To your question, my sense is that Texas is an interesting place--there's a very well-regarded state-level news source (The Texas Tribune) but my guess is that italics readership is the Texas equivalent of Politico's. In DFW, KERA is experimenting in lots of directions--they started or bought a local online paper (Fort Worth Report) and a legacy physical outlet.
I'm not alone, though, I don't think, in observing that if people know anything about politics they are more likely to know about federal politics than state or local. I imagine the toxicity of national politics prevents some people from ever looking any further.
I agree that from a state-level news perspective, Texas is very interesting! I’ve heard the founder of The Assembly compare it to the Texas Observer, for example.
Not sure how much the ugliness of national politics is what’s keeping folks from finding local political news, but the fact that it’s much harder to read a national political story and know how to ~do anything~ about it certainly contributes to alienation and helplessness. Which is a problem! We can meaningfully shape local politics more easily, and they can affect our lives in large and concrete ways (spoken as someone trying to keep PFAS omissions out of the air I breathe).
To your question, my sense is that Texas is an interesting place--there's a very well-regarded state-level news source (The Texas Tribune) but my guess is that italics readership is the Texas equivalent of Politico's. In DFW, KERA is experimenting in lots of directions--they started or bought a local online paper (Fort Worth Report) and a legacy physical outlet.
I'm not alone, though, I don't think, in observing that if people know anything about politics they are more likely to know about federal politics than state or local. I imagine the toxicity of national politics prevents some people from ever looking any further.
I agree that from a state-level news perspective, Texas is very interesting! I’ve heard the founder of The Assembly compare it to the Texas Observer, for example.
Not sure how much the ugliness of national politics is what’s keeping folks from finding local political news, but the fact that it’s much harder to read a national political story and know how to ~do anything~ about it certainly contributes to alienation and helplessness. Which is a problem! We can meaningfully shape local politics more easily, and they can affect our lives in large and concrete ways (spoken as someone trying to keep PFAS omissions out of the air I breathe).