signed on to a letter, precinct chairs, county chairs, SEC members, elected officials, party leaders across the state, basically saying that it’s undeniable that the party is in a better spot now than it was a year ago,” Scudder told us on Inside Texas Politics.

click here for more

When Scudder was first elected chair, one of his first steps was to “decentralize” the party by downsizing the headquarters in Austin. That meant some staffers were asked to move to other areas in the state, thought to be one of the main reasons some folks were upset. The party now has offices all over Texas, including Dallas-Fort Worth, Houston, Austin, Amarillo and Eagle Pass. “This party, the Democratic Party, has to be a 254-county party. It cannot be a party that just camps out in urban areas and tries to call it a day. Doesn’t matter how many consultants you lock into a room in Austin, they cannot buy their way out of this problem,” Scudder explained. And Scudder stands by his – and the party’s – recent accomplishments. Since he was elected, the party has paid off its debt, flipped a state Senate seat, placed a Democrat on the ballot for every federal and statewide office, the first time that’s happened since 1972, and they also have around 80 staff members involved in a $30 million coordinated campaign. Scudder has already filed to run for reelection, so he’s hopeful to stick around for a while. “I think if you go up and down our ballot, we have great candidates this year, lots of excitement, and finally, we have some infrastructure. And I think that Republicans should be scared,” said the chair.

‘Come and make the ask’: Talarico faces a test with Black voters in Texas

Friendship-West Baptist Church is a stronghold for Black politics, where candidates pass through cycle after cycle to win over its 13,000 congregants. It’s the church Rep. Jasmine Crockett (D-Texas) calls home; her pastor, the Rev. Dr. Frederick D. Haynes III, is now running to succeed her in Congress. Even Beto O’Rourke visited last week to encourage people to register to vote. But several congregants can’t help but notice a continued absence this year: James Talarico. The Democratic Senate nominee has a long road ahead if he wants to flip the Texas seat blue — one that requires winning over the state’s nearly 3 million Black voters, who largely broke for Crockett in the March primary and many of whom remain skeptical of his candidacy.

click here for more

“Come and make the ask. Come and try to earn the vote,” said Alan Williams, a Crockett voter and Friendship-West congregant. “I think he thinks our vote is just a default and he doesn’t have to earn it.” In the month-and-a-half since he won the nomination, Talarico has begun criss-crossing Texas, including visiting some Black churches, holding meetings with faith leaders and elected officials, and block-walking in majority-Black cities. But frustration from worshippers at Friendship-West — who have yet to hear from him directly — and interviews with Black power brokers across the state reveal the pressure Talarico faces to move faster to heal open wounds from a contentious primary and convince voters to turn out. David Malcolm McGruder, the church’s executive pastor, said Talarico has to do more to sell his vision to voters — and convince them he’ll follow through: “We have people who show up in our churches during the election season, but who don’t show up for us at the level of policy beyond November.”

The Hormuz billion-barrel oil shock is about to crash demand

The Strait of Hormuz oil shock has yet to crash demand as the rich world borrows from its stocks and pays up to secure supply. Traders are now sounding the alarm that a harsh adjustment is coming. The longer the vital oil channel doesn’t reopen, traders say, the more consumption is going to have to recalibrate lower to align with supply that’s dropped at least 10%. And for that to happen, people will have buy less, either through prices they can’t afford, or government intervention to force consumption down. A billion barrels of supply loss is already all-but guaranteed — more than double the emergency inventories that governments released not long after the conflict began at the end of February. Buffers are being used up fast, helping to keep a lid on oil prices for now. But with the closure now in its ninth week, demand destruction that started in less obvious sectors like petrochemicals in Asia, is quietly spreading to everyday markets the world over.

click here for more

“Demand destruction is happening in places that are not visible pricing centers,” Saad Rahim, chief economist of trader Trafigura Group, told the FT Commodities Global Summit in Lausanne this week. “That adjustment is already happening, but if this continues, it has to get larger and larger. We’re at a critical inflection point.” The most dependent industries and markets — including petrochemicals plants in Asia and the Middle East, and shipments of liquefied petroleum gas, a vital cooking fuel in India — saw an immediate hit when the US and Israel first attacked Iran on Feb. 28. Now, with a stalemate between US President Donald Trump and his Iranian adversaries dragging on, the impact is increasingly shifting west — and to products that are central to consumers’ everyday lives. Airlines in Europe and the US are cutting thousands of flights. Analysts are warning of weakness in consumption of gasoline after prices hit $4 a gallon in the US, and diesel — used to power everything from trucks to construction equipment.

State Stories

Why Greg Abbott is still declaring a border emergency under Trump

Border crossings have ground to such a halt over the last year that President Donald Trump’s border czar, Tom Homan, recently said “we have the most secure border in the history of the nation.” But last week, Gov. Greg Abbott quietly renewed a border disaster proclamation — a version of the same order he has issued monthly since 2021, when migrant crossings were at decades-long highs. The now five-year-long disaster declaration has provided the foundation for Abbott’s $11 billion security crackdown and is now allowing the state to help Trump’s mass deportation effort. “The effects of four years of failed border policy under the Biden Administration did not go away overnight,” said Andrew Mahaleris, a spokesman for the governor. “Illegal crossings, cartel smuggling, fentanyl trafficking, and related criminal activity continue to threaten public safety in Texas.”

click here for more

The lasting nature of the declaration underscores how Abbott — who is seeking a record fourth term as governor this fall — has leveraged his executive authority and consolidated power over the past decade in office. The border disaster appears to be the longest standing since at least the 1990s, surpassing even Abbott’s yearslong COVID-era proclamations, said Brandon Rottinghaus, a political scientist at the University of Houston who studies governors. The order is “a testament to the core power of Texas governors: longevity,” Rottinghaus said. “The political ramifications are significant too — the governor can continue to brag about being on the front lines of the front lines of the border crisis.” The governor’s use of such emergency orders has previously chafed some in the Legislature, who see it as shifting the balance of powers in the state. The COVID orders pushed some in Abbott’s own party to seek to curtail the governor’s ability to issue such proclamations indefinitely, arguing it tips the balance of power in Austin away from the Legislature. State Sen. Brian Birdwell, a Granbury Republican, pushed a constitutional amendment last year that would require the governor to call a special session if a declared disaster or emergency that affects most of the state exceeds 30 days. Birdwell’s legislation easily cleared the Senate and unanimously passed a House committee. But it never made it to the House floor.

Dallas Republican’s petition to force precinct-based runoff rejected by Texas appeals court

A North Texas appeals court rejected a petition from a Dallas County republican trying to force the county to hold a precinct-specific Election Day for the upcoming primary election. The petition came after former county GOP Chair Allen West agreed to countywide voting for upcoming runoffs — in the wake of a chaotic March election marred by confusion and legal challenges. The filing from petitioner Barry Wernick, a Republican Party precinct chair and commissioners court candidate, requested the Dallas-based Fifth Court of Appeals order the county elections administrator to conduct the upcoming runoff Election Day with precinct-based polling places. The judges declined Friday, finding they had no jurisdiction to do so. They also found Wernick had no standing for relief, in part because he won his primary race outright and wasn’t in a runoff.

click here for more

He also was not a party to the election services agreement between the GOP's County Executive Committee and the county, the court said, calling Wernick "a stranger to the contract." "(Wernick) is a party precinct chair and, therefore, a member of the CEC. He also serves as a chair of a committee of the CEC," Friday's opinion said. "But he is not the county executive committee, nor is he chair of the CEC." The court did not weigh in on the merits of the challenge itself — namely, whether the contract to go back to countywide voting between the county and the GOP under West was valid. KERA News reached out to Wernick for comment and will update this story with any response. Dallas County is in charge of early voting locations, and its rules stipulate Democrats and Republicans can vote at any location throughout the early voting process. The process for primary Election Day itself is controlled by the parties.

San Antonio courts strained as immigration detention cases spike

On a typical day in his federal courtroom in San Antonio, U.S. District Judge Orlando Garcia might preside over a drug trafficking trial or sentence someone for human smuggling or oversee a civil case. But on a recent Thursday afternoon, Garcia's docket was filled solely with back-to-back habeas corpus cases — all of them filed on behalf of immigrants seeking to get out of federal detention. A habeas corpus petition allows someone in government custody to challenge their detention. The number of habeas corpus cases has skyrocketed in recent months as federal agencies have ramped up enforcement of immigration law during President Donald Trump’s second term. More than 38,000 petitions have been filed nationwide since January 2025. More than 7,600 of them were filed in Texas.

click here for more

The filings have come from people in a variety of different situations — some seeking asylum, others who overstayed their visas or have expired work permits, and some who crossed the border years ago without permission and never left. Some of the filings are high-profile cases such as that of Liam Conejo Ramos, a 5-year-old Ecuadorian boy who was detained with his father in Minnesota and brought to the Dilley Family Detention Center in South Texas. The surge in filings is creating backlogs in the federal court system, slowing down immigration cases and diverting resources and court time from other criminal and civil matters, according to judges and attorneys. Normally, criminal cases take precedence, “but when you have a habeas corpus case, that case needs to be dealt with because someone’s liberty is at stake," Garcia said. More than 4,000 of the habeas corpus petitions are in the Western District of Texas. About 2,100 of them have been assigned to federal judges in San Antonio. Those courts handle about 1,500 cases of all kinds in a typical year, said U.S. District Judge Fred Biery. Biery said that since January, his court has recorded 401 habeas corpus filings.

Dallas is (almost) broke

Dallas City Manager Kimberly Bizor Tolbert announced that the city is essentially broke. A budget shortfall means that the city will begin “immediate cost containment measures.” The press release gives three main reasons: Expenses are forecast to exceed this year’s budget by $16.4 million, “primarily due to Police and Fire pay and overtime.” Revenues are $3.8 million below budget because of declining sales tax revenue. The city self-funds its employee health insurance. It will exceed its budget by $13.8 million because of increased medical and pharmacy claims.

click here for more

The city is now freezing all hiring, with the exception of police and fire, seasonal positions, and jobs in departments outside the general fund. All non-uniform overtime has been halted and discretionary overtime for uniform positions is suspended. Departments are asked to delay all non-essential purchases, and travel is paused. The City will continue monitoring revenues and expenditures closely,” the announcement says. “Additional cost containment measures may be implemented as needed.” The City Council will vote on next year’s budget by the end of September. The city has grand plans for its convention center redo. In the meantime, its existing portfolio is crumbling—and nobody knows what it will cost to fix.

Austin man deported by ICE says he is a U.S. citizen

Federal immigration agents deported an Austin man who says he is a U.S. citizen after detaining him during a traffic stop near Fredericksburg earlier this month. Brian Jose Morales Garcia, 25, said he was born in Denver but grew up in Mexico and lived there until last year, when he legally crossed into the U.S. Despite having documents at home that he said show he is a U.S. citizen, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement deported him four days after his arrest. The American-Statesman reviewed copies of Garcia’s Colorado birth certificate, hospital records and a baptismal record from a few months after his birth, which he and his attorney provided to the newspaper. The Statesman independently corroborated the existence of the birth certificate and baptismal record.

click here for more

“There just is no dispute about whether he is a U.S. citizen,” his lawyer, Kate Lincoln-Goldfinch, said. “What happened here was not that they reviewed those documents and decided that they didn't care. What happened here was that they immediately assumed that he was lying.” Morales Garcia was being driven to a worksite on April 3 when his boss’ truck was stopped by Texas state troopers for what the officer said was a window tint violation. The officer contacted ICE, which asked the Gillespie County Sheriff’s Office to hold Morales Garcia in jail. Morales Garcia, whom authorities identified as a Mexican citizen, was eventually picked up by U.S. Customs and Border Protection and deported four days later. During those four days, friends of Morales Garcia said they tried to provide authorities with a copy of his birth certificate. In a statement, U.S. Customs and Border Protection said that it had determined Morales Garcia’s lack of authorization to be in the country “through record checks” and pointed to an admission by Morales Garcia that he had entered the country illegally, a statement that Morales Garcia said he made after being intimidated. “They didn’t believe me; they were intimidating me so that I’d sign,” Morales Garcia said. “I figured that I’d come back with my birth certificate.” Border Patrol did not provide the Statesman with proof of its claims or evidence to dispute Morales Garcia’s account. In its statement, the agency wrote: “CBP did NOT arrest a U.S. citizen.”

The Texas Legislature bowed to Trump. It screwed him in the process.

Back in August, state Representative Mitch Little, Republican of Lewisville, had an admirably masculine sound bite for CNN’s Brianna Keilar. The TV anchor had asked Little why Texas Republicans were trying to redraw the state’s congressional map in the middle of the decade to deliver the president more seats in the upcoming midterm. “Because we can,” Little said. “We have the votes.” Little, to his credit, and unlike many of his colleagues, didn’t hide the ball. He explained to Keilar that his party wanted a handful of congressional districts it currently couldn’t win. This had a whiff of Thucydides about it—“the strong do what they can and the weak suffer what they must”—and apart from the general preference Panera Bread–frequenting state lawmakers have for a little classical grandeur from time to time, it had the added benefit of making the Texas Legislature look like the tough-guy mover in the equation. This bluster obscured what had actually happened. Texas Republicans had received, and submissively obeyed, marching orders from the political arm of the White House to find five more Republican congressional seats, even though at least some of them knew mid-decade redistricting in this political environment was a bad idea for them.

click here for more

It was hard not to remember the Republican legislative braggadocio of last summer when President Trump spoke to a Virginia radio station on Monday before that state’s redistricting referendum. (Citizens got to vote on it—isn’t that cute?) Virginia was about to approve maps that are designed to give Democrats four seats currently held by Republicans, and Trump offered mewling and uncharacteristically beta complaints about our wonderful Norms and the integrity of the Process. “I don’t know if you know what gerrymandering is, but it’s not good,” he told the host. Not good, he says. Won’t Mitch Little have egg on his face? When it comes to taking a whole pile of busywork hypothetically aimed at making things better and then producing no substantive forward motion, the Texas Legislature is God’s own machine, perfect and sublime. Not infrequently, months of effort put into making something better will end up making it worse. This is the gang, you may remember, that accidentally legalized dirty, lab-prepared THC products while keeping the real thing, God’s green herb, illegal. The White House probably did not know about the deeply ingrained hopelessness that pervades the Texas Legislature, or it probably would not have ordered state leaders to spearhead the gerrymander charge. It was hoping to encourage red states across the country to follow in Texas’s wake. It was hoping Texans would start a prairie fire, and it asked the state to move first and early—which is significant in part because the president’s approval rating was much healthier-looking than it would be six months down the road.

Austin Police will adjust ICE policies following Gov. Abbott funding threat

The Austin Police Department will adjust its rules on how officers engage with federal immigration authorities after Texas Gov. Greg Abbott threatened to block the city from receiving state grant funding. Earlier this year, APD released new rules for how officers interact with Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Under those rules, an officer had to first clear any communication with ICE with a supervisor if an individual had a civil administrative warrant — a noncriminal charge. Austin officers are required to communicate with ICE if a suspect is facing criminal charges. Now, the rules will be updated to clarify that if someone has an ICE administrative warrant, the officer or supervisor “should, when operationally feasible,” contact ICE.

click here for more

Officers should consider urgent public safety needs in the city first, and whether they are needed elsewhere, the city said. The orders also clarify “officers shall not take an unreasonable amount of time assisting in these matters.” Last week, Abbott threatened to pull $2.5 million in state grants from Austin over its rules on how police cooperate with federal immigration authorities. Houston and Dallas are facing similar threats from the governor. Abbott said restricting any notification to ICE agents could be in breach of the grant agreements the city entered into. Just a few days before, Attorney General Ken Paxton announced he had launched an investigation into APD's policies over the same concern. Austin Police Chief Lisa Davis said public safety and community policing are the main focus. “Allocating resources in a way that protects public safety is vitally important and these updated General Orders allow for that," she said in a written statement. Mayor Kirk Watson said the new rules were a rational approach that maximized APD's limited resources to adequately address Austin’s public safety needs.?

Elizabeth Stoker Bruenig: Texans will decide if Jesus was a lefty

While some might pray for hope or peace in such dark times, others are praying for the death of Texas Democrat James Talarico, who is running for the U.S. Senate. During a recent episode of the right-wing Protestant podcast Reformation Red Pill, host Joshua Haymes told the pastor Brooks Potteiger that he prays that “God kills” Talarico, given that the politician seems to be possessed by demons. Potteiger agreed, offering that Talarico should be “crucified with Christ.” Both Haymes and Potteiger later insisted that their remarks were not sincere expressions of violent intent, but rather metaphorical calls for Talarico, a Presbyterian seminarian, to find salvation in their brand of Christianity. Talarico shrewdly responded by offering forgiveness: “You may pray for my death, Pastor, but I still love you. I love you more than you could ever hate me.” A cherubic and well-scrubbed 36-year-old state lawmaker, Talarico seems lately to invite such vitriol. This despite the fact that he has run a generally positive campaign. Born and raised in Texas, he is campaigning on a fairly standard Democratic platform: He supports higher wages, labor organizing, comprehensive immigration reform, and increasing firearm regulations. Talarico’s sermonic speeches are largely about inclusivity and justice.

click here for more

What has made his candidacy so controversial is what he says about God. An avowed progressive, Talarico argues that the country’s powerful Christian conservatives have distorted the lessons of their faith. The words of Jesus, he insists, endorse policies the left embraces. In deep-red evangelical Texas, does his brand of Christian politics have a chance? In a 2021 debate on transgender issues in the Texas House of Representatives, Talarico said that “God is both masculine and feminine, and everything in between. God is nonbinary.” In a 2025 conversation with Joe Rogan, Talarico argued that “this idea that there is a set Christian orthodoxy on the issue of abortion is just not rooted in Scripture,” explaining (somewhat confusingly) that because God sought Mary’s consent before the conception of Jesus, Christians ought to conclude that creation requires permission—and therefore that women should have access to legal abortion. As soon as Talarico’s primary victory over Jasmine Crockett was certain, conservatives called on those remarks and others to swiftly and uniformly deride his Christianity as blasphemous and insincere. “Talarico is a leftist atheist’s idea of a good Christian,” Allie Beth Stuckey, a Texas-based evangelical-conservative influencer, wrote in The Daily Wire.

Texas' quiet city west Of Houston is now the fastest-growing boomtown in the country

It's no surprise that the Houston area is an appealing place for those looking to relocate. Space City has it all, from walkable neighborhoods with fantastic dining to affordable living and a lively, diverse culture. However, there's one particular area west of Houston that's seeing explosive growth. GO Banking Rates reports that Fulshear, a city suburb just 35 miles outside the city, has experienced a 736% growth in total population between 2015 and 2023, making it the fastest-growing town in the United States. In 2024, the U.S. Census Bureau reported that the area had more than 54,000 residents, an increase of 26.9% from the previous year. So, how does a once-tiny town like Fulshear turn into a magnet for working professionals? For one, Fulshear's location makes it a fantastic option for those who need to commute into the city for work in tech or healthcare.

click here for more

Just outside of Katy, itself an ideal weekend destination, Fulshear has designed itself to be nothing short of a residential paradise. From being one of the safest towns in Texas to an excellent school system and several master planned communities, it's the quality of life that sets this town apart from all the others. Here's what the research says. One of the most important things about Fulshear is its reputation for safety. The area is widely considered one of the safest and most welcoming cities in Texas, and the data agrees. Neighborhood Scout gave Fulshear a score of 86 on its total crime index, making it considerably safer than national and state-wide medians. Safewise also conducted a study of the safest cities in Texas for 2026, and Fulshear made the top 10. Even students feel safe here, as polls on Niche revealed that 79% felt that the police were very visible and responsive, and 73% reported feeling completely safe and having no safety concerns. That peace of mind is priceless. Don McCoy, the mayor of Fulshear, told Fox 26 Houston that this exponential growth reflects the high quality of life in the area. The massive influx of people has naturally increased stress on infrastructure, but the good news is that the Fulshear area is flat enough to easily accommodate needed expansions, unlike towns near mountain ranges that have to navigate difficult terrain to expand. Fulshear has the space for additional road and housing projects, which keeps the cost of living down for those looking to purchase homes in the area.

A looming execution raises questions of race, responsibility, and rap

Curtis Riser had some concerns about the problem of wrongful convictions. He wasn’t the only potential juror to raise this point ahead of the 2009 capital murder trial of James Broadnax, in which the Dallas County District Attorney’s Office was seeking death, but attorneys for the state used one of their limited peremptory strikes to keep Riser off the jury. Prosecutors for the state have said they struck him from the jury pool because of his stated concerns, but their notes tell a different story. “Only concern … age + race,” an attorney for the state wrote on his jury questionnaire. Aqwana Long said her feelings about capital punishment were mixed, but she clarified she meant it should only be applied in some cases. Rating her approval of the death penalty on a scale of one to 10, she chose seven. Still, the state rejected her.

click here for more

Dedric Morrison, who said he believed the death penalty was appropriate in “some murder cases,” seemed to prosecutors like he might be sympathetic to a defendant who was intoxicated at the time of the crime. This, according to the state, was enough to exclude him from the jury pool. Riser, Long, and Morrison are all Black. They had similar answers and beliefs to potential jurors who were white, yet they were struck while their white counterparts were not. Attorneys built an all-white jury to try Broadnax, a Black teenager, until the trial judge defied protocol and reinstated one of the other previously struck Black jurors. The judge didn’t go so far as to imply that the prosecution was racially profiling, but stepped in after prosecutors had used almost half of their allowed challenges to cull all seven of the potential Black jurors from the pool. In front of what ended up as a nearly all-white jury, prosecutors would argue that Broadnax and his cousin had robbed two white men—26-year-old Stephen Swan and 28-year-old Matthew Butler, both producers of Christian music—and that Broadnax had shot and killed the pair outside of a recording studio in Garland on June 19, 2008. Broadnax had confessed to shooting the men, and the jury returned a guilty verdict. One juror recently stated, “It seemed to be an open and shut case.”

In billionaire space race, Bezos gaining on Musk's SpaceX

SpaceX, which was fast off the launch pad in the private race for space business, may be feeling some heat. Though the Texas-based builder of rockets and satellites led by Elon Musk is easily the global leader, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos has been ramping up the rivalry with recent strides by his Blue Origin space company. The latest move, Amazon.com Inc.’s $11.6 billion deal to buy satellite operator Globalstar Inc., comes along with decisions by the U.S. military and NASA favoring Blue Origin over SpaceX.

click here for more

Bezos’ global technology and retail company said this month it’s buying Globalstar to launch a direct-to-device service that would compete with SpaceX’s Starlink satellite internet service. Starlink, which has fast-growing operations in Bastrop County, is the biggest moneymaker for SpaceX and the current leader in an industry that’s expected to be worth $200 billion in the coming years. The Globalstar deal came the same day the U.S. Space Force announced it had selected Blue Origin to build a new launch site for super-heavy rockets at Vandenberg Space Force Base, California, beating out SpaceX’s bid for a site for Starship, which is in development at Starbase in South Texas. Delays in the troubled Starship program, which saw multiple testing failures last year, contributed to NASA changing its plans for the next moon mission, Artemis III, which has already been pushed out to next year. NASA scrapped the original plan, which called for a SpaceX Starship to land astronauts on the moon, opting for a scaled-back mission to practice docking maneuvers between an Orion capsule and Starship — and a Blue Origin lunar lander.

Former detainees report water price-gouging at the Dilley Immigration Processing Center

Amanda Aguilar is a staff attorney at American Gateways in San Antonio. She represents multiple families detained at the Dilley Immigration Processing Center and said her clients claim the tap water there is foul. “The water that they have smells like bleach and it’s not really drinkable," said Aguilar. “So, for them to have water that they can drink, they have to pay $3 per bottle of water. Or $39 for a 12-pack of water." Aguilar said one thing that's consistent between all of her clients, whether they were detained out of San Antonio, El Paso, Austin, or another check-in office, is that they were all concerned about the water situation. She said it was causing stomach issues for many of them, emphasizing that people who have medical conditions are much worse off than healthier detainees, considering the lack of available medical care at the facility.

click here for more

One of Aguilar's clients spent more than $ 900 in 20 days on water, food, and phone calls. All of a detained person's cash is put into a commissary, and direct access to their bank account is cut off, so they have to depend on friends and family to receive money they need while in detention. Aguilar files habeas corpus petitions and is challenging the legality of initial detention and adequacy of conditions for children at Dilley. She says the only thing they can do right now is sue ICE. "I plan to keep suing them, and hopefully just keep educating people on what's going on there so we can have humanity and dignity for all families," said Aguilar. In a February 2026 news release from ICE, titled "Debunking the mainstream media lies about South Texas Family Residential Center in Dilley, Texas," ICE Director Todd M. Lyons states that detainees receive "medical care, educational services, recreational opportunities and essential daily living needs." Federal contractor Core Civic operates Dilley. Their website states that the facility gets the same clean?drinking water supplied to the town. Dilley’s water department hasn’t released a water quality report since 2024.

National Stories

A new worry for Republicans: Latino Catholics offended by Trump

When Stuart Sepulvida arrives at St. Francis de Sales Roman Catholic Parish in Tucson, Ariz., for Mass, which he attends most mornings, he passes a display honoring local soldiers and encouraging parishioners to pray for their safety. Hundreds of small cards record their names: Robles, Arenas, Grajeda. A portrait of Pope Leo XIV hangs across the lobby. Mr. Sepulvida, 81, is a Vietnam veteran whose patriotism and Catholicism are deeply intertwined. He voted for President Trump three times but has never felt more betrayed by an American president than when Mr. Trump denounced Pope Leo as “weak on crime” and “terrible for foreign policy.” “It was very disturbing to me to hear both of them clashing like they did,” Mr. Sepulvida said, standing outside the church one morning this week. Now, he is reconsidering whether he will vote Republican this year.

click here for more

The Republican Party is struggling to hold onto the support from Hispanic voters who helped propel Mr. Trump back into the White House in 2024. Yet as many party leaders have acknowledged the urgent need to stop the backsliding among Latinos, the president has enraged many of even his strongest supporters by clashing with the pope. On Easter Sunday, Pope Leo, the first U.S.-born pontiff, spoke of the need to “abandon every desire for conflict, domination and power, and implore the Lord to grant his peace to a world ravaged by wars.” Within days, Mr. Trump, who has led the United States into a war with Iran, said the pope was “catering to the radical left” and posted an AI-generated image portraying himself as a Jesus figure. Mr. Trump later deleted the image, saying he thought it depicted him as a doctor. “It just isn’t what a president should do,” Mr. Sepulvida said. “The pope speaks for his people. He is beyond politics.” Mr. Trump won 55 percent of Catholic voters in the 2024 election, compared to 43 percent who voted for former Vice President Kamala Harris, according to Pew Research Center. The most sizable gains came from Hispanic Catholics. While Joseph R. Biden Jr. won their votes by a 35-point margin in 2020, the Democratic advantage shrunk to 17 points in 2024. Now, just 18 percent of Hispanic Catholics said they support most or all of President Trump’s agenda, according to a poll from Pew released earlier this year. If the president’s quarrel with the pope sours more Latinos on the Republican Party, it could affect midterm races across the country, including in South Florida and South Texas, where Republicans have notched important victories in predominantly Hispanic districts in recent years.

‘He has the market in a chokehold’: Stocks swing as Trump posts

There are lots of things that can move the stock market, from economic data, to Federal Reserve pronouncements, to corporate developments. But for the past 15 months, traders’ fortunes have been largely tethered to the whims of a single person: President Donald Trump. Since taking office last January, Trump’s comments to reporters in extemporaneous gatherings in the Oval Office and at formal press conferences, as well as his posts on social media, have been the primary driver behind the five best and worst days in the S&P 500 Index, according to an analysis from Fundstrat Research. It’s a grip unmatched by any modern American leader. No other president has orchestrated this many best and worst days in a dozen administrations going back to President Ronald Reagan in 1981. “He has the market in a chokehold,” said Hardika Singh, economic strategist at Fundstrat. “The president isn’t supposed to have such an extraordinary amount of control over the fortunes of the stock market. It’s completely unprecedented.”

click here for more

The war in Iran is providing a perfect backdrop to see how much Trump can move US stocks. The S&P 500 just posted its fastest V-shaped drop and recovery since 2020, tumbling 9% from a Jan. 27 peak to the cusp of a technical correction on March 30, before rallying back to all-time highs over the course of 11 trading days. The impact of the president’s words is even clearer when examined session-by-session. For example, the S&P 500 sank 1.5% on March 20, as Trump said in a White House briefing that he didn’t want a ceasefire with Iran. Then, on March 31, the index jumped 2.9% for its best day since May and rallied through the rest of the week after Trump told reporters at several different news outlets that negotiations with Iran were going well and the war was close to ending. There are numerous similar examples from before and since then. It isn’t just equities that are seeing these moves either. Commodity prices have also swung wildly, with oil market volatility rising to levels last seen at the start of the Covid-19 pandemic. In essence, Trump’s wavering positions on the war have made him the market’s “arsonist and firefighter,” said Alexander Altmann, head of global equities tactical strategies at Barclays.

Every Black Republican is leaving the House, erasing diversity gains

Eight years ago, Kevin McCarthy, then the House Republican leader, embarked on a push to recruit more Black Republicans to run for Congress, arguing that the G.O.P. needed to diversify to survive. By 2022, his efforts had yielded modest success, helping pave the way for four Black Republicans to be elected to the House that year, which boosted the total number of Black Republicans serving in Congress to five, including Senator Tim Scott of South Carolina. That progress is about to be erased.

click here for more

All four Black Republicans in the House are leaving Congress next year: Three are seeking statewide office, and one is retiring because redistricting in his state effectively boxed him out of his seat. The exodus is a reflection of the striking and persistent lack of diversity in the G.O.P. ranks of Congress, something that Mr. McCarthy has acknowledged is still an issue even years after his efforts to address it. “When you look at the Democrats, they actually look like America,” he said shortly after leaving Congress in 2023. “When I look at my party, we look like the most restrictive country club in America.” Republican leaders who for a time focused heavily on recruiting and electing more Black candidates appear to have allowed those efforts to flag during the second Trump presidency, as the president has denounced and eliminated diversity programs, fired Black officials while installing an overwhelmingly white senior team and presided over an administration that routinely circulates material echoing white-supremacist references, including a racist meme he posted himself. With the president’s gains with Black men dwindling, there are few Black Republicans running for Congress this year, and none regarded as likely to win.

DOJ drops investigation into Fed’s Powell

U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro said Friday that she is dropping her investigation into Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell over the cost for renovations at the central bank, a move that could clear a path for the Senate to confirm Kevin Warsh as Powell’s replacement. “I have directed my office to close our investigation as the IG undertakes this inquiry,” Pirro said in a post on social media platform X. “Note well, however, that I will not hesitate to restart a criminal investigation should the facts warrant doing so.” She said the Federal Reserve’s inspector general has been asked to scrutinize the renovation, saying the cost overruns ran into “the billions of dollars.”

click here for more

Pirro is the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia. Her investigation into Powell and the cost overruns led Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C., a member of the Senate Banking Committee, to say he wouldn’t support any Fed nominee until the probe was dropped. His opposition would leave the committee tied if all the Democrats also oppose Warsh, which would prevent the nomination from advancing. Tillis also said he considers Warsh a qualified nominee. Powell’s term as chair ends on May 15. “Let’s get rid of this investigation so I can support your confirmation,” Tillis said at Warsh’s hearing before the Senate Banking Committee on Tuesday. Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., said Wednesday that the Banking Committee would provide “accountability” for the investigation into the Fed renovations in an attempt to move the Warsh nomination ahead.

Pope Leo reiterates opposition to death penalty on same day U.S. approves firing squads

The Trump administration announced Friday that it will authorize firing squads as a federally permitted method of execution, deepening its push to revive the death penalty — underscoring a sharp divide with Pope Leo XIV and recent Catholic teaching. Hours after the Justice Department made its announcement, the pontiff condemned the death penalty as an attack on human dignity. In a prerecorded video message shared with DePaul University in Chicago to mark the 15th anniversary of Illinois' abolition of the death penalty, Pope Leo declared that the Catholic Church has consistently taught that each human life, from conception until natural death, is sacred and deserves protection. "We affirm that the dignity of the person is not lost even after very serious crimes are committed," Leo said.

click here for more

Hours earlier, the pontiff had condemned capital punishment aboard the papal plane, when asked about executions carried out by the Iranian government. The timing comes amid a widening divide between the Trump administration and Catholic leaders, who have also opposed the administration's immigration tactics, including widespread arrests of undocumented immigrants. In February, as part of a case contesting the administration's position on birthright citizenship, U.S. bishops filed an amicus brief outlining its opposition. Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche said the Justice Department is also reauthorizing lethal injection using the sedative pentobarbital, which was withdrawn by the Biden administration after a government review found the injection may cause unnecessary pain and suffering. The changes reflect a broader directive from Trump, who since returning to office has ordered the Justice Department to prioritize pursuing and carrying out death sentences. The pentobarbital protocol was originally developed during Trump's first term – with the reintroduction of the federal death penalty – under then-Attorney General Bill Barr. It replaced a three-drug mixture last used during the early 2000s. The Trump administration's report released Friday pushes back on the Biden administration's finding, arguing the review misread the science and that pentobarbital renders a prisoner unconscious rapidly enough to prevent pain.

‘Hyperscale’ data center project in Utah — expected to generate and consume more power than entire state — nears final approval

Celebrity investor Kevin O’Leary plans to build a massive hyperscale data center project in Box Elder County — which state boosters say will fund modern buildings at Hill Air Force Base while generating all of its own power, cleaning the water it uses so it can be sent to the Great Salt Lake and creating 2,000 high-paying jobs in the rural area. The board that oversees the state’s Military Installation Development Authority, or MIDA, approved a series of resolutions Friday to move the multibillion-dollar project forward, agreeing to move fast and charge far lower taxes than usual to help O’Leary “lure the hyperscalers” to Utah. “There’s only five hyperscalers in America, OK, so it’s pretty easy to know who they’re negotiating with,” Paul Morris, MIDA’s executive director, told the board Friday. “You can look those up and you know who they’re talking to.”

click here for more

Amazon, Microsoft and Google are the country’s top-tier hyperscalers — tech giants that run vast cloud computing networks. Analysts typically list Meta and Apple right behind them. The project is awaiting only a final approval from the Box Elder County Commission, which postponed a planned Friday afternoon meeting until Monday. The head developer of the project is O’Leary Digital, owned by O’Leary, a Canadian tycoon and one of the investors on the reality show “Shark Tank,” where his nickname is Mr. Wonderful. O’Leary also made his movie debut last year, co-starring with Timothée Chalamet in “Marty Supreme.” In February, O’Leary posted on Facebook: “Luckily, in Utah, I found … three senators and Governor [Spencer] Cox, pro-business, pro-data centers, but the ball’s back in their court now. We’ve announced that we need every incentive we can get out of that state because we have to raise billions to build this power, and then the data centers that come afterwards.”

The MAHA revolt threatening the farm bill

Republican infighting between two important constituencies — the agriculture sector and the MAHA coalition — is threatening passage of a bill leaders are counting on to help woo rural voters ahead of the midterms. House GOP leaders hope this week to advance a long-stalled farm bill that would secure a slew of industry and rural investments. They see a political incentive to move quickly now to shore up farm country support in advance of the November elections, plus heed calls from President Donald Trump to “PASS THE FARM BILL, NOW!” The farm bill traditionally comes to the floor with bipartisan support. But House Democrats this time are largely opposed to the package because it does not reverse the massive cuts to the country’s largest food aid program enacted by last year’s GOP megabill. That’s putting extra under pressure on Republicans to see it over the finish line amid intraparty disagreements over provisions related to pesticides, livestock laws and ethanol sales.

click here for more

The farm bill traditionally comes to the floor with bipartisan support. But House Democrats this time are largely opposed to the package because it does not reverse the massive cuts to the country’s largest food aid program enacted by last year’s GOP megabill. That’s putting extra under pressure on Republicans to see it over the finish line amid intraparty disagreements over provisions related to pesticides, livestock laws and ethanol sales. The biggest source of conflict is over a provision that would shield pesticide makers — a powerful lobbying force with agriculture state Republicans — from lawsuits. It comes as the Trump administration has also moved to protect access to a key pesticide after chemical manufacturers told the White House they were concerned about regulatory uncertainty or MAHA-driven crackdowns. Removing the measure would stoke backlash from Trump officials and farm state Republicans. MAHA activists feel betrayed after voting for Trump in hopes that his administration would crack down on chemical exposure they blame for driving up chronic illness and disease. And now these activists are so fed up that they’ve turned to working with a group of House Democrats to strip out the language, according to four people granted anonymity to share private discussions.

Copyright April 26, 2026, Harvey Kronberg, www.quorumreport.com, All rights are reserved