Most Recent in Texas Politics:

1Voting Begins in a Month. Here’s What Is at Stake in Texas.

2Joaquin Castro Says He’ll Champion Progressive Foreign Policy

3Historic Runoff Turnout Sets Stage for Texas Democrats in 2020’s ‘Biggest Battleground’

4Amid a National Reckoning Over Racial Injustice, Royce West Seeks to Upset MJ Hegar—and the DSCC

5Doctors Reverse Course, Say Texas GOP Should Cancel In-Person Convention

6The Next Census Could Determine the Future of Port Arthur

Most Recent in Environment:

1Running from the Storm

2A Coral Reef Sanctuary in the Gulf of Mexico Could Triple in Size

3A Battle is Brewing Over a Trump EPA Official’s Confidential Emails

4Marsha Jackson Is Trying to Move Shingle Mountain

5A New Study Finds a Link Between Flaring and an Increase in Premature Births

6Texas Solar Hits a Turning Point

Most Recent in Border:

15,000 People Contract COVID-19 While In ICE Custody, Including This Father Of 5

2Mexico Turns To Television And Radio For Remote Learning

3New Engineering Report Finds Privately Built Border Wall Will Fail

4El ducto del coronavirus

5The Coronavirus Pipeline

6El Paso Remembered

Most Recent in Criminal Justice:

1When Asthma in Jail Becomes a Death Sentence

2In Harris County, A Group is Working to Expand Voting Access in Jails

3Will The Reckoning Over Racist Names Include These Prisons?

4How Long Can You Hide a Dead Body in a Prison Cell?

5Reform vs. Rebuild: Defunding Law Enforcement in Texas

6As COVID-19 Cases Surge, Some Incarcerated People Remain Behind Bars After Making Bail

Most Recent in Education:

1Texas Has the Widest Digital Divide in the Nation. What Does that Mean for the School Year?

2The New Ensemble

3Raise a Glass to the Class of COVID-19

4Tough Decisions Ahead for School Leaders in Rural Texas

5‘Almost Akin to a Political Coup’: Houston Teachers Fight Back Against State Takeover of HISD

6The Creature of Martin Creek Lake Won’t Die

Most Recent in Health Care:

1Conception Deception

2Portraits of the Pandemic

3El ducto del coronavirus

4The Coronavirus Pipeline

5One of Texas’ Biggest Nursing Home Operators Beset By COVID-19 Cases and Deaths

6Telehealth Could be Great, if Texans Had Access to It

Most Recent in The Interview:

1Texas Observer Founding Editor Ronnie Dugger Reflects on 65 Years of Publication

2How Katharine Hayhoe Stays Hopeful as the Planet Warms

3Author William Lopez on How Immigration Raids Inflict Long-Lasting Trauma

4Why a Texas Gun Control Activist is Optimistic About the Chances for Reform

5American Health Care is Broken, Especially in Texas. What Can We Do About It?

6Thousands of Rape Kits in Texas Went Untested For Years. Lavinia Masters Is Ending That.

Most Recent in Books:

1How Texas Women Delivered the Nineteenth Amendment

2A New Short-Story Collection Imagines a Texas Town’s Secession

3Improbable, Prophetic Houston

4Announcing the 2020 Insider Prize Winners

5‘A Saint From Texas’ Gets the Lone Star State Right

6‘After the Last Border’ Reveals the Human Cost of Trump’s Draconian Immigration Policies

Most Recent in Features:

1Young Texans Keep Spelling Bees Going From Home

3San Antonio Embraces Mandaean Refugees

4The Ghosts of Jefferson

5Little Arthouse on the Prairie

6The Clothes that Make the Man

Most Recent in Essay:

1What the Black Lives Matter Protests Mean for East Texas

2Raise a Glass to the Class of COVID-19

3What’s a Bookstore for?

4Lessons on the Long Game from Goose Island’s Whooping Cranes

5In a Pandemic, Poor Defendants Could Pay With Their Lives

6Loneliness in the Age of Coronavirus

Most Recent in Eye on Texas:

1Eye on Texas: Border Tuner

2Eye on Texas: The Broken Wheel Ranch Project

3Eye on Texas: Spike Johnston

4Eye on Texas: Loren Elliott

5Eye on Texas: Charlotte Moore

6Eye on Texas: ‘My Joyful Dance’

Most Recent in Poetry:

1Author Saeed Jones on Empathy, the Power of Memoir, and Growing up Gay in North Texas

2Remembering W.S. Merwin, Honorary Texan

3Lost in Limbo in the Hays County Jail

4Houston Poet Analicia Sotelo’s Debut Smashes Latino Stereotypes

5Parallel Planes

The Year in Observer Stories

rural reporting, tumbleweed, tractor

by Christopher Collins

Six Stories About Rural Texas You Should Read Before 2018 Ends

From the shuttering of Dairy Queens, driver's license offices and rural hospitals across the state to an only-in-Texas alligator tale, you may have missed this great reporting.

Thu, Dec 20, 2018 |

I understand if the wild and weird news cycle of 2018 has got your head spinning. This rollercoaster ride of state and national politics has some reporters near...Read More

by Naveena Sadasivam

The Strange, Record-Setting Weather Extremes Texans Faced in 2018

Scientists predict temperatures, seasonal extremes and flooding will continue to intensify if carbon emissions aren’t immediately reduced.

Wed, Dec 19, 2018 |

In 2018, natural disasters touched nearly every part of the country. Hurricanes Michael and Florence hit the East Coast, killing at least 89 people and causing ...Read More

immigration, border

Year in Review: Loon Star State in 2018

The year in political cartoons from the strangest state in the union.

Wed, Dec 19, 2018 |

Trump’s sophomore year in the White House made for plenty of ammunition for political cartoonist Ben Sargent. In the pages of the Observer in 2018, the fo...Read More

out of power, stan stanart, pete sessions, carlos uresti

by Justin Miller

Six Texas Political Players Who Lost Power in 2018

A diverse and bipartisan ensemble of politicians and groups were rudely awakened as they were wrested from or kept out of power in 2018.

Tue, Dec 18, 2018 |

Power is a funny thing. One minute you have it; the next it’s gone. Sometimes it’s taken forcefully; other times it’s given away. In Texas, the ruling Rep...Read More

abortion

by Sophie Novack

Four Texas Abortion Court Cases to Watch in 2019

The lawsuits could eventually end up at the Supreme Court, where the future of Roe v. Wade is now in question.

Tue, Dec 11, 2018 |

The Texas Legislature’s zeal for passing anti-abortion legislation has created an endless cycle of court challenges that’s frustrated lawmakers and judg...Read More

by Rose Cahalan

Our 10 Favorite Texas Books of 2018

Politics, immigration, poetry, LSD, art and yes, vampires: There’s a little something for everyone on this list.

Thu, Dec 6, 2018 |

If there’s a bright side to the fact that, politically speaking, we spent 2018 still deep in what people on Twitter wearily call “the darkest timeline,” i...Read More

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