TEXAS HOLD ‘EM: The right wing and hard-nosed attorney general of Texas said yesterday that he willask for a court order to vacate the seats of any Democratic lawmakers who are not back to work by Friday.

The Democrats left the state to deny the Republicans a quorum they need to vote on a congressional re-districting map that would assure them five more congressional representatives in the 2026 election.

“Democrats have abandoned their offices by fleeing Texas, and a failure to respond to a call of the House constitutes a dereliction of their duty as elected officials,” Attorney General Ken Paxton said in a statement. “Starting Friday, any rogue lawmakers refusing to return to the House will be held accountable for vacating their office.”

The Texas Constitution explicitly allows a so-called “quorum break,” according to a state Supreme Court ruling in 2021. Legal experts say it would be difficult to argue that engaging in a quorum break qualifies as abandonment of office. Paxton admits that it would be a lengthy process.

REGIME NEWS:

— President Trump yesterday threatened to take control of the District of Columbia if it doesn’t get a handle on crime. “If D.C. doesn’t get its act together,” Trump wrote on his Truth Social feed, “we will have no choice but to take Federal control of the City.”

Actually, as of the first of the year violent crime in Washington hit a 30-year low. Total violent crime for 2024 in the District of Columbia was down 35% from 2023, according to the Metropolitan Police Department.

Nevertheless. Trump wrote, “Crime in Washington, D.C., is totally out of control. Local ‘youths’ and gang members, some only 14, 15, and 16-years-old, are randomly attacking, mugging, maiming, and shooting innocent Citizens, at the same time knowing that they will be almost immediately released.”

— The Trump administration is preparing to end $7 billion in federal grants for helping low and moderate-income families install solar panels on their homes, The NY Times reports. The Environmental Protection Agency is writing up termination letters to 60 state agencies, nonprofit groups, and Native American tribes that received the grants under the “Solar for All” program during the Biden administration. President Trump has denounced the use and cost-effectiveness of solar and wind power.

— Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. canceled nearly $500 million in grants and contracts to develop mRNA vaccines, the vaccines first used against Covid-19 that can be developed quickly and altered as a virus changes. Kennedy has been sharply critical of the technology to the dismay of scientists who know how they work.

AVATAR: Former CNN reporter Jim Accosta “interviewed” on his Substack the artificial intelligence avatar of teenager Joaquin Oliver, who died in the 2018 parkland Florida school shooting. Oliver would be 25 today and the avatar was created by his father.

“I would like to know what your solution would be for gun violence,” Acosta asked.

“Great question. I believe in a mix of stronger gun control laws, mental health support, and community engagement,” the Oliver avatar answered. “We need to create safe spaces for conversations and connections, making sure everyone feels seen and heard.” The avatar said, “It’s about building a culture of kindness and understanding. What do you think of that?”

SUNK: A Coast Guard investigation attributes the primary cause of the OceanGate Titan submersible implosion that killed five people in 2023 to inadequate design, construction, and testing of the hull.

The Titan was taking sightseers down to the wreck of the Titanic when its hull failed at a depth of 12,500 feet and water pressure of 5,500 pounds per square inch.

The investigators found that OceanGate CEO Stockton Rush, who died in the implosion, inflated numbers “to bolster the perceived safety and dive count” of the final Titan hull, creating “a false impression of the submersible’s proven reliability and safety.”

Storage and maintenance of the submersible also seemed to be somewhat casual. It was stored outdoors one winter and in July 2022, the Titan became stuck in the Titanic wreckage sustaining “irreversible” hull damage that was not properly investigated, according to the investigation.

THE OBIT PAGE: Actress Kelley Mack, who appeared in the in post-apocalyptic zombie drama “The Walking Dead,” has at age 33 of an aggressive cancer in her central nervous system.

THE SPIN RACK: A flash flood tore through a village in the Indian Himalayas yesterday, killing at least four people. Video shows a wall of water crashing through the village and sweeping away buildings. The number of dead is likely to rise. — The New York Post tabloid, owned by the right wing Murdoch media empire, says it will publish a California newspaper starting next year, “The California Post.” — A 15-year-old New York City carriage horse named Lady collapsed and died yesterday at the corner of 11th Avenue and West 51st Street. The death feeds the controversy over whether using horses to pull tourist carriages is animal cruelty. — A wildfire burning at the Grand Canyon for a month has grown to 126,000 acres. — Elon Musk’s Tesla car company has opened a futuristic-looking Los Angeles diner replete with food boxes that look like a Tesla cybertruck. With “a menu of meat-focused fast food that diners order on touch screens, then pick up at the counter,” wrote The NY Times food critic, “It’s an unremarkable model that chains rolled out years ago.”

BELOW THE FOLD: Federal workers have been told they no longer have to send emails describing five things they’ve done in their work week. It appears that no one was reading the memos first ordered up by Elon Musk as the head of the Department of Government efficiency. It was never anyone’s job to read the memos, not even five of them a week.

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