DALLAS – Dallas County Judge Clay Jenkins was seen boarding a plane to Costa Rica Friday morning, the day a powerful winter storm is expected to hit North Texas.

What we know:

FOX 4 obtained the photo above, taken Friday, Jan. 23, showing Jenkins and his family boarding a plane leaving Dallas-Fort Worth for Costa Rica.

The trip comes as a winter storm prepares to drop temperatures in Dallas to sub-freezing levels.

In Texas, the county judge is responsible for emergency preparedness, and the only one who can declare a disaster.

Dig deeper:

WASHINGTON, DC – JANUARY 05: Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, questions U.S. Capitol Police Chief J. Thomas Manger during the Senate Rules and Administration Committee oversight hearing on January 5, 2022 in Washington, D.C. One day before the anniversary of

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The photo is reminiscent of when Texas sen. Ted Cruz traveled to Cancun in 2021 as a winter storm caused extended outages across the state.

Cruz was seen this week leaving Texas as reports of the winter storm’s intensity grew.

Cruz returned to Texas Friday. He poked fun at social media chatter about the incident on his X account.

What they’re saying:

A representative for Jenkins told FOX 4 the trip was pre-planned and that he will receive regular updates on the developing weather in North Texas.

“The County’s full focus is on keeping people safe and services running,” Lauren Trimble, his Chief of Staff, told FOX 4. “The Judge prepared in advance, ensuring emergency operations and coordination were in place during his travel which was scheduled months ago.”

“Dallas County’s experienced teams are ready to respond as conditions change, and he will continue to get regular updates.”

His office further responded on their plans with Jenkins out of office.

“The county’s readiness and emergency operations are fully staffed and coordinated. Chief of Emergency Services Scott Forster will oversee and coordinate the response,” Jenkins’ office said. “Chief of Staff Lauren Trimble is empowered to sign orders, but the Governor’s order makes that unnecessary.”

Political theater

Dallas County voters are being asked to accept confusion on election day at the polls as unavoidable. It isn’t. This mess was intentionally created by the Dallas GOP engaging in performance politics, not election integrity.

For decades, Democratic and Republican election judges in Dallas County have worked together to run welcoming, lawful and efficient polling places. That bipartisan success is being undermined by Allen West and the Dallas GOP, who seem to have chosen loyalty to Gov. Greg Abbott and President Donald Trump over voters.

After Republicans passed mid-decade gerrymandered maps that violated the law (by splitting precincts in half, thus forcing massive redrawing of precincts), they created a logistical crisis and blamed election workers for it.

In Irving, those maps cost us our Democratic congressional representative.

Now the GOP wants credit for security while Texas already has the strictest voter ID laws in the nation. If Republicans can send the state’s voter file to Washington, they can implement statewide voting and reduce confusion. They simply don’t want to.

This chaos isn’t accidental. It’s political theater designed to suppress turnout.

Liza Hameline, Irving

Voting should be effortless

If I have the right to vote, and voting by mail is a valid way to exercise that right, then why can the state ignore that right if I: failed to re-create a driver’s license signature, didn’t have a printer, didn’t have stamps, didn’t have a car, misread forms that haven’t been checked for errors, had a visual impairment or was impacted by a mailing delay longer than four days?

If citizens have the right to vote, then the process of exercising that right should be as effortless as possible. The state shouldn’t be able to shift the burden of running elections onto voters by making them jump through bureaucratic hoops.

Finnegan Motz, Dallas/Lochwood

Cheers and jeers for DMN

Cheers to The Dallas Morning News for 1. the Ultimate Puzzle Book, 2. the Sports section and 3. our local paper delivery person. I look forward to receiving the Ultimate Puzzle Book every month. The Sudoku Monster is quite a challenge.

The Sports section, although not quite as current as in recent years, is good. Your sports writers do a good job of reporting both national and local sports news.

Our paper delivery people are excellent.

Jeers to The Dallas Morning News news section. As Mario Vitale masterly reported in a recent letter to the editor, I find that the vast majority of the national and international news agencies used by The News are left-leaning. From reading most of the news articles, one would think a majority of North Texans are liberals. Recent election results don’t verify this. No surprise Fox News is the most popular cable news channel.

David Gordon, Bedford

We need DART

Re: “Density wrong for DART,” by Bill Pritchard, Jan. 1 Letters.

I can’t agree with Pritchard’s opinion on DART. In Nassau County, N.Y., the population is 1,900 per square kilometer and in Suffolk County, the population is 647 per square kilometer. The Long Island Railroad carries around 270,000 to 300,000 people every day and is the main transit artery for Long Island.

The railroad stops at many towns and transfers along the way, and includes a stop at John F. Kennedy International Airport.

Texas roads are great, but it is not a long-term solution. We need to get cars off the road and mass transit is the solution. Imagine how much better and robust Dallas would be and can be.

I believe it’s not too late to continue building and improving Dallas Area Rapid Transit. The Long Island Railroad is well over 100 years old and still growing and improving. We can do the same with DART.

Jesse T. Reed, Flower Mound

Some other facts

Re: “A ‘convenient fairy tale,’” by Janet Worthington, and “Good tried to run over agent,” by Carl Herman, Wednesday Letters.

Now that it’s an established “fact” that Republicans have always staunchly supported civil rights and that Renee Good was killed in self-defense, we can move on to other “facts.” Pinocchio became a real boy, and the cow really did jump over the moon. Also, the fact that Rudolph has a red nose shows clearly that Santa Claus is a Republican.

Tom E. Stone, Dallas

The whole story

Worthington’s selective recall of American history fails to note that President Lyndon Johnson said that his voting rights legislation would lose the Southern Democratic vote for generations as the solid South immediately began switching to the Republican Party.

Richard Nixon’s Southern strategy of promoting “law and order” in Black neighborhoods and emphasizing state’s rights regarding progressive legislation further attracted their move. Now Donald Trump’s apprehension of people of color completes the transition.

James Clinton Cargile, Plano

A nightmare for Cowboys fans

In only two National Football League seasons, Denver Broncos quarterback Bo Nix and New England Patriots quarterback Drake Maye each has two NFL postseason victories under his belt. Each has also earned an appearance in the American Football Conference conference championship game, and one of the teams will be going to the Super Bowl this season.

In 10 NFL seasons, Dallas Cowboys quarterback Dak Prescott, the highest-paid player in the NFL, also has two postseason victories, although they were not in the same season.

I’m still waiting on Prescott and the Cowboys to make it to the National Football Conference conference championship game though. Then, maybe the Super Bowl?

A fan can dream, right? Because the last 30 years of being a Cowboys fan have been a nightmare.

Craig Renfro, Mesquite

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If you have problems with the form, you can submit via email at letters@dallasnews.com

Team USA women’s hockey is heading into the 2026 Winter Olympics hoping for more than the silver medal finish from Beijing in 2022.

While they have dreams of gold, they are also inspiring the next generation of potential Olympians, some of whom are being coached in North Texas.

One of them is Angel Zerby, who has already caught the attention of USA Hockey.

“I want to be at the highest level that I can be,” Zerby said. “It’s hard to lose. Honestly, sometimes it’s hard to win when you have to be mentally tough in every scenario.”

Tough lessons learned at just 16-years-old, but she says they are lessons that are worth it. That mental toughness and her love of hockey started when her dad took her to her first Dallas Stars game.

“I decided that I thought that it looked cool, and I wanted to try that. So ever since then, he put me in skates,” Zerby said.

She learned to skate when she was just 8 years old. She was playing hockey by the age of 9 years old and then leveled up to the traveling Dallas Stars Elite when she was 10. She quickly realized that this was a lot different from the sports that her other friends were playing.

“So there’s not really enough girl competition here to have [a big league]. I think there are only three girls’ teams in Texas. There’s only one Tier One, which would be Dallas Stars Elite. So there’s not really enough for us to play other girls’ teams in Texas regularly,” Zerby said.

Her team has seen a lot of success. They have won regionals and been to nationals. Zerby herself has plenty of personal accomplishments to celebrate already.

“I was selected in 2024 for the USA player development camp. So that means I was invited by USA Hockey. That was a big deal for me. I was just super excited to go and do that,” Zerby said.

She was just one of four defensewomen in her region of several states to be invited. Her hard work was all in hopes of following in the skates of North Texas women who came before her from the Dallas Stars Elite Program.

Coppell’s own Hannah Bilka, who plays in the Professional Women’s Hockey League for Seattle, was on the USA Women’s National Team when they won the World Championship in 2024. Bilka has been named to Team USA’s roster for the Winter Olympics in Milan and Cortina.

Allyson Simpson from Frisco plays professional women’s hockey for the New York Sirens and was also a member of the Dallas Stars Elite in her early career.

It’s a spotlight Angel says she has trained most of her life for.

“We can go at this and be scared, or we can go at this as a challenge and see what we can do,” Zerby said.

While girls like Angel are still playing with the guys… the sport is growing. According to Dallas Stars Hockey programs, the girls’ side saw an 18-percent increase year over year. Since 2013, the Dallas Stars Elite has helped more than 90 North Texas girls earn scholarships for higher education.