Shortly before the Texas House convened on Saturday to vote on a list of twenty articles of impeachment for Attorney General Ken Paxton, Donald Trump posted a missive to his followers on Truth Social. “Hopefully Republicans in the Texas House will agree that this is a very unfair process that should not be allowed to happen or proceed—I will fight you if it does,” the former president and current 2024 GOP front-runner warned. Who did Trump blame for Paxton’s woes? “Radical Left Democrats,” “Criminals,” and, critically in the GOP-led House, “RINOS,” or Republicans In Name Only. Trump has a ..read more

In a history-making late-afternoon vote, a divided Texas House chose Saturday to impeach Attorney General Ken Paxton, temporarily removing him from office over allegations of misconduct that included bribery and abuse of office.The vote to adopt the twenty articles of impeachment was 121-23.Attention next shifts to the Texas Senate, which will conduct a trial with senators acting as jurors and designated House members presenting their case as impeachment managers.Permanently removing Paxton from office and barring him from holding future elected office in Texas would require the support of two ..read more

At the start of this week, the Texas Legislature was sliding toward the conclusion of yet another underwhelming, but basically normal, session. Lawmakers had wasted a lot of time and effort, and soon they would go home. But the calm was illusory. By the end of the week, everything was in flames: blood was sloshing down the Capitol’s marble halls like the building was the Overlook Hotel. Attorney General Ken Paxton called House Speaker Dade Phelan a drunk, urging him to resign and “get the help he needs”; later that afternoon, a House committee announced it had been investigating Paxton for mon ..read more

When Paul Haddad unfolded his laptop to start working after dinner on a Thursday evening in mid-January, he didn’t realize his life was about to be turned upside down. Haddad, the brainy cofounder of Tapbots, an award-winning software company that develops apps for the iPhone, iPad, and Mac, clacked away writing lines of code in the living room of his home in Flower Mound. A text message interrupted him. “I’m having problems logging in,” wrote Mark Jardine, Haddad’s mild-mannered business partner, referring to Tapbots’ flagship product, Tweetbot. As a third-party Twitter app, Tweetbot provided ..read more

Around 5 p.m. on a spring Friday, cars and freight trucks motor through downtown El Paso on Interstate 10. You can hear the hum of vehicles buzzing across pavement from the pedestrian bridges that span the interstate. The scene looks like a success story for a state whose transportation policy prioritizes moving vehicles quickly. But the Texas Department of Transportation doesn’t see it that way. The state agency cited congestion as a key reason for its support of a highway-widening project, still years away from completion, in the 5.6-mile stretch of downtown El Paso from Executive Cente ..read more

In the finale of Max’s limited series Love & Death, viewers finally see the bloody axe killing at the heart of the Candy Montgomery case. While everybody watching knew the scene was coming (it had been teased for six episodes), it was still absolutely terrifying—the ferociousness of Candy’s attack was shocking, her savagery beyond doubt.So (spoiler alert) how in the world did the jury find her not guilty of murder? To understand the acquittal, you have to go back a couple of episodes, to a scene in a dark doctor’s office. Candy, played by Elizabeth Olsen, sits in the office of psychiatrist ..read more

Ken Paxton has been under indictment for most of his tenure as Texas attorney general. This hasn’t stopped voters from reelecting him—twice—to serve as the state’s top law enforcement official. That’s not purely a matter of Texas voters favoring Republicans over Democrats, either. In 2020, near the midpoint of his second term, seven of Paxton’s top aides sent a whistleblower letter accusing the attorney general of corruption, including abuse of office, bribery, and improper influence, relating to Austin real estate developer Nate Paul. Then, in 2022, Paxton faced not one but three well-funded ..read more

A Texas House committee revealed Tuesday it was investigating the office of Attorney General Ken Paxton over his push for $3.3 million in taxpayer dollars to settle a whistleblower lawsuit from former deputies who had accused Paxton of misconduct.The news came hours after Paxton called on the House Speaker Dade Phelan to resign over alleged drunkenness while leading the House, a remarkable moment of acrimony between two of Texas’s top Republicans.Phelan’s office fired back, noting the investigation has been going on since March.“The motives for and timing behind Paxton’s statement today couldn ..read more

Like a lot of people, I prefer to remember the John Nova Lomax of the past, instead of more recent times, when he fell victim to the terrible disease that had plagued him for years and killed him on May 22 at 53. His work here at Texas Monthly encompassed the period from 2015 to 2019, but from the time he first started as a journalist in Houston in 2001, he was unstoppable, writing authoritatively for the Houston Press, Houstonia, and Texas Highways, as well as Spin, the New York Times, the Village Voice, and LA Weekly. There were two books, one on Houston dive bars and another on murder and m ..read more

Danna Ghafir doesn’t want to leave Texas. The 27-year-old was born and raised here, part of a tightly connected Arab American community spread throughout sunny, sprawling Houston. She grew up speaking three languages, crisscrossing the massive city to meet up with friends in neighborhoods that, to Ghafir, felt teeming with life—mosaics of homes and restaurants and schools and museums all on top of one another. They’re one of the reasons she loves Houston: she’s comfortable in the diverse city, where she is never the only woman of color in the room. So, when she decided she wanted to ..read more