Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner is the most recent official to defy the governor’s order. He announced Monday that the city’s nearly 22,000 city employees will be required to mask up inside city buildings where social distancing is not doable.

For some energy experts, the increase in donations for the officials at the close of the session looks like a reward for not passing more stringent regulations and raises questions about whether lawmakers let the oil, gas and the broader energy industry off easy for its massive failures.

There are two main groups within Texas’ unvaccinated population: white conservatives in rural areas, and Hispanic and Black people in big cities.

Republicans believe they have already compromised enough on the legislation, while Democrats are distrustful of both the policy driving the bill and of their GOP colleagues after seeing how they have managed the process around the proposal so far.

Hospital officials worry that “staggering and frightening” hospitalization rates will push facilities to capacity at a time when staffing is short and workers are exhausted.

As the safety net for Texas tenants behind on rent begins to disappear, a 19-year-old Houston organizer helps Hispanic residents apply for emergency financial assistance.

Texas Republican state leaders held their ground against allowing local schools and governments to require masks. The CDC guidelines are not mandates and have no weight of law.

The warrant to apprehend state Rep. Philip Cortez is the first one signed by the speaker since more than 50 House Democrats left the state to block Republicans from having the quorum needed to pass legislation during the special legislative session.

Officials in Dallas, Harris and Travis counties want residents to take stronger precautions as the delta variant drives an increase in coronavirus infections across Texas.

Despite promises from Abbott that transparency in the crowdfunding process for the border wall would be paramount, donor information released to The Texas Tribune for the first week of collections was bereft of any way to verify the identities of the majority of the donors.