Backed into a corner by circumstances at the border and growing pressure from Congress, the White House on Monday renewed a public health order—Title 42—that allows the Border Patrol to turn migrants back at the border over COVID-19 concerns. That pressure from Congress came in the form of a discharge petition on a bill that...
In recent days, hair-on-fire reports like this one from the Huffington Post claim that the Texas Senate “has passed a bill to eliminate a requirement that public schools teach that the Ku Klux Klan and its white supremacist campaign of terror are ‘morally wrong.’” The reports are misleading at best; even Texas news outlets that...
“The Way to Stop Discrimination on the Basis of Race is to Stop Discrimination on the Basis of Race” -U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts Texas Public Policy Foundation attorneys, along with America First Legal, struck a blow against government-sanctioned discrimination. A Biden administration program that “prioritized” COVID-19 relief funds based upon the race...
“The loveliest trick of the Devil is to persuade you that he does not exist.” —Charles Baudelaire Gov. Greg Abbott is likely to sign the bill that will effectively ban the teaching of critical race theory in Texas, but its implementation will be key. In the months that CRT has been debated in Texas, it...
Sometimes, I really feel the distance between East Texas and Austin. It’s a five-hour drive for me, but Austin can seem much, much farther away when important bills on being debated at the Capitol. My voice simply doesn’t carry like the voices of lobbyists ensconced in their Austin offices, with easy access to members of...
To lead off its editorial railing against Senate Bill 7 and efforts to reform—or at least regularize—the rules for voting in Texas, the Houston Chronicle evokes the White Man’s Primary Association of Dimmit County. But like the editorial itself, there’s far less here than meets the eye. It’s true that in tiny Dimmit County in...
Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner tweeted out a bold statement on Tuesday: “We don’t have voter fraud in Texas…” It was part of a longer tweet, which continued, “but we did have massive systemwide grid failure, statewide power outages, bursted water pipes, no water and high electricity bills. Um. Now I understand why some elected officials...
To the People of Texas & All Americans in the World— Fellow Citizens & Compatriots— I am besieged by a thousand or more… So opens the famous letter from William Travis at the Alamo. Our situation isn’t nearly as dire, but our cause is the same. The Texas Public Policy Foundation is proud to announce...
TPPF Senior Managing Editor and Policy Analyst Carine Martinez took her Oath of Allegiance on Tuesday, making her an official American (and proud Texan). The journey that led to raising her right hand in a San Antonio naturalization ceremony began in Paris. “But it was after I started learning more about U.S. history—after reading the...
Braving cold temperatures and a constant drizzle, East Texans gathered in Tyler on Saturday to learn more about property tax and school finance reform. The event, hosted by Grassroots America-We The People and the Texas Public Policy Foundation, brought TPPF experts Rafa Bejar, Kara Belew and James Quintero in for a closer look at how...
TPPF’s Rafa Bejar, Kara Belew and Vance Ginn spoke to an estimated 100 members of the Republican Club at Heritage Ranch in Fairview near McKinney on Monday, explaining the state’s complicated school finance and property tax systems, and proposing some fixes. “Over time, per-pupil spending for public education is up,” Kara explained. “But at the...