State of Texas: Biden order brings praise, skepticism from border leaders

AUSTIN (Nexstar) — President Joe Biden announced executive action to temporarily close the border to most asylum-seekers. The goal is to slow the number of illegal crossings.

"We must first secure the border, and secure it now," Biden said Tuesday at a White House event. He was flanked by supporters for the announcement, including mayors from a few Texas cities.

Under the President's order, when illegal crossings exceed a threshold of 2,500 per day, most asylum seekers who cross illegally can be turned away. According to the Associated Press, crossings have not dropped below an average of 2,500 per day since January 2021.

The order does make exceptions for migrants who can show they have "credible fear" of returning home. The new order makes that standard more strict.

"This action will help us gain control of our border, restore order in the process," Biden said at the announcement.

It has been common for asylum seekers to cross the border illegally at areas other than official ports of entry, then surrender to authorities to make an asylum claim. Many of those people have been allowed to stay in the United States while their asylum claim moves through the court system. The process can take years.

The new executive order aims to make it less likely that people who cross the border illegally will be allowed to stay in the country.

"I think that's a strong message to people that want to come to United States saying you got to do it the right way," Brownsville Mayor John Cowen said of the President's move. He was one of the border mayors at the White House for the announcement.

Mayor Ramiro Garza of Edinburg also had praise for the border order. "This does not fix our entire system. But it's a lot of work to do, right? But this is a step in the right direction," Garza said.

Others were critical of the announcement.

"It's just another ploy for the political year," Terrell County Sheriff Thaddeus Cleveland said, noting the timing of the announcement. "We all know that immigration is the number one topic for this election."

Cleveland is skeptical that the thresholds for closing the border will make a difference.

"That's still almost a million if we were to catch 2,500 a day," Cleveland said. "And who's still going to process those that are coming across? It's going to be Border Patrol. And if those numbers are significant, they're still going to be tied up," he added.

Governor Greg Abbott also criticized the announcement, calling it a "hollow border order."

"For three years the President has lied about the existence of the border crisis, deflected blame to Congress, and now contradicts himself by issuing a feckless executive order months before election day," Abbott wrote in a statement released to reporters.

Under the President's order, the border will not reopen to asylum seekers until illegal crossings fall to an average of 1,500 per day. According to the Associated Press, the last time numbers fell below that level was July 2020, at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Lawmakers pledge to explore fix to veteran benefit loophole

A battle veteran Keith Romel has been fighting for about a year is finally getting the attention he’d hoped.

“It’s brought awareness to the issue,” said the east Austin Resident, referring to a recent KXAN investigation highlighting his struggle to get the property tax exemption he’s entitled to as a 100% disabled veteran.

When Romel sold his east Austin home last year and bought another one, he was upset to find he would not be able to use his 100% disabled veteran property tax exemption immediately.

The Travis Central Appraisal District, or TCAD, ruled the exemption could not be applied to his new condo for the time he owned it in 2023, from mid-May through December.

“To come up with, you know, $6,500 that I wasn’t expecting to have to pay when I bought the house was a little hard,” Romel told KXAN Investigator Mike Rush in early May.

As a TCAD spokesperson explained to KXAN, property value is appraised based on the state of a property on January first of each year. Regarding Romel’s new condo, in January 2023, a developer owned the land and was in the process of splitting it into two condos, one of which became Romel’s.

TCAD determined since Romel’s condo and new address did not exist at the start of the year, he couldn’t use his exemption on his new home for the remainder of that year, although the exemption is in effect for 2024 and beyond.

“I don’t think it’s right,” Romel said.

Neither does Texas State Rep. Lulu Flores, who represents Romel’s district.

“The exemption should go with him and into whatever property he goes into,” the Austin Democrat said.

Romel believes KXAN’s investigation helped elevate conversations he’d been having for a few months with Flores’ office.

Flores tells KXAN she’s committed to coming up with a solution.

“It’ shouldn’t be rocket science,” the lawmaker said. “Maybe we need to clarify in the legislation that the exemption travels with the individual.” She added, “That whatever exemption they have and are entitled to applies to that property regardless of whether it was on the rolls or not.”

Romel’s predicament also has the attention of another state lawmaker.

In our original report, KXAN spoke with longtime Austin property tax attorney Lorri Michel, who disagreed with TCAD’s interpretation of the tax code that denied Romel the exemption on his new property for 2023.

“I’m thinking he should have had it,” Michel said at the time.

After KXAN brought the issue to Michel’s attention, she reached out to State Sen. Paul Bettencourt’s office to try to change the law.

“Quite frankly, if it wasn’t for y’all’s investigative report, we wouldn’t have heard about it,” Sen. Bettencourt told Rush.

Bettencourt, R-Houston, owns a tax consulting company, previously served as the Harris County Tax Assessor for 10 years, and in 2019 authored major statewide property tax reform legislation.

The senator said his office is looking into Romel’s situation and the possibility of tweaking the law.

“At the end of the day, we may have to clarify this to make it crystal clear,” Bettencourt said.

If the lawmakers determine the law does need clarification, they would introduce measures next year, when the legislature meets next.

While he won’t get the money back he spent on property taxes in 2023, Romel supports a change.

“It will help somebody else from being caught in this situation in the future,” he said.

A spokesperson with the Texas Comptroller’s Office tells KXAN local appraisal districts in Texas decide whether to approve or deny exemptions and may have different interpretations of how exemptions are applied.

We reached out to neighboring appraisal districts to see how they would handle this situation.

In a statement, the Hays Central Appraisal District’s chief appraiser, Laura Raven, wrote:

“Hays CAD works diligently within the framework of the Property Tax Code to ensure that anyone who applies and qualifies for an exemption receives it. If someone applies for an exemption on a property that didn’t exist on January 1 there would not be an account to apply an exemption to.”

Meanwhile, Williamson Central District Chief Appraiser, Alvin Lankford, told KXAN’s Mike Rush a veteran in a similar situation there would also not be able to have a 100% disabled veteran property tax exemption applied. The reason would not be just because the veteran moved during the year.

Investors aim to create new Texas stock exchange

A group of financiers announced on Wednesday plans to create a Texas stock exchange based in Dallas. 

TXSE Group Inc. released a statement outlining their plans to register with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission on Wednesday, including that it is backed by major investing firms like BlackRock and Citadel Securities. 

The group raised approximately $120 million in capital with the help of investors. The group said it expects to be the “most well capitalized exchange entrant” seeking entry to the SEC. In their release, the group stated that TXSE aims to make it easier for everyone to invest in U.S. stock markets and to help public companies and those looking to go public better connect with these markets. 

James Lee, the founder and CEO of TXSE Group Inc., said that the changes in trading markets are creating more opportunities for investors.  

“TXSE will ultimately create more competition around quote activity, liquidity and transparency,” Lee said in the press release. “Resulting in more consistent and reliable markets that benefit investors, global issuers and liquidity providers alike.” 

The Texas Stock Exchange will operate as a fully electronic national securities exchange that seeks to generate competition with leading stock exchanges New York Stock Exchange and NASDAQ. The group will have a physical headquarters in Dallas according to The Texas Tribune.  

Texas Comptroller of Public Accounts Glenn Hegar said that Texas is open for business and is continuing to grow as the number one industry contributing to the state’s gross domestic product is the finance sector. 

“Texas is really rooted in plans to continue to grow for quite some time economically as it would be a benefit overall to the state revenues,” Hegar said. “In part because it's another reason for businesses to route their sales here in Texas — whether it's Austin, Houston, the metroplex, San Antonio, or out in the other corners of the state of Texas.” 

Hegar said this is the first of many steps in the process of getting SEC approval. 

The state has accused BlackRock of boycotting the oil and gas industry due to its ESG investments, which has put the financial titan in direct conflict with Texas. BlackRock in response has accused Texas too of playing politics. In March, a spokesperson told The Hill: “as a fiduciary, politics should never outweigh performance, especially for taxpayers.”

Last year, Texas passed a law that requires the state to divest from companies with ESG policies — or when firms weigh the environmental, social and governance impacts of investments, rather than solely financial benefits. 

In March, the state divested $8.5 billion from Blackrock due to its ESG practices. 

Hegar said regardless, he still supports BlackRock’s ability to do business in Texas if it will be economically beneficial to the state.

“I think this is an effort that, while they may still be ‘boycotting’ the oil and gas industry per the list, they are trying other efforts to show that they want to be a willing participant in the state of Texas,” Hegar said. “And I've continued to say to others that we want them to do business.” 

Gov. Greg Abbott also addressed these conflicts in an interview on CNBC Thursday morning. He said that the ESG movement is currently changing “dramatically” which is of particular importance to the state of Texas. 

“We need to make sure that Texas companies and companies similarly situated are not going to be cut off from capital markets in New York with policy decisions made from the left in places like New York,” Abbott said. “And we think because of that, and because of some other reasons, there actually is a big market opening for this stock exchange in the state of Texas.”

Hegar estimates it could take months — if not years — for the TXSE to be up and running, due to regulatory hurdles it must jump through. 

The TXSE plans to register with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission later this year. It will also be a fully electronic national securities exchange, according to the press release. 

Rural Texas needs nurses, state program aims to help

A new state program is trying to help address the nursing shortage in rural Texas communities.

On Monday, Texas Agriculture Commissioner Sid Miller and the Texas Department of Agriculture (TDA) announced applications are open for the Rural Nursing Recruitment & Retention Program (RNRR).

This comes a few weeks after Gov. Greg Abbott announced $17 million in grant funding awarded to rural hospitals by the Texas Health and Human Services Commission.

"In rural Texas, we have a lot of challenges. We have most elderly population," said Commissioner Miller. "We have the highest uninsured population. We have the two vocations that are most accident prone: farming and oil field work."

The nurse program provides eligible health care facilities with the money to incentivize nurses to work in rural areas of Texas, according to a news release. 

Eligible facilities must do the following:

• Employ nurses
• Provide direct patient care to its community as a whole
• Accept Medicare/Medicaid patients
• Stay within a rural Texas county with a population of 68,000 or less

The program helps rural health care facilities provide $15,000 in stipend assistance to nurses who agree to work or continue to work at their facility.

"Access to medical care is crucial for rural Texans. With the implementation of RNRR, qualifying rural healthcare facilities will be able to attract and retain needed staff to provide quality care," the news release said.

An awarded facility can give that money to a nurse who is currently employed or will be employed and agrees to work full-time for a minimum of three years.

Applications are due June 27. The release said the award is competitive and TDA cannot review completed applications before the deadline.

"Staff are available to answer questions until 5 p.m. June 27," the release said.

Staffing concerns are an ongoing issue that rural communities have dealt with for years.

"There are 4 million rural Texans. Sometimes those areas of the state are an afterthought."

John Henderson, CEO of the Texas Organization of Rural and Community Hospitals

Henderson said sometimes it’s hard to recruit and retain a good clinical workforce.

“Not just with physicians, but also with nurses, respiratory therapists, and lab technicians,” Henderson said.

Ultimately, Henderson said a lot of it comes down to money.

"Even if they offer competitive pay packages, sometimes they can't match the bonus and incentives that some of the urban systems can provide," Henderson said.

This program adds to a growing list of resources for rural hospitals. Henderson said he already knows of hospitals that are interested in applying.

"This, they think, will help put them over the top with regard to those recruitment efforts," Henderson said.