BG Reads // June 10, 2025

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Today's BG Reads include:

🟪 Hundreds protest in Austin against nationwide ICE detentions (Texas Tribune)

🟪 Austin's 'dire' air traffic controller shortage raises risk of flight delays (KUT)

🟪 CapMetro swears in first-ever transit police force (Community Impact)

🟪 Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick’s push to ban THC in Texas draws rare backlash from the right (Texas Tribune)

🟪 How could Texas’ new child care laws impact students and parents? (Dallas Morning News)

🟪 ‘Trump movement’ turns on Cornyn, poll finds (Politico)

🟪 White House pushes Texas to redistrict, hoping to blunt Democratic gains (New York Times)

Read on!

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[CITY OF AUSTIN]

🏛️ City Memos:

🏛️ City Leadership

[AUSTIN METRO NEWS]

Hundreds protest in Austin against nationwide ICE detentions (Texas Tribune)

A largely peaceful march in downtown Austin on Monday condemning the uptick in immigrant detentions across the country dispersed when law enforcement fired tear gas into a portion of the crowd that refused to leave.

The protest, organized by the Party for Socialism and Liberation’s Austin branch, began outside state Capitol grounds at around 7 p.m. as several hundred protesters condemned raids conducted in recent weeks by U.S. Immigration Customs and Enforcement.

The group guided the mile-long march and chants through downtown toward the J. J. “Jake” Pickle Federal Building before circling back to the Capitol.

While the organizers announced the end of their gathering just after 8 p.m., more than a hundred protesters continued marching as police told them to leave the streets. Some rerouted back to the federal building but were blocked from it by law enforcement, who eventually fired tear gas canisters into the crowd.

Speakers during the protest and those who marched in downtown Austin said ICE and law enforcement were operating without due process for people they have detained in raids.

Some, including Valerie Cruz, an Austin resident and first generation American, came to share their solidarity with undocumented immigrants they say have been villainized by law enforcement… 🟪 (READ MORE)

Austin's 'dire' air traffic controller shortage raises risk of flight delays (KUT)

A shortage of air traffic controllers at Austin-Bergstrom International Airport (ABIA) has increasingly forced federal officials to slow the pace of arriving flights, at times holding planes on the ground in other cities to avoid overwhelming the tower.

The delays — known as "ground delay programs" — don't happen every day. But they were triggered twice in May alone, a growing symptom of an acute staffing crisis inside the tower, where controllers are enduring mandatory overtime, six-day work weeks and managing more flights with less rest.

"Some people question how safe [a ground delay] is," said Colin Scoggins, a retired air traffic controller with more than 30 years of experience. "The ground delay is where you're getting your safety from. They put in ground delays because they can only handle so many aircraft per hour."

For travelers, it can mean boarding a plane, then getting off and waiting at the gate. During the most recent ground delay on May 21, the average flight was 41 minutes late. Some travelers were delayed by almost two hours… 🟪 (READ MORE)

CapMetro swears in first-ever transit police force (Community Impact)

Capital Metro welcomed its inaugural class of transit police officers June 6, marking a milestone in the agency’s push for increased public safety.

Concerns over safety is not something new for the organization.

CapMetro adopted a three-pronged public safety strategy back in 2021, leading to the creation of the specialized transit police department, public safety ambassadors and community intervention specialists.

The agency appointed its first police chief, Eric Robins, last August, after the agency received approval from the Texas Commission on Law Enforcement authorizing CapMetro to recruit and hire its own officers… 🟪 (READ MORE)

 Luling's new economic development leader sees a canvas for 'smart growth' (Austin Business Journal)

Christina Arias was born and raised in Buda when it was mostly farmland. There was no H-E-B LP or Cabela's Inc. — and definitely not the wave of manufacturers that have headed to the city over the last several years.

Arias – known by her nickname "Ari" – said there's a lot of the same in Luling, where she moved a decade ago. She's now tasked with overseeing "smart growth" for the city of 5,800 people, about 50 miles south of Austin, after taking over as the director of the Luling Economic Development Corp. in June.

"It's very community-oriented, which I love. Everybody knows everybody," said Arias, who worked as a grant writer for the city for the past year.

While small, Luling is on the map for developers already. Lake Jackson-based Buc-ee's Ltd. completed an expansion of its flagship store. X-Bow Systems Inc. is building out a massive rocket-making facility. Hometown Meat Market LLC is expanding its meat processing facility. Nutraceutical company Veritacor Manufacturing LLC built out its campus. There are also a couple of notable new neighborhoods in the works, and Arias would like to see the H-E-B grocery store expand… 🟪 (READ MORE)

[TEXAS NEWS]

Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick’s push to ban THC in Texas draws rare backlash from the right (Texas Tribune)

Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick was clear from the start.

Weeks before this year’s legislative session began, and before he announced any other priorities, the Republican Senate leader said he wanted lawmakers to ban, at any cost, products that contain the psychoactive compound in weed. His target was the multibillion-dollar hemp industry that had sprouted up thanks to a loophole in a 2019 state law that legalized products providing a similar high to marijuana.

Patrick justified his conviction by contending that retailers had abused that loophole to sell products with dangerous amounts of tetrahydrocannabinol, or THC. He accused the retailers of preying on the state’s young people with shops posted near schools and marketing aimed at children.

“I couldn’t, in good conscience, leave here knowing if we don't do something about it in the next two years — how many kids get sick?” Patrick said in March, talking about his willingness to force a special legislative session by blocking must-pass legislation from making it through the Texas Senate… 🟪 (READ MORE)

White House pushes Texas to redistrict, hoping to blunt Democratic gains (New York Times)

resident Trump’s political team is encouraging Republican leaders in Texas to examine how House district lines in the state could be redrawn ahead of next year’s midterm elections to try to save the party’s endangered majority, according to people in Texas and Washington who are familiar with the effort.

The push from Washington has unnerved some Texas Republicans, who worry that reworking the boundaries of Texas House seats to turn Democratic districts red by adding reliably Republican voters from neighboring Republican districts could backfire in an election that is already expected to favor Democrats.

Rather than flip the Democratic districts, new lines could endanger incumbent Republicans. But a person close to the president, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the person was not authorized to talk publicly, nevertheless urged a “ruthless” approach and said Mr. Trump would welcome any chance to pick up seats in the midterms. The president would pay close attention to those in his party who help or hurt that effort, the person warned.

At an “emergency” meeting on Monday night in the Capitol, congressional Republicans from Texas professed little interest in redrawing their districts, according to a person briefed on the gathering who was not authorized to comment publicly.

The 20-minute meeting, organized by Representative Michael McCaul, a senior member of the state delegation, focused on the White House push. Representative Pete Sessions, Republican of Texas, said lawmakers plan to gather again to share data and “be on the same page” on the possible redrawing of the map. “We assured each other, you need to bone up.

We need to have a conversation. We need to think about what those impacts would be on the entire delegation,” Mr. Sessions said. Other members exiting the meeting, including Mr. McCaul, declined to comment. Redistricting of states is supposed to come at the beginning of each decade, when new census data requires the reapportionment of House seats to match population shifts within the states. Mid-decade redistricting is rare and almost always contentious.

The maps that were drawn by the Republican Legislature in 2021, after the last census, are still being fought over, in forums including a trial that began last month in a federal court in El Paso… 🟪 (READ MORE)

 ‘Trump movement’ turns on Cornyn, poll finds (Politico)

MAGA loyalists have put Sen. John Cornyn’s reelection campaign in a Texas-size hole. An early May poll commissioned by the American Opportunity Alliance, a major conservative funding group linked to megadonor Paul Singer, shows the Texas Republican down 17 points in a head-to-head primary matchup with state attorney general Ken Paxton. Below the top-line of Paxton’s 52-percent-to-35-percent advantage, the poll found a clear divide between those voters who were defined as “Trump Movement” voters and those who were “Traditional Republicans.” In the former category, which made up of 58 percent of the electorate, Paxton had a 45-point lead. Among the latter, who made up only 35 percent of voters, Cornyn had a 27-point lead.

The findings reflect a increasingly prominent divide among Republican primary voters in Texas where an insurgent hard-right faction has been steadily gaining ground in recent years while ousting more traditional GOP elected officials. Paxton, who has faced federal investigation and impeachment, has long been a darling of right-wingers in Texas, while Cornyn — first elected to the Senate in 2002 — is considered a pillar of the establishment GOP.

In a speculative three-way race with GOP Rep. Wesley Hunt, who is exploring a bid, the margin barely narrowed with the Cornyn trailing Paxton, 43 percent to 27 percent, with Hunt receiving 14 percent. There was some good news for the incumbent in the poll. Despite trailing Paxton significantly, he is still viewed favorably by the Republican primary electorate in the Lone Star State — just not as favorably as the state attorney general.

The poll, conducted from April 29 through May 1 among 800 Republican primary voters, is among a series of public and private surveys all showing Cornyn significantly trailing Paxton. They have sparked increasing concern from national Republican operatives about a potentially ugly and costly primary, as well as the possible elevation of a scandal-plagued candidate who might be at risk in a general election. The American Opportunity Alliance’s interest in the race is notable; it’s one of the key donor consortiums in Republican politics and its members including Singer and Chuck Schwab are some of the biggest funders on the right… 🟪 (READ MORE)

Why we’re blowing up our 52-year tradition of naming best and worst Texas lawmakers (Texas Monthly)

When Texas Monthly began cataloging the state’s Best and Worst Legislators 52 years ago, power manifested behind closed doors at the Capitol, in boardrooms, and in private associations, such as the Petroleum Club of Midland. This January, at 5 a.m. on the first day of the Eighty-Ninth Legislature, you could find it in a church parking lot off the Katy Freeway in Houston. Hours before newly elected lawmakers would even get up to dress themselves for one of the most memorable days of their lives—when they each would take the oath on the floor of their chamber and be invested with the power, they thought, to run the state—about fifty right-wing activists in red shirts boarded a charter bus to head to the Capitol.

There they’d be joined by passengers of thirteen other coaches from around the state for a day of tone-setting protest. Most Texans have things to do and can’t devote a weekday or two to driving to Austin and waiting in committee to testify on a bill, let alone doing so again on short notice when a rewritten version appears in the other chamber. So it makes sense that the folks on the buses—the most devoted Texans—were not excessively normal. “After six months of eating no vegetables, my health markers are back to normal,” said one.

Evolutionarily speaking, he went on, “the only way plants have to defend themselves is toxins.” Hours later, at the Capitol, the activists packed an underground auditorium to capacity to watch representatives decide who would be the Speaker of the House. The practical difference between the bus riders’ preferred candidate, David Cook, and his opponent, Dustin Burrows, whom they detested, was so thin that a person who doesn’t obsessively consume right-wing media and hasn’t studied up on the minutiae of House procedure would need a microscope to investigate it. Both were conservative Republicans who supported the governor’s school-vouchers push, the defining issue of the session… 🟪 (READ MORE)

How could Texas’ new child care laws impact students and parents? (Dallas Morning News)

Working Texas families seeking access to quality child care could receive more support under new laws recently passed by state lawmakers.

The most significant development for child care was Senate Bill 1, which includes $3.3 billion for child care and an additional $106.8 million for Texas’ child care scholarship program, said Sen. Joan Huffman, R-Houston, in a statement about her legislation.

Using federal funds, the additional money will serve nearly 20,000 more children across fiscal years 2026 and 2027, she said. The Texas Legislature’s session concluded earlier this month after lawmakers had months to craft laws to strengthen care services. Several passed bills focus on expanding home-based child care, increasing provider reimbursement rates and supporting families of child care workers. But many other proposals failed, including measures to offer employers tax breaks for funding care for their employees’ children.

These setbacks are significant, as more than half a million Texas children lack access to care, and the state lost nearly 75,000 child care seats last year, according to the advocacy nonprofit Children at Risk. Child care matters in Texas because without it, parents cannot work and contribute to the state’s booming economy, alongside both local and migrant employees, advocates say. The new funding aims to reduce the state’s waitlist for child care scholarships, which includes nearly 95,000 families.

“I was raised by a single mother, and so I understand, personally, the need to try to have a little safety net for folks that just want to work and provide for their families,” said House Appropriations Committee Chairman and State Rep. Armando Walle, D-Houston, who spearheaded the additional scholarship funding effort.

“The [additional funding’s] impact for families is huge,” he said, “because the costs associated with child care are cost prohibitive for some families.” Elizabeth Gaines, founder and CEO of the Children’s Funding Project — a national nonprofit aimed at helping states improve public funding for children’s programs — said the additional funding is a good first step for Texas… 🟪 (READ MORE)

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