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HIn the hours after the Uvalde school shooting, when family members were frantically trying to fi gure out whether their loved ones were safe, GOP Gov. Greg Abbo was 300 miles away in East Texas raising money for his re-election campaign. Abbo , who was in the region surveying the state’s wildfi re response in Taylor County, said that he only made a brief appearance at the fundraiser before traveling back to Austin.

HBeto O’Rourke crashed an Abbo -led press conference on the Uvalde school shooting last Wednesday, voicing the outrage of millions of Americans as he told the elected offi cials on stage that they are “doing nothing” and their conduct “is totally predictable.” O’Rourke, the Democratic nominee for governor, was escorted out of the building. Outside, he told reporters that Abbo ’s decision to frame the shooting primarily as a mental health issue was “insane.”

HThe San Antonio Police Department has suspended two offi cers who allegedly crashed their police vehicle into another car, then drove away without checking to see whether the people inside were injured. KSAT 12 News reported that Anthony S. Brown was suspended for 40 days, while his partner Jason Owen was suspended for 15. The incident reportedly took place in November when the offi cers were responding to an assigned call.

CPS Energy has made another renewable shift. The municipal utility is adding 300 megawa s of solar power to its portfolio through an agreement with Consolidated Edison Development Inc. The deal is the fi rst made under the utility’s FlexPOWER Bundle initiative, which seeks to add 900 megawa s of solar to replace older, dirtier plants. Construction on the new solar facilities will begin next year, providing 300 jobs. — Abe Asher

YOU SAID IT!

“After every one of these, he holds a press conference just like this — and I wish to hell when he came to El Paso that someone would have stood up and held him to account and confronted him and shocked the conscience of this state into doing something.” — Beto O’Rourke Democratic gubernatorial candidate on why he crashed Gov. Greg Abbott’s Uvalde press conference

Facebook / Rep. Paul Gosar

ASSCLOWN ALERT

Spreading Unfounded Hate with Rep. Paul Gosar

Assclown Alert is a column of opinion, analysis and snark.

It should come as no surprise that after the Uvalde mass shooting, the Internet was awash in bullshit conspiracy theories. By now, we’ve become used to that sad, sick phenomenon.

In the hours following the slaughter, Twitter, Facebook and 4chan users spread around photos of at least three transgender women to propagate the baseless theory that the 18-yearold shooter was transgender.

It’s bad enough that such repulsive smears bubbled up in the wake of the tragedy, but the situation was made even worse by a member of Congress piling onto the trolling.

In a now-deleted tweet, U.S. Rep. Paul Gosar, R-Arizona, made this declaration about the shooter: “It’s a transsexual leftist illegal alien named Salvatore Ramos.” Beyond the falsehoods about Ramos’ national origin and gender identity, Gosar didn’t even get the perpetrator’s fucking fi rst name right before he let his fi ngers spread the hate.

Gosar hasn’t returned a request for comment to multiple news organizations. Li le surprise there. It’s hard to imagine this assclown having the spine to account for fi ring off such a ghoulish, racist and transphobic tirade all in the hopes of scoring cheap political points. —

Sanford Nowlin

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Rep. Henry Cuellar and progressive challenger Jessica Cisneros’ third ba le for the Democratic nomination in a congressional district that stretches from San Antonio to Laredo was their closest yet. With all precincts reporting in last week’s primary runoff , Cuellar led Cisneros by a mere 177 votes. The nine-term incumbent declared victory, while Cisneros, who ran up huge margins in and around San Antonio, said that there are votes yet to be counted. At press time, a recount looked inevitable.

Former District Judge Peter Sakai is the Democratic nominee for Bexar County judge, easily besting State Rep. Ina Minjarez in last week’s runoff . Sakai, a 67-year-old native of the Rio Grande Valley, is set to face former county commissioner Trish DeBerry, the GOP nominee, in a November contest to replace outgoing Judge Nelson Wolff . More than 156,000 Bexar County homeowners have fi led property appraisal protests, the highest number ever recorded as values exploded this year. The number beats the previous record of 141,000, set in 2021. In the coming weeks, the Bexar County Appraisal District will schedule informal hearings with property owners. Owners who missed the initial May deadline to fi le protests can still do so until 30 days after the date on their appraisal notice.— Abe Asher

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