May/June 2021

The Texas Observer

Observing Texas since 1954

The Texas Observer1 min read
The Texas Observer
EDITOR Tristan Ahtone EXECUTIVE EDITOR Megan Kimble ASSOCIATE EDITORS Christopher Collins, Sophie Novack DIGITAL EDITOR Danielle Lopez SENIOR REPORTER Lise Olsen STAFF WRITERS Amal Ahmed, Michael Barajas, Gus Bova, Pauly Denetclaw, Justin Miller PUBL
The Texas Observer2 min read
Dialogue
This is so wrong (“Payday and Car Title Lenders in Texas Won More Than $45 Million in Pandemic Aid,” February 2, texasobserver.org) and impacts people who are already economically vulnerable. Take the time to call your state Representative and voice
The Texas Observer11 min read
Political Intelligence
WILDFIRE BRAD SMITH IS LOOKING AT TEXAS’ WILDFIRE FORECAST, and what he sees is not encouraging. Smith, the head of a Texas A&M Forest Service division that predicts fires, has one of the best handles on when and where one will strike in Texas. In th
The Texas Observer2 min read
Texas Tally
During Winter Storm Uri in mid-February, millions of Texans lost power and water. Nearly 200 died from hypothermia, carbon monoxide poisoning, and other causes, according to the Houston Chronicle. About three-quarters were people of color, half were
The Texas Observer1 min read
Trivia Texas
The polar vortex that hit Texas in February plunged the state into frigid temperatures for days. But Texas is a place of weather extremes. Which of the following about extraordinary Texas weather is untrue? a. An invisible line called the 98th meridi
The Texas Observer2 min read
Strangest State
AMARILLO // A rare cloned horse raised in Amarillo is heading to its forever home at the San Diego Zoo, KAMR reports. The endangered Przewalski horse named Kurt was born after his father’s DNA was frozen for 40 years. The veterinarian who raised Kurt
The Texas Observer3 min read
Texas Observed
“THIS IS LIKE THE HUNGER GAMES!” some version of this exclamation, often peppered with curse words and red-faced anger emojis, is a common refrain in a now-defunct volunteer Slack group I spent a few hours in each week this spring, working alongside
The Texas Observer2 min read
Hidden in Plain Sight
TO SEE HOW TEXAS BENEFITS FROM INTERNATIONAL kleptocracy, you could take a trip to South Padre Island, where you’d find “premier beachfront condominiums.” Here, one of these luxury condos, valued at $640,000, was seized by the federal government afte
The Texas Observer5 min read
A Texas Labor Organizer Goes to Washington
TWENTY-NINE YEARS AGO, MONTSERRAT GARIBAY LEFT Mexico City for Texas with her mother and sister. They were undocumented. At a public middle school in Austin, Garibay learned English. Later, she and her sister founded one of the first organizations na
The Texas Observer14 min readAmerican Government
Robert Bullard Isn’t Done Yet
In 1979, Robert Bullard and a team of 10 graduate students spent weeks poring over city records, library archives, and microfiche, searching for landfill locations in Houston, a sprawling 557-square-mile city home to nearly 1.5 million people. There
The Texas Observer18 min readCrime & Violence
Follow The Money
LUIS CARLOS CASTILLO CERVANTES’ nickname, “El Dragón,” makes him sound like a ruthless drug trafficker. His alias’ roots, however, are in the fairly mundane business he was known for in Mexico: He had the country’s exclusive license to lease a popula
The Texas Observer7 min read
The Western’s Long Glorification of Oppression
“IT JUST SO HAPPENS WE BE TEXIcans,” says Mrs. Jorgensen, an older woman wearing her blond hair in a tight bun, to rough-and-tumble cowboy Ethan Edwards in the 1956 film The Searchers. Mrs. Jorgensen, played by Olive Carey, and Edwards, played by Joh
The Texas Observer3 min read
A Feminist Rewrite of Lot
THE STORY OF LOT, THE FAMOUS ONE, IS A story for men. In it, Lot is given a divine warning that his city, Sodom, and its neighbor, Gomorrah, will be destroyed for their inhabitants’ wickedness and he and his wife and two daughters must flee. Lot is w
The Texas Observer6 min readGender Studies
The Next Trans Griot
ON AN OVERCAST DAY IN LATE OCTOBER, Dee Dee Watters stood on the stage at the University of Houston’s Cullen Performance Hall. She had forgone the traditional black of mourning for a purple flowered dress and large gold hoop earrings. She clasped her
The Texas Observer6 min readAmerican Government
An Irreversible Sentence
IT’S 2016, AND I’M DRIVING NORTH ON U.S. 59, A four-lane stretch of blacktop in Deep East Texas bordered by towering pines. This morning, I’d set out from New Orleans, where I intern at a public defender’s office, to make the five-hour trek to rural
The Texas Observer1 min read
Sobrevivir
Today an abandoned housecrumbles in the brush at Esperanza.No more caretakers.No more foremen. A rusty roof of corduroy.A gate on one hinge.A porch of broken chairs.Empty, yet— stuffed with stories.A single shoe, collapsed at the heel.A rotten backpa
The Texas Observer1 min read
Eye On Texas
WHEN I WALKED INTO MARIA MAGARIN’S APARTMENT IN NORTHEAST DALLAS IN early March, I was shocked at the damage that remained, weeks after historic Winter Storm Uri left millions without power or water across Texas. The stucco ceiling sagged from water

The Texas Observer

More Issues From The Texas Observer