Most Recent in Politics:

1Environmentalists Fear Conservative Group’s Push to End Corporate Subsidies is Really Just a Hit on Renewables

2Steve King Has a Friend in Texas Congressman Louie Gohmert

3One Candidate, One Destiny: Julián Castro’s Inevitable Presidential Bid

4Border Residents Roast Plans For Trump’s Wall in Congressional Committee Now Led by Democrat

5One Casualty of the Government Shutdown: Low-Income Texans Who Need Housing Assistance

6Abbott, Patrick, Bonnen Quietly Vote to Remove Slavery-Denying Plaque from Texas Capitol

Most Recent in Environment:

1Environmentalists Fear Conservative Group’s Push to End Corporate Subsidies is Really Just a Hit on Renewables

2Report: Power Plants are Leaking Cancer-Causing Toxins into Groundwater Across Texas

3The Border Fence vs. Wall Debate is a ‘Trap’ for Democrats

4TCEQ is Finally Doing Something About an East Texas Polluter

5The Texas Observer’s Best Features of 2018

6Six Stories About Rural Texas You Should Read Before 2018 Ends

Most Recent in Border:

1Border Residents Roast Plans For Trump’s Wall in Congressional Committee Now Led by Democrat

2Audio: Border Patrol Plans to Light Up Butterfly Refuge Like a ‘War Zone’

4Trump’s Wall Is Coming to Texas. Meet Its First Victims.

5Trump’s Border Wall is a Vortex of Stupidity that Trump and the GOP Can’t Escape

6The Border Fence vs. Wall Debate is a ‘Trap’ for Democrats

Most Recent in Criminal Justice:

1‘Ignored to Death’ in the Bexar County Jail

2The Texas Observer’s Best Features of 2018

3Botham Jean’s Death Could Lead to an Overhaul of Police Oversight in Dallas

4When Prison Reform Goes Bad

5John Guandolo is on a Crusade to Turn Texas Cops Against Muslims

6State-Sanctioned Secrecy Shields Texas’ Death Penalty Machine from Scrutiny

Most Recent in Education:

1In Violation of Texas Law, Most High Schools Aren’t Giving Students the Chance to Register to Vote

2Amid Record Youth Suicide Attempts, Texas Lags in Prevention Training for Teachers

3Cash-Strapped Rural Texas Schools Look to Universities for Help

4What’s in a Name? Texas SBOE Tentatively Approves ‘Ethnic Studies: Mexican American Studies’

5SMU Just Lost Its Independent Student Newspaper. Is Your College Next?

6Lawsuit: Texas Art Teacher Suspended Because She Told Students About Her Wife

Most Recent in Health Care:

1The Texas Observer’s Best Features of 2018

2Six Stories About Rural Texas You Should Read Before 2018 Ends

3‘How Can You Do This to People?’: After Rural Hospitals Close in Milam County, Residents Scramble to Find Care

4Four Texas Abortion Court Cases to Watch in 2019

5Meet Jim Allison, Texas’ Newest Nobel Laureate (and Three-Time Cancer Survivor)

6Struggling Rural Hospitals Say They’re Being Preyed Upon by Blue Cross Blue Shield

Most Recent in The Interview:

1Dolores Huerta is Still Knocking on Doors and Registering Voters at 88

2The Interview: Veronica Escobar is Poised to Make History

3Redistricting Guru Michael Li on Texas’ Gerrymandered Maps

4Senfronia Thompson Says #MeToo: Texas Lawmaker on 45 Years of Sexism, Racism at the Capitol

5Houston Police Chief Art Acevedo on Sanctuary Cities, Police Unions and Tommy Guns

6Meet Nueces County’s New DA, a Self-Professed ‘Mexican Biker Lawyer Covered in Tattoos’

Most Recent in Books:

1The Texas Observer’s Best Features of 2018

2‘Life Was Her Art’: Nadine Eckhardt Remembered as an Influential Cultural Conduit in Texas and Washington

3Our 10 Favorite Texas Books of 2018

4The Lone Star State Teems with Snakes, Lizards and Toads in ‘Herping Texas’

5Octavio Solis’ ‘Retablos’ Recounts a ‘Beautiful, Messy’ Youth on the Border

6‘When I Spoke in Tongues’ Chronicles a Long Walk Away from the Church

Most Recent in Features:

1The Texas Observer’s Best Features of 2018

2Raspa Revolution

3100 Ways to Draw a Line

4Homeward Bound

5The Sisterhood

6The Time-Traveler’s Guide to the Lower Pecos

Most Recent in Essay:

1The Trouble with Yoga

2Heads in the Mud

3The Day the Windows Shook

4Women’s Work

5I Grew Up on the Texas-Mexico Border, but Now I Barely Recognize It

6Somewhere It Hides a Well

Most Recent in Eye on Texas:

1Eye on Texas: Ghosts of the City

2Eye on Texas: Fiesta Protesta

3Eye on Texas: Remembering Draylen Mason

4Eye on Texas: Gentrification in East Austin

5Eye on Texas: Transgender Youth in Texas

6Eye On Texas: Hurricane Harvey

Most Recent in Poetry:

1Houston Poet Analicia Sotelo’s Debut Smashes Latino Stereotypes

2Parallel Planes

4Poem: ‘Resistance’

5Poem: ‘Screenplay for a Homemade Movie’

6Poem: ‘To Be One with the All’

Tag Archives: Texas National Guard

by Melissa del Bosque and G.W. Schulz

After Observer Story, Congressman Questions DEA’s Secretive Surveillance Partnership with Texas National Guard

“I want to know why a federal law enforcement agency is working with a military unit,” Congressman Joaquin Castro said in an interview.

Tue, Dec 5, 2017 |

Texas Congressman Joaquin Castro is asking the Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) to explain its role in the use of controversial cellphone spying devices on surveil...Read More

by G.W. Schulz and Melissa del Bosque

Documents: Texas National Guard Installed Cellphone Spying Devices on Surveillance Planes

“There are really big privacy and constitutional due-process concerns with the use of this technology,” a state lawmaker said.

Mon, Nov 6, 2017 |

The Texas National Guard last year spent more than $373,000 to install controversial cellphone eavesdropping devices in secretive surveillance aircraft. Mary...Read More

by Christopher Hooks and John Savage

Why Dan Patrick Wants a Permanent Border ‘Surge’

The lieutenant governor's rhetoric on the border is shifting, and it could mean a split with House Speaker Joe Straus.

Tue, Feb 10, 2015 |

Dan Patrick wants to extend the National Guard presence on the Texas border, illustrating his shifting rhetoric & foreshadowing conflict with the House....Read More

by Melissa del Bosque

At Photo-Op with Soldiers, Rick Perry Offers Few Details on Border Deployment

Wed, Aug 13, 2014 |

At a press conference near Bastrop today, Rick Perry shed little light on border troop deployment but did provide striking visuals for his presidential bid....Read More

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