Your State

Following a disastrous explosion at the West, Texas, fertilizer plant earlier this year, national attention shifted briefly to the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), its underfunding, and the way in which it is handcuffed when overseeing workplace safety. Not so surprisingly, there's been little to no follow-up in the wake of a 24 hour news cycle.

Texas State Senator Leticia Van de Putte received the nod from Emily's List Friday in her run for Lieutenant Governor. The women's grassroots organization brings with it money and clout for the upcoming Governor's race, one that's gaining national attention with filibuster star Wendy Davis at the top of the Democratic ticket.

The state's top GOP hopefuls recently met to discuss the changing political landscape in Texas and how they might keep their iron grip on the state's highest offices. At the heart of their concern is that Texas' traditional non-voting populations are starting to wake up thanks to a resurgent state Democratic Party led by their flagship gubernatorial candidate Wendy Davis and the on the ground organizers of Battleground Texas.

With open enrollment for 2014 drawing to a close this Saturday, there’s little time for delay for 36 million Medicare patients to choose a drug plan. Even those happy with their plan from last year need to re-evaluate dozens of choices, as changing costs can double or even triple a person's annual prescription costs.

Although TransCanada's Keystone XL tar sands pipeline has received the lion's share of media attention, another key border-crossing pipeline benefitting tar sands producers was approved on November 19 by the U.S. State Department. Enter Cochin — Kinder Morgan's 1,900-mile proposed pipeline — to transport gas produced via the controversial hydraulic fracturing ("fracking") of the Eagle Ford Shale basin in Texas, north through Kankakee, Illinois, and eventually into Alberta, Canada, the home of the tar sands.

This week, the Texas State Board of Education held hearings to discuss the adoption of new textbooks for Texas schools. Given the SBOE's past history with creationism, all eyes were specifically on the science textbook hearings, to see whether the SBOE would let real science into Texas textbooks.

Since 2012, unpaid campaign staffers for Republican Texas Representative Steve Stockman slept in a ramshackle garage. Until recently, that is, when fire marshals shut down the operation in the building which for years had been considered unsafe.

The Department of Homeland Security announced last week that family of U.S. military members will no longer have to face deportation. The constant fear that any one of their loved ones might at any time be deported out the country seems to add an unnecessary "stress and anxiety" on troops.

Reacting to the news was Jon Solt

On Wednesday the University of Texas at Austin chapter of Young Conservatives of Texas (YCT) plans to host a “Catch an Illegal Immigrant Game.” According to its Facebook page, students will have to find a person “walking around the UT campus with the label ‘illegal immigrant’ on their clothing” and then turn that person in to a YCT table for a $25 gift card reward.

A new lawsuit in Texas claims that the states new Voter ID law undermines the fundamental right to vote under the 14th and 15th Amendments to the Constitution. This comes after an election fraught with issues, especially with the "substantially similar" name-matching requirement.

A new report shows that Texans in the Rio Grande Valley are now unable to access the affordable reproductive health care that was available to them just a few years ago, before conservative state legislators drastically cut family planning funds, causing more than a quarter of the area’s family planning clinics to shutter.

Over the weekend, filing in Texas for the 2014 general election officially began. Between the two major parties, 82 candidates filed paperwork to officially become candidates. Leading each of their parties, Sen. Wendy Davis (D) and Attorney General Greg Abbott (R) were both at their respective state party offices on the first day, making their expected 2014 face-off for Texas governor official.