On a hilltop overlooking the Rio Grande, just below a picnic area along Highway 83 in San Ygnacio, there’s an unmarked grave. The river—as well as its new razor-sharp decorations—stretches as far as the eye can see in either direction. Occasionally a car passes, but mostly there’s a quiet stillness. The riverine border between Texas […]

The post The River and the Fever Dream appeared first on The Texas Observer.

This article originally appeared on Inside Climate News, a nonprofit, non-partisan news organization that covers climate, energy, and the environment. Sign up for their newsletter here. Editor’s Note: This story illuminates potential push factors that could influence future immigration at the Texas border. There is a sense of deja vu in the jungles of South America to […]

The post Trump’s Plan for Venezuelan Oil Raises Prospects of Paramilitary Violence appeared first on The Texas Observer.

In September, two new Shakespeare adaptations used the Bard’s canonical plays as jumping-off points to bring stories infused with Hispanic culture to Dallas audiences.  Echo Theatre’s world-premiere production of El Rey del Pollo by Anna Skidis Vargas, an adaptation of King Lear, and Shakespeare Dallas’ The Taming of the Shrew used the Spanish language to […]

The post In Dallas, Spanish-Inflected Shakespeare Adaptations Experiment with Language appeared first on The Texas Observer.

Earlier this month, a few dozen police officers, school district representatives, and one pro-Trump candidate for Congress crowded together in a room above the cafeteria at Samuel V. Champion High School in Boerne. School was cancelled for the day, but there was activity in the hallways, which was being shown on large TV screens at […]

The post Uvalde Trial Raises Question of Whether Police Stop School Shootings appeared first on The Texas Observer.

As a new Department of Homeland Security (DHS) funding bill works its way through Congress, Congressman Marc Veasey, a Democrat who represents part of Dallas, introduced an amendment in committee Wednesday aimed to reduce the salary of James Rodden, an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) assistant chief counsel who acts as a prosecutor for ICE […]

The post Congressman Tries to Cut Pay of ICE Prosecutor with Racist X Account to $1 appeared first on The Texas Observer.

The rolling grounds of the UMLAUF Sculpture Garden and Museum near Austin’s Barton Springs are dotted with bronze pieces, their patinas letting them almost blend in with the scenery. But up close, they’re vividly detailed. A refugee holds a baby in gnarled hands, molded by American artist Charles Umlauf—the garden’s benefactor and namesake—in 1945. John […]

The post ‘Black Bird Redemption Song’: A Fort Worth Artist’s Work on Confinement, Freedom, and Fred Rouse appeared first on The Texas Observer.

At 4:50 p.m. on May 25, 2024, a security camera in a Hutchins State Jail dorm catches Jackie Wiley standing in his white jumpsuit at the back of the large communal room he shares with dozens of other men. The 52-year-old Dallas native, known around the lockup for his bubbly humor, is talking with others […]

The post In Texas State Jails, a Rising Death Toll and a Broken Promise appeared first on The Texas Observer.

In the realm of Texas newspapers, one media mogul now rules them all—or close to it at least. Last February, Hearst Communications acquired the Austin American-Statesman. Seven months later, the privately held New York-based conglomerate bought up the Dallas Morning News, one of the country’s last locally owned metro papers, for just over $80 million—outbidding […]

The post In Ink and on Airwaves, Texas Media Grows Ever More Concentrated appeared first on The Texas Observer.

After last year’s deadly Hill Country flood took at least 135 lives over the July 4 weekend, volunteers flocked to the area to support disaster relief efforts. Among those volunteers were members of Patriot Front, a neo-Nazi organization that is one of the nation’s largest and most influential white nationalist groups. On July 23, Patriot […]

The post Revealed: Four Businesses with Ties to Patriot Front Operating in North Texas appeared first on The Texas Observer.

In February of last year, the Texas Observer reported that James “Jim” Joseph Rodden—an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) assistant chief counsel who acts as a prosecutor for ICE in immigration court in Dallas—operates a white supremacist X account named GlomarResponder, based on an overwhelming number of biographical details that the Observer matched through publicly […]

The post ICE Prosecutor Who Runs Racist X Account Returns to Dallas Immigration Court  appeared first on The Texas Observer.

Upon signing school vouchers into law last May, Governor Greg Abbott pronounced that he had delivered “education freedom to every Texas family.” But the billion-dollar program, which opens to parents on February 4, has enrolled dozens of private schools that openly discriminate against Texas families on the basis of religion, sexual orientation, or gender identity, […]

The post Texas Taxpayers Will Fund Dozens of Private Schools that Openly Discriminate appeared first on The Texas Observer.

Editor’s Note: This story is the third installment in a series produced in partnership with the Pulitzer Center’s AI Accountability Network.  Goliad County police kicked off one human smuggling investigation not with a suspect’s name, but with a discarded receipt and cell phone surveillance software. In June 2021, Chief Deputy Tim Futch chased a speeding […]

The post Texas Police Invested Millions in a Shadowy Phone-Tracking Software. They Won’t Say How They’ve Used It. appeared first on The Texas Observer.

On October 15, 2024, the Texas Senate State Affairs Committee held a wide-ranging special hearing in the Capitol’s underground extension. The first subject was “addressing homelessness,” an issue that affects tens of thousands of Texans on any given night. Among those who testified were elected politicians, law enforcement officials, and service providers from major cities […]

The post A Dallas Megadonor, a New Nonprofit, and the War on ‘Housing First’ appeared first on The Texas Observer.

To see more political cartoons from Ben Sargent, visit our Loon Star State section. Find Observer political reporting here.

The post Loon Star State: That Dog Hunts appeared first on The Texas Observer.

President Donald Trump’s deadly invasion of Venezuela and kidnapping of its president could be an unusually clear example of “blood for oil.” The president has nearly said as much himself. But one hitch is that Houston’s oil giants don’t immediately appear eager to buy what Trump is selling. Following the administration’s military coup, Trump suggested […]

The post Why Houston Oil Majors Are Hesitant to Go All In on Venezuela appeared first on The Texas Observer.

Even some of his most passionate supporters were surprised by the number of votes Democrat Taylor Rehmet received in the November special election for Texas Senate District 9.  His competitors, Republicans Leigh Wambsganss and John Huffman, each had mountains of cash and the backing of major PACs and political players across Texas. Even so, Rehmet, […]

The post Could This State Senate Runoff be a Tipping Point for Tarrant County?  appeared first on The Texas Observer.

Much like how a sailor, lost and withering at sea, at least gets the chance to see the world, Texas’ ailing Democrats will get the chance this year to recreate some of the magic of the 2018 midterms. You know the drill: Donald Trump’s in the second year of a presidential stint, and his megalomaniacal […]

The post Midterm Memo: The C-Team. Maybe B-. appeared first on The Texas Observer.

Texas Observer reader, Call me biased, but I do believe you’re holding a damn good magazine in your hands right now. Michelle Pitcher continues her ascent as one of the state’s best criminal justice reporters and narrative feature writers. Josephine Lee again takes you into a corner of Houston culture you might otherwise never know […]

The post Editor’s Letter: Introducing Our January/February 2026 Issue appeared first on The Texas Observer.

Web traffic is a fickle thing, but online readership numbers do at least give us at the Observer a sense of what stories are making a splash with a bigger audience, and that’s useful information for us to have. So, for my benefit and perhaps yours, here’s a moderately curated list of our most-read stories […]

The post Our Most-Read Stories of 2025 appeared first on The Texas Observer.

In case you find yourself this holiday season with a little extra reading time, or maybe time to return to a story you left open in a tab some many months ago, here are 10 of the best Observer longform stories from 2025 (in chronological order). May they enrich you for the now, and steel […]

The post Our Best Longform Stories of 2025 appeared first on The Texas Observer.

The editor of this publication wasn’t exaggerating when he called 2025 “this frankly awful year”: Things are dark, and likely to get much darker.  Our politics nationally and here in Texas is now firmly in the grip of a narrow, petty tribalism that feeds on enmity. Each day brings new horrors; scrolling through social media […]

The post A Light the Darkness Cannot Extinguish appeared first on The Texas Observer.

The train tracks leading to my grandma’s house always reminded me of a spine. Curved & ancient, a body of splintered wood & metal hinges groaned when the train was coming. & my mom once told me that the train tracks split the town in two. Everything here is split in two. If it isn’t […]

The post Hereditary appeared first on The Texas Observer.

For labor organizing, Texas was long dismissed as a forlorn place. “Right-to-work” laws restrict organizing here, most public-sector workers can’t collectively bargain or strike, and local governments are broadly banned from passing their own worker rights ordinances. Yet total membership in Texas unions has been growing. According to data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, […]

The post At the Texas AFL-CIO, a Changing of the Guard in a Time of Growth appeared first on The Texas Observer.

Texas Republicans have been wary of unmanned aerial vehicles, with some even backing proposed laws to allow the citizenry to gun down invasive airborne drones. Now, thanks to years of Operation Lone Star, Governor Abbott’s multi-billion dollar border mission, the Texas Department of Public Safety (DPS) is ushering in the Drone Star State with an […]

The post Under Operation Lone Star, Texas State Police More Than Doubled Its Drone Fleet appeared first on The Texas Observer.

Last Monday, just hours before the candidate filing deadline, Dallas Democratic Congresswoman Jasmine Crockett made it official: The high-profile political flamethrower is running for the U.S. Senate. The move was not a surprising one, but it did finally bring resolution to the weeks of her very public consideration of whether to get into the race, […]

The post Everyone Knows Jasmine Crockett. Could That Be a Good Thing? appeared first on The Texas Observer.

Editor’s Note: This is part one of what will be a two-part series supported by the Pulitzer Center and the Ida B. Wells Society Investigative Reporting Fellowship. (Leer en español aquí.) For the Gulf Coast oil and gas industry, the mini-region around the 50-mile-long Laguna Madre is the final frontier. A rare hypersaline lagoon that […]

The post Peering Into the Rio Grande Valley’s Fossil Fuel Future appeared first on The Texas Observer.

Nota del editor: esta serie fue apoyada por la Beca de Periodismo de Investigación de la Sociedad Ida B. Wells y el Centro Pulitzer. (Read in English here.) Para la industria del petróleo y el gas de la Costa del Golfo, la miniregión alrededor de la Laguna Madre, de 80 kilómetros de largo, es la […]

The post Mirando hacia el futuro: Los combustibles fósiles en el Valle del Río Grande appeared first on The Texas Observer.

The post Strangest State: Drones, Drugs, Deer, and a Dutiful Dog appeared first on The Texas Observer.

Between 2022 and 2025, the Institute for Social Policy and Understanding’s Islamophobia Index increased by 8 points. The Center for the Study of Organized Hate found that online Islamophobia was widespread throughout Zohran Mamdani’s mayoral race in New York City. From June to October 2025, the study found that online Islamophobic narratives frequently labeled Mamdani […]

The post With Islamophobia on the Rise, Houston Becomes Home to First Ismaili Center in the U.S.  appeared first on The Texas Observer.

Former Congressman and felon Steve Stockman, a Friendswood-area conservative who was convicted of 23 federal corruption charges and sentenced to 10 years in prison back in 2018, has declared himself rehabilitated and fit to run again for the U.S. House of Representatives. This week, Stockman, once dubbed Texas’ “weirdest lawmaker”, entered a crowded field of […]

The post Ex-Con Congressman Attempts a Texas Comeback appeared first on The Texas Observer.