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AUSTIN (AP) — A Texas lawmaker who helped pioneer the state’s restrictive abortion laws introduced a bill on Friday to clarify medical exceptions allowed under the law, representing a pivot from Republican legislators who have defended the state’s abortion ban in the face of lawsuits and medical scrutiny.

The bill, introduced by Republican state Sen. Bryan Hughes, still requires that patients have a medical emergency for a physician to perform an abortion but strikes language that it be a life-threatening condition. The bill would also require doctors and lawyers to receive training about the law.

“We’ve learned in a number of cases where the physician was willing to treat the mom, but the lawyers for the hospital would advise against it,” Hughes said. “So one of the most important things we want to do is make sure that doctors and the hospital lawyers are trained on what the law is.”

Hughes’ proposed legislation follows similar efforts by Kentucky lawmakers who added medical exceptions to their state’s near-total abortion ban on Thursday.

Texas law currently prohibits abortions except when a pregnant patient has a life-threatening condition. Doctors who are convicted of providing an illegal abortion can face up to 99 years in prison, a $100,000 fine and lose their medical license.

Texas’ abortion laws are among the strictest in the nation and have survived multiple legal challenges since the overturning of Roe v. Wade from opponents who say the law is unclear about when medical exceptions are allowed.

Republican Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, the president of the Senate, has made the bill one of his legislative priorities, and Republican Gov. Greg Abbott’s office said he’s open to supporting the legislation.

“Since the Dobbs decision, there have been 135 medically necessary abortions to save mothers’ lives in Texas with no repercussions for those physicians,” Abbott spokesperson Andrew Mahaleris said in a statement. “Governor Abbott looks forward to seeing any clarifying language in any proposed legislation from the legislature.”

For years, abortion rights advocates have criticized Texas’ abortion laws, which do not allow exceptions for cases of incest or rape, as too restrictive.

“No amount of attempted clarification from Texas lawmakers would suffice because abortion bans are dangerous,” said Ashley Gray, senior policy adviser for the Center for Reproductive Rights. “As long as you’re criminalizing doctors for providing care, patients will suffer.”

In 2024, the Texas Supreme Court said the state’s abortion laws were not too vague, ruling against a group of women who had serious pregnancy complications and were denied abortions. The Texas Medical Board has refused to list specific exceptions for doctors under the law.

Dallas mother Kate Cox was at the center of a separate lawsuit brought in 2023 for a similar issue after a court denied her permission to obtain an abortion after her fetus developed a fatal condition.

A group of more than 100 obstetricians and gynecologists across the state sent a letter in November to state officials urging them to reform the law after an investigation by ProPublica found three women had died after doctors had delayed treating their miscarriages.

AUSTIN (AP) – A man was charged Friday with intoxication manslaughter after five people were killed and several injured in a late-night wreck in Austin, Texas, that involved over a dozen vehicles on Interstate 35, authorities said.

Authorities said that the five people killed in the crash that involved 17 vehicles Thursday just before 11:30 p.m. included three adults, a child and an infant. First responders said that 11 people were taken to hospitals.

Solomun Weldekeal Araya, 37, was charged with five counts of intoxication manslaughter and two counts of intoxication assault after the crash, Austin police said Friday. Police said he was in custody in Travis County Jail. It was not immediately clear if he had an attorney. Jail records did not list an attorney for him.

Police have not detailed the circumstances that led to the wreck. Police said in an email Friday that they were still early in the investigation and had no further information available to release.

The southbound lanes of I-35 were closed following the crash, and they remained closed into Friday before reopening at about 1 p.m. The wreck left a stretch of the interstate littered with mangled vehicles and debris.

The collision was “very large and very complex,” police Officer Austin Zarling said at an early morning news conference.

Edgar Viera told the KXAN television station that he was at a nearby store when he heard the crash and went to try to help those involved.

“We didn’t have the proper tools to open the vehicles, so we just did what we could,” Viera told the station. “It was hard to see this.”

AUSTIN – The Dallas Morning News reports that Texas colleges and universities could face more oversight — including over who is hired, what is taught and how they are following the law — under a wide-ranging priority bill filed Thursday. The Senate proposal would give governor-appointed boards of regents more power to overturn decisions made by campus leaders and review curriculum. The bill also would reduce the role of faculty senates and create a new office to investigate concerns at state schools. Introduced by Sen. Brandon Creighton, R-Conroe, Senate Bill 37 is of one Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick’s top 40 priorities. Patrick has long said he wants to roll back the “woke left” that is rampant on college campuses. “By reaffirming the authority of the Board of Regents, SB 37 clearly defines university governance roles while increasing transparency in policies, hiring, curriculum, and financial decisions,” Creighton said in a statement.

“With taxpayer dollars and students’ futures at stake, universities must operate with accountability,” he added. Others saw the bill as “an attack on faculty’s role in governance in colleges and universities,” the University of Texas at Austin chapter of the American Association of University Professors said in a statement. “Shared governance is one of AAUP’s top priorities and central to the protection of academic freedom and faculty’s status as professionals,” the statement read. In a statement, the Texas Conference of AAUP said the legislature is “attempting to micromanage and overregulate universities that are already thriving.” The group noted that Gov. Greg Abbott bragged about Texas leading the nation in top research universities on social media Thursday. The state recently significantly expanded the number of schools reaching tier 1 status. “This happens because we have top-notch faculty,” AAUP’s statement read. Under the bill, governing boards would have expanded authority that includes the ability to overrule decisions made by school administrators. The boards would have to send annual reports to the governor, lieutenant governor, speaker of the House and each state lawmaker on their hiring, curriculum and other issues.

HOUSTON – The Houston Chronicle reports that while Texas has long been considered one of the nation’s top states for business, workers in the state are among the nation’s most miserable, a new study finds. The state’s workforce is the 12th-most miserable in the nation, according to a ranking from Final Round AI, maker of an AI interview virtual assistant, based on data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. The analysis focused on four factors: average hours worked, average wages, fatal work injury rates and the rate of nonfatal work injuries and illnesses causing missed workdays. “Not all factors that contribute to a worker’s happiness can be quantified, but paying workers well, providing a good work-life balance and making sure their health is prioritized goes a long way to alleviating a lot of the stress in their lives, allowing them to perform their best when they are at work,” said Michael Guan, CEO of Final Round AI.

Mississippi has the most miserable workers in the nation, the company concluded, standing out for having the lowest average wage in the nation, at $47,570 per year, and the 6th-highest rate of workplace fatalities. Wyoming had the second-unhappiest workforce, with 15.14 fatal injuries per 100,000 employees in 2023, according to BLS data. West Virginia ranked third in this context. By contrast, New York has the happiest workforce in the nation, thanks to a combination of relatively high wages, relatively low hours worked and relatively few workplace fatalities. Texas scored second-worst in the nation, the study found, when it came to workload. On average, workers in the state put in 36.5 hours a week. Texas also has middling wages, with an annual average of $61,240. And in 2023, the most recent data available, the state saw 3.94 fatalities for every 100,000 workers, according to the BLS data. The state’s overall score in Final Round AI’s ranking was 42.8 out of 100, compared to 30.2 for Mississippi and 79.7 for New York. Guan suggested that when workers are unhappy, that can take a toll on the overall business climate. “Happy workers are better workers as they will work harder, smarter, and make fewer mistakes while working,” he said. “Having happy workers is also a glowing recommendation for your company.”

TEXARKANA – A 10-year-old girl and her mother were shot in their sleep around 12:30 Friday morning in the 3000 block of Mason St. according to the Texarkana Police Department.

According to our news partner, KETK, police said they were alerted to the incident by neighbors who reported hearing several shots. When officers arrived, they learned both were injured and another house had been caught in the crossfire after several rounds were fired. The mother and daughter were taken to a Texarkana hospital, but the girl was then transferred to Arkansas Children’s Hospital later on for additional treatment.

As police investigate this case, if anyone has more information on this shooting they’re ask to contact Texarkana Police Department, or Texarkana Area Crime Stoppers.

TEXAS – Newsweek reports that immigration was the sole driver of the United States’ population growth in a single year for the first time since records began, a new study released Wednesday said. The nonpartisan Migration Policy Institute (MPI) looked at U.S. Census Bureau data for 2022-2023, the latest available, finding that falling American birthrates factored into the change. The findings come at a time when immigration, particularly illegal immigration, is a key focus of the current White House administration. While plans for mass deportations are being carried out, the other obstacle — a collapsing fertility rate — has been far more vexing for officials, both in the U.S. and other developed nations suffering from the same dynamic. The U.S. immigrant population grew by 1.6 million between 2022 and 2023 to 47.8 million, according to the MPI analysis, with immigrants now representing a 14.3 percent share of the overall population—the highest ever. The Census Bureau started collecting data in 1850 and has tracked immigrant arrivals through the boom in the early 1900s, the bust in middle of the century, and then a steady rise from the 1970s onward.

In 2023, birth rates among American women reached a record low for those aged between 20 and 24, while the rate also dropped overall for the larger group of 20-39 year olds, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). The shift has been noted in other reporting in recent months, including from the National Foundation for American Policy (NFAP), which found that more immigrants were entering the workforce than American-born workers because of an aging population and the declining birthrate. Immigrants made up around 18 percent of the total workforce in 2023, the last year for which complete data is available. In a separate study, the nonpartisan Center for Immigration Studies (CIS) looked at estimates from January 2025, finding an even larger rise in the immigrant population. It now stands at around 15.8 percent, according to the CIS analysis. Among the largest nationalities represented in the U.S. immigrant population in 2023 were Mexicans at 23 percent, followed by Indians (6 percent) and Chinese (5 percent).