AUSTIN, Texas (KBTX) – The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has notified the Texas Department of State Health Services (DSHS) that two Texas residents were passengers on the MV Hondius, a ship that experienced an outbreak of hantavirus while traveling in the Atlantic Ocean. The passengers left the ship and returned to the United States before the outbreak was identified.
“Public health workers in Texas have reached the two individuals, and they report they are not experiencing any symptoms and did not have any contact with a sick person while aboard the ship. They have agreed to monitor themselves for symptoms with daily temperature checks and contact public health officials at any sign of a possible illness,” the agency said on Thursday in a statement.
DSHS will not release additional personal details about the passengers to protect their privacy.
“This is not the next COVID, but it is a serious infectious disease,” said Maria Van Kerkhove, director of epidemic and pandemic preparedness at the World Health Organization. “Most people will never be exposed to this.”
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More than two dozen people from at least 12 different countries left the ship without contact tracing nearly two weeks after the first passenger died on board.
Health authorities on at least four continents are now tracking down and in some cases monitoring the cruise passengers who disembarked on April 24, and trying to trace others who may have come into contact with them since then.
That includes two people in Georgia who are also being monitored, according to our affiliate WTOC.
Hantaviruses are usually spread through contact with wild rodent droppings or urine. The strain in the Hondius outbreak, Andes virus, can spread from person to person in limited circumstances. It typically requires close, prolonged contact with a person who is actively sick with the disease.
It is not known to spread through casual contact such as shaking hands or being in the same room for a few minutes. There have been no documented cases where a person without symptoms spread it to someone else.
The oil and gas industry is king in Texas, but it still doesn’t have enough power to save Republican incumbents.
The state’s largest oil producers couldn’t stop hard-right activist Bo French from winning the Republican runoff Tuesday for a seat on the Texas Railroad Commission — despite pouring money into the campaign of incumbent Jim Wright. An oil and gas fundraising advantage also wasn’t enough to keep four-term Sen. John Cornyn from losing his Senate primary to Texas Attorney General and MAGA darling Ken Paxton.
The twin losses are animating Democrats, who see an opening for a spot on Texas’ powerful oil and gas regulatory commission — and for a Senate seat that could help decide which party controls the chamber come 2027.
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“While Republicans are facing their nightmare scenario… Democrats are one step closer to winning a Senate majority,” said Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.), chair of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee.
A new mural outside Garland’s Granville Arts Center honors The Flats, the city’s first Black community. Created by artist Reginald Adams, the 3‑foot‑tall, 36‑foot‑long piece features 15 scenes highlighting community life, faith, agriculture, and Black‑owned businesses.
Trump endorsement ‘most powerful force in politics’, says Paxton after runoff victory
Hello and welcome to the US politics live blog.
Texas attorney-general Ken Paxton said Donald Trump’s endorsement is “the most powerful force in politics” as he comfortably won the Republican nomination for the Senate last night.
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Paxton defeated four-term senator John Cornyn in the latest contest where president Trump sought to oust an incumbent he saw as insufficiently loyal, AP reported.
Trump endorsed Paxton, calling him a “true MAGA warrior”, with Paxton’s victory in the runoff making Cornyn – who was first elected to the Senate in 2002 – the first Republican senator from Texas to lose the party’s nomination for reelection.
“When everyone in Washington told him to abandon me and abandon the people of Texas, he didn’t listen,” Paxton said. “President Trump is the leader of our party, and his endorsement is the most powerful force in politics.”
Cornyn’s loss followed primaries this month where Trump successfully backed challengers to Republican lawmakers who had displeased him in Louisiana, Kentucky and Indiana, a sign of his enduring influence among primary voters.
“After a public service career lasting more than four decades and 18 consecutive campaign wins, tonight we’ve come up short in this primary runoff,” Cornyn said shortly after the race was called. “I’ve always supported the GOP ticket. I intend to do so again this general election.”
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The race had wide implications for Trump’s strength heading into November’s midterm elections, where Paxton will now face James Talarico, a Democratic pastor and state legislator whose message of peace and populism has attracted much attention. If he wins, Talarico would become the first Democrat in more than 30 years to win statewide office in Texas.
In other developments:
Christian Menefee defeated Al Green to represent Texas’s newly redrawn 18th congressional district. Green, 78, had served 11 terms as a Democrat, earning a reputation as one of Donald Trump’s top critics, when he became the first member of Congress to call for his impeachment, as early as 2017. Menefee, 38, began serving in Congress earlier this year after he won a special election. The two Democrats faced off against each other in this year’s election after Republican redistricting saw their home districts near Houston redrawn.
Two Republican-led efforts to redraw congressional maps in Alabama and South Carolina hit setbacks. In Alabama, a federal court said the proposed map could not be used because it was drawn to intentionally discriminate against Black voters. The South Carolina Senate voted against redrawing the state’s congressional map due to political and administrative reasons.
Construction is under way on the White House lawn for a UFC arena that will host a cage-match next month to mark the United States’s 250th anniversary and Trump’s 80th birthday. The mixed martial arts fight is planned for 14 June.
Trump completed his annual physical after year of public attention to health issues. Trump,the oldest inaugurated president in US history, completed a physical exam on Tuesday at Walter Reed national military medical center, amid questions around his health. “Everything checked out PERFECTLY,” the US president declared in a social media post.
The Trump administration considered asking federal workers to sign NDAs. The goal of asking federal employees to sign nondisclosure agreements is to prevent them from sharing confidential information with journalists.
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Key events
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Trump moves Camp David cabinet meeting to White House as Iran talks continue
Robert Tait
Donald Trump will host the 12th cabinet meeting of his second term on Wednesday as talks on ending the nearly three-month war with Iran reach a crucial stage amid conflicting signals over whether an agreement is close.
The gathering had originally been scheduled to take place in the bucolic setting of Camp David, the presidential retreat that had previously been the site of sensitive Middle East negotiations, including the historic Israeli-Egyptian peace accords.
But Trump switched it back to its more accustomed White House setting, citing adverse weather forecasts.
“Based on the possible bad weather conditions tomorrow, we will be having our Cabinet Meeting in the White House, and will be postponing the Cabinet trip to Camp David,” he wrote on his Truth Social platform. Heavy rain is expected in the area on Wednesday.
The initial decision to stage it at Camp David had raised eyebrows, given that Trump had visited the presidential retreat deep in the Maryland countryside, 62 miles north-west of Washington, much less frequently than most of his predecessors.
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Veteran Texas congressman Al Green beaten in Democratic primary runoff
Uwa Ede-Osifo
Christian Menefee, a freshman Democratic US representative, beat veteran congressman Al Green on Tuesday in a fierce runoff that was the product of Republican gerrymandering.
Last year, the Republican-dominated Texas legislature unveiled a congressional map designed to flip seats in the GOP’s favor. Donald Trump had urged the state’s lawmakers to safeguard the party’s congressional majority.
Under the new map, Green, a congressional fixture for over two decades and a staunch Trump critic, saw his reliably Democratic ninth district effectively eliminated. He announced a bid for the 18th district in November.
Menefee was sworn into the seat in January, after winning a special election to replace the late US representative Sylvester Turner.
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On the campaign trail, Green sought to link Menefee with big-money politics, accusing his challenger of being aligned with “Trump crypto cronies”, Houston Public Media reported.
Green’s protests of the Trump administration have garnered national attention in recent years.
In February, he was ejected from the president’s State of the Union address after holding a sign that read “Black people aren’t apes!” It was a counter to Trump sharing a racist AI-generated video where Barack and Michelle Obama were depicted as the simians.
Trump endorsement ‘most powerful force in politics’, says Paxton after runoff victory
Hello and welcome to the US politics live blog.
Texas attorney-general Ken Paxton said Donald Trump’s endorsement is “the most powerful force in politics” as he comfortably won the Republican nomination for the Senate last night.
Advertisement
Paxton defeated four-term senator John Cornyn in the latest contest where president Trump sought to oust an incumbent he saw as insufficiently loyal, AP reported.
Trump endorsed Paxton, calling him a “true MAGA warrior”, with Paxton’s victory in the runoff making Cornyn – who was first elected to the Senate in 2002 – the first Republican senator from Texas to lose the party’s nomination for reelection.
“When everyone in Washington told him to abandon me and abandon the people of Texas, he didn’t listen,” Paxton said. “President Trump is the leader of our party, and his endorsement is the most powerful force in politics.”
Cornyn’s loss followed primaries this month where Trump successfully backed challengers to Republican lawmakers who had displeased him in Louisiana, Kentucky and Indiana, a sign of his enduring influence among primary voters.
“After a public service career lasting more than four decades and 18 consecutive campaign wins, tonight we’ve come up short in this primary runoff,” Cornyn said shortly after the race was called. “I’ve always supported the GOP ticket. I intend to do so again this general election.”
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The race had wide implications for Trump’s strength heading into November’s midterm elections, where Paxton will now face James Talarico, a Democratic pastor and state legislator whose message of peace and populism has attracted much attention. If he wins, Talarico would become the first Democrat in more than 30 years to win statewide office in Texas.
In other developments:
Christian Menefee defeated Al Green to represent Texas’s newly redrawn 18th congressional district. Green, 78, had served 11 terms as a Democrat, earning a reputation as one of Donald Trump’s top critics, when he became the first member of Congress to call for his impeachment, as early as 2017. Menefee, 38, began serving in Congress earlier this year after he won a special election. The two Democrats faced off against each other in this year’s election after Republican redistricting saw their home districts near Houston redrawn.
Two Republican-led efforts to redraw congressional maps in Alabama and South Carolina hit setbacks. In Alabama, a federal court said the proposed map could not be used because it was drawn to intentionally discriminate against Black voters. The South Carolina Senate voted against redrawing the state’s congressional map due to political and administrative reasons.
Construction is under way on the White House lawn for a UFC arena that will host a cage-match next month to mark the United States’s 250th anniversary and Trump’s 80th birthday. The mixed martial arts fight is planned for 14 June.
Trump completed his annual physical after year of public attention to health issues. Trump,the oldest inaugurated president in US history, completed a physical exam on Tuesday at Walter Reed national military medical center, amid questions around his health. “Everything checked out PERFECTLY,” the US president declared in a social media post.
The Trump administration considered asking federal workers to sign NDAs. The goal of asking federal employees to sign nondisclosure agreements is to prevent them from sharing confidential information with journalists.
