texas

May 22, 2015 - Immigrant and refugee rights advocates are making headway in their efforts to end the Obama administration's punitive family detention policy even as detention centers, like the privately-managed and largest center in Dilley, Texas, are set to expand.

May 21, 2015 - Nine states, four of them in the South, hold judicial elections but don't ban judges from seeking campaign cash from people that could appear before them. Following a recent U.S. Supreme Court ruling on a Florida case upholding such bans, judicial watchdogs are working to change the law in these outlier states.

May 21, 2015 - The Mary Reynolds Babcock Foundation has launched a "Southern Voices" oral history project to capture the stories of Southern leaders working for social and economic justice. The latest installment focuses on organizing for immigration reform.

April 30, 2015 - Five years after the BP disaster, a group of governors led by North Carolina's Pat McCrory is pushing for drilling in the Atlantic. The group has close ties to a secret-money nonprofit and energy lobbyists, a relationship that raises questions about transparency, ethics and the blurring of public and private interests.

April 24, 2015 - There's growing scientific consensus linking the uptick in seismic activity with a type of wastewater disposal from oil and gas drilling.

April 17, 2015 - Companies spent millions in lobbying on immigration issues that led to a spike in incarceration levels and, in turn, boosted corporate profits.

April 10, 2015 - Immigrant mothers held at a private family detention center in Karnes City, Texas went on five-day hunger strike last week to press for their and their children's release -- and they say they will renew the strike if their demands are not met soon.