• In Texas, the State Doesn't Stop Wage Theft — And Cities Can't Seem to Either
   
• Ken Paxton: ‘The More We Talk About Gun Regulation, the More People Are Gonna Die’

• New Lawsuit Challenges Dozens of Texas Anti-Abortion Restrictions
   
• Waco Immigrant Mom Locked Up for 2 ½ Years, Alleges Sexual Assault by Guard

The Lede
Rainbow Rodeo

• For three days in late April, more than 100 men and women from across Texas and at least nine other states gathered at Mesquite Arena in the Dallas suburb of Mesquite to compete in the Texas Gay Rodeo Association’s 33rd annual Texas Tradition Rodeo.
   
• They ranged in age from 18 to 72 and competed in 13 events, from bull riding and calf roping to goat dressing, in which athletes in drag must wrangle underwear onto a goat as quickly as possible. The weekend also included a royalty competition that culminated with the crowning of a drag queen and king.
   
• “Anyone is welcome,” says Tim Smith, the organization’s president. “Men, women, fathers and sons and daughters will compete together.”

• Why Some Baptists Weren’t Happy with Mike Pence’s Stump Speech at Texas Gathering
   
• Despite Public Health Risks, Trump’s EPA to Roll Back Regulation to Prevent Methane Leaks
   
• Industrial Wood Processor Accused of Making East Texans Sick May Get to Pollute Even More

• What’s in a Name? Texas SBOE Tentatively Approves ‘Ethnic Studies: Mexican American Studies’
   
• ‘Driven’ is an Edgy Memoir of Cars, Crises and Coming of Age

From the archives
So Long, Lincoln Park

• An oasis of low-income housing collapses in heartache, loss and an FBI investigation in this story from 2016.
   
• From the story: “Even when they first moved in, Lynda and David McLaren sensed that Lincoln Park didn’t belong. In the middle of glossy Dallas suburbs, it was just a trailer park, 46 acres of single- and double-wides surrounded by planned communities with themed architecture and members-only water parks. It was a quirk, a legal oddity, founded as a town in 1970 for the sole purpose of skirting liquor laws in dry Denton, 12 miles away. Its property manager doubled as its mayor, its owner as its town manager.”

What’s Happening at the Observer

• The Texas Observer has a brand-new merch store! Here you can find all kinds of new ways to show your support for the work we do. Show the world your love for independent investigative journalism, and help pay for it all at the same time!
   
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