Bayliss Wagner
@baylisswagner
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@Statesman Texas politics reporter | Past: @USATODAY , @PhillyInquirer & @Swat_Phoenix | Signal: 703-623-3580
Northern VA to Austin, TX
Joined April 2015
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Today, I'm sharing one of the most difficult stories I've ever written, on a TX woman whose situation was almost identical to that of Kate Cox.
Also forced out-of-state to end a wanted pregnancy, she says TX laws put her through "emotional torture."
🧵
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NEW: The Travis County jail began releasing ppl arrested during UT-Austin protests at 12:30 am today.
@ChaseRogersAAS
and I watched at least one leave the jail with her father at that time; he said she was arrested around 1 p.m.
Her mom was in tears as they reunited.
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One thing the media coverage can’t quite capture here at the UT protest: The stench of horse manure is completely overpowering. It smells like what it is: baked animal feces. Everywhere.
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Some Travis Scott fans downplayed the
#AstroWorld
tragedy by comparing it to a Michael Jackson concert where 23 people supposedly died.
But there's no evidence this, or any other deaths, occurred at MJ shows.
My latest FC for
@USATODAY
@usatodaylife
:
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New from me: More than 80% of Texas women of reproductive age lack an accurate understanding of the state's near-total abortion ban, per recently-released survey results.
1 in 4 incorrectly believed there are exceptions for rape and fatal fetal diagnoses.
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Since UT-Austin cracked down on a pro-Palestine demonstration last week, an ill-informed debate has ensued about the authority Texas public universities have– & don’t have– to remove protesters.
So I asked five First Amendment law experts.🧵
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NEW: UT says it’s filing a felony charge for gun possession on a campus where concealed carry is legal; declined to answer any of my questions about:
-how gun-carrying protester(s) broke the law on “gun possession in prohibited places”
-when they plan to file the charge
UT provides few details on planned felony gun charge related to campus protest Monday
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@MarkHamill
Hi Mark, I'm a fact-check reporter at USA TODAY, and according to our research, this list isn't accurate. FLDOE recs books including 1984 and To Kill a Mockingbird in its "BEST" education standards guide & spox for the Gov's office have repeatedly denied this claim. Any comments?
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1. A common misconception is that UT-Austin & other public universities can remove any non-students from campus.
They can't, thanks to a law passed by our Republican legislature and signed by Gov. Greg Abbott in 2019.
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Thank you so much to everyone who shared and/or tweeted me about the MJ fact-check—it’s rare and rewarding to see that it had an impact.
&&& I’m always on the lookout for misinfo, so please feel free to DM/ email me if you see an SM post that seems false or out of context! 📭📥
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Stunning photos of law enforcement arrests at today’s UT-Austin protest in support of Palestine. From the
@statesman
’s
@jayjanner
,
@MikalaCompton
&
@photo_Brazziell
:
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@USATODAY
@usatodaylife
@richardjllecocq
Here's a video I didn't get to put in the story showing Jackson dealing with a fan who could have been injured-- pretty interesting. Thanks
@richardjllecocq
for sharing this with me.
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@USATODAY
@usatodaylife
As
@richardjllecocq
, Jackson expert & author of Michael Jackson: All The Songs, told me, MJ seems to be the de facto point of comparison for any music world scandal, even if the comparison is erroneous.
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@USATODAY
@usatodaylife
Around 40 people were injured in a crowd crush at his 1988 Liverpool show, attended by 125,000 people, but there's *no evidence* I could find of even one reported death at an MJ concert. It'd be obvious -- he was one of the biggest pop stars in the world for a long time.
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Thank you for sharing it! That's what fact-checking is here for!
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BREAKING: The Texas GOP platform committee narrowly rejected draft language classifying IVF embryos as “children” and calling for state law to designate their destruction as “homicide" at the party convention in San Antonio late last night.
The proposal, which failed 17-14:
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That law designates outdoor spaces at public universities “traditional public forums,” affording protesters — including nonstudents — the highest level of First Amendment protections. UT even made a video about it.
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While both work full-time, they've put their energy into advocacy in Texas.
She is among 20 women who are suing the state over enforcement of abortion ban exceptions in Zurawski v. Texas. A decision will be released by SCOTX this coming year.
Context:
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3. One rule that may not be considered reasonable? A no-mask requirement.
Amy Sanders, a UT law and journalism professor, said the university's rule "would violate the Constitution" because U.S. courts have established strong protections for anonymous speech.
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@steventcollis
6. We all saw Abbott's tweet implying the state can make mass arrests at "antisemitic" protests.
Two things to know:
1. Neither UT nor police have publicly accused protesters of using hate speech.
2. You can't arrest them for that in the first place.
Arrests being made right now & will continue until the crowd disperses.
These protesters belong in jail.
Antisemitism will not be tolerated in Texas. Period.
Students joining in hate-filled, antisemitic protests at any public college or university in Texas should be expelled.
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2. For this reason, law-abiding protesters generally cannot be considered to be trespassing unless they are flouting "reasonable time, place & manner" restrictions that the university has put in place.
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She's expecting a baby boy now, after a 4th round of IVF. Though optimistic, the couple is "terrified" something could go wrong again.
"As a pregnant woman, I feel like I have no rights," she told me.
photo:
@MikalaCompton
@statesman
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UT-Austin protest in support of Palestine is spirited but very orderly — students and community members, toddlers and parents and white-haired folks, are standing and listening to speakers at the front, repeating after them, chanting a bit.
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Huge finding from
@TxPolProject
poll today:
The overwhelming majority of Texas voters — 73% — support allowing legal access to abortion when pregnant women face serious chance of a birth defect & 80% support abortion access in cases of rape or incest.
TX law allows neither.
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Here's the story link again to read the rest and see
@MikalaCompton
's beautiful photos & video interviews with both Taylor Edwards & Kaitlyn Kash, another Austin resident who left Texas to terminate a pregnancy with a fatal fetal diagnosis.
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@santikapowski
@USATODAY
@usatodaylife
Feel free to email/DM me next time you see stuff like this spreading widely, it's super helpful to get tips about misinformation given how many posts are out there!
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New: I spoke with a juror who voted to sentence Ivan Cantu to death in 2001. He has called on Texas Gov. Greg Abbott to halt the execution and allow a court to review the case again after a key witness admitted he lied.
Cantu is set to die by lethal injection at 6 p.m.
Congressman, former jurors call for Texas Gov. Greg Abbott to halt Ivan Cantu's execution
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These restrictions can include rules preventing protesters from blocking passageways or roads, limits on areas where amplified sound can be used, etc.
They must be content-neutral, meaning they can't apply (or be enforced) differently to different points of view.
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this was an alarming story to report.
an anonymous article by the "West Cook News" generated a local and national panic about a "race-based grading system" supposedly being implemented at a high school in the Chicago suburb of Oak Park.
(1/x)
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By the time she arrived at an abortion clinic in Colorado, Taylor was 19 weeks pregnant and very sick.
Because of the 2-week delay, the procedure took 2 days instead of 1 and caused more scarring, which Taylor had to have addressed with an operative hysterectomy.
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UT's VP of legal affairs, Amanda Cochran-McCall, said this:
"Imagine if the government, at the whim of a political party, could decide at any time what constitutes hate speech and then just start arresting people for that. I don't think that's a place we want to be."
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They got a second opinion, hoping it was just a disability and not a death sentence. Two doctors confirmed the diagnosis.
If Edwards continued the pregnancy, the couple could lose their chance to have a living child, doctors told them.
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5. However, even if protesters violate reasonable restrictions, there is a question of whether police force used was "proportionate," as UT 1A law prof
@steventcollis
told me.
That means they only use necessary force & that it is proportional to the seriousness of the offense.
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All the time they had to spend in public while grieving the loss of an expected family member, the uncertainty about whether her husband could be arrested, the fact that they had to undergo the procedure away from their support systems in Texas -- it was "emotional torture."
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"When we're talking about dispersal orders, those orders have to be aimed at people who are engaged in unlawful activity,"
@amy_k_sanders
said last week. "An order to disperse when students have a right to be on their public university campus is not necessarily a lawful order."
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With the fetus having a high chance of dying in utero, Edwards would be at risk of developing sepsis, a life-threatening medical condition. She also faced all the potential dangers of a normal pregnancy, including preeclampsia, preterm labor, injury in labor or cesarean section.
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mask mandates aren't new, and some of them were much stricter:
this photo was taken in fall 1918 in Mill Valley, CA, when you could indeed go to jail for refusing to wear a mask in some cities 😲
read more here:
@USATODAY
@usatodaylife
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Per
@Tsleather
: "It's hard to justify preemptive cancellation because you're predicting that there will be violations of the law," he said."The First Amendment doesn't really favor those kinds of predictive measures based on what you think is going to happen."
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The two weeks they spent trying to schedule an appointment were hellish. Taylor was vomiting constantly, for hours at a time.
Three hours before their plane to New Mexico was scheduled to depart, they received a call saying it was canceled due to lack of medication.
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"It's already a very traumatic situation that you're put in, and to add what they intend to do with these laws — scare, and shame, and all — on top of getting the worst news in your life, it's just adding insult to injury," Edwards said. "It's a level of emotional torture."
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@steventcollis
Under the 1A, all speech is protected except for
-incitements of lawlessness (note: not just rulebreaking)
-defamatory language
-obscenity (narrow category generally referring to child pornography, etc.)
- "fighting words" like imminent threats
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"In Texas, your doctors can't help you," Edwards told me. "I was just alone, researching online, without any sort of guidance from anybody."
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@statesman
Taylor Edwards and her husband Travis have wanted to start a family for more than 3 years.
After a 3 rounds of IVF (and hundreds of painful injections), Edwards became pregnant in November 2022.
They named the baby girl they were expecting Phoebe.
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@RealDEFENCE25
In Texas, public university property is considered public property because taxpayers help pay for it. Thus the law designating their outdoor spaces “public forums.”
Protesters can’t occupy buildings on campus, but outdoors, they are allowed to be there
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When hate speech doesn't fall into those categories, it is protected under the law. UT's VP of legal affairs discussed this at length in a video six months ago.
She also noted that the term "hate speech" does not have an agreed-upon definition.
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-whether the person(s) to be charged threaten campus safety
-what kinds of gun(s) were confiscated & how many
-how criminal trespass & other misdemeanor charges were upgraded to a gun-related felony
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@statesman
Then, four months into the pregnancy, they received devastating news: Phoebe wasn't going to make it.
She had a severe case of encephalocele, a rare neural tube defect that causes brain tissue to protrude out of the skull.
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UPDATE: Fewer than 10 students were released last night per attorney George Lobb, who is representing protestors arrested at UT-Austin on behalf of the Austin Lawyers’ Guild.
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@Tsleather
, director of SMU'S First Amendment clinic, was also skeptical that a mask rule would justify breaking up a peaceful protest where demonstrators are using protected speech.
But he said a court would ultimately need to decide in the context of an individual case.
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@statesman
When I visited their home, they showed me the note their MFM specialist gave them on the worst day of either of their lives.
Under the hospital's official letterhead, he had written the name of an abortion clinic in New Mexico.
He couldn't help them, he said.
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7. UT President Jay Hartzell largely justified the arrests last week by saying they had preemptively canceled the protest.
It is not a given that the university had the right to cancel the protest in advance or to order students to leave, however.
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This thread is probably massively too long at this point but I just want to thank everyone who spoke to me for this story & end on the note that we don't yet know all of what happened on April 24 and Monday.
Stay tuned for more
@statesman
coverage.
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I am so honored to hear this from you, Julie. But all credit should go to
@O4Sswarthmore
and their tireless dedication to this cause - the 7 days we spent working on this can’t compare to the 14 months they’ve done this exhausting & often heartbreaking work!
This story is a testament to the importance of student journalism. Campus publications
@swat_phoenix
and
@swatvoices
were the first to publish these documents.
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BREAKING: The Texas Medical Board has agreed to clarify abortion ban exceptions for physicians after months of silence. The process will begin at its meeting in Austin on March 22.
Email sent by TMB counsel to Amy Bresnen, who petitioned the Board with husband Steve in Jan:
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4. UT's rule against encampments is more likely to be viewed as a reasonable justification for removing protesters, several experts said.
Also worth noting that creating encampments without the consent of the agency / official that manages the site is illegal in TX.
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I spoke with several friends, family members of those arrested as well as an imam, a UT alum and other Austin residents who came to support those still held in the jail Wednesday night.
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I should also note that this thread definitely doesn’t cover everything in my article, so please do read it! And follow
@AustinNewsGuild
🦇
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8. Dispersal orders also don't justify arrests of students otherwise following the rules, said
@amy_k_sanders
.
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"If we're talking about peaceful protesters that are simply exercising their free speech rights, that's protected. But when it comes to installing tents and fixtures & staying overnight, that's a rule that would be permissible to enforce,"
@Zach2Greenberg
of
@TheFIREorg
told me.
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NEW: The Texas Medical Board's proposed rules on abortion add to confusion around state law and could endanger pregnant women, Texas' largest medical society, OB-GYNs, lawyers, Kate Cox & other women who have suffered pregnancy complications said Monday
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Until then, here's the
@statesman
story on the April 24 protest and the 57 arrests that police made:
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“The American-Statesman received 3 of the 7 highest honors – more than any other publication statewide in its division”- at the TME awards.
So happy for my
@Statesman
colleagues & so lucky to be learning from some of the best reporters in the industry.
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Median home sale price is up to $374,900, via
@stlouisfed
.
But a viral TikTok said if prices had increased at the same rate as U.S. median income since 1970, it would be just $61,000.
We checked that math with help from
@EricaGroshen
and
@Harvard_JCHS
👉
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BREAKING: The Texas Supreme Court has ruled against Amanda Zurawski + 21 other women who sued the state, vacating a lower court’s order blocking Texas’ near-total abortion ban & denying that the law puts Texans with severe pregnancy complications at risk.
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This struck me:
GOP primary voter for
@EllenTroxclair
told me on Tuesday that even though he didn’t agree with all of her policies, he came out to support her for voting to impeach
@KenPaxtonTX
. He’s also concerned about the influence of Tim Dunn.
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today i learned that major non-numbered streets in philadelphia (walnut, locust, spruce, pine, etc.) are ALL TREE NAMES (duh) arranged from north to south IN ORDER OF TREE DENSITY. i have never heard something so useful yet so .... pennsylvania
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And
@lilykepner
and
@ChaseRogersAAS
on Monday's protest/encampment, where 79 students were arrested:
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The U.S. does have significantly more school shootings than other countries, but the data included in a viral post actually understated the scope of the problem. One database pushes the tally past 2,000 school shootings in the U.S. From
@brieannafrank
:
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THREAD from my
@USATODAY
story: The “swollen testicles” tweet from
@NICKIMINAJ
has generated some very funny responses, but vaccine hesitancy is no joke, particularly in the Black community
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At the Texas Medical Board meeting to propose draft guidelines on abortion, attendees on both sides of the debate acknowledged doctors are confused and women are suffering as a result.
The story is on our A1 today with
@jayjanner
's poignant photos:
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Very very excited to announce that today is my first day PolitiFact, Data and Disinformation reporter at The Austin-American
@statesman
! DM me with questions and tips for fact-checks and other stories 🤠
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Very thankful to have heard from
@ravenscimaven
, who replied to Minaj’s tweets about vaccine concerns with a rap explaining how it works. This is what she told me:
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Contrary to some viral claims that the shooter was in the country illegally, including one from Rep. Paul Gosar, Ramos was a U.S. citizen. From
@katespetersen1
:
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The head of the college board is touring TJ right now nbd
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Hi
@ravenscimaven
— yes, there is. We go by
@APStylebook
, which says Dr. is only used for people with MDs, not PhDs or other degrees. Other fact checks follow the same rule. If you have an MD or equivalent degree we will correct the story ASAP.
Is there a reason why you addressed everyone else in this article as Dr. instead of me??
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I’m here at the
@statesman
office picketing with my colleagues
@AustinNewsGuild
to demand a fair contract. Donate to our strike fund here:
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Update from the Texas Medical Board website tonight:
-TMB will discuss abortion ban rulemaking at the end of the Fri. meeting, just before public comment
-Proposed rules will be posted online March 22
-Board will hold add’l public forums on rules & accept written comments
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At the Texas Medical Board meeting to propose draft guidelines on abortion, attendees on both sides of the debate acknowledged doctors are confused and women are suffering as a result.
The story is on our A1 today with
@jayjanner
's poignant photos:
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It's true that the FDA considers fragments of some types of insects safe in chocolate--60 pieces per 100g, to be exact.
But is there any truth to the years-old claim that "ground-up cockroach pieces" cause chocolate allergies?
My fact-check for
@USATODAY
:
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Fascinating article by
@BrandyZadrozny
on the man arrested after threatening to commit acts of violence at US-Mex border...
His son: “We went hunting and my dad had to shoot at a deer standing still 3 different times before he hit it. He’s not a sniper.”
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when you've spent the past four days working on an online food guide with photos and you realize you don't have the willpower you thought you did:
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@cherylhungry
/which CEO position to take/which book to write/ what government position to pursue/ what to invent
#strongindependentwoman
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@USATODAY
Off-duty Border Patrol agent Jacob Albarado didn't take down gunman Salvador Ramos -- that was a tactical team of on-duty officers. From
@KochiSudiksha
:
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@KathTX
Thank you for reading and for the kind words, I really appreciate it. It really is brave of them.
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@USATODAY
@usatodayDC
not only were the claims false, the "West Cook News" is not really a local newspaper.
it's one of many conservative blogs owned by LGIS, a private company, that, its co-founder told CJR, produces most of its articles via algorithm
(3/x)
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For those of you with questions, please read the full story, which mentions and includes links to campus firearm policies and state law.
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The fact that my literal horsheshit tweet has 9 bookmarks is concerning to me. What are you guys saving this for? Fertilizer?
One thing the media coverage can’t quite capture here at the UT protest: The stench of horse manure is completely overpowering. It smells like what it is: baked animal feces. Everywhere.
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this company, in turn, is part of a far larger network of such 'local newspapers' whose content is often directed in the shadows by conservative PR firms and political groups, the NYT found in a 2020 investigation
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I’m here at the Texas Supreme Court as plaintiffs in Zurawski v. Texas, husbands and family members wait to enter the Court. The case challenges Texas abortion bans.
@statesman
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BREAKING: Texas District Judge Maya Guerra Gamble said she will issue a temporary restraining order to allow Ms. Kate Cox to obtain an emergency abortion during hearing in Travis County 459th District Court.
Story to come for
@statesman
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Kate Cox just made a rare public appearance to address the Texas Medical Board on new proposed abortion guidelines: "The new rules will create additional hurdles for patients like me"
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@KateSPetersen1
A Twitter thread claiming that a representative of Texas Gov. Greg Abbott offered to pay the family of a child Uvalde victim to oppose gun restrictions was completely made-up. From me:
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@MarkHamill
If so, please feel free to email me at bwagner
@usatoday
.com or to reach out via DM. Thanks!
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In Uvalde, waiting for families to emerge from conference with AG Medrick Garland on forthcoming DOJ report on the May 2022 shooting
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Updated my story with reactions from
@amy_bresnen
,
@SteveBresnen
,
@BeeMoorhead
, and two Zurawski v. Texas plaintiffs to the TMB's decision to begin drafting guidance for physicians around Texas' abortion ban exceptions. Cautious optimism abounds:
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