Good morning –

No doubt you have already read about – and seen – the actions and activities in Washington, D.C., yesterday. Let us all unite in prayer for our Republic.

Here is today's Texas Minute.

– Michael Quinn Sullivan 

Wednesday, January 6, 2021
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• Much of Texas has been placed under a new round of “coronavirus” economic shutdowns by Gov. Greg Abbott – despite his assurances days ago that such things wouldn’t happen again. Brandon Waltens has the details.
     
• Executive orders from Gov. Abbott divided the state into 22 regions called Trauma Service Areas. Any region where the seven-day hospitalization rate is below 15 percent is allowed to engage in economic re-openings, but if coronavirus hospitalizations go over 15 percent the increased restrictions would be put back in place.
      
• This week, Trauma Service Area Q – which contains Harris County – became the latest area to reach the 15 percent threshold for increased lockdowns. That means, as of January 5, that 149 of Texas’ 254 counties are subject to the increased restrictions, including the Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex, San Antonio, and Galveston.

• Looking ahead to the start of the 87th Session of the Texas Legislature, Jacob Asmussen previews the coming fight on pro-life issues. 
   
• Worldometer reports more than 42 million children worldwide were killed by abortion in 2020, compared to 1.8 million worldwide deaths from COVID-19.
   
• “It is baffling to see the response of the pandemic and to see a lot of the slogans about ‘we’ll wear masks if it saves one life’ … yet our culture sees the atrocities of elective abortions and euthanasia year after year in the millions, and we are fine. That’s the status quo, there’s nothing to panic about.” – John Seago, legislative director of Texas Right to Life

• In a new commentary, Cisco businessman Jon Francis exposes the “con game” being perpetrated by Austin lobbyists against the people of Texas.
       
• Francis specifically addresses the top-earning lobbyist in Austin: Gov. Abbott’s former chief of staff, Daniel Hodge. According to state records, writes Francis, Daniel Hodge “earned an average of between $212,639 per month and $319,306 per month.” Those records show that after Hodge stopped working for the governor – through this October – his income as a lobbyist was between $7,655,002 and $11,494,999.
       
• “If Daniel Hodge’s clients are willing to pay him to lobby during years in which the Legislature isn’t even in session, who is he lobbying? I think someone should ask Governor Abbott.” – Jon Francis