Free Republic

I just wrote about some of the billionaires fleeing California to avoid the proposed "one time" wealth tax which would take 5% of everything they own. But the LA Times points out it's not just the very wealthy who are fleeing the state. Once again, California topped a list put together by U-Haul showing the most out-migration.U-Haul’s survey of the more than 2.5 million one-way trips using its vehicles in the U.S. last year showed that the gap between the number of people leaving and the number arriving was higher in California than in any other state.While the Golden State...

Texas is now the first state in the U.S. to eliminate American Bar Association oversight of its law schools, ending the state's 42-year-long reliance on the national organization. The Texas Supreme Court issued an order Tuesday finalizing a tentative September opinion, asserting the ABA should "no longer have the final say" on which law school graduates can take the bar exam — a requirement to becoming a licensed lawyer in each state. … The change means law school graduates who want to practice in Texas are no longer required to attend an ABA-accredited school. The power to approve those law...

While no Democrat has won statewide in Texas in more than 30 years, Cornyn's seat is an especially tough nut to crack... This year's contest, however, is marked by an especially bitter Republican primary headlined by Cornyn, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton and U.S. Rep. Wesley Hunt of Houston. Many Democrats believe that provides them with an opening. Numerous polls suggest their best chance will come if Paxton — who has a history of scandals and is in the midst of a high-profile divorce from his wife, McKinney state Sen. Angela Paxton – becomes the GOP nominee. Two major Democratic...

CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas - Jury selection is underway in the trial of former Uvalde Consolidated Independent School District police officer Adrian Gonzales, one of the first officers on the scene of the Robb Elementary mass shooting. What we know: Jury selection is taking place in Corpus Christi. Gonzales faces 29 felony counts of abandoning or endangering a child, and has pleaded not guilty. The charges are classified as state jail felonies, the lowest level of felony under Texas law. If convicted, Gonzales could face between six months and two years in prison. Gonzales is the first police officer in Texas...

The mayor of Dallas said he’s ready to welcome a “flood” of Wall Street firms if Zohran Mamdani follows through on his socialist agenda — and even claimed that Texas could overtake New York as the nation’s top financial hub. In an exclusive sitdown interview with The Post, Dallas Mayor Eric Johnson said Mamdani’s socialist agenda for the Big Apple — including vows to hike taxes on the rich and expand government control over prices for housing, groceries, and childcare — could accelerate defections of big financial firms from the city. The 50-year-old Republican, who majored in history as an...

GOP lawmakers are fleeing for the exit in droves, with many pointing to a Congress they argue has grown too dysfunctional and a demanding schedule that leaves little time for their families. More than 50 lawmakers in both parties have announced decisions to leave their seats, scrambling the calculus on both sides of the aisle ahead of next year’s high-stakes midterms. The wave of exits could be particularly ominous for Republicans in charge of the House and Senate. The number exiting is nearly on par with 2018, a dismal midterm year for the GOP. Some lawmakers frustrated with inaction on...

A Texas judge…ordered the release of court documents detailing the divorce of U.S. Senate candidate and Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton and his wife, state Sen. Angela Paxton, months after she filed citing “biblical grounds.” The disclosures are likely to fuel attacks against Paxton in one of the nation’s most heated Republican primaries as he seeks to unseat Sen. John Cornyn. Whether the divorce details resonate with voters remains to be seen, with the Senate primary set for March 3 next year… which includes Rep. Wesley Hunt. The divorce comes after 38 years of marriage, during which Angela Paxton had...

Some of the Democrats who have been spiking the ball in the end zone after the passage of the so-called “Inflation Reduction Act” probably didn’t read all of the finer details in the bill. They’ve been celebrating its passage along with Joe Biden as the “biggest climate legislation” to ever be passed. They have also been grudgingly thanking West Virginia Democrat Joe Manchin for getting the bill over the finish line. But it turns out that Manchin snuck in a few items that haven’t drawn many headlines yet and the climate warriors aren’t going to be very happy about them....

"Topline: A then-employee at the City of Austin’s energy utility allegedly paid $980,000 in taxpayer funds to fictional companies with bank accounts belonging to his family members, according to a new report from the city auditor. Key facts: Mark Ybarra was given a city credit card from 2018 to 2023 to hire repair companies for city buildings. He used it to pay 30 different vendors, but the city auditor could only verify that eight of them were real companies, according to the report."

In a request for opinion filed to state Attorney General Ken Paxton’s office on Dec. 12, Hancock asked whether schools could be excluded from the program if they were linked to a “foreign terrorist organization” or a “foreign adversary.” Hancock suggested schools that had hosted events for the Council on American-Islamic Relations, a Muslim civil rights group which Gov. Greg Abbott recently designated as a terrorist organization, would be affected. Abbott’s designation of CAIR as a foreign terrorist organization is part of an uptick in Texas politicians’ criticisms of Islam and the presence of Muslim organizations in the state. The...

AUSTIN (KXAN) — Texas officials are warning the public about a fraud scheme that could impact gift cards sold across parts of Texas. The Texas Financial Crimes Intelligence Center (FCIC) arrested three men, accusing them of stealing about $14 million from gift cards purchased at stores from Dallas-Fort Worth to Central Texas and across the Gulf Coast. In a press release, investigators with FCIC said the three men were arrested for the scheme, which was believed to have started back in May 2025. FCIC said the process they allegedly used to scam consumers is known as gift card cloning. It...

Three Texas men used shell companies to pocket revenues from hundreds of New Mexico oil and gas wells while leaving the state with cleanup costs for abandoned properties, Attorney General Raúl Torrez alleges in a new lawsuit. The suit describes a complex asset-stripping scheme in which profitable wells were placed in certain companies while non-productive wells remained in other companies that filed for bankruptcy. The lawsuit was filed Tuesday in 1st Judicial District Court in Santa Fe on behalf of New Mexico and the state Energy, Minerals & Natural Resources Department. The suit names as defendants Everett Willard Gray, Marquis...

The father of a teenage girl who deputies say was kidnapped on Christmas Day found her using his phone’s parental controls, according to authorities in Texas. A 15-year-old girl was reported kidnapped from the Houston suburb of Porter on Thursday after her parents said she took her dog out for a walk but did not return, the Montgomery County Sheriff’s Office said in a news release. Authorities said the girl’s father tracked her phone using parental controls, which led him to a secluded, partially wooded area in Harris County, roughly two miles from Porter. Her father located her and her...

A little boy in Texas was the only member of his family to survive a horrific car crash caused by an alleged drunk driver. Nearly all members of the Contreras family were killed in Fort Bend around 2am on December 20, while driving home from a Christmas party, according to the Fort Bend Sheriff's Office.

A crime that has haunted East Texas for more than four decades has finally found closure. The Texas Rangers announced this week that they’ve identified the last suspect in the 1983 Kentucky Fried Chicken murders. It was a case that shocked Texas and the nation when five people were abducted from a Kilgore KFC and later found executed on a remote oil lease in Rusk County.

A Mexican Navy aircraft carrying medical patients crashed Monday near Galveston, Texas, resulting in at least two confirmed deaths. According to Fox News, the Mexican Navy said eight people were on board the aircraft – four naval crew members and four civilians. The U.S. Coast Guard conducted search and rescue operations. A Mexican Navy Beechcraft King Air 350i crashed into Galveston Bay in southeastern Texas while approaching Scholes International Airport. Local authorities and the U.S. Coast Guard are conducting ongoing search-and-rescue operations. More from Fox News: Search and rescue protocols were immediately activated following the crash in coordination with the...

The world's largest producer of mozzarella is closing one of its dairy plants in California due to the state's sky high operating costs. Leprino Foods, headquartered in Denver, Colorado, supplies cheese for fast-food pizza restaurants, including Domino's, Pizza Hut and Papa John's. For the last 115 years, the plant has operated in Lemoore, a small town deep within California's rural Central Valley. But now more than a century of history is coming to a close, with an estimated 300 people set to lose their jobs when the plan shutters early next year. To give people time to find new employment,...

The Texas attorney general says television companies have become unwelcome visitors in consumers' homes. Ken Paxton announced five separate lawsuits, including two against Chinese companies, alleging that the television companies are secretly spying on Texans by recording what they watch at home. The Texas AG said in a press release that the method through which the companies were conducting their spying is called Automated Content Recognition technology. Labeling it an "uninvited" and "invisible" digital invader, Paxton said that the software is capable of capturing screenshots of a user's TV display every 500 milliseconds. Sony, Samsung, LG, Hisense, and TCL each...

(18 Dec 2025) The Department of Homeland Security and U.S. Customs and Border Protection announce the award of five new contracts totaling $3.3 billion for the construction of Smart Wall along the U.S. – Mexico border in Texas and Arizona. With these latest awards, the total contracts awarded for Smart Wall Construction now reach $8 billion. These contracts, which were awarded using funds from President Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act... ...In total these five new contracts will add 97 miles of primary border wall system, 19 miles of secondary border wall and 66 miles of waterborne barrier system. This...

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton is suing Verona-based Epic Systems, alleging the company runs an illegal monopoly and blocks parents from accessing their children's medical records. Paxton's suit alleges that Epic uses its electronic health records (EHR) software to effectively control how and when that data can be accessed. Additionally, the suit alleges that Epic makes it nearly impossible for health care providers to switch EHR providers by imposing huge financial penalties for doing so. "Epic publicly admits it does not "own" those records," Paxton wrote. "But Epic has used its position as an EHR software database architect to insert...