404 Media is revealing the name of Border Patrol's predictive policing units, which analyze financial data and have local cops pull people over. The people are not suspected of any particular crime.

The attorney general's office once aggressively pursued fraudsters targeting immigrants. Not on Ken Paxton's watch.

The attorney general's office once aggressively pursued fraudsters targeting immigrants. Not on Ken Paxton's watch.

How the Carrizo/Comecrudo Tribe turned family lore into money, media, and a place at the United Nations.

A note from the editor

On August 11, 2023, local law enforcement seized electronics and reporting materials from the Marion County Record in a raid that provoked a national outcry over the blatant press freedom violation…

Community-powered tracking of US/Mexico border wall construction, surveillance technology, and infrastructure.

After the fatal shooting of Lorenzo Salgado Araujo, local authorities have struggled to stake their claim on an investigation into a killing within the most populous Texas city’s limits.

“Ben was irrepressibly hopeful of the human spirit,” longtime friend Ruben Garcia said about Sáenz, an award-winning author whose “Aristotle and Dante” young adult novel was adapted into a movie in 20...

“We’re gonna be riding around areas where most everybody thinks it’s unsafe, and you’re gonna see that there’s really nothing to be worried about.”

Six of the victims, including a 14-year-old boy, were found dead inside a train shipping container in Laredo in the sweltering Texas heat.

“We’re gonna be riding around areas where most everybody thinks it’s unsafe, and you’re gonna see that there’s really nothing to be worried about.”

The plan, from Laredo trucking magnate Ruben Garibay, has the backing of key political leaders in Austin and D.C. Locals warn it's a boondoggle.

Ruben Garibay's push for a new trade bridge has won support from U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz and other powerful leaders. But local critics worry it's a boondoggle.

Tribal police in Washington hire officers fired elsewhere at a rate four times higher than their share of the workforce

FBI investigators sought permission to search the van involved in the ICE shooting, citing suspected methamphetamine. In a rare move, the warrant is public.

A Rio Grande Valley murder case was botched and evidence lost by local police and by Texas Rangers. Will anyone ever be held responsible?

YouTube video by Austin History Center

The citizen-journalist and social media provocateur's case against local officials was thrown out in a decision that horrified First Amendment advocates. But, at home, observers say arresting her…

The Park Center for Independent Media (PCIM) is honored to announce that this year’s Izzy Award “for outstanding achievement in independent media” will be shared by one outlet, Texas Observer; journal...

A federal court is unlawfully prohibiting journalists from copying immigration records at the courthouse. The practice must stop.

Last year was the deadliest year in ICE detention in two decades. Nearly a quarter of those deaths occurred in Texas.

The case of one Houston man, nearly deported to India after a quarter-century here, shows what happens when prosecutorial discretion is abandoned.

A mass casualty event last spring lays bare the state’s backward approach to the ongoing crisis spurred by fentanyl and other super-potent substances.

Along with the monetary settlement, city officials agreed to send its employees to training that the Texas Municipal League will develop about Sylvia Gonzalez’s case.

Growing security deployments pose unique challenges for harm reduction groups.

The 20-story Torre Centinela looming over Juárez is part of a much larger AI-powered network that won’t stop at the U.S.-Mexico divide.

Afghan scholar Mohammad Halimi, who fled the Taliban in 2021, had worked to help U.S. diplomats understand his homeland. Then DOGE put his family’s lives at risk by exposing his sensitive work for a U...

As public attention has shifted away from policing reform, legislators attempt to shove information into the dark.

Since Democratic lawmakers left Texas to delay Republicans’ new map, state leaders have challenged the limits of traditional democratic norms to break the impasse.

Lone Star grants paid for pickups, office furniture, workout rooms and other items with little connection to border security. 'There it is,' we'll take it,' one county judge said of the state money.

State trooper Freeman H. Martin was driving 101 mph in a 45 mph zone when he blew through a red light and hit another car during a police chase.

Lone Star grants paid for pickups, office furniture, workout rooms and other items with little connection to border security. 'There it is,' we'll take it,' one county judge said of the state money.