Texas

A Texas sheriff on Monday opened an investigation into two flights of migrants sent to Martha’s Vineyard by Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, but did not say what laws may have been broken in putting 48 Venezuelans on private planes last week from San Antonio.

Thursday is the start of Hispanic Heritage Month, four weeks of celebrating Latino contributions not just to the United States, but to the entire hemisphere. Meanwhile, Republicans have decided to treat Latinos seeking sanctuary like vermin.

Suggesting that criticism against Arredondo and his firing constitutes a “public lynching” —as Arrendondo does in a 17-page statement— is not only abhorrent but diminishes the lives that were lost that day.

A personal account about the murder of a young Latino man in Texas and the failure of the local court system to provide justice to his loved ones.

Ana Guadalupe Robles last spoke to loved ones on June 10. Three days later, they received a photo supposedly showing the 29-year-old Salvadoran nurse and mother lying dead in the Texas desert. But more than two months later and still no body, friends and family members are left with questions.

Domingo García, national president of the League of United Latin American Citizens, told Latino Rebels that CEO Sindy Benavides has been “temporarily suspended pending an investigation by the personnel committee of LULAC.”

Born in McAllen and practically raised at her family’s flea market in the Rio Grande Valley, Michelle Vallejo is focused on defending Texas’ 15th congressional district from being flipped by her Trump-backed Republican opponent.

Two men, both of Pasadena, Texas, were indicted Wednesday in the case of a hot, airless tractor-trailer rig found last month with 53 dead or dying migrants in San Antonio, officials said.

A political blogger paid by Texas Democratic Rep. Vicente Gonzalez to run campaign ads has aimed racially charged insults at Gonzalez’s Republican opponent, Rep. Mayra Flores, including “Miss Frijoles” and “Princess Pozole.”

The new findings that a culture of lockdowns in Uvalde played some role in the failures on May 24 reflects how one of the worst school shootings in U.S. history intersected with immigration policies and thousands of Border Patrol agents, National Guard members, and state police assigned to apprehend migrants and stop drug traffickers.

Two months after the Uvalde school massacre, Texas state police on Monday announced an internal review into the actions of dozens of troopers who were at Robb Elementary during 73 minutes of bewildering inaction by law enforcement as a gunman slaughtered 19 children and two teachers.

As high temperatures threaten to leave Texans without power to cool their homes, the Electric Reliability Council of Texas, which operates a grid carrying about 90 percent of the state’s power load, has asked residents to turn up their thermostats and reduce their use of major appliances from 2 to 8 p.m. to avoid outages.

Some hospitals in Texas have reportedly refused to treat patients with major pregnancy complications for fear of violating the state’s abortion ban, the Texas Medical Association said in a letter this week.

First Lady Jill Biden apologized Tuesday morning for calling Latinos “as unique” as breakfast tacos during her speech at a conference in San Antonio, Texas held by UnidosUS, the nation’s largest Latino nonprofit advocacy organization.

The Latino Book Review speaks with Christopher Carmona, author, poet, and interim director of Mexican American Studies at the University of Texas-Rio Grande Valley, about his work, superheroes, the bloody history of the Texas Rangers, and more.​

U.S. Border Patrol agents on horseback engaged in “unnecessary use of force” against non-threatening Haitian immigrants but didn’t whip any with their reins “intentionally or otherwise,” according to a federal investigation of chaotic scenes along the Texas-Mexico border last fall that sparked widespread condemnation.

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott on Thursday authorized state forces to apprehend and transport migrants to the U.S.-Mexico border, claiming the enforcement powers of federal agents and pushing the legal boundaries of the Republican’s escalating efforts to curb the rising number of crossings.

The U.S. Department of Justice is investigating potential civil rights violations in Texas’ multibillion-dollar border security mission that has given the National Guard arrest powers and seen state authorities bus migrants to Washington, D.C., according to public records.

All but six of the 53 migrants found dead or dying in a tractor-trailer in Texas last week have been identified, officials said Wednesday. The Bexar County Medical Examiner’s Office said 22 of the dead were from Mexico, 19 were from Guatemala and six were from Honduras.

More than a day after the discovery of a stifling trailer in San Antonio where dozens of migrants died after being abandoned in the sweltering heat, few identities of the victims have been made public, illustrating the challenges authorities face in tracing people who cross borders clandestinely.

Rep. Mayra Nohemi Flores (R-TX) was sworn in Tuesday to serve in the House seat vacated by former Rep. Filamon Vela (D-TX), who resigned to become a lobbyist. An immigrant from Tamaulipas, she is the first woman born in Mexico to become a member of the U.S. Congress.