Texas Take

As expected, the "Texas Privacy Act" has quickly touched off arguments, triggering a lengthy debate while the House was trying to establish its operating rules.

The Senate was quickly enmeshed in a snit of its own, over whether to restore a rule deleted two years ago that would have given Democrats say in what bills are considered for debate. Not surprisingly, the Republican majority deep-sixed that idea in short order.

In a week when Lt. Gov. Patrick announced he will not run for governor against incumbent Greg Abbott -- and then endorsed Abbott even though Abbott has not said whether he will run for reelection, the focus of most discussion under Austin's pink dome was how the state will make ends meet with a billion-dollar shortfall.

One group of House members thinks that President-elect Donald Trump should help, reimbursing the state for the $2.8 billion that Texas taxpayers have spent in recent years because the federal government was not keeping the border secure.

But the real gem of the week may be this: A move is afoot to designate the cannon as the official state gun, right along with the official state flower and state bird and state fish . Gotta love it. Why would anyone want to shoot a pistol if they could fire a cannon?  Seriously.

Texas politics are never boring. Get the inside scoop and behind-the-scenes insights about the upcoming legislative session in this week's Texas Take: The Podcast -- the leading political podcast in the Lone Star State

And the only one with  Second Amendment ring to its intro.

The "Texas Privacy Law," legislation that was known at various times in the past year as the Transgender Bathroom Bill and the Women's Privacy Act, has finally been filed -- setting up what promises to become one of the most contentions issues of the upcoming legislative session.

Texans will have to use the restroom for the gender on their birth certificate, and violators could face hefty fines enforced by none other than Attorney General Ken Paxton, who would become the state's top cop for toilets in government buildings and schools.

Those who commit crimes in the wrong head could face enhanced penalties. Read that 15 years in prison for some violations.

If that weren't enough to hold the Legislature's attention, state revenues promise to billions of dollars short of what state programs need, a proposal to require burial of fetal remains and other controversies promise to rachet up the debate under the Pink Dome when lawmakers convene next Tuesday for their every-other-year meeting.

Get the bottom line on what's getting ready to happen, and to whom.

Texas politics are never boring. Get the inside scoop and behind-the-scenes insights about the upcoming legislative session  in this week's Texas Take: The Podcast -- the leading political podcast in the Lone Star State.

A reality star picks a reality star, as President-Elect Donald Trump picks former Texas Gov. Rick Perry to serve in his cabinet as the nation's energy czar. Perry's nomination is sparking controversy and discussion.

As Gov. Greg Abbott gears up for the approaching legislative session, he is predicting that the state will have enough money to pay for everything it needs, even though revenues are down and the list of additional expenses keeps ticking upward.

He hopes a Trump Administration will be a boon to the Texas budget, because if Washington steps up to cover border-security expenses and reforms federal healthcare programs, the Legislature could have more cash to spend on its own pressing needs.

And that so-called 'bathroom bill" that Senate leaders want to keep men out of women's restrooms? Abbott seems lukewarm at present, just weeks before the legislative session begins, until her sees exactly what the legislation covers.

A holiday throwdown over whether a Killeen nurse's aide can have a door decoration that features a biblical message from the classic "A Charlie Brown Christmas' goes to court, an annual rite for state leaders who insist government should not be taking the Christ out of Christmas.

Get the bottom line on these and other hot-button issues facing the state.

Texas politics are never boring, and these topics and other behind-the-scenes insights about the upcoming legislative session are explored in this week's Texas Take: The Podcast -- the leading political podcast in the Lone Star State.

Will the Texas bathroom bill flush the state's economy down the toilet? A business group says yes, but supporters say no.

What's next with the state's growing foster-care crisis, which carries a huge price tag to repair, and should the state tell women to call 911 if they feel pressured to get an abortion?

Get the bottom line on these and other hot-button issues facing the state, along with a short summation by U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz extolling the virtues of Texas queso over Arkansas cheese dip, a not-to-miss performance.

Texas politics are never boring, and these topics and other behind-the-scenes insights about the upcoming legislative session are explored in this week's Texas Take: The Podcast -- the leading political podcast in the Lone Star State.

Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick is promoting his bathroom-protection bill with a poll he paid for that says a majority of all Texans  -- Republicans, Democrats and everyone else -- agree that the controversial bill is a good idea.

If you thought the upcoming legislative session might go smoothly, think again. A throwdown over property-tax cuts appears to be on the horizon, pitting the state against local taxing entities including cities and school districts.

Abortion will also be back, this time in the form of a bill to require fetal remains to be buried or cremated, in what quickly heated up the debate once again over women's rights. 

Facing a tight state budget, Texas will be hoping for some relief from the federal government in a Donald Trump era on the rising costs of healthcare and border security. But no one yet know whether that relief will come soon enough.

Texas politics are never boring, and these explosive topics and other behind-the-scenes insights about the upcoming legislative session are explored in this week's Texas Take: The Podcast -- the leading political podcast in the Lone Star State, with a much-watched Facebook Live video to boot. Saddle up and watch at Chron.com.

You can't make up stuff this good.

U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz is back in the limelight, promising pitchforks and torches if the new Republican majority in Washington doesn't deliver on its promises to drain the swamp and make American politics work for the people again.

If the Washington establishment is feeling the heat from Donald Trump being president-elect, so could Texas lawmakers who are heading back into their biennial session starting in January. They face a growing list of issues -- including several on which the Senate and House already don't agree, such as school choice and transgender restrooms and fetal tissue.

Add to that list the fact that Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner will be heading to Austin seeing  a deal on pension reform in Texas' largest city, in a session where Democrats already are thinking Trump could end up being good for them if he secures the border so Texas can spend its billion-dollar allocation there on other state programs.

Texas politics are never boring, and these intriguing highlights and other behind-the-scenes insights are explored in this week's Texas Take: The Podcast -- the leading political podcast in the Lone Star State, with a much-watched Facebook Live video to boot. Saddle up and watch at Chron.com.

With Donald Trump now America's president elect, after one of the wildest and most vicious elections in history, Texans are turning their attention to Washington to see what kind of Lone Star flavor his cabinet and policies may have.

Among the Texas officials who campaigned for Trump. former Gov. Rick Perry has hinted strongly that he'd be interested in a job with Team Trump, Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick has said he'd reject any offer and Agriculture Commissioner Sid Miller has uncharacteristically silent. So has U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz, to talk that Trump might consider him for the U.S. Supreme Court -- a job  Cruz would love.

Trump won Texas by one of the slimmest margins for a Republican in two decades, Houston went for Hillary Clinton -- and so did Fort Bend County, a reliably GOP bastion in the past. We look at what's up with that.

Texas politics are never boring, and these intriguing highlights and other behind-the-scenes insights are explored in this week's Texas Take: The Podcast -- the leading political podcast in the Lone Star State, in a season when the furor over the just-ended presidential election will soon transition into speculation about the legislative session that begins in January.

With just days before the November election, Donald Trump is gaining on Hillary Clinton in the presidential contest as new details about investigations targeting Clinton surface daily.

That's bringing more and more Republicans to board the Trump Train in Texas and elsewhere in the final days of the ugliest presidential campaign in decades, a contest that now has observers predicting that Texas will go Red for Trump with margins not predicted weeks ago. That said, some urban areas in Texas may go for Hillary and down-ballot races could go to Democrats in Houston and Dallas.

In this tumultuous political year, when the F-word, the B-word and even the P-word have been bandied about, Texas Agriculture Commissioner Sid Miller added the C-word.

Texas politics are never boring, and these intriguing highlights and other behind-the-scenes insights are explored in this week's Texas Take: The Podcast -- the leading political podcast in the Lone Star State, with a Facebook Live post so you can see the show each week as it happens.

With less than two weeks to go before the November election, Texas Republican officials are in radio silence over mention the name of Donald Trump, for fear of endangering their election chances or those of their friends. That's even though polls show Trump maintains a small but safe lead in the State of Texas.

 Early-voting numbers are setting new turnout records -- Harris County is setting a new record each day -- and we have the details on some curious patterns about the Texans who are casting their ballots early.

House Speaker Joe Straus has taken the lead in calling for immediate reforms to the state's special-education programs after a Houston Chronicle investigation revealed that many students have been systematically denied required programs. Plus, a crisis over foster care takes main stage in a heated Senate hearing and misbehaving voting machines.

Texas politics are never boring, and these intriguing highlights and other behind-the-scenes insights are explored in this week's Texas Take: The Podcast -- the leading political podcast in the Lone Star State, with a Facebook Live post so you can see the show each week as it happens.

With less than three weeks to go before Election Day, Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton heat up the third and final presidential debate with bitter personal attacks against each other, even as Clinton dodges questions about whether shehas  engaged in pay-to-play politics, and Trump makes headlines for refusing to say he will accept the outcome of the November  election unless he wins.

Plus, Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick outlines school choice and the so-called "bathroom bill" as his priorities for the legislative session that starts in January, proposals that may pass the Senate but which will almost certainly be defeated in the House.  

And finally, if Texas was such a reliably Republican state then why are the most recent polls showing Clinton and Trump in a near dead heat, and why is Clinton running TV ads here at the last minute?

Texas politics are never boring, and the intriguing highlights and these and other topics that have dominated headlines in recent days are explored in this week's Texas Take: The Podcast -- the leading political podcast in the Lone Star State, with a Facebook Live post so you can see the show each week as it happens.