Greg Abbott Archives - Public Seminar

Disability

Greg Abbott’s Wheelchair

Cripnormativity rewards crips like Abbott for distancing themselves from other disabled people

June 10, 2025 • by Andrew Joseph Pegoda

On July 14, 1984, an 8,000-pound oak tree fell down in the River Oaks suburb of Houston, Texas. The tree stuck a young man out doing one of his favorite pastimes—running—leaving him paralyzed from the waist down. But the young man, who had just received a law degree from Vanderbilt ...

Sex & Gender

The Courage of E. Jean Carroll

Telling one person you were raped is hard; telling a nation is heroic

May 11, 2023 • by Claire Potter

It would be foolish to tell anyone not to be afraid of Donald Trump, and it would be foolish not to fear the consequences of being widely known as a person who has been raped....

Democracy

“I’ve had enough”

When are we going to do something?

May 25, 2022 • by Heather Cox Richardson

Today, a gunman murdered at least 19 children and 2 adults at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas. For years now, after one massacre or another, I have written some version of the same article, explaining that the nation’s current gun free-for-all is not traditional but, rather, is a symptom of ...

Feminism

How We Are Doing in Texas

S.B. 8 and the hypocrisy of a “pro-life” state

September 8, 2021 • by Lauren Gutterman

_____ On September 2, 2021, I received a text from an old friend, an advocate for global reproductive health. “Sending love to Texas,” she wrote. “How are you all doing?” In short, not well. The day before, Senate Bill 8 took effect; that night, the United States Supreme Court announced it ...

Politics

Will GOP Voters Go to War with Corporations Over New Vaccine Mandates?

And what are Republican leaders going to do when the civil society moves in the direction of good public health?

August 30, 2021 • by John Stoehr

_____ Now that the Food and Drug Administration has finally given its full blessing to the Pfizer BioNTech shot, the president is jawboning corporate leaders into establishing mandates requiring employees to be vaccinated. This is not a reversal, as some reporters have said. Joe Biden is not ordering firms to do ...

Will GOP Voters Go to War with Corporations Over New Vaccine Mandates?

The Right

Stop calling the GOP ‘conservative’

That’s the lesson today from Texas.

February 18, 2021 • by John Stoehr

"As the late Rush Limbaugh said, if conservatism animated the Republican Party, there would be no President Donald Trump."...

Democracy

The United States Is in Recovery

What Texas, white supremacy and coronavirus can teach us about American history

February 18, 2021 • by Heather Cox Richardson

"In the exchange, Americans saw a president who cared, and a government that finally, after its previous leaders had told them to get out of a terrible catastrophe on their own, responded to their needs."...