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Seven state employees have been fired for improperly accessing — and in some cases, stealing money from — accounts of thousands of Texans who receive Medicaid, food stamps and other public assistance, The Texas Tribune has confirmed.

Four of those employees were fired in December in what is believed to be the largest data breach in the Texas Health and Human Services Commission’s history after officials say they had accessed the personal account information of 61,104 Texans without a clear business reason.

In separate cases earlier last year, one employee was fired after officials said she illegally possessed information on the public assistance accounts of 3,392 people and another two were fired after $270,000 was stolen from some 500 food stamp accounts, according to the health agency’s watchdog arm, the state’s Health and Human Services Office of Inspector General. The office has referred those three individuals to local district attorney’s offices for prosecution.

The seven firings, from four separate incidents in the past year, are remarkable because Texas’ entire apparatus for investigating fraud in public assistance programs in the gargantuan $93.4 billion Texas Health and Human Services Commission was built to focus on outside actors, such as providers or retailers and clients themselves. These cases, however, show threats from within the agency, impacting the public benefits of several low-income and disabled adults and children who live in Texas.

First reported publicly by the Texas Attorney General’s Office on Jan. 6, the most recent breach impacted 61,404 account holders who had either applied or received assistance between June 2021 and December 2024 from the state’s Medicaid, Children’s Health Insurance Program, the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families or the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, that is commonly referred to as food stamps.

On Friday, the social services agency will begin notifying all 61,104 individuals by first-class mail of the breach and that the state will be offering two years of free credit monitoring to them. Those who believe they were affected by the breach can call 866-362-1773 with questions and use the reference number B138648.

“The Texas Health and Human Services Commission is notifying recipients of agency services that their protected health, personal identifying or sensitive personal information may have been inappropriately accessed, used or disclosed,” according to a draft of the news release the agency plans to publish Friday. “HHSC recommends that affected individuals carefully review their accounts and health care provider, insurance company, and financial institution statements to make sure their account activity is correct.”

So far, officials have not offered a price tag on the cost of this breach.

Because the investigation is ongoing, officials have not released the names of the fired employees and would not confirm on Friday if any personal information of the 61,104 was leaked to the public or if any of their funds were stolen.

Collectively, the cases are the latest reminder of how large of a target to criminals the state’s database of personal data involving its poorest residents is and raises new questions about TIERS, the decades old computer system where employee-accessed information was stored. The system houses applications for Medicaid, food stamps and other public assistance programs.

The agency has asked the Texas Legislature for $300 million to update its eligibility and enrollment processes, including to the TIERS system, which was also at the center of problems during the resumption of Medicaid health insurance enrollment rules after the COVID-19 pandemic had ended. Texas removed, sometimes erroneously, more than 2 million individuals, mostly children, from the program once the emergency was declared over and the federal government resumed requirements that clients renew their Medicaid applications.

Nearly all — 8,386 — of the 9,500 staffers who work in the agency’s access and eligibility services division have access to personal account information, including dates of birth, home addresses, income and health information of people enrolled in various public assistance programs. But in all four major incidents that resulted in the seven firings, these division employees violated agency rules when they were caught either accessing client information without a legitimate business reason, state officials confirmed.

In the breach affecting the 61,104 Texans, a private contractor alerted agency officials on Nov. 21 of potential suspicious activity. Officials later connected the activity to eligibility division employees.

The case surfaced publicly on Jan. 6 when the agency, by law, notified the Texas attorney general’s office that a data breach had occurred. While the initial report to the attorney general’s office had indicated the private information of at least 250 beneficiaries had occurred, the agency updated that figure on Friday to 61,104.

Going forward, the agency insisted it is “strengthening internal security controls and working to implement fraud prevention measures, including enhanced monitoring and alerts to detect suspicious activity,” per its news release.

The agency’s office of inspector general continues to investigate the latest breach.

Created in 2003, the inspector general’s office is designed to concentrate on rooting out nefarious activities from outsiders. While it conducts internal affairs investigations of employees, the office has never been set up to focus primarily on state employees involved in security breaches that could result in fraud, according to the inspector general’s office.

The office also relies mostly on referrals from the public and agencies and while it has methods to investigate data activity, the office does not monitor various state databases on a daily basis to check whether state employees are properly handling data.

While agency employees have historically been investigated for violation of rules, three incidents last year have now alerted the inspector general’s office to focus more deeply at data-handling that has the potential to turn into public assistance fraud.

On Jan. 31, a member of the public reported that an employee in the eligibility division was changing personal identifying numbers, or PINs, on clients’ cards and selling the cards for half their worth in cash. Investigators found that the employee had changed PINs on 211 food stamp cards, leading to $81,638 stolen. The employee was fired and the case referred to local prosecutors.

Then in March, an internal investigation found that another division employee had emailed to her personal account a spreadsheet of people in the state’s community care program, which pays for attendant care for older and disabled Texans, a violation of the agency’s data-handling rules. She was fired and the case was referred to local prosecutors because the use or possession of such information is illegal in Texas.

Then last summer, the inspector general’s office found another division employee who had changed the PINs on 391 food stamp cards, using the benefits for illegal purchases resulting in a loss of $190,518. The employee was fired and the matter referred to a local district attorney.

With the latest large breach, the agency is warning all public assistance recipients to carefully examine their account activity, especially those with food stamp benefits.

“SNAP recipients, specifically, are being advised to check their Lone Star card transactions for potential fraudulent activity at YourTexasBenefits.com,” the agency release states. “Anyone who suspects they are a victim of fraud should call 2-1-1 and choose option 3 to report the fraud, contact law enforcement and visit a local agency office to have benefits replaced.”

The agency release also hinted that more employee terminations could be coming.

“As the agency’s internal review continues, additional affected individuals identified will be notified,” the release noted. “Employees involved in similar inappropriate and illegal conduct will be terminated and referred to the appropriate authorities.”

Texas Health and Human Services Commission accounts for nearly a third of the state’s budget, according to its latest strategic plan. About 91% of the agency’s expenses is for grants and client services.

The commission is one of two agencies under the health services umbrella. The other is the Department of State Health Services. Together the two employ about 50,000 people.

Of all the public assistance programs that the commission manages for Texans, the food stamp program is a frequent criminal target. In the fiscal year ending Aug. 31, the agency distributed more than $7 billion to Texans who qualified for grocery assistance, which can amount to roughly $200 to $1,500 per family depending on family size. In December, 3.6 million Texans received food assistance.

Food stamp assistance is fully funded by the U.S. Department of Agriculture. State dollars are used to pay for half of the state agency’s costs to administer the food stamp program and the other half is paid for by the federal government.

In its latest strategic plan, the agency lists as a goal to reduce waste in the food stamp program by 10% by focusing on employees more diligently evaluating applications. It does not mention employee-generated breaches or fraud, but instead focuses on impropriety among contractors of services.

“The OIG focus on high-risk providers protects against fraud, waste, and abuse of taxpayer funds and ensures that Texans receive the services they need,” the plan’s section on accountability states.

The most common fraud schemes the health agency’s inspector general’s office investigates involves clients selling their food stamp card balances “to a small store or food truck in exchange for cash,” according to the investigative agency’s December report. “A retailer typically gives cash to the (cardholder) at a discounted rate in exchange for their benefits. Then, the retailer uses the full amount of the benefits to buy inventory for their business.”

In the fiscal year ending in August, the inspector general’s office completed 17,075 investigations of retailers and clients, recovering $54.4 million. They referred 100 cases for criminal prosecution.

The original article was published by The Texas Tribune. To read the originally published article, click here.

AMARILLO(AP) – The Texas judge who previously halted approval of the nation’s most common method of abortion ruled Thursday that three states can move ahead with another attempt to roll back federal rules and make it harder for people across the U.S. to access the abortion drug mifepristone.

Idaho, Kansas and Missouri requested late last year to pursue the case in federal court in Amarillo, Texas, after the U.S. Supreme Court issued a narrow ruling finding that abortion opponents who first filed the case lacked the legal right to sue.

The only federal judge based in Amarillo is Matthew Kacsmaryk, a nominee of former President Donald Trump who in recent years ruled against the Biden administration on several issues, including immigration and LGBTQ protections.

The states want the federal Food and Drug Administration to prohibit telehealth prescriptions for mifepristone and require that it be used only in the first seven weeks of pregnancy instead of the current limit of 10 weeks. They also want to require three in-person doctor office visits instead of none to get the drug.

That’s because, the states argue, efforts to provide access to the pills “undermine state abortion laws and frustrate state law enforcement,” according to court documents.

Meanwhile, Kacsmaryk said they shouldn’t be automatically discounted from suing in Texas just because they’re outside the state.

The American Civil Liberties Union said Thursday that the case should have been settled when the U.S. Supreme Court unanimously preserved access to mifepristone last year, where the justices issued a narrow ruling finding that abortion opponents who first filed the case lacked the legal right to sue.

Kacsmaryk’s decision “has left the door open for extremist politicians to continue attacking medication abortion in his courtroom,” the ACLU said.

The ruling comes days before Trump begins his second term as president, so his administration will likely be representing the FDA in the case. Trump has repeatedly said abortion is an issue for the states, not the federal government, though he’s also stressed on the campaign trail that he appointed justices to the Supreme Court who were in the majority when striking down the national right to abortion in 2022.

In the years since, abortion opponents have increasingly targeted abortion pills, largely due to most U.S. abortions being carried out using drugs rather than through surgical procedures. So far, at least four states — Indiana, Missouri, New Hampshire and Tennessee — have seen Republicans introduce bills aimed at banning pills. None take the same approach as Louisiana, which last year classified the drugs as controlled dangerous substances.

Previously, Kacsmaryk sided with a group of anti-abortion doctors and organizations that wanted the FDA to be forced to rescind entirely its approval of mifepristone in 2000.

Yet the states are pursuing a narrower challenge. Rather than target the approval entirely, they sought to undo a series of FDA updates that have eased access.

But while the states’ leaders are pushing to severely limit access to the drugs, voters in Missouri sent a different message in November when they approved a ballot measure to undo one of the nation’s strictest bans. In Idaho, abortion is banned at all stages of pregnancy. In Kansas, abortion is generally legal up until the 22nd week of pregnancy.

Across the U.S., 13 states under Republican legislative control bar abortion at all stages of pregnancy, with some exceptions, and four more ban it after the first six weeks — before women often know they’re pregnant.

Some Democratic-controlled states have adopted laws seeking to shield from investigations and prosecutions the doctors who prescribe the pills via telehealth appointments and mail them to patients in states with bans. Those prescriptions are a major reason a study found that residents of states with bans are getting abortions in about the same numbers as they were before the bans were in place.

Mifepristone is usually used in combination with a second drug for medication abortion, which has accounted for more than three-fifths of all abortions in the U.S. since the Supreme Court’s ruling overturning Roe v. Wade.

The drugs are different than Plan B and other emergency contraceptives that are usually taken within three days after possible conception, weeks before women know they’re pregnant. Studies have found they’re generally safe and result in completed abortions more than 97% of the time, which is less effective than procedural abortions.

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Whitehurst reported from Washington. Associated Press writer Kimberlee Kruesi in Nashville, Tennessee, contributed.

SAN ANTONIO (AP) – A Texas truck driver charged in the deaths of 53 migrants who rode in a sweltering tractor-trailer with no air conditioning pleaded guilty Thursday over the 2022 tragedy that became the nation’s deadliest smuggling attempt across the U.S.-Mexico border.

Homero Zamorano Jr. pleaded guilty in federal court in San Antonio to one count of conspiracy to transport aliens resulting in death, causing serious bodily injury, and placing lives in jeopardy; one count of transportation of aliens resulting in death; and one count of transportation of aliens resulting in serious bodily injury and placing lives in jeopardy.

The 48-year-old could face a maximum sentence of life in prison, the Justice Department announced. Zamorano is scheduled to be sentenced on April 24.

Mark Stevens, Zamorano’s attorney, said in an email that he was unable to comment on a pending case.

Authorities say Zamorano, who drove the truck, and other men charged in the smuggling attempt were aware that the trailer’s air-conditioning unit was malfunctioning and would not blow cool air to the migrants trapped inside during the sweltering, three-hour ride from the border city of Laredo to San Antonio.

Temperatures reached 100 degrees Fahrenheit while migrants screamed and banged the walls of the trailer for help or tried to claw their way out, investigators said.

The truck had been packed with 67 people, and the dead included 27 from Mexico, 14 from Honduras, seven from Guatemala and two from El Salvador, according to Mexican authorities. Prosecutors have said migrants paid up to $15,000 each to be taken across the U.S. border.

The incident happened on a remote San Antonio back road on June 27, 2022. Police officers detained Zamorano after spotting him hiding in nearby brush, according to a statement from the U.S. Attorney’s Office. A search of Zamorano’s cellphone showed calls concerning the smuggling run.

Surveillance video of the 18-wheeler passing through a Border Patrol checkpoint showed the driver matched Zamorano’s description, according to the indictment.

Also charged previously in the tragedy was Christian Martinez, also of Texas, who with Zamorano was arrested shortly after the migrants were found. Martinez has since pleaded guilty to smuggling-related charges.

Four Mexican nationals were also arrested in the case in 2023. And in August, a suspect arrested in Guatemala was charged with helping coordinate the smuggling attempt. U.S. authorities said they would seek the extradition of Rigoberto Román Miranda Orozco, who is charged with six counts of migrant smuggling resulting in death or serious injury. Authorities alleged he is connected to four Guatemalan migrants in the trailer, three of whom died, and faces up to life in prison if convicted.

According to the indictment against Miranda Orozco, the smugglers had forced the migrants to give up their cellphones before getting inside the trailer, leaving them no way to call for help. An unknown powder was spread around the trailer to prevent the smell of human cargo from being detected by patrol dogs at border inspection stations.

When the trailer was opened in San Antonio, 48 migrants were already dead. Another 16 were taken to hospitals, where five more died. President Joe Biden called the tragedy “horrifying and heartbreaking.”

Those who died were seeking better lives. News of the trailer full of bodies was met with horror in cities and villages accustomed to seeing their young people leave, trying to flee poverty or violence in Central America and Mexico.

Authorities allege that the men worked with human smuggling operations in Guatemala, Honduras and Mexico, and shared routes, guides, stash houses, trucks and trailers, some of which were stored at a private parking lot in San Antonio.

Migrants paid the organization up to $15,000 each to be taken across the border. The fee would cover up to three attempts to get into the U.S.

The incident is the deadliest among tragedies that have claimed thousands of lives in recent decades as people attempt to cross the U.S. border from Mexico. Ten migrants died in 2017 after they were trapped inside a truck parked at a Walmart in San Antonio. In 2003, the bodies of 19 migrants were found in a sweltering truck southeast of San Antonio.

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Weber reported from Austin and Baumann from Bellingham, Washington.

BOCA CHICA (AP) – SpaceX launched its Starship rocket on its latest test flight Thursday, but the spacecraft was destroyed following a thrilling booster catch back at the pad.

Elon Musk’s company said Starship broke apart — what it called a “rapid unscheduled disassembly.” The spacecraft’s six engines appeared to shut down one by one during ascent, with contact lost just 8 1/2 minutes into the flight.

The spacecraft — a new and upgraded model making its debut — was supposed to soar across the Gulf of Mexico from Texas on a near loop around the world similar to previous test flights. SpaceX had packed it with 10 dummy satellites for practice at releasing them.

A minute before the loss, SpaceX used the launch tower’s giant mechanical arms to catch the returning booster, a feat achieved only once before. The descending booster hovered over the launch pad before being gripped by the pair of arms dubbed chopsticks.

The thrill of the catch quickly turned into disappointment for not only the company, but the crowds gathered along the southern tip of Texas.

“It was great to see a booster come down, but we are obviously bummed out about ship,” said SpaceX spokesman Dan Huot. “It’s a flight test. It’s an experimental vehicle,” he stressed.

The last data received from the spacecraft indicated an altitude of 90 miles (146 kilometers) and a velocity of 13,245 mph (21,317 kph).

Musk said a preliminary analysis suggests leaking fuel may have built up pressure in a cavity above the engine firewall. Fire suppression will be added to the area, with increased venting and double-checking for leaks, he said via X.

The 400-foot (123-meter) rocket had thundered away in late afternoon from Boca Chica Beach near the Mexican border. The late hour ensured a daylight entry halfway around the world in the Indian Ocean. But the shiny retro-looking spacecraft never got nearly that far.

SpaceX had made improvements to the spacecraft for the latest demo and added a fleet of satellite mockups. The test satellites were the same size as SpaceX’s Starlink internet satellites and, like the spacecraft, were meant to be destroyed upon entry.

Musk plans to launch actual Starlinks on Starships before moving on to other satellites and, eventually, crews.

It was the seventh test flight for the world’s biggest and most powerful rocket. NASA has reserved a pair of Starships to land astronauts on the moon later this decade. Musk’s goal is Mars.

Hours earlier in Florida, another billionaire’s rocket company — Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin — launched the newest supersized rocket, New Glenn. The rocket reached orbit on its first flight, successfully placing an experimental satellite thousands of miles above Earth. But the first-stage booster was destroyed, missing its targeted landing on a floating platform in the Atlantic.

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The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Science and Educational Media Group and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

TIJUANA, Mexico (AP) — A nurse who fled Cuba as part of the Caribbean nation’s largest exodus in more than six decades needed a place to stay in Mexico as she waited to legally enter the U.S. using a government app. A woman who had lived her whole life in the same Tijuana neighborhood was desperate for medical help after a dog attack left her with wounds to her legs.

A mutual acquaintance brought the two women together. Nurse Karla Figueredo stayed with Martha Rosales for three days in October 2023, waiting for a border appointment booked through the CBP One app and treating Rosales’ dog bites. When Figueredo left for the U.S., she got Rosales’ permission to give her name to other migrants.

Word quickly spread and Rosales made her home part of a roster of at least three dozen migrant shelters in her hometown on the U.S.-Mexico border, temporarily housing people who use the CBP One app.

“I told God that if they didn’t amputate my feet, I would help every Cuban,” said Rosales, 45, who was using a wheelchair after being attacked by five dogs until Figueredo helped heal her wounds.

CBP One has brought nearly 1 million people to the U.S. on two-year permits with eligibility to work but could go away once President-elect Donald Trump takes office.

Figueredo, 25, now works as a medical assistant in the Houston area and keeps in touch with Rosales, who quit her job as a bank cleaner to focus on her migrant shelter. The people Rosales houses, mostly Cubans, refer to her as “’Tía Martha” (Aunt Martha) as she cooks pancake breakfasts, throws birthday parties and shuttles them to their CBP One appointments.

Supporters say CBP One has helped bring order to the border and reduced illegal crossings. But Trump has said he would end it as part of a broader immigration crackdown. Critics say it prioritizes a lottery system over people who have long lived in the U.S. illegally while paying taxes and people who have waited years for visas.

Dayron Garcia, a doctor in Cuba who heard about Rosales from a nephew, applied with his wife and children and plans to settle with a friend in Houston. He said Rosales’ house “feels like family” and that “CBP One has been a salvation.”

“It’s a guarantee,” Garcia, 40, said. “You enter with papers, with parole.”
CBP One began under Trump and changed under Biden

U.S. Customs and Border Protection debuted CBP One near the end of Trump’s first term as a way for customs brokers to schedule inspections and for visitors with short-term visas to extend stays.

The Biden administration extended its use to migrants to replace an opaque patchwork of exemptions to a pandemic-related asylum ban that was then in place.

CBP One is popular with Cubans, Venezuelans, Haitians and Mexicans, likely because advocates in their communities promote it.

Illegal border crossings by Cubans plunged under CBP One from a peak of nearly 35,000 in April 2022 to just 97 in September.

Demand for appointments has far outstripped supply, with an average of about 280,000 people competing for 1,450 daily slots toward the end of last year, according to CBP. Winners must report to a border crossing in three weeks.
A night owl

Migrant shelters along Mexico’s border with the U.S. are now occupied primarily by people seeking the online appointments.

Rosales’ house is in a neighborhood with ramshackle homes where old tires are stacked to stop flash floods. Migrants watch television, play billiards, do chores and look after their children at Rosales’ house or a rental home nearby. Those who don’t yet have appointments work their phones for slots made available daily at eight U.S. border crossings with Mexico, a task likened to trying to buy Taylor Swift concert tickets.

Rosales works throughout the night. A helper drives to the airport in an SUV Rosales bought with retirement pay from her bank job.

Shortly after midnight, she shuttles guests from her house to Tijuana’s main border crossing with San Diego for the day’s first appointments at 5 a.m. She chats with them, smiles for photos and hugs people goodbye.

By 3 a.m., she is at a television station for a four-hour shift cleaning the newsroom and fetching coffee for journalists, who give her the latest information on immigration and the city.

She checks her phone for migrants needing shelter who heard about her on social media or from friends and family. Her contact list identifies them by size of party and appointment date: “3 on the 16th,” “6 on the 17th.”

Rosales, one of 13 children, dropped out of school in third grade. Reading the Bible taught her enough to barely understand texts, which she generally responds to with voice messages or calls.

Enrique Lucero was Tijuana’s director of migrant affairs when she came to City Hall for advice. He helped Rosales establish a legal entity to raise money and made himself available for emergencies, such as when a woman missed her CBP One appointment to give birth. Lucero talked to CBP to make sure the woman and her baby got in.

“She worries about them. She cries for them,” Lucero said.
The exodus from Cuba

Border arrests of Cubans increased during the COVID-19 pandemic and after anti-government protests in 2021. Nicaragua had recently eased rules for Cubans to fly from Havana, allowing them to avoid walking through the Darien Gap, a dangerous jungle in Colombia and Panama. By the spring of 2022, Cubans eclipsed all nationalities but Mexicans in illegal crossings.

“CBP One came like a gift from God,” said Yoandis Delgado, who flew to Nicaragua in 2023, paid a smuggler $1,000 to reach southern Mexico and was repeatedly robbed by Mexican authorities while trying to reach the U.S. border. “CBP One gave us a sense of possibility, of hope.”

Delgado, a cook in Cuba, said Rosales’ home and neighborhood don’t stand out for people seeking to prey on migrants, giving a sense of security he wouldn’t get at hotels or other shelters.

“She lives in the same condition that we do, not any better,” Delgado said after a pancake breakfast. “She cries for everything that happens to us, for what we have suffered to get here from Cuba.”
A grim future for CBP One

Biden administration officials portray CBP One as a key success in its strategy to create legal pathways at the border while deterring illegal crossings. They note people in life-threatening circumstances can come to a border crossing without an appointment to plead their case.

Anxiety is spreading among migrants in Mexico who fear Trump will end CBP One. Even those in the U.S. are uneasy because parole expires after two years.

The Trump transition team didn’t respond to a question about CBP One’s future, but his allies say it’s overly generous and encourages immigration. A bill that stalled in the Senate in 2023 would have prohibited using the app to admit migrants.

Figueredo, the nurse who helped Rosales, plans to get a green card under a 1966 law that applies to Cubans. She says she and her partner, a barber, came to “continue to grow professionally and support our future children.”

She writes Rosales often, telling her that her job is “crazy” busy and asking about her health. “I hope you’re very happy,” she wrote.

AUSTIN – The Houston Chronicle reports that a complaint stemming from the Texas General Land Office’s allocation of Harvey disaster recovery funds, which originally awarded no money to Houston or Harris County from a $1 billion distribution, has been escalated to the Civil Rights division of the Department of Justice. The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development asked the Justice Department on Wednesday to take action against the GLO after finding that it had violated the Fair Housing Act by discriminating against Black and Hispanic residents when it designed a competition to allocate the relief money. HUD’s review of the GLO’s funding process revealed that the state agency had engaged in a pattern of “discriminatory actions based on race and national origin,” wrote Ayelet Weiss, assistant general counsel for HUD’s Office of Fair Housing Enforcement, in a letter to the Justice Department.

In a separate letter sent to state officials, HUD told the GLO that it knowingly denied communities critical funding, and “compounded the harm” that residents suffered from Hurricane Harvey. The new correspondence affirmed HUD’s previous finding of descrimination in 2022 against the GLO. At that time, the Justice Department said it would defer consideration of the matter until HUD wrapped up its fair housing investigation. In a statement, Texas Land Commissioner Dawn Buckingham said “political activists” embedded in HUD by the Biden administration have made false discrimination claims against the GLO for years. “Last time HUD sent this political stunt to the DOJ, the fake claims were rejected for lacking substance – in less than 48 hours,” Buckingham said. “The fact is, the HUD-approved plan overwhelmingly benefited minorities and there simply was no discrimination. No other state has performed as efficiently and effectively as Texas in providing disaster recovery and mitigation funding to communities and residents. Our only goal is to serve those we are supposed to serve and do it well.” Former mayor and now U.S. Rep. Sylvester Turner said Wednesday that while he was glad the findings were being sent to the Justice Department, he was frustrated by the amount of time it took to hold the GLO accountable. Houston residents whose lives were devastated by Harvey should have received federal aid years ago, Turner said, and instead the GLO diverted those funds to communities in lesser need.

EAGLE PASS – President-elect Donald Trump will pick Mike Banks, a special advisor to Gov. Greg Abbott for border matters, to lead the U.S. Border Patrol, according to the New York Post.

Banks, a retired Border Patrol agent, has served as Texas’ “border czar” since 2023 when Abbott created the position. The press offices for the Trump administration’s transition team and Abbott’s office did not immediately respond Thursday to requests for comment.

Banks served as a border advisor amid the state’s all-out effort to control the southern border with Mexico, dubbed Operation Lone Star, and its confrontations with the Biden administration over immigration enforcement, which has long been the sole responsibility of the federal government. As part of the mission, Department of Public Safety troopers and National Guard soldiers have been deployed to the border, where they have installed miles of concertina wire and a floating buoy barrier in the Rio Grande near Eagle Pass while also arresting thousands of migrants on criminal trespassing charges.

U.S. Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, told reporters in Washington D.C. Thursday that Trump’s pick was a “great choice.”

“I know Mike, and I think it’s an inspired choice, and nobody understands the border better than Texans,” Cornyn said. “Texas obviously has the biggest border, longest border, and I really like the idea that we’re going to have somebody who understands the Texas border.”

This article was originally published by The Texas Tribune. To read the original article, click here.

TEXAS – Stateline reports that every state has a committee of medical and public health experts tasked with investigating deaths that occur during and after pregnancy. But as data paints a clearer picture of the impact that state policies such as abortion bans and Medicaid expansion can have on maternal health, leaders in some states are rushing to limit their review committee’s work — or halt it altogether. In November, Georgia officials dismissed all 32 members of the state’s maternal mortality review committee after investigative reporters used internal committee documents to link the deaths of two women to the state’s six-week abortion ban. In September, Texas announced its committee would not review 2022 and 2023 maternal deaths — the two years immediately following its near-total abortion ban. And two years ago, Idaho effectively disbanded its committee when conservative groups went after members for calling on the state to extend Medicaid coverage for postpartum women.

In March, Arkansas Republican Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders created her own maternal health advisory group after Arkansas’ maternal mortality review committee, like Idaho’s, recommended extending the amount of time that low-income postpartum women can qualify for Medicaid coverage — something Sanders has staunchly opposed. The maternal mortality rate for U.S. women is far higher than in any other high-income country, and Black women are more than twice as likely to die during pregnancy or after birth than the national average. Research has shown most of these maternal deaths are preventable. State officials have given varying reasons for their decisions. Sanders has called an extension of postpartum Medicaid “duplicative” because Arkansas has other insurance options. The maternal mortality review committee chair in Texas said the panel would skip a full review of the 2022 and 2023 deaths in order to offer analysis and recommendations based on the most recently available data. And Georgia’s state health officer said she dismissed committee members because they violated state law by sharing confidential information. Georgia plans to replace them with new appointees.

LUBBOCK — It was 2014. Charles Perry was moving from the Texas House of Representatives to the Senate. The Panhandle lawmaker had several priorities, including water and how it gets to Texans.

“We must continue looking into ways to conserve and develop our water infrastructure and resources at both a state and local level,” Perry told the Lubbock Avalanche-Journal at the time.

Since then he’s been seen as a catalyst for water in the Capitol — and he is still sounding the same alarm.

Last year, Perry traversed the state to raise support for what might be the most ambitious overhaul to the state’s funding approach to water in modern state history.

The plan has become one of the worst-kept secrets in Texas politics, as Perry has met with an array of water lobbyists, local leaders and his fellow lawmakers. Those he’s met with have said Perry is working hard to secure the support necessary to make sure his plan does not fail under the dome.

Those conversations have created a buzz in the Texas water world and in Austin, where lawmakers began meeting again this week. However, Perry’s aspirations are, for now, still just an idea. The lawmaker and his team are still drafting the legislation.

According to interviews with water leaders across the state and with the lawmaker himself, the priority is clear — create a dedicated stream of state tax dollars to help local water agencies and cities buy more water and update the infrastructure that carries it to homes, businesses and farms.

Perry plans on asking lawmakers for as much as $5 billion for success in maintaining water infrastructure and growing water supply in the future, amid the state’s population growth.

“The Texas miracle’s happening, and we don’t have enough water to support it,” said Mary Alice Boehm-McKaughan, a lawyer for the Texas Rural Water Association.

The gamut of problems have popped up in all corners of the state, and has Texans worried. About 85% of registered voters are concerned about the risk of future water supply shortages, according to a survey by the policy think tank Texas 2036.

Perry said this session is likely the last chance for the Texas Legislature to get a significant jump start on addressing water issues. He said it’s not practical to leave it up to local governments anymore, because of how expensive it is.

“These are big billion-dollar conversations,” Perry said, in an interview with The Texas Tribune. “If we don’t jump-start this, I think Texas may have seen its best days on some level from some industries.”

Advocates say paying attention to water couldn’t come at a more critical time for Texas. Over the last several years, the state has endured ongoing drought, water contamination, declining water supply from reservoirs and aquifers, and water outages due to aging infrastructure.

It’s too early to say if his approach will work. Perry tried another ambitious bill last session, which allocated $1 billion to create the Texas Water Fund. Advocates say it was just a first step and it falls short of the long-term funding required. Others are waiting to see if Gov. Greg Abbott will make water a priority this session.

“I’m a frustrated CPA (certified public accountant), wannabe engineer,” Perry said. “It’s doable.”

As a Texas House Member in 2013, Perry was against using money in the state’s emergency savings account for water. Doing so would have required the legislature to bust its spending cap. He advocated for financial restraint and to wait.

“This is not a debate on having a water plan,” Perry wrote in 2013. “It’s a discussion on the best way to fund our water needs while protecting the state’s financial stability.”

His opponents used it against him later. However, Perry has long been an advocate for dedicated funds even then. Water, he says, is statewide infrastructure and should be funded the same as roads and bridges.

“Water is life, everything else is quality of life,” Perry said. “We can do without electricity for a day or two. It’s not good, but I can’t do without water for more than about four days. That’s death.”

Perry said part of the plan is to have the recurring funds expire after 10 or 15 years to see what the state’s water supply looks like then.

The idea, he said “will literally provide access to a water supply system — new supply, not existing — actual new supply to every 254 counties in the state.”

Water advocates say it’s not impossible to fix the water issues — leaking pipes, water contamination risks, and declining supply — plaguing the state. However, it will be expensive. A Texas 2036 report estimated that the state needs nearly $154 billion by 2050 for water infrastructure, including $59 billion for water supply projects, $74 billion for leaky pipes and infrastructure maintenance, and $21 billion to fix broken wastewater systems.

“We need to be more aggressive… and consider dedicated funding for water infrastructure, much like we already do for state parks and state road projects,” said Jeremy Mazur, director of infrastructure and natural resources policy at Texas 2036.

Texas voters appear ready for lawmakers to address water concerns. In 2023, voters approved $1 billion to create the Texas Water Fund. And according to Texas 2036’s survey, 85% of voters said they want the state to invest in long-term funding for water supply and infrastructure projects. The group polled over 1,000 registered Texas registered voters from across the state after the election last November for the results.

Perry’s bill would dedicate annual funding to water issues. He could ask for $5 billion per year to be allocated to the Texas Water Fund to help close this substantial funding gap. It’s unclear where that money would come from. The $1 billion approved last session that created the fund was a one-time investment and was used from the state’s historic surplus. Once the money runs dry, so do the water pipe repairs.

“Water supply projects are just becoming more challenging and complex because the easiest and cheapest projects have already been developed,” said Sarah Kirkle, policy director at the Texas Water Association. “We need to act now, or it will become even more expensive in the future.”

If the legislature does move forward in dedicating revenues to the Texas Water Fund, the bill would require a constitutional amendment to the Texas Constitution that voters would have to approve next November. The Texas 2036 poll found 68% of likely voters support dedicating $1 billion annually to the water fund.

Texas loses a significant amount of water from infrastructure breaks and leaks. The primary problem with Texas water infrastructure is its age and deterioration, which leads to significant water loss through leaks and breaks in old pipes.

A 2022 report by Texas Living Waters Project, a coalition of environmental groups, estimated that Texas water systems lose at least 572,000 acre-feet per year — about 51 gallons of water per service connection every day — enough water to meet the total annual municipal needs of the cities of Austin, Fort Worth, El Paso, Laredo, and Lubbock combined.

Cities and local water systems play a vital role and are responsible for the day-to-day management and implementation of water policies. However, many in Texas have struggled to keep up with the costs to fix deteriorating infrastructure, increasing demand, financial constraints and workforce shortages.

Old pipes raise concerns about water quality and supply, and often result in boil water notices paired with the need for costly repairs and replacements across the state. This issue is further compounded by the lack of funding for maintenance in some areas and the increasing demand for water due to population growth.

Boehm-McKaughan with the Texas Rural Water Association said the state’s population boom has sped up the issues.

“We’re very blessed to have folks moving in all the time,” Boehm-McKaughan said. “Nobody’s bringing roads with them. Nobody’s bringing water or more electrical grids.”

The 2022 Texas Water Plan estimates the state’s population will increase to 51.5 million by 2070 — an increase of 73%. At the same time, existing water supplies are projected to decline by 18%. The plan suggests strategies that, if not implemented, could cause a quarter of the state’s population in 2070 to have less than half the municipal water supplies they would need during a drought.

“We’re just having some severe growing pains,” Boehm-McKaughan said. “And, quite frankly, we can’t conserve our way out of it when it comes to water.”

Water experts say securing a reliable, consistent funding stream for water is seen as critical to supporting Texas’ continued economic growth and development, which depends on having dependable water supplies and infrastructure.

“The state level would really be helping those communities in ways that they can’t do on their own,” Kirkle said. “Especially without dramatic increases in local water rates.”

Water organizations are selling the idea as an economic proposal, as they say water is a key component to the economy. Industries and companies often look at the state’s water reliability when making their decisions on where to invest and locate their headquarters.

“If you want to continue to see this economic growth, it’s an economic development, you need to make sure that there’s reliable water infrastructure in place to support that,” Mazur said.

He added that without significant investments in water, Texas could struggle to compete for industry growth.

If a dedicated water fund is created, it could open the door to larger projects that offer regional solutions. In a December essay for the Texas Water Journal, Perry said water desalination — a process that removes minerals from water to make it drinkable — could help produce new water supply across the state.

The Legislature “will have an opportunity to vote for a plan that will supply water to every community, county, and region of the state,” Perry wrote.

There’s also the idea of a state water grid — pipelines transporting water from the water-rich regions of Texas to arid, drought-stricken areas — has been circulating since the 1960s. It first appeared in the 1968 State Water Plan, an era marked by significant interest in interstate water transfers. While the idea persists, the path to implementation is fraught with challenges, according to some water experts.

Building large-scale water transfer systems is no small feat. The costs are astronomical, the timelines daunting and there have been environmental concerns raised in the past.

Robert Mace, executive director of the Meadows Center for Water and the Environment at Texas State University in San Marcos, said projects like these often take 20 to 30 years to complete. However, he’s careful not to dismiss the idea entirely.

“Never say never,” he said.

He added that large-scale water transfers remain a potential lifeline for the state.

“Who knows what’s going to happen and how desperate things could get,” he said. “We have had things like climate change.”

Kirkle with the Texas Water Association said there’s a need for additional water supplies now and addressing Texas’ water challenges will require “every kind of project on the table.”

Perry Fowler, executive director of the Texas Water Infrastructure Network, said Perry seems determined to make a significant change for water. Fowler said the plan for a pipeline network is conceptual, for now.

“I think that the chairman is trying to get a sense of what we’d be looking at in terms of dollars to be able to execute a large scale, large supply investment,” Fowler said.

In an interview with the Tribune, Perry said working on water supply now is critical. He says the state is already behind on its water supply, and it takes a long time to build these projects.

“It takes 20 years to build out the infrastructure to have the water 20 years from now,” Perry said.

Perry has a few more weeks to hammer out the details before he has to present it to lawmakers. All bills must be filed by March 14.

Article originally published by The Texas Tribune. To read the original article, click here.