Featured podcast: “They have no DNA. They have no fingerprints. They have no ballistics. They have no fibers—they have nothing that you would think of as objective evidence connecting Charles to this crime scene.”

The Trump administration’s present plans to add another 90 or so miles of new and replacement wall would finish sealing off the region from the Brownsville Ship Channel all the way up to Falcon Dam, completing the job that George W. Bush and Barack Obama started.

Featured story: "I returned to Texas—not because I expected to fit in, but because it is home. And through a circuitous career path, I found myself a librarian sitting at the circulation desk of a high school library in Abilene."

New from Alex Birnel: This new book’s intention is clear— to sketch a distinct throughline connecting the left organizers of the Texas present to the radicals of the Texas past. Think of it like laying down an ideological I-35 for us to follow.

As protesters chanted outside, C-suite oil and gas executives expressed alarm over sudden oil price shocks that, perhaps counterintuitively, threaten to reduce their revenues by catering demand.

“Fossil fuel folks in the White House [are] pushing an agenda where we will shut down alternatives like wind farms and solar and start a war that will benefit American companies. A few do well. The rest of us around the world, not just Americans, are suffering because we are so dependent on this.”

New today: “The Department of Homeland Security is not being clear intentionally about what their plans are, what they’re deploying in the region, and so it’s up to us in the community to track and document and report on it. This is how we fight back.”

Last week: As James Baldwin famously wrote—”all of the children are always ours.” Our march was a political action, a spiritual practice, a grief ritual, a block party, and a walking love letter to our communities, all rolled into one.

Featured podcast: If you're interested in potential wrongful convictions, hypnosis, or the death penalty—or if you just want to go on a wild ride during your commute—check out The Unforgotten: ‘Riding Shotgun’ wherever you listen to podcasts.

“It’s anyone and everyone who is pushing back against the insanity that is gripping our country right now. This can happen to you, and if they can do it to you, they will.”

A construction contract was awarded March 18, using money from the “One Big Beautiful Bill,” to build wall through the National Butterfly Center and the Santa Ana refuge, among other once-protected sites. New from Michael Gonzalez, copublished with @theborderchronicle.bsky.social:

It’s a region that’s historically been difficult for wall-building presidents, but the Trump administration’s present plans for new and replacement fencing would finish sealing off the Rio Grande Valley: www.texasobserver.org/trump-border...

We partnered with The Unforgotten to do a podcast! If you're interested in potential wrongful convictions, hypnosis, or the death penalty—or if you just want to go on a wild ride during your commute—check out ‘Riding Shotgun’ wherever you listen to podcasts. www.texasobserver.org/riding-shotg...

New: Gulf Coast activists gathered to protest the war on Iran while C-suite oil and gas executives expressed alarm over sudden oil price shocks. @candicebernd.bsky.social takes us into this massive fossil fuel conference ...

Out today: Jill Barganier, a petite blond mother of three from the Dallas suburb of Farmers Branch, has been asked many times over the past three decades to recall what she saw from her window on January 29, 1998. ...

Last week: “If we get to the point where we have to declare a Level 1 Water Emergency, we need to be ready for that and we have no precedent to follow. There’s no manual, there’s no video/ There’s a monumental task ahead of us to develop this.”

“They have no DNA. They have no fingerprints. They have no ballistics. They have no fibers—they have nothing that you would think of as objective evidence connecting Charles to this crime scene.”

Featured story: "I entered this profession just as the storm clouds of the current book-banning push were starting to gather, hoping it would pass over me as if lamb’s blood were painted on my doorframe. And for the first three years, wishful thinking worked."

New! @MichellePitcher.bsky.social of the Observer teamed up with Free Range Productions to create "The Unforgotten: Riding Shotgun," a true crime podcast about potential wrongful convictions, hypnosis, and the death penalty. Check out this preview:

“The Trump administration and the media had demonized Antifa all through the first Trump term, and even more aggressively in the second. This concept of terrorism tends to become politicized, particularly when government officials intentionally politicize it.”

“The Trump administration and the media had demonized Antifa all through the first Trump term, and even more aggressively in the second. This concept of terrorism tends to become politicized, particularly when government officials intentionally politicize it.”

Don't miss an article! Catch up with everything we've published from the March/April 2026 issue of our magazine: www.texasobserver.org/issues/march...

Last week from Trudy Taylor Smith of @cdf1973.bsky.social -Texas: We feel grief as we watch lives and families torn apart, and the horror unfolding around us takes a toll on our emotional and even physical health. We must meet those feelings with collective action.

From @dylanbaddour.bsky.social at @insideclimatenews.org: City officials in Corpus Christi on Tuesday released modeling that showed emergency cuts to water demand could be required as soon as May as reservoir levels continue to decline.

Last week's top story, from Texas Observer magazine: “Long term, it’s going to set a lot of precedent that pushes the law away from environmental protection, which will either lead to more-harmful outcomes for the environment or will necessitate the development of new legal and policy approaches.”

The latest from Texas Observer cartoonist Ben Sargent. Read our latest political analysis and investigations: www.texasobserver.org/topics/polit...

Featured story: "It didn’t take long before Tammy Fogle, the leader of our local Moms for Liberty group, issued 27 book challenges. She had no children attending our schools, but SB 13 had opened the door for her."

Drive around Fort Worth, or any populous Texas city, and you’ll see Muslim mosques, Hindu and Buddhist temples, Sikh gurdwaras, and Jewish synagogues, as well as Christian churches of all sizes and varieties. A diversity that depends on a wall of separation. www.texasobserver.org/a-wall-thats...

From @stevanzetti.bsky.social: Experts say the outcome of the Prairieland "Antifa" case will give the Trump administration the green light to take a more aggressive stance against left-wing activity and further politicize the use of domestic terrorism laws.

Previously: If border walls destroy La Lomita, Santa Ana, Bentsen State Park, and the National Butterfly Center, they will not be magically resurrected when the White House has a less malignant occupant.

"As we take action alongside each other, this generates further energy and hope, fueling our ability to respond to injustice with creativity and sustain our resistance over time. All of this is crucial, because it has never been more important for us to advocate for an end to family detention."

“It’s pretty facially an attempt to mollify the White House post Charlie Kirk’s assassination. … What I’m seeing is the unfettered use of these very powerful tools and these very powerful statutes, absent any sort of norms or guardrails that normally would be in place to guard against overreach.”

Experts say the outcome of the Prairieland "Antifa" case will give the Trump administration the green light to take a more aggressive stance against left-wing activity and further politicize the use of domestic terrorism laws. www.texasobserver.org/prairieland-...

Our top story: Out of 309 climate-related court decisions issued between January 2018 and September 30, 2025 by circuit court panels that included Trump appointees, more than half—167 of those rulings—were clearly anti-environment.

The latest from Texas Observer cartoonist Ben Sargent. See more from Loon Star State: www.texasobserver.org/topics/loon-...

In books: On August 3, 2019, I was nearly 2,000 miles away in Washington, D.C., where I worked as a national political reporter in the bureau of The Boston Globe. It was a Saturday, and I was in a movie theater when my phone lit up with calls and messages.

Previously: "We know where the checkpoints are. We warn one another when the Border Patrol is nearby. In public space, we adjust our bodies and behavior, attempting to go unnoticed, offering smiles of compliance as a way to disarm."

“I think this is the worst-case-scenario verdict.” New from @stevanzetti.bsky.social: Late last week, feds notched a victory in an unprecedented and controversial trial that sought to tie alleged members of “Antifa” to domestic terrorism, a case that could cast a long shadow over free expression.

Out today: To give into despair would be to fall for the administration’s bluff and willingly give up our power. That’s why embodied, communal practices such as singing, marching, and dancing together are so important at times like these.

From Monday: Talarico—whose central message is that it’s about not left versus right, but top versus bottom—is going to have to meaningfully engage with and accept the critiques of Black voters and politicos and give those voters substantive policy that renders them as seen, full humans.

“If we get to the point where we have to declare a Level 1 Water Emergency, we need to be ready for that and we have no precedent to follow. There’s no manual, there’s no video. There’s a monumental task ahead of us to develop this.”

New from Trudy Taylor Smith of @cdf1973.bsky.social -Texas: ICE is detaining families under dangerous, life-threatening conditions. Since Trump took office, ICE has detained more than 3,800 children and the daily number of children in detention has exploded.

New from Trudy Taylor Smith of @cdf1973.bsky.social -Texas: ICE is detaining families under dangerous, life-threatening conditions. Since Trump took office, ICE has detained more than 3,800 children and the daily number of children in detention has exploded.

How did we get here? Story from 2022: "Five years ago, when ExxonMobil came calling, city officials eagerly signed over a large portion of their water supply so the oil giant could build a $10 billion plant to make plastics out of ethane gas." www.texasobserver.org/corpus-chris...

My latest for Texas Observer:

From 2022: Now the commitments city officials made over the past five years are coming due. Exxon’s plastic plant started operations this year and will eventually consume 25 million gallons per day.

Our top story: In Trump’s first presidential term, federal judges often blocked administration efforts to roll back environmental protections. But as Trump has increasingly filled the courts with people who share his views, he faces fewer and fewer barriers to gutting environmental protections.

"I can’t have many of the books I loved in high school. Modern collection development policies and state laws don’t allow for it."

"[E]nvironmental racism." "[F]ederal courts increasingly in the hands of anti-environment judges." "Somebody with a lot of money comes into your town, uses up all your resources, [..] makes money, and sends it somewhere else." #Texas #USA #Genocide #Climate #Water #FossilFuels #Courts

“Disaster is on the doorstep of the City of Corpus Christi,” Abbott’s chief of staff wrote to the TCEQ at 4:30 pm Friday, five days after @insideclimatenews.org reported the impending catastrophe. Reservoirs “may be depleted as soon as May 2026,” he wrote.