How closely did you follow the news in Texas this week? Take The Texas Tribune’s news quiz to find out!

The Senate has rejected attempts by Sen. Bernie Sanders to block the sale of offensive weapons to Israel.

House Speaker Mike Johnson declared that lawmakers and staff will have to use the restroom corresponding with their biological sex.

So far Trump has looked elsewhere for his earliest cabinet and high-level staff appointments, in some cases passing over Texans who were in the mix.

Donald Trump’s first stint in the White House proved to be a chaotic ride for the nation's capital.

The House has passed legislation that would provide full Social Security benefits to millions of people.

After one of the most chaotic and least productive U.S. House sessions in modern history, voters made a surprising choice in elections — they overwhelmingly stuck with the status quo.

Democrat Janelle Bynum has flipped Oregon’s 5th Congressional District.

Cruz won over Latino voters and targeted Colin Allred’s support of transgender rights to win a third term.

Cornyn has for years signaled he wanted to succeed his close ally GOP leader Mitch McConnell. He lost in a vote decided by the Republican members of the Senate.

Rep. Mike Johnson has won the Republican nomination to remain as House speaker, on track to keep the gavel after a morning endorsement from President-elect Donald Trump ahead of a full House vote in the new year.

House Speaker Mike Johnson said Tuesday that Republicans are “ready to deliver” on President-elect Donald Trump’s mandate.

Congress has a short but important to-do list as lawmakers return to Washington this coming week for what is known as a lame-duck session.

The 2024 presidential election is over, but the path to Inauguration Day on Jan. 20 is just beginning.

House Republican leaders are projecting confidence that they will keep control of the U.S. House.

San Antonio’s Intergovernmental Relations Committee held a briefing this week on the city’s legislative program, which addresses city priorities and interests at the federal level for next year’s congressional session

From engaging with representatives to joining advocacy groups, there are numerous ways to continue participating in democracy and shaping policy after the polls close.

Tuesday was another electoral blowout in which Democrats underperformed expectations, weakening their case that Texas is a battleground state worthy of investment and attention from the national party.

The majority in the U.S. House hangs in balance.

Donald Trump’s presidential win is going to be certified in Congress in January by the candidate he beat, Vice President Kamala Harris.

Recent gains made by Democrats in past elections were wiped out, as Donald Trump, Ted Cruz and other Republicans won by wide margins.

The longtime Laredo congressman fended off Republican challenger Jay Furman despite a federal indictment accusing the incumbent of bribery and money laundering.

Both major parties poured hundreds of thousands of dollars into winning the seat, a rematch between Mayra Flores and Vicente Gonzalez.

De La Cruz defeated Democrat Michelle Vallejo for Texas’ 15th Congressional District in a rematch from two years ago.

U.S. Rep. Colin Allred, a former NFL linebacker and civil rights lawyer from Dallas, repeatedly broke fundraising records in his campaign, raising more than $80 million by mid-October.

For the first time ever, two Black women have been elected to serve simultaneously in the U.S. Senate.

Texas might not be a swing state, but many of its races will have major consequences to the national political landscape and on the lives of everyday Texans.

Tell us about any trouble you have trying to vote, so we can continue to report on potential challenges Texans may face at the ballot box.

Both candidates are making their closing arguments at the culmination of a heated and expensive race which could decide control of the U.S. Senate.

The races for control of Congress are at a stalemate.

Election results for president, U.S. Senate, Congress, Texas Legislature, Bexar County, San Antonio and other races.

Five candidates were re-elected to the US House of Representatives.

Inspired by the candidacy of Vice President Kamala Harris, individual members of historically Black sororities and fraternities are working to help her presidential campaign and that of downballot candidates.

Hundreds of Indigenous people were marching Wednesday in Brazil’s capital, urging Congress to drop a proposed constitutional amendment that has the potential to paralyze and even reverse land allocations.

With stops in Houston and the Rio Grande Valley, Allred hopes to make the race competitive by running up the tally with the core of the Democratic base.

This presidential election will be the first since the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection at the Capitol.

Michael Brown’s fatal shooting by police a decade ago set off more than a week of protests by thousands of people in Ferguson, Missouri.

Polarizing.

Cruz alleged that national Democrats illegally exceeded contribution limits when it spent more than $10 million for television ads in Texas benefiting Allred campaign.

Colin Allred also continues to out raise Ted Cruz bringing in over $11.8 million in the first 16 days of October. Cruz raised $9.9 million in the same period.

Harris talked about reproductive rights to a stadium full of supporters in Houston. In Austin, Trump stumped to supporters and reporters at a private jet terminal and appeared on Joe Rogan’s podcast.

Republican incumbent Monica De La Cruz has been declared the winner in the reelection race for United States Representative District 15, according to the Associated Press.

Democrat incumbent Henry Cuellar stormed back from behind to narrowly defeat Republican challenger Jay Furman in the race for U.S. Representative District 28.

Only a handful of Texas counties will not have all in-person voters cast paper ballots at the polls. By 2026, all voting machines in Texas must produce a paper trail, per a 2021 state law.

This artificial intelligence tool queries The Texas Tribune’s guides to help answer your questions about voting rules in 2024.

For more than 10,000 years, Native Americans have been living along California’s central coast.

A student loan cancellation program for public service workers has granted relief to more than 1 million Americans — up from just 7,000 who were approved before it was updated by the Biden administration two years ago.

The Pentagon says more than 800 military personnel have seen their service records upgraded to honorable discharges after previously being kicked out of the military under its former “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy.

The Small Business Administration has run out of money for its disaster assistance loans, delaying much needed relief for people applying for aid in the wake of the destruction caused by Hurricanes Helene and Milton.

Flores briefly represented the district after winning a 2022 special election. Gonzalez went on to beat her by nearly 9 points in the general.

The same candidates will be running in Texas’ 15th and 34th Congressional Districts, though the presidential and Senate races could mix things up.

Donald Trump insists that Project 2025, a nearly 1,000-page blueprint for a hard-right turn in American government and society, does not reflect his priorities for a White House encore.

National Republicans and Democrats are keenly eyeing the Pacific Northwest, where two of the most competitive U.S. House races in the country are playing out.

Immigrants who were brought to the U.S. illegally as children were among more than 200 demonstrators who gathered outside a federal courthouse in New Orleans where appellate judges heard arguments over a policy shielding them from deportation.

The staggering fundraising numbers mean that Cruz and Allred have collectively raised at least $132 million, surpassing the final combined haul from 2018.

Kashmir’s biggest political party opposed to India’s stripping of the region’s semi-autonomy has won most seats in a local election.

Votes are being counted in the recent election for a largely powerless local government in Indian-controlled Kashmir.

Our guide can help you determine how to register, who is eligible to vote, whether you’re still registered and more in advance of Election Day.

After a tumultuous and unproductive session of Congress, nearly 50 House members have decided either to not seek reelection or to run for a higher office.

Texan voters will have significant influence in November, both within and outside the state. They will be electing a U.S. senator, 38 U.S. House members, 150 state House members, as well as various judges and local elected officials. Additionally, they will have influence over important questions.

Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas says the agency tasked with helping communities recover from Hurricane Helene and other natural disasters does not have enough money to make it through the hurricane season.

The Republican challenger trying to flip the U.S. Senate seat in swing-state Pennsylvania says he'll press for U.S. military action in Mexico to target fentanyl trafficking networks.

The topic is playing a major role in one of Texas’ only competitive congressional races this year as the competitors debate Medicare, abortion and expanding coverage.

Joining Sanders as he campaigns up and down the I-35 corridor are Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Rep. Greg Casar, and former El Paso congressman Beto O’Rourke.

Millions of Texans would lose food subsidies and farm insurance if Congress doesn’t act before the end of the year.

Congress is off for the campaign season.

The president of the NCAA lashed out at “evidence of dysfunction in today’s NIL environment” while reiterating his desire to see Congress create national guidelines to set the template for the so-called name, image and likeness endorsement deals that are reshaping college sports.

President Joe Biden has signed a temporary government spending bill that keeps agencies operating into December, after Congress punted key spending decisions until after the November election.

The late-cycle investment signals the party is taking Texas seriously — a shift from past cycles.

An executive at cybersecurity company CrowdStrike apologized in testimony to Congress for sparking a global technology outage over the summer.

Congress has avoided a government shutdown just weeks before the Nov. 5 election.

Cruz’s thrice-weekly podcast, “Verdict,” has become an integral part of his day-to-day life as a senator — and a tool in his effort to win reelection this fall.

A new report from the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) reveals that major social media and video streaming services are collecting and monetizing vast amounts of user data, often without adequate protections, especially for children and teens.

The Oct. 15 debate will mark the first time the nominees will face each other onstage before the November election.

Lawmakers are scrambling to ensure that the U.S. Secret Service has enough money and resources to keep the nation’s presidential candidates safe amid repeated threats of violence.

Work on the presidential inauguration platform is kicking off at the U.S. Capitol.

A secretive group that recruited Donald Trump supporters to run as third-party spoiler candidates in some of the nation’s most competitive congressional districts was accused of violating campaign finance law.

A new report says the U.S. has seen an increase in the number of a certain kind of derailment related to the forces created when railcars push and pull against each other as freight trains have gotten longer.

A bipartisan group of lawmakers on Tuesday introduced legislation that would prohibit political campaigns and outside political groups from using artificial intelligence to misrepresent the views of their rivals by pretending to be them.

Libertarian President Javier Milei of Argentina has presented the 2025 budget to Congress, outlining policy priorities that reflected his key pledge to kill the country’s chronic fiscal deficit and signaled a new phase of confrontation with lawmakers.

A San Jose-based biotechnology company that helps doctors detect genetic causes for cancer is among those that could be cut out of the U.S. market over ties to China.

U.S. officials say nearly $6 billion in funding for aid to Ukraine will expire at the end of the month unless Congress acts to extend the Pentagon’s authority to send weapons from its stockpile to Kyiv.

The Biden administration is sending Egypt its full $1.3 billion allocation of military aid.

Mexico is poised to amend its constitution this weekend to require all judges to be elected as part of a judicial overhaul championed by the outgoing president but slammed by critics as a blow to the country’s rule of law.

The Senate has the potential for history-making this fall.

Speaker Mike Johnson has postponed a vote on a temporary spending bill that would keep federal agencies and programs funded for six months.

U.S. Rep. Colin Allred, D-Dallas, is challenging Sen. Ted Cruz this November, but the Democratic Senate Campaign Committee has vulnerable incumbents to defend first.

House Speaker Mike Johnson is vowing to press ahead with requiring proof of citizenship for new voters as part of a bill to avoid a partial government shutdown.

The House Foreign Affairs Committee, which U.S Rep. Michael McCaul chairs, accused Biden of ignoring warnings from his staffers and allies, leaving American interests vulnerable to the Taliban takeover.

Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin says passage of a six-month temporary spending bill would have widespread and devastating effects on the department and the military.

Education has become a primary goal of artificial intelligence interests in Washington.

House Speaker Mike Johnson has teed up a vote this week on a bill that would keep the federal government funded for six more months.

House Republicans have unveiled legislation to avoid a partial government shutdown at the end of the month.

Mexico’s governing party says judges in the current court system are corrupt, and it wants to push through a unusual proposal to make the country’s entire judicial branch — some 7,000 judges —stand for election.

Allred, who had previously gotten the Chamber’s endorsement in his House races, had long used the endorsement as proof of his bipartisan credentials.

Hawaii's congressional representatives say the nation’s disaster relief fund needs to be replenished so the U.S. government can continue to help survivors of Maui’s deadly wildfires and other disasters around the country.

Protesters in Mexico City are blocking the entrance to Congress over proposals that would make judges stand for election.

Federal law already allows only U.S. citizens to vote in elections for president and Congress.

View and easily share in-depth voter guides by The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit and nonpartisan news organization.

Allred’s sharp divergence from Beto O’Rourke’s more active campaign style has stirred dissent among some Democrats. His allies say it’s working.