Alexa Ura
covers politics and health care for The Texas Tribune, where she started as an intern in 2013. While earning her journalism degree at the University of Texas at Austin, she was a reporter and editor for The Daily Texan. A Laredo native, Alexa is a fluent Spanish-speaker and is constantly seeking genuine Mexican food in Austin.
Recent Contributions
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photo by: Marjorie Kamys Cotera
State Sen. Leticia Van De Putte and state Rep. Mike Villarreal — both Democrats from San Antonio — will face-off in the race to become the city's next mayor.
Nothing better demonstrates San Antonio's distinction as a political springboard for Hispanic Democrats than the political turnover triggered when Mayor Julián Castro left to join the Obama administration.
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State Sen. Leticia Van de Putte waves to the delegates at the 2014 Texas Democratic Convention held at the Dallas Convention Center on June 27, 2014.
Two weeks after losing her bid for lieutenant governor, state Sen. Leticia Van de Putte announced that she was running for mayor of San Antonio and would not finish her term at the Texas Capitol.
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State Rep. Mike Villarreal, D-San Antonio signing letter resigning from state House to run for mayor of San Antonio.
A special election has yet to be called for the vacant House District 123 seat, but two San Antonio Democrats are already lining up to replace state Rep. Mike Villarreal, who stepped down to run for mayor of the city.
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photo by: Bob Daemmrich/Marjorie Kamys Cotera
State Reps. José Menéndez (l.) and Trey Martinez-Fischer, both from San Antonio Districts, are seeking the state Senate seat vacated by Leticia Van de Putte, who is running for mayor of that city.
Rep. Donna Howard (D-48) on the floor of the Texas House, February 15, 2011.
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photo by: Marjorie Kamys Cotera
State Sen. Dan Patrick celebrates his election as the next lieutenant governor of Texas in Houston on November 4th, 2014.
Jeremy Bird speaking at The Texas Tribune Festival on Sep. 28, 2013
Oops. Battleground Texas, a liberal group working to boost Democratic hopes in conservative Texas, admitted Friday that its boasts of increased early voter turnout were wrong.
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Early voting at the Acres Home Multiservice Center in Houston on Oct. 26, 2014.
With early voting wrapping up Friday, turnout numbers don't seem to reflect much result from Democratic efforts to cultivate new voters.
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State Sen. Leticia Van de Putte waves to the delegates at the 2014 Texas Democratic Convention held at the Dallas Convention Center on June 27, 2014.
State Sen. Leticia Van de Putte, the Democratic nominee for lieutenant governor, is reaching out to voters in conservative hotbeds in North and East Texas — a nod to Democrats’ dependence on increasing voter turnout in statewide races.
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A nod to the city's changing demographics, the masthead for a branch of Jefferson Dental Clinics in Irving, Texas includes a large Spanish-language sign on its storefront that reads, “A friend of the Hispanic family.”
Democrats are hoping to take advantage of the shifting demographics in Irving to flip Texas House District 105, which has been held by a Republican for more than a decade.
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photo by: Cynthia Goldsmith
Ebola virus virion. Created by CDC microbiologist Cynthia Goldsmith, this colorized transmission electron micrograph (TEM) revealed some of the ultrastructural morphology displayed by an Ebola virus virion.
A representative of the Dallas hospital under scrutiny for its handling of the first Ebola case in the United States apologized on Thursday for mistakes he said the facility made when it initially misdiagnosed the patient.
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Dan Patrick, the Republican nominee for lieutenant governor, is shown at the Texas Republican Convention in Fort Worth on June 7, 2014.
Dan Patrick, the GOP nominee for lieutenant governor, has made clear that he wants to lower property taxes. What he has left unclear — both to voters and to prominent business groups that have endorsed him — is exactly how he'll do that.
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photo by: Todd Wiseman / Callie Richmond
A provision of the Texas abortion law that closed all but eight abortion facilities in the state almost two weeks ago was put on hold Tuesday by the U.S. Supreme Court.
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photo by: Todd Wiseman / Callie Richmond
The U.S. 5th Circuit Court of Appeals on Thursday refused to reconsider a March ruling that allowed Texas to require physicians who perform abortions to obtain admitting privileges at a hospital within 30 miles of an abortion facility.
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Dallas County Judge Clay Jenkins during "All Transportation is Local," part of The Texas Tribune Transportation Symposium on Oct. 17, 2013.
After the first case of Ebola in the U.S. was confirmed in Dallas, Dallas County Judge Clay Jenkins has been thrust into the national spotlight.
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