One might have hoped, with the Texas House’s powerful General Investigating Committee getting in on the action Monday, that a little light would have been shed on what exactly transpired between Texas Speaker of the House Dennis Bonnen and Empower Texans gadfly Michael Q. Sullivan on June 12. The committee, led…
Never fear, those of you who worried Dallas might actually sort out its paid sick leave situation without state intervention. Wednesday, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton formally thrust his nose into the lawsuit brought against the city over its ordinance, keeping his longstanding record of supporting local control, except all…
Former Dallas County Schools Superintendent Rick Sorrells is going to spend the next seven years in prison. Sixteen months ago, Sorrells, 73, pleaded guilty to taking more than $3 million in cash and other assets from a company that stocked DCS with cameras for a program that ticketed drivers who…
Whatever happens over the next 15 months, whether President Donald Trump gets reelected and continues his slow-burn destruction of American political norms or a Democrat wins the White House and immediately begins trying to throw 2017-20 way down the memory hole, one piece of the president’s legacy that will endure…
The Dallas Morning News and NBC5 won a three-year campaign Monday for the release of Dallas Police body camera footage showing the last minutes of 32-year-old Anthony Timpa’s life. The video shows the events of the detainment and death of the unarmed man on Aug. 10, 2016. According to the…
The 2019 offseason continues to be about anything but football for the Dallas Cowboys and their star running back, Ezekiel Elliott. Tuesday afternoon, Ronnie Hill sued Elliott and the team for interfering with police during the aftermath of a 2017 crash near the Cowboys headquarters at The Star in Frisco…
The other proverbial shoe finally dropped Tuesday. Two Collin County companies, set to be subject to Dallas’ new paid sick leave ordinance because of the amount of time their employees work in Dallas, sued the city with the help of the Texas Public Policy Foundation. Dallas’ ordinance violates the companies’…
Wednesday’s decision from a three-judge panel in federal court in San Antonio reads like a really good joke. There’s the buildup, in which they repeatedly blast Texas’ Republican-controlled legislature for its racially discriminatory 2011 redistricting, that gets you leaning in one direction. Then there’s the punchline that nearly gives you…
There was never any way Dallas was going to make it all the way to Aug. 1 without a legal challenge to its paid sick leave ordinance, but now it’s official: the Texas Public Policy Foundation, the conservative think tank helping represent business groups suing to stop similar ordinances in…
After about two years on the lam, Nathan Hawkins is back in Dallas County’s jail, but he likely won’t be there for long. Hawkins, 36, had been on probation for 12 years, stemming from a 2007 charge for burglary of a building, a state jail felony. His case was the…
Although a proposed citizenship question on the 2020 census appears dead for good and all, the long legal battle over it may have done lasting damage in Texas, the head of a nonpartisan think tank said Thursday. While she welcomed President Donald Trump’s announcement that his administration was backing away…
Last week, right after a Dallas County grand jury indicted him for the murder of Juan Moreno Jr., Farmers Branch Police Department officer Michael Dunn turned himself in, quickly made $150,000 bail and was released from custody. Standard operating procedure as far as North Texas cops are concerned — see…
Barring something truly unforeseen, Texas is officially out of the woods when it comes to a potential citizenship question on the 2020 U.S. census. In an email sent to opposing counsel in the ongoing legal fight over the question, lawyers for the Department of Justice said Tuesday that the “decision…
It took a little digging through federal court documents and a helpful tweet pointing us in the right direction, but the Observer had the distinct pleasure of witnessing the origin story of Texas’ newest civil rights icon Monday. Turns out, he’s been sitting right in front of us the whole time…
There’s a chance, somewhere between a small- and a medium-sized one, that Tuesday ends up being one of the defining days of the Cowboys’ 2019 season. According to reports from the Cowboys beat reporters at ESPN and The Dallas Morning News, star running back Ezekiel Elliott is meeting with NFL…
In the end, it wasn’t a definitive or even particularly clear statement, but it might have been just enough from the chief justice of the United States Supreme Court, John Roberts. Joining with court’s four liberals, Roberts wrote that the Trump administration’s efforts to add a citizenship question to the…
A new filing by Wade Callender, former corporate counsel for Frisco-based game developer Gearbox Software, provided evidence that CEO Randy Pitchford diverted $12 million dollars from Gearbox to his personal company. The amended petition is the latest entry…
It’s starting to look more and more like Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton is never going to go on trial despite being indicted on felony charges nearly four years ago. Wednesday, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals refused to reconsider a decision that resulted in the lawyers prosecuting Paxton’s alleged…
Texas’ Driver Responsibility Program, perhaps the most loathed program administered by the state, is no more. Friday afternoon, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott signed a bill immediately putting the program to the sword, clearing the path for about 1.5 million Texans to regain their driver’s licenses. The program imposed surcharges on…
A Dallas County took less than an hour Friday morning to convict Brenda Delgado of Dallas dentist Kendra Hatcher’s 2015 murder. Delgado will spend the rest of her life in prison without the possibility of parole. According to prosecutors, Delgado paid Kristopher Love and Crystal Cortes to kill Hatcher because…
Just days after advocacy groups filed more than two dozen new sexual harassment charges against the fast-food chain, a group of McDonald’s workers from across the country protested in North Texas on Thursday, demanding better wages, better working conditions and the right to form a union. Fight for $15, a…
Last week, Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp signed a piece of anti-abortion legislation that left Texas, one of the pro-life movement’s biggest hotbeds, in the dust. Thanks to Kemp’s signature, Georgia law now bans any abortion occurring more than six weeks into a pregnancy, creating an almost impossible window for women…
