In the News
A Houston community organizer was arrested by Immigration and Customs Enforcement on Thursday after inviting the agency to a community event where he had planned to discuss worries about President Trump's immigration raids.
The Houston Chronicle reported that 40-year-old Roland Gramajo, a father of five, organized a town hall last month to talk about the raids with Democratic Texas Rep. Sylvia Garcia. He extended an invitation to ICE representatives, who declined to attend.
Garcia said she witnessed three white men acting "suspiciously" by taking pictures of the crowd, which was mostly Hispanic.
EL PASO, Texas (KFOX14) - Members of the United States Judiciary Committee are meeting in El Paso to discuss issues regarding immigration and violence in our country linked to racism.
The meeting comes one month after the Cielo Vista Walmart shooting and the announcement that arrests at the United States border have decreased significantly in the last couple of months.
The Subcommittee on Immigration and Citizenship will be focusing on conditions along the border and violence targeted toward minority communities.
In an interview, El Paso U.S. Rep. Veronica Escobar, stated that what is happening in the United States is "unjust, un-American, unfair, and deadly."
As reports of racist attacks spike and the nation continues to reel from the El Paso massacre that police are investigating as a hate crime as well as the latest Odessa shooting, Houston and San Antonio legislators agree there is a problem in Texas and the U.S.
The solution, however, varies depending on who you ask.
According to statistics released by the FBI late last year, hate crimes in the U.S. rose 17 percent in 2017 compared to the previous year, part of a three-year upward trend.
On Tuesday, the House Judiciary Committee's Subcommittee on Immigration and Citizenship will hold a field hearing in El Paso, TX on Friday, September 6th, 2019 focusing on conditions along the southern border and the violence aimed at immigrant communities.
The hearing is open to the public and will take place at UTEP's El Paso Natural Gas Conference Center at 10 a.m. MDT, doors open at 9:45 a.m. MDT.
The two-panel hearing, entitled Oversight of the Trump Administration's Border Policies and the Relationship Between Anti-Immigrant Rhetoric and Domestic Terrorism, will be led by El Paso Congresswoman Veronica Escobar (D-TX) and attended by Chairman Nadler (D-NY), Rep. Jayapal (D-WA), Rep. Garcia (D-TX), Rep. Neguse (D-CO), and Rep. Jackson Lee (D-TX).
At Kashmere High School, Houston ISD administrators and community members touted the school's profound turnaround—earning a passing grade on the state's rating system for the first time in almost a decade.
"With the right support, we have changed the narrative," interim Superintendent Grenita Lathan told the audience Aug. 15.
Despite the fanfare, one underperforming school and a Texas Education Agency investigation could shake up the district's elected board of trustees, who do not make the day-to-day decisions of the district but are held responsible for its oversight. The state has the option to appoint a board of managers to replace the trustees, a move that has divided elected officials, community groups and parents.
Democrats voiced frustration over their blocked gun-control agenda after Saturday's shootings in West Texas, with one 2020 presidential candidate tweeting the situation was "f---ed up."
"There is no reason we have to accept this as our fortune, as our future," former U.S. Rep. Beto O'Rourke said in a video he tweeted that also includes him using profanity about the shooting.
There has been a dramatic surge in measles cases in Europe, placing lives at risk.
There has been a dramatic surge in measles cases in Europe, placing lives at risk.
According to data from the World Health Organization (WHO), in the first six months of 2019 there have been nearly 90,000 cases and 37 deaths in 48 European countries. This is the highest number of cases in any year since 2006.
WHO said that there have been as many cases reported to date in 2019 as there were at this same time last year, and referred to a ‘concerning and continuing upsurge in the overall measles disease burden worldwide'.
HOUSTON - On Sept. 15, 2015, two students were killed when the Houston Independent School District school bus they were traveling in was struck by a car, sending it over 610 South Loop.
The bus was headed to Furr High School when the crash sent it through the guardrail of 610 South, where it landed on its side at the intersection of Telephone Road and 610 South Loop.
The victims
Mariya Johnson, 17, died at the scene and 14-year-old Jenecia Chatman later died at Memorial Hermann Hospital. In 2018, KPRC Investigates spoke with the mothers of both victims, who shared how this tragic collision changed their lives forever.
Mariya, 17, was starting her first year at REACH Charter High School, which is on the campus of Furr High School.
For Mariya's mother, it was an ordeal she could have never imagined.
WASHINGTON — Texans have been waiting a year and a half for more than $4 billion in disaster recovery money Congress approved after Hurricane Harvey and major floods the two years before. They'll have to wait several months more, but the federal government finally cleared a major hurdle toward sending the cash on Friday.
The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development published long-awaited rules for the funding, which is meant to help brace homes and neighborhoods for future storms. It's an incremental step — next, Texas will submit its plans for the money that Congress appropriated in February 2018.