Texas
Texas officials warn of
The New Year is starting with a fresh warning for those who work with animals in Texas. The state’s Parks and Wildlife Department is asking hunters and other outdoor enthusiasts to watch out for animals that may be impacted by dangerous “maneater” parasites from flies that lay eggs in open wounds, nostrils, eyes and mouths.
The advisory, posted by the department on Dec. 30, was issued for outdoor enthusiasts in South Texas after the New World Screwworm was recently found in a cow in the southern Mexico state of Chiapas.
According to the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department, the New World Screwworm has been making its way further north through the Americas.
“As a protective measure, animal health officials ask those along the southern Texas border to monitor wildlife, livestock and pets for clinical signs of NWS and immediately report potential cases,” the department said.
What is the New World Screwworm?
According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the New World Screwworm “is a devastating pest.”
“When NWS fly larvae (maggots) burrow into the flesh of a living animal, they cause serious, often deadly damage to the animal,” the USDA says. “NWS can infest livestock, pets, wildlife, occasionally birds, and in rare cases, people.”
The Texas parks department says the maggots will lay eggs in “open wounds or orifices of live tissue such as nostrils, eyes or mouth.” Such an infestation is known as New World screwworm myiasis.
“These eggs hatch into dangerous parasitic larvae, and the maggots burrow or screw into flesh with sharp mouth hooks. Wounds can become larger, and an infestation can often cause serious, deadly damage or death to the infected animal.”
The scientific name for the parasite, Cochliomyia hominivorax, is roughly translated to “maneater,” according to the USDA’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service.
“It is an appropriate name,” the agency added, saying that the screwworm was once prevalent in the U.S., with 230,000 cases reported just in 1935. But then scientists developed a way to release sterilized male blow flies, and since female blow flies only mate once, the agency says it “effectively removed that female and her potential offspring from the population.”
It’s believed that the elimination of the New World Screwworm has saved U.S. agriculture workers nearly $900 million in lost livestock annually, the agency said.
Where are New World Screwworms found?
New World Screwworms are endemic in Cuba, Haiti, the Dominican Republic and countries in South America. The USDA says that cases of the parasite, however, are also spreading north to Costa Rica, Nicaragua, Honduras, Guatemala and Mexico.
“Although USDA eradicated NWS from the United States in 1966 using sterile insect technique, there is a constant risk of re-introduction into the United States,” the USDA’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service says. “To prevent the northward movement of this pest from South America to NWS-free areas in Central and North America, APHIS collaborates with Panama to maintain a barrier zone in eastern Panama.”
What to know about New World Screwworm Myiasis
The Texas Parks and Wildlife Department says that female New World Screwworm flies are “drawn to the odor of a wound or natural opening on a live, warm-blooded animal.” There, just one fly can lay up to 300 eggs at a time, and she may lay up to 3,000 eggs during her lifetime.
After eggs hatch, they become larvae or maggots that burrow into an opening to feed. Once they feed, they drop to the ground, burrow into the soil and emerge as adult flies. The adult flies can travel long distances, the department says, “and the movement of infested livestock or wildlife can increase the rate of spread.”
Signs of NWS Myiasis include irritated or depressed behavior, loss of appetite, head shaking, the smell of decaying flesh, the presence of maggots in wounds and isolation from other animals or people.
To prevent an infestation, Texas officials say to clean and cover all wounds when spending time outdoors, especially in NWS-affected areas, and to apply insect repellant to outdoor clothing.
Dallas weather: July 8 morning forecast
High pressure starts to build back into North Texas, which lowers our rain chances and brings triple digit temperatures to parts of the region. Expect partly to mostly sunny skies today, with highs near 100.
DALLAS – A building system of high pressure is bringing triple-digit temperatures back to North Texas, though the intense heat will be short-lived before a weekend weather shift brings relief and renewed chances of rain.
Wednesday forecast
We expect partly to mostly sunny skies Wednesday, with high temperatures reaching near 100 degrees across much of the region. While hot and dry conditions will dominate, a low chance of scattered rain showers remains possible, primarily in areas east of the Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex.
The heat is expected to solidify Thursday as the upper-level ridge settles firmly over the area. We have removed all chances of precipitation from Thursday’s forecast, locking in dry conditions and an afternoon high temperature of 100 degrees.
However, relief is on the horizon for the upcoming weekend. The high-pressure ridge will lose its grip on North Texas as it begins to shift westward toward the desert southwest.
Weekend forecast
By late Saturday and continuing into Sunday, the atmospheric shift will establish a northerly flow aloft. This pattern change is expected to funnel a series of weather disturbances into the region, triggering a return of widespread rain and thunderstorm opportunities.
The unsettled weather pattern is forecast to linger well into next week. The persistent cloud cover and moisture associated with the continuing rain chances will successfully suppress the heat, keeping afternoon highs closer to historical norms for this time of year.
7-Day forecast
The Source: Information in this article is from the FOX 4 weather team.
Man, identified as Lorenzo Salgado Araujo, is latest to be killed by ICE officers since President Trump took power.
Published On 8 Jul 2026
A United States immigration agent fatally shot a man in Houston, Texas, while officers were attempting to stop his vehicle, US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) said.
The man killed on Tuesday was identified as Lorenzo Salgado Araujo, described by ICE as a Mexican national and “illegal alien” who attempted to evade arrest during a “targeted enforcement operation” by federal immigration officers.
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Ronaldo Salgado, who identified himself as Salgado Araujo’s son, told the Spanish-language television station Telemundo Houston that his father was shot while he was looking for workers to hire in the area.
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS), which oversees ICE, said Salgado Araujo ignored commands to stop his vehicle, saying he “rammed an ICE law enforcement vehicle, refused to follow multiple verbal commands, and weaponized his vehicle in an attempt to run over an ICE law enforcement officer”.
In past shooting incidents, including the January killings of Renee Good and Alex Pretti, immigration officials had said that their officers were being attacked when the two were shot, claims vigorously disputed in both incidents.
Video footage captured on Tuesday by a surveillance camera from a nearby business and reviewed by the Reuters news agency showed a person lying on the ground beside a white van and surrounded by officers, in what appeared to be the aftermath of the shooting.
Salgado Araujo was targeted in an operation because he was living in the country without legal permission, according to DHS.
Democratic US Representative Sylvia Garcia called for an independent and thorough investigation of ICE’s claims about the fatal shooting.
“All available footage, communications, and other evidence should be preserved and reviewed as part of a full and impartial investigation,” Garcia posted on social media.
Juan Proano, CEO of the League of United Latin American Citizens, echoed Garcia’s calls for a transparent investigation into ICE’s actions.
“We don’t take DHS at their word at all,” Proano told The Associated Press news agency. “There should be an independent investigation, and they should release all the videos.”
There have been at least six fatal shootings by federal immigration officers since the start of President Donald Trump’s intensified immigration enforcement crackdown.
Good, a 37-year-old US citizen, was shot in the head by a federal immigration agent during a crackdown in Minneapolis. DHS also said Good was trying to hit the agent with her vehicle, which local officials and witnesses disputed, saying she was only trying to drive away.
The backlash from Good’s killing and other similar incidents led ICE to step back from some of its more controversial operations.
However, Tuesday’s deadly confrontation in Houston came amid a recent increase in the number of ICE arrests nationwide, with immigration officers picking up about 2,000 migrants a day last week, Reuters reported.
Texas
Trump takes credit for Toyota moving some truck production from Mexico to Texas: ‘That’s what tariffs do’
Toyota is planning a $3.6 billion expansion of its Texas truck assembly plant. President Donald Trump took credit for the investment.
On Monday, the automaker announced the multibillion-dollar investment to add a second vehicle assembly line at its San Antonio manufacturing campus to support production of the Tacoma pickup. Toyota said the expansion project would shift some of the midsize truck’s production from its Mexico plants to San Antonio over roughly 4 years. Toyota will still build some Tacoma models and the Corolla in Mexico.
While Toyota did not attribute the expansion to tariffs in its announcement and the company is not fully exiting production in Mexico, Trump said the fresh investment was a sign that his tariffs were working.
“It came over the wires that Toyota is moving out of Mexico into the United States, and building one of the biggest truck and car plants ever built,” Trump said on Tuesday during a visit to Ankara, Turkey. “It’s amazing. That’s what tariffs do, properly used.”
Toyota said the investment will create 2,000 jobs and add 2.5 million square feet to the site, doubling the company’s Texas footprint by 2030.
Toyota
On Monday, Ted Ogawa, president and CEO of Toyota Motor North America, said the investment reflected the company’s “confidence in the region’s workforce, innovation, and long-term growth potential.”
The move gives Trump a high-profile example of a well-recognized company creating manufacturing jobs. His administration has argued that tariffs incentivize companies — particularly automakers — to reshore manufacturing in America and reduce reliance on foreign production.
Toyota’s announcement also comes amid major uncertainty for automakers with plants in North America. The USMCA — the trilateral free trade pact between the US, Canada, and Mexico struck during Trump’s first term — is under review after the US declined to renew the treaty in its current form on July 1. The Trump administration is reportedly pushing to change the agreement so 50% of all automotive parts and manufacturing would happen in the US.
Toyota also nodded to that trade uncertainty in its release, saying it remained committed to operations in all three countries while encouraging “a quick resolution to USMCA” to keep North America globally competitive.
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