Texas
Texas will send inspectors to monitor 2024 elections in Harris County
:focal(0x0:5186x2963)/static.texastribune.org/media/files/d0dda93a49bd8462cb35795437d3b4f2/Harris%20County%20Votes%20AM%20TT%2009.jpg?ssl=1 "Texas will send inspectors to monitor 2024 elections in Harris County")
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The Secretary of State’s Office will again assign state inspectors to observe the handling and counting of ballots and monitor election records in Harris County, the state agency said while releasing a new audit outlining problems with the county’s elections in 2021 and 2022.
The audit, released late Friday, found that in those years, Harris County election officials did not follow state-mandated rules related to voter registration list maintenance; failed to adequately train election workers, which led to problems at the polls; and violated the law when it failed to estimate and issue the required ballot paper at some polling locations.
Harris County failed to adequately train election workers on how to properly set up and operate the voting system, the audit found, which “may have impacted the high percentage of equipment malfunctions” in the November 2021 constitutional amendment election. The county then did not adequately address these training issues prior to the March 2022 primary, the state said.
Former Harris County Elections Administrator Clifford Tatum did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the audit’s findings. Harris County Clerk Teneshia Hudspeth, who took over running elections last September after state lawmakers passed a law eliminating the election administrator position in the state’s most populous county, said in a statement that her office “will continue to ensure that the concerns that plagued the now-defunct Elections Administrator’s Office are not revisited.”
In the audit report, the Secretary of State’s Office said current Harris County election officials, who didn’t oversee the elections included in the audit, have worked to address the problems and correct the county’s procedures.
Other counties audited for the 2021-22 election cycle included Cameron, Eastland and Guadalupe. The report says election officials in those counties have improved recordkeeping, chain of custody procedures and election worker training.
The House Elections Committee is set to discuss the audit’s findings and the management of voter registration data in the state on Monday.
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Last fall, a preliminary report of an audit specifically about Harris County’s November 2022 election found the county had different numbers of registered voters than the state, and different numbers of absentee ballots sent out, though it didn’t detail the causes of the discrepancies or suggest they influenced the election outcome. That report also said the county failed to adequately train election workers and failed to supply some polling locations with enough ballot paper.
The final audit released Friday echoed the findings in the earlier report.
Audits began after the 2020 presidential election
The state began auditing counties after the 2020 presidential election, in response to baseless claims of voter fraud. The audits aim to examine counties’ election procedures and evaluate whether election laws are being properly followed.
Harris County is dominated by Democrats and often the focus of election conspiracy theories. It’s been audited twice so far. The first time was in 2021, when the Secretary of State’s Office ordered a “full forensic audit” of the state’s two largest Democratic counties — Harris and Dallas — and the two largest Republican counties — Collin and Tarrant. That same year, lawmakers passed a sweeping overhaul of voting laws that included a provision requiring the Texas secretary of state to conduct an audit of four randomly selected counties’ elections.
In 2022, officials with the agency drew four county names out of a bucket — and Harris came up again.
Although the audit has found no evidence of widespread fraud in any of the counties reviewed, auditors have twice flagged problems in Harris. The audit report covering the 2020 election said the county had improper chain of custody procedures at some of its polling locations, and discrepancies in electronic poll book data.
Last week, during an annual training of election officials from across the state, Secretary of State Jane Nelson conducted the drawing of the four counties to be audited for the 2023-24 election cycle: Brazoria, Bell, Val Verde and Real.
No evidence of fraud, but other problems with elections surface
As for Harris, the heavily Democratic county’s handling of elections has made it a target for years. The problems with the 2022 election prompted Texas Republican lawmakers to pass a law that abolished the elections administrator position in Harris County. The county challenged the law in court, and lost. Last fall, election administration duties were transferred to the county clerk, and voter registration duties are now the responsibility of the tax assessor-collector’s office.
Those problems also prompted 21 losing Republican candidates to go to court seeking a redo of the November election. A judge did order a new election in response to a challenge of a single judicial race. He found that more than 1,000 votes in Harris should not have been counted because, in most cases, there were deficiencies with two types of forms that some voters have to fill out at the polls.
Three candidates dropped their lawsuits, and a judge, dismissing the remaining challenges, said that, although the county did make errors, there was not enough evidence to order a new election.
Last week, Harris County District Attorney Kim Ogg said an investigation by the Texas Rangers found no evidence of fraud in the November 2022 election. One former county elections department employee now faces charges for theft and tampering with government documents. Ogg said investigators found the employee, whose responsibility at the elections department was distributing supplies, improperly worked two full-time jobs during the election.
‘Put a process in place’
Hudspeth has presided over multiple county-wide and municipal elections, including a primary and a runoff election, since taking over last September. Although a storm left at least a dozen locations without power during the primary runoff election in May, voting wasn’t disrupted.
Speaking on a panel at the annual training for election officials hosted by the Secretary of State’s Office in Austin earlier this month, Hudspeth said her office has created a compliance team made up of roughly four people familiar with every step of the election process and responsible for properly documenting it. After each election, that team also digitizes election records and labels them to be used for auditing purposes or during election challenges, if necessary.
“It makes it easier for us to identify when the audit comes, what we need to pull together,” Hudspeth told hundreds of Texas election officials who gathered at the event. “Not every audit is exactly the same. It doesn’t always look the same. It isn’t always the same exact information, but what we have learned over time, is to put a process in place.”
Natalia Contreras covers election administration and voting access for Votebeat in partnership with The Texas Tribune. Contact Natalia at ncontreras@votebeat.org
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Texas is planning its grid around an unprecedented wave of AI-driven power demand that the state’s energy regulator says may not fully materialize on projected timelines.
In a recent filing to the Public Utility Commission of Texas, the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) projected statewide power demand could surge to nearly 368 GW by 2032 – more than four times the state’s current peak demand record of 85.5 GW. But the filing also contains an unusual warning from the grid operator itself.
“ERCOT has concerns with using the preliminary load forecast values for the Reliability Assessment and any other transmission and resource adequacy analysis,” the organization wrote in its April 2026 long-term load forecast filing.
The organization added that it may seek adjustments to the forecast based on “actual historical realization rates or other objective, credible, independent information.”
ERCOT has already begun adjusting for realization risk internally. In its 2025 long-term load forecast report, the grid operator said the “average peak consumption per site was 49.8% of the requested MW” and applied that factor to projected non-crypto data center load additions in some planning models.
ERCOT President and CEO Pablo Vegas said the forecast reflects “higher-than-expected future load growth” tied to changing large-load planning dynamics.
Texas has emerged as a hotspot for data center growth, with numerous new projects reshaping the energy market and challenging grid capacity. (Image: Alamy)
Texas Developers Race Ahead of Grid Capacity
Texas has emerged as a key data center market, driven by its abundant land, competitive energy prices, and favorable regulatory environment. This combination has positioned the state as a magnet for hyperscale operators and AI infrastructure investments. The state is estimated to account for around 15% of all data center connectivity in the US.
Recent and proposed AI data center campuses tied to OpenAI, Oracle, Meta, Crusoe, CoreWeave, Soluna, and other hyperscale operators are reshaping Texas grid planning. Developers have proposed large campuses across North Texas, Abilene, West Texas, and the Houston corridor, many requiring hundreds of megawatts of capacity and, in some cases, dedicated onsite generation to bypass interconnection delays. That buildout pushed ERCOT’s non-crypto data center forecast above 228 GW by 2032.
Developers are continuing to pursue Texas aggressively because ERCOT still offers faster timelines and more flexible market structures than many competing regions. Several proposed campuses pair AI infrastructure with onsite gas generation, colocated power assets, or flexible-load arrangements to navigate mounting transmission constraints.
Utilities across the US are grappling with AI-driven electricity growth, but ERCOT’s projections stand apart for both scale and uncertainty. PJM Interconnection, the nation’s largest grid operator, expects summer peak demand to climb above 241 GW over the next 15 years as data centers and electrification expand. ERCOT, by contrast, projects demand potentially reaching nearly 368 GW by 2032, driven largely by proposed non-crypto data center loads. At the same time, the grid operator openly questions how much of that demand will materialize on schedule.
Bigger Than Texas
Similar pressures are emerging elsewhere. In California, CAISO’s latest transmission plan cited “data center load growth” as a driver of major grid upgrades and described interconnection volumes as “unmanageable” before recent queue reforms.
A recent Grid Strategies report reached a similar conclusion nationally, warning that the “data center portion of utility load forecasts is likely overstated by roughly 25 GW” compared with market-based deployment estimates.
Ihab Osman, an independent strategist specializing in data center and other mission-critical infrastructure, said the distinction is less about “real” versus “fake” AI demand and more about “announced versus deliverable demand.”
“A large share of the current AI/data center planned load should be treated as paper megawatts until it is validated through physical gates,” Osman said, citing factors including site control, transmission deliverability, generation availability, turbine and transformer supply, permitting, financing, and credible energization schedules.
Osman said ERCOT’s forecast is best understood as “a stress-test map, not as a fait accompli build map.”
Separating ’Paper Megawatts’ From Real Demand
The filing shows Texas regulators and grid planners struggling to distinguish operating AI infrastructure from a rapidly expanding pipeline of proposed projects.
“The vast majority” of ERCOT’s projected load growth comes from submissions provided by transmission and distribution utilities, according to the filing. Those requests include hyperscale AI campuses, GPU clusters, and other large industrial loads seeking future grid capacity reservations.
Alison Silverstein, a former senior adviser to the chairman of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, said “a large proportion” of projects in ERCOT’s large-load interconnection queue have already been canceled, particularly among smaller developers facing long interconnection delays and high turbine and transformer costs.
Forecasts Collide With Physical Infrastructure Limits
ERCOT has also signaled that many projects may not materialize on the timelines shaping transmission planning.
The grid operator said summer 2026 peak demand is likely to land between roughly 90.5 GW and 98 GW – far below the preliminary 112 GW figure embedded in the long-term forecast. ERCOT said it appears “unlikely” that new large-load projects and existing site expansions will ramp quickly enough to push demand that high this year.
The filing suggests uncertainty around AI-related load growth is beginning to influence broader infrastructure planning assumptions. By 2032, ERCOT projects non-crypto data centers reaching 228 GW of demand, compared with just 9 GW from cryptocurrency mining and roughly 3 GW each from hydrogen/e-fuels and oil-and-gas-related industrial growth.
The move also suggests the regulator is no longer simply forecasting AI-driven growth, but also working to determine how much of the proposed boom can actually be financed, supplied, interconnected, and energized before utilities commit billions to long-lived infrastructure.
AUSTIN, Texas — Bravo is developing a new reality series set in the Texas Hill Country, the network announced on Instagram Monday.
“Secrets, Lies, Texas Wives” would follow a group of women in Boerne.
According to the network’s description, the series centers on “a tight-knit circle of glamorous women” navigating family life, ranching, and social obligations in a community rooted in rodeo and tradition. They promise drama with “forbidden romances” and relationship angst.
No premiere date or cast have been announced.
If picked up, the series would join Bravo’s long-running portfolio of region-specific reality franchises, which includes the “Real Housewives” lineup.
AUSTIN, Texas — With the average price of a gallon of gas in Texas topping $4, some leaders from Austin to Washington, D.C., are backing a temporary pause on gas taxes as a way to deliver relief.
Veronica Valdez Rodriguez was pumping gas at a southeast Austin station on Tuesday. She said the rising costs are becoming unmanageable.
“They’re sky high,” Rodriguez said. “I can barely get by, you know? It’s too expensive.”
She said she is spending $40 more every week on gas.
According to AAA Texas, the average cost of a regular gallon of fuel stood at over $4.01 in the Austin area on Tuesday, $1.24 higher than the average one year ago.
President Donald Trump said he is working to pause the federal gas tax, which is 18 cents per gallon.
A reporter asked the president on Monday how long the tax would be suspended.
“Until it’s appropriate. It’s a small percentage, but it’s, you know, it’s still money,” Trump said.
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In Texas, an 18-cent-per-gallon pause could add up to savings of about $2 to $3 on an average tank of gas.
Support for a federal pause is coming from both parties. State Rep. and U.S. Senate nominee James Talarico (D-Austin) backed the idea last month.
“Lowering prices at the pump should be a bipartisan commitment,” Talarico said in a statement Monday.
Republican U.S. Sen. John Cornyn said he didn’t know the details of the president’s plan.
“There’s a difference between a temporary suspension and a permanent suspension,” Cornyn said Monday. “I don’t know exactly what the President has in mind. I think a temporary suspension getting through this sort of bumpy time because of uncertainty about energy prices, I can live with that.”
Democratic gubernatorial candidate Gina Hinojosa is calling for a state gas tax pause as well. The state tax currently sits at 20 cents per gallon, according to the Texas Department of Transportation.
The state pause is also being urged by Texas Agriculture Commissioner Sid Miller, who has called on Governor Greg Abbott to act.
“Governors in Indiana, Georgia, and Utah have already stepped up to provide relief for their citizens, and I once again renew my call for Governor Abbott to follow the lead of President Trump and act decisively for Texas families,” Miller wrote on Monday.
The governor’s office, however, said a state gas tax pause is not an option under his executive authority.
In a statement, the governor’s press secretary, Andrew Mahaleris, wrote in response to Miller:
There’s a reason Sid Miller lost his election, it’s because he doesn’t shoot straight with Texans. Any suggestion that the Texas governor is authorized by law to suspend a gas tax is entirely uninformed or purposefully misleading. If the Texas governor could suspend taxes, he would have suspended the property tax years ago.
At the federal level, the Bipartisan Policy Center said a gas tax holiday would require an act of Congress. The group also estimated that a five-month pause could cost as much as $17 billion.
Some drivers, like Rodriguez, said any break would help.
“Pause the taxes!” she said.
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