Editor’s note: The views and opinions presented by guest contributors to The Barbed Wire do not necessarily reflect the views and opinions of the company, the newsroom, its staff, advisers, or advertisers. Emmanuel Gonzalez, a 15-year-old who has a serious intellectual disability, walked away from his mom’s fruit stand in Houston in October. His mother […]
Tag: Houston
Posted inSports
‘It’s Top Tier.’ With $260 Million in Funding, Professional Volleyball Is Booming in Texas — and Fans Are Watching.
On a Wednesday night in February at the H-E-B Center in Cedar Park, purple foam fingers swayed in the air during LOVB Austin’s third home game of the season. As the inaugural-season champions, the pressure was on for Austin to beat LOVB Atlanta. After a long rally, University of Texas alum Madisen Skinner scored a […]
Posted inCulture
‘Life-Changing Money’: How the Houston Rodeo Is Leveling the Playing Field in Women’s Events
In the span of 2.8 seconds, Josie Goodrich exploded into the arena on her horse and wrapped her lasso around a fleeing calf. The maneuver landed the 24-year-old from Oregon first place in a preliminary round of breakaway roping at the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo. Goodrich’s roping has won her $5,000 thus far, and […]
Posted inBig & Bright
At Least 15 LGBTQ+ Businesses Have Quietly Disappeared in Texas
EXCLUSIVE San Antonio’s Turner Hall was constructed more than a century ago as a gathering space to improve its community. Now home to a gay bar called the Bonham Exchange, the storied building survived the Civil War, both World Wars, the 1921 flood, and the HIV/AIDS epidemic. Today, like many queer spaces, it’s facing an […]
Posted inCulture
From ‘Kung Flu’ to the Matcha Craze, Asian American Business Owners Say It’s Been a Whiplash Six Years Since Covid
Walk into Hannah Foy’s specialty coffee shop LauLau in Central Austin, and there’s a good chance her father is washing dishes in the kitchen. Her mother — whom the cafe is named after — is usually at the register taking orders for their signature Mala Latte with Sichuan peppercorn or Black Sesame Hot Chocolate. The […]
Posted inInvestigations
Where Did Anti-Trans Laws Start? How a Forgotten Houston Ordinance Turned Into a Massive, Nationwide Culture War
This story is a collaboration between The Barbed Wire and the Investigative Reporting Workshop— a nonprofit newsroom at American University that trains student journalists on in-depth reporting. When she was elected mayor of Houston in 2009, Annise Parker became the first openly gay mayor of a major American city. In 2014, Houston was one of […]
Posted inNews
A Disabled Child’s Mom Reported Him Missing. He Was Locked Away by Federal Immigration Authorities for 48 Days.
This article was published in partnership with The 19th* News. Maria Garcia couldn’t bear to attend the nightly meals near Triangle Lake, where for several weeks, the smell of pinto beans, turkey necks, and other soul food staples filled the air outside a federal children’s detention facility in southeast Houston. The Southern home-cooked meals had […]
Posted inNews
A Woman Asked 43 Churches If They’d Feed a Starving Baby. The Texas Ones Failed Her Test.
UPDATE, Nov. 20, 2025: On Nov. 18, a spokesperson from First Baptist Church told D Magazine that prior to the call that Monroe recorded in her TikTok, she had previously contacted the church and hung up after they provided information about available resources. The spokesperson also said that the church had been alerted about similar […]
Posted inNews
The Government Shutdown Caused Thousands of Flight Delays This Weekend. Even Sen. Cornyn Wasn’t Safe.
Texas airports were hit with thousands of delays and hundreds of flight cancellations over the weekend after the Federal Aviation Administration announced last week it would be cutting flights at the top 40 airports in the nation. Dallas Love Field, Dallas Fort Worth International Airport, George Bush Houston Intercontinental Airport, and Houston’s William P. Hobby […]
Posted inNews
‘Hell on Earth’: Texas Airports Are Slammed With Hours-Long TSA Lines and 1,000 Flight Delays
Correction: An earlier version of this story incorrectly stated the number of flight delays at Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport. There were 1,000 delays over the weekend into Monday, not 10,000. The Barbed Wire regrets the error. Three-hour wait times. Missed flights. TSA lines stretching out the doors. Texas airports are starting to feel the pressure […]