Here are the stories on Texas Standard for Tuesday, Jan. 24, 2023:
Social media free speech debate may head to the Supreme Court
Claiming their views were being censored, Republican lawmakers in Texas and Florida passed laws restricting platforms like Facebook, Twitter and YouTube from blocking or limiting political speech. Now, after conflicting rulings on the laws’ legality, the Supreme Court’s expected to weigh in. Tom Leatherbury with the First Amendment Clinic at Southern Methodist University has more.
What a $50 savings per taxpayer is costing Harris County residents
Republican commissioners boycotted the Harris County Commissioners Court for weeks this past fall to force Democrats to adopt a smaller budget and lower tax rates. Houston Public Media’s Andrew Schneider explores whether the savings to taxpayers are worth the cuts to services.
Indigenous opposition grows to gas project in Rio Grande Valley
Opposition against liquified natural gas plants continues in the Rio Grande Valley, as members of the Carrizo Comecrudo tribe and others demonstrated near the plant this past weekend. Texas Public Radio’s Gaige Davila has more:
Life for truck drivers in the United States is changing
Are the nation’s truckers in it for the long haul? More and more drivers are saying no, as stagnant salaries, supply chain woes and more make it harder to make ends meet. Wired’s Andrew Kay offers more on these historic changes in the trucking industry.
The generation gap and how it informs tech workers’ layoff reactions
The mass layoffs across the tech industry disproportionately affect Gen X and millennial workers, in terms of financial struggles and career advancement. While it’s been a big awakening for a generation that hasn’t experienced a cyclical economic crash, that’s not the case for older workers. Tripp Mickle, tech reporter for The New York Times, has more.
This Texas label makes records the old-school way
Grant Himmler makes lathe-cut records with 80-year-old machines. We’ll hear from him and learn more about the work behind his Old Faithful Records label.
Know someone who wants to join the National Guard? In some states, you now can get a finder’s fee.
About a half dozen states are trying something new to attract recruits into the National Guard: They’re paying finder’s fees to people who help bring in new troops. Some National Guard leaders want to roll out a similar program of referral bonuses nationwide. Desiree D’iorio reports for the American Homefront Project.
Election deniers raised money for a hospital in Ukraine. It was never built.
What happens when a far-right group of election deniers tries to build a hospital in a war zone? It can get messy, at least in the case of Texas-based “True the Vote.” A new investigation from ProPublica and the Dallas Morning News found that the group raised millions for a hospital in Ukraine that never got built. ProPublica’s Cassandra Jaramillo has the story.
All this, plus the Texas Newsroom’s state roundup and Wells Dunbar with the Talk of Texas.
