Tag: Texas

The Texas Senate has passed a package of bills that would enact substantive changes to the state’s franchise tax. Not a single bill related to franchise tax reform has received a public committee hearing in the Texas House.

The Texas Senate has passed a package of bills that include substantial reforms to the state’s franchise tax, a tax on a business’ gross margins. Conservatives are cheering the news, and turning a hopeful eye toward the House, where the fate of these reforms now rests.

AUSTIN, Texas — Republican Party of Texas (RPT) Chairman Tom Mechler spoke to Breitbart Texas to express his support for SB 1968, a bill filed by Senator Joan Huffman (R-Houston) that would end the practice of automatic payroll deductions for labor union dues for the majority of public-sector unions. Mechler was elected the new RPT Chairman in an election earlier this month.

Few public policy issues are more boring than public employee pensions.

Really, who wants to sit around the dinner table and talk about pension amortization, funded ratios, or unfunded liabilities? By comparison, C-SPAN 2 looks like a summer blockbuster.

Despite her team’s best attempts to bury the story of Hillary Clinton’s bizarre email deception blunder, inquiring minds still want to know what was going on in that server closet at the Clinton residence while Hillary was serving as Secretary of State. It is a situation that drives open government advocates like me up a wall. Fortunately, open government advocates are everywhere, including South by Southwest (SXSW) in Austin.

Texas House Representative James White (R-Woodville) has filed H.B. 547 relating to the creation and dissolution of a covenant marriage. The law would allow couples to select to enter into an agreement for a covenant marriage. The law applies to populations between 54,000 and 56,000 in which more than 250 divorces are granted each year, or to counties where the commissioners court in the county have adopted an order authorizing persons to enter into covenant marriages. Bills providing for covenant marriages in Texas have not been successful in the past.

Democratic Ex-Judge Carlos Cortez, the Dallas judge who received national media attention when his girlfriend accused him of assaulting her, and leaning her precariously over a balcony, and threatening to kill her, has received a public warning by the Texas Commission on Judicial Conduct. It was not this action, but his statements taped by his ex-girlfriend about his campaign reports that got him admonished. In its Public Warning, the Commission stated it started its investigation because of “widespread,” local, state, and national stories about his conduct, which included allegations of criminal conduct. The Commission also issued the order because his outrageous conduct cast the judiciary as a whole in a bad light.

Jordan Britten, age 20, went missing Friday on South Padre Island. According to a report by KGBT Action 4 News, Britten was attending the Ultimate Music Experience, a three day music concert at the Schlitterbahn water park, while on a Spring

The Austin Police Department arrested a woman last night after a “Molotov cocktail” was thrown at pro-life activists praying outside of an Austin Planned Parenthood abortion facility. A Molotov cocktail is a type of homemade incendiary device usually incorporating gasoline, a breakable glass bottle, and a wick that is lit before the device is thrown.

A bill has been filed in the Texas State Legislature that would require the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board and the Texas Board of Law Examiners to study online law schools, and the licensing of lawyers who obtain degrees online or through correspondence schools. It would also mandate a study of the licensing of attorneys in this state who become licensed in other states through apprenticeship programs.

A Democrat Texas legislator has filed a bill that would allow the removal of life support from a pregnant woman. The bill would repeal section 166.049 of the Texas Health and Safety Code providing that a person may not withdraw or withhold life-sustaining treatment from a pregnant patient. The law is entitled “Marlise’s Law.” Marlise Munoz was removed from life support when she was 23-weeks pregnant. She was kept on life support for eight weeks before life support was terminated.

Senator Ted Cruz (R-Texas) is expected to announce he is running for President in 2016 in a speech scheduled Monday morning at Liberty University, but a tweet he posted Sunday evening indicated the news could come within a few hours.

The United States Supreme Court will hear oral arguments Monday, March 23rd, in a case deciding whether the State of Texas acted unconstitutionally in disallowing the sale of a license plate displaying the Confederate Flag. The Texas Chapter of the Sons of Confederate Veterans (SCV) argue that the free speech rights of their members have been violated by the rejection of their 2009 application for the license plate. The license plate bears the Confederate flag and the words “Sons of Confederate Veterans 1896.”

Grassroots conservatives across Texas are cheering the news that Senator Ted Cruz (R-Texas) will announce that he is running for President in 2016 on Monday. The news was especially welcomed by many activists who have supported Cruz for years, long before he became a household name.

One Texas legislator seems to be finding criticism over a bill he filed too much to take, lashing out at critics on Twitter, then deleting some of his most intemperate remarks, as well as deleting critical comments from his Facebook page before finally taking down the page altogether.

A bill has been filed in Texas which would simplify where one may lawfully use the W.C. It is designed to address controversial city ordinances, as in Houston, which would open bathrooms, showers, and dressing facilities to all, regardless of

AUSTIN, Texas — State Representative Jason Villalba (R-Dallas) is pushing back against critics of a bill he filed that would make it a crime for bloggers and independent journalists to film or photograph police officers. After the bill, HB 2918, was filed, it was the target of criticism from both the right and the left. Villalba has conceded he will make some amendments, but has continued to aggressively defend the bill. This week, the bill was referred to a committee and set for public hearing on March 26.