Valentine’s Day is one of the most romantic days of the year, and also a great source of revenue for restaurants, candy manufacturers, and florists. Couples are exchanging gifts, going on dates, and generally spending money on their significant others. But in the last four years, even the smallest gifts have increased dramatically in price....
Election fraud cases that grab the most headlines are almost always related to vote harvesting. Vote harvesting is the term used to describe teams of people who conduct large-scale operations to illegally obtain massive amounts of ballots for a chosen candidate. It is so common in Texas’s Rio Grande Valley that harvesters have their own...
Important sideboards are missing from a bill that would add mandatory minimum sentences for fentanyl trafficking. Every parent raises a child knowing they will make mistakes. We hope our kids learn and do better. But imagine your teenager or a young adult at a party and sharing illegal drugs. It might be one of the...
Harris County officials seem to have developed a bad habit of violating state law. After launching a likely unconstitutional welfare program last month, county officials this month could be in hot water for politicking on the public dime. According to sources online, the Harris County Clerk’s office has been circulating the image below, which at...
Investment support services firm MSCI’s corporate leadership should be ashamed of continuing to shill for China. From June 28, 2022, to Feb. 8, 2024, two of China’s most well-known stock indices, the Shanghai Stock Exchange Index and Hong Kong’s Hang Sang Index, have lost 20 percent and 28 percent of their value, respectively. And this...
The city of Garland’s property tax is skyrocketing, especially as compared to basic economic measures, like population and inflation. According to its latest available Annual Comprehensive Financial Report (ACFR), the city’s property tax levy rose from $70,801,851 in 2013 to $138,853,429 in 2022, equating to a 96.1% spike in monies to the government (see pg....
The city of Irving’s property tax is growing quickly, causing some observers to wonder why. According to its latest available Annual Comprehensive Financial Report (ACFR), the city’s property tax levy rose from $103,633,782 in 2013 to $187,488,649 in 2022, representing an 80.9% spike over 10 years (see pg. 186 of the ACFR). That high rate...
A city manager in Bozeman, Montana is in hot water after publicly slamming the city of Austin and the prospect of taking a job there. Perhaps most shocking of all, the now-suspended city manager claimed that the position came with a base salary of $475,000 plus “ the car allowance, the housing allowance, all the...
Property taxes imposed by the city of Laredo are growing faster than many people would consider reasonable. According to its latest available Annual Comprehensive Financial Report (ACFR), the amount of property tax monies sought by the city rose from $67,621,015 in 2013 to $99,359,198 in 2022, representing a 46.9% hike in the levy (see pg....
Last year, the Texas Legislature passed a limited disannexation measure, House Bill 3053, that allows people unfairly captured by large cities during a particular time period to hold an election on the question of staying or leaving municipal control. The law was passed after concerns were raised that some cities had accelerated their involuntary annexation...
Recently, U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz reiterated his belief—a belief I and millions of Texans share—that school choice is the civil rights movement of our time. It didn’t take long for opponents to come for him and claim that school choice is actually a segregationist plot. For example, the Nacogdoches Daily Sentinel published an editorial titled...
The following commentary is published on Thursdays as part of TPPF’s subscriber-only newsletter The Post. If you would like to subscribe to The Post, click here. For at least the third time in the last two decades, Congress attempted to pass an immigration and border security-related reform. And for the third straight time, the bill failed...