Trump Backs Mike Johnson For Speaker

Jimmy Barrett takes you through the stories that matter the most on the morning of 12/31/24.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:02):
This is Huge Radio seven forty kt RH Houston five
everywhere with fire now.

Speaker 2 (00:10):
The latest news, weather and traffa. It's more of what
matters to you. From the John Morris Services Studios.

Speaker 3 (00:17):
Good morning, It's five am New Year's Eve. Here on
Houston's Morning News. I'm Jimmy Barrett. Among our top stories
as we get started this morning, slowly getting back to
normal in areas hit by Saturday's tornadoes. Trump Back's Mike
Johnson for speaker, and coming up at five o eight,
the Folther vourtex is coming back. Will it get Houston
details in the minutes ahead. You're in Houston's Morning News. First,

(00:39):
we're checking the sky Mike for the first time this morning.
We're off to a rough start. Jimmy Barrett, this is
forty five. The Peer selebated northbound. You got this reggits
technically at Hogan. Sure looks to me like they've shut
down the whole pier salivated. This is northbound northbound southbound.
You're actually getting bted. In fact, you can't really see it,
so watch out as you're coming around. Not only from

(00:59):
forty five, I have the Peer slevraated part of downtown,
but also if you're coming around I ten from the
east side to the west side, the KD side, watch
out for that closure. I'm Skymike will revisit this at
five ten in the Generator Supercenter dot Com traffic Center
from our KTRH stop tax Defenders twenty four hour weather
center areas Apache Foggs. Starting our day today, then partly

(01:19):
clouding with the high temperature in near seventy colder weather
evidently is coming to town. We'll see if Terry knows
anything about this polar vortex when we talked to her
in about nine minutes right now sixty five at your
official severe weather station, News Radio seven forty k TRH.
It's time now for the news. Here's Cliff Saunders.

Speaker 4 (01:37):
Thank you very much, Jimmy. Good morning everybody. Five o
two on KTRH, our top story this hour. The cleanup
continues from Saturday's tornado outbreaks, slowly getting back to normal.
Montgomery County officially declared a disaster after an EF three twister.

Speaker 5 (01:52):
We had plenty of damage. Three hundred and two damaged
homes is our internal estimates. Thirty of them were actually
destroyed completely flattened.

Speaker 4 (02:01):
County Judge Mark Kello in Galveston County. The storm's knocked
out power to the Bolivar Peninsula.

Speaker 6 (02:07):
All of Bolivar was out of power from Saturday approximately
one forty five.

Speaker 4 (02:13):
County Judge Mark Henry telling us that nobody was hurt.
And in Brazoria County, the alvin Id says students of
the Walt Disney Elementary School will be temporarily relocated because
of damage from the storm. Things seem to be calming
down at the airports as well, after a couple of
days of mass delays and cancelations. This morning at Bush

(02:34):
excuse me, as my flight aware just went down on me.
At Bush Airport, we've got eight cancelations, or rather eight
delays than seven cancelations. And at Hobby just a handful
of flights have been delayed so far five h three
on KTRH. We now know more about the memorial services
for former President Jimmy Carter after his death on Sunday.

Speaker 7 (02:55):
Funeral services for the former president will begin on Saturday,
January fourth, then run through the ninth. They include viewings
in Atlanta and Washington, d C. A ceremony at the
National Cathedral, and a stop outside his boyhood farm in
South Georgia.

Speaker 4 (03:12):
That is Fox's Jonathan Serry. President Joe Biden did sign
an executive order closing all executive departments and agencies of
the federal government on January ninth, while the House is
set to vote for Speaker on Friday, and President elect
Donald Trump has given his full endorsement to the incumbent,
Mike Johnson.

Speaker 8 (03:32):
I'm really humbled in honor to have President Trump's endorsement
for Speaker again. He and I work so well together,
so closely together, and we have a lot of big
things to do.

Speaker 4 (03:41):
But some Republicans, including Thomas Massey of Kentucky, say they
won't vote for Johnson, who worked with Democrats to keep
the government open Earlier this month. Massey online called Johnson
quote the next Paul Ryan. It's now five oh four.
The President elect is set to make waves with some
executive orders on January twentieth, his very first day back

(04:03):
on the job, for.

Speaker 9 (04:04):
Mass deportations to addressing vaccine mandates. The engine revs up
in twenty one days, beginning.

Speaker 10 (04:10):
On an inauguration day, and that very first week of
the second Trump presidency, there are going to be an
extensive amount of orders that really change the direction of
the country.

Speaker 9 (04:19):
Political strategist flied to Vidia Access He'll have two years
to build before the midterms, but the shift needs to
go more swiftly than that.

Speaker 10 (04:26):
I think that first three hundred and sixty five days
of this president's here are going to be key to
establishing a successful second term.

Speaker 11 (04:32):
He says.

Speaker 9 (04:33):
The orders have already been drafted and things will move
quickly onto a Perard News Radio seven forty e KTRH.

Speaker 4 (04:39):
Thanks Andre chompst return is a big reason why new
polling shows that Americans are more optimistic about twenty twenty five.
No surprise to Fox's Brian kill.

Speaker 12 (04:48):
Mean got the sense things will be different. In my view,
When Jeff Bezos told people at watch sim Posts, we're
not going to endorse a candidate leading up to the election,
he had a bunch of people quick because that.

Speaker 4 (05:00):
In fact, Trump becoming president elect was the top reason
that people were hopeful, ranking higher than either personal relationships
or finances. But in order to get to twenty twenty five,
we all had to go through what may have been
the most absurd year ever in politics.

Speaker 13 (05:18):
Perhaps the most politically absurd thing we dealt with this
past year. President Joe Biden's quote unquote connective sharpness.

Speaker 14 (05:25):
This is the sharpest, most intellectually clear guy ever. There
will never be a time when this isn't embarrassed.

Speaker 15 (05:31):
That both to the people involved and to us as
American political and economic analyst Jack Novak says Biden was
never mentally or physically fit to serve.

Speaker 14 (05:39):
Becoming clear now that this guy was not mentally capably
president from day one.

Speaker 13 (05:45):
Novak calls to cover up of Biden's mental decline the
biggest political scandal in American history. Jared Lewis, News Radio
seven forty k j H.

Speaker 4 (05:52):
It's now five oh six. Border sanity is also returning
on January twentieth, right on the.

Speaker 16 (05:58):
Gate, we're going to conscentrain in public safety t and
you want to talk about heartless. I got mayors and
governors who say they're going to do everything can prevent
me from arresting public fafty threats.

Speaker 4 (06:06):
The incoming borders are Tom Homan last night. Now, a
massive debate has erupted over the H one B visa
program back by Trump, which allows citizens of other countries
to come here and work.

Speaker 17 (06:18):
Tech companies say those visas are necessary. Others say they
hurt American workers.

Speaker 15 (06:23):
Legal immigration is an area where there's disagreement. There are
indeed ways of satisfying both sides of this concern.

Speaker 17 (06:32):
Mark Krikorian with the Center for Immigration Studies says, we
could start by reforming the program.

Speaker 15 (06:37):
You would do that by giving the visas out based
on who is offered the highest salary rather than by lottery,
which is the way you do it now.

Speaker 17 (06:46):
That would allow tech companies to still bring in high
skill labor while also protecting American workers. Ethan Buchanan News
Radio seven forty KTRH.

Speaker 4 (06:54):
And by the way, Krekorian joins Jimmy at six point twenty,
it's five oh seven. If you thought road construct shouldn't suck, now,
wait till next year.

Speaker 11 (07:02):
We're going to have some major major construction projects. The
one that worries me the most is that deal downtown
where they're going to retool forty five to follow along
with it and the East text. Not only will that
be a huge hold up with traffic itself, look how
it will affect buildings, homes, businesses downtown.

Speaker 4 (07:23):
Our own sky miike. Well, the good news is that
for people between Texas City and League City, some intersections
along the Gulfrey Way. We'll finally be opening next year.
I'm Cliff Saunders on Houston's news, weather and Traffic station
k t RH.

Speaker 2 (07:37):
This is Houston's Morning News with Jimmy Barrett.

Speaker 3 (07:42):
All Right, here comes social media talking about the polar vortexts.
Uh stop you you've heard this one before. You know
that we're going to go into a d freeze and
here in Houston and everything is going to die, including us,
that we're going to have freezing down pictures for long
periods of time. Is It's kind of what's going around

(08:05):
right now on social media starting I want to say,
starting January eighth or ninth, somewhere in there, I think
is where I'm seeing it. And it's so prevalent on
social media right now that some of the local meteorologists
have been tackling and I'll probably later this hour i'll
share with you KHOU eleven's Pat Calvin trying to explain

(08:27):
the polar vortex. It's it's it's fun to watch meteorologists
try to explain the polar vortex because they get they
get so wrapped up in it, you know, they get
so they get so scientific and they start throwing around
all these terms, and they try to explain, you know,
here's you've got. You've got this frigid air that's up
around around the polar ice caps, and normally it's kept
captive up there by the jet stream. But the jet

(08:48):
stream is going to weaken, and when the jet stream weekends,
then this, this super cold air can leak out and
make its way south. And the only question is how
far south will it go and just how cold will
it get? Now, I did see the long range forecast.
We'll ask Terry about this in the moment. I don't
know if she's bothered to look at the long range
forecast it or she's heard that there's all this social

(09:09):
media talk about the polar vortex coming. But I do
know that the long range forecast, when the weather Channel
has high temperatures, I want to stay around January seventh
or eighth, maybe around fifty degrees somewhere around there, which
is certainly chilly, but not exactly what I would call frigid.
But we'll get into that in just a second. Right now,
five to ten, Let's talk a little traffic first, because

(09:32):
already a big problem this morning sky mind.

Speaker 11 (09:34):
Oh yeah, downtown, that's I forty five. The pure slevated
is shut down after I ten northbound, so basically that's
really forty five, and what is shut down is the
ramp from downtown that takes you on to forty five northbound. Now,
is that affecting it. It's tough for me to see
if you could completely get through downtown, but it looks
like for it looks like I ten going from the

(09:56):
Baytown side to the Katie side. Is this big tangle
of lane here. I've got kind of a flat shot
on camera number two O six. If you're playing the
home game with me, whatever's going on here, it's nothing good.
They've shut it down again. This is the ramp from
forty five coming out of downtown, past the Ferris Will
and all and northbound. That ramp that takes you up
to Dallas to the Dallas exit forty five north, that's

(10:18):
shut down. I'm gonna stick my neck out and say it.
You're able to get through now from the Baytown to
the Kadi side. We're going to keep an eye on that. Also,
I noticed it's not affecting southbound. This is even though
it's all lanes closed right there. Overturned vehicle by the way,
it's not affecting southbound. So if you're coming down the
North Freeway trying to hit the pair of elevated you
need to take the Dallas Street exit or whatever. You're

(10:39):
just fine, Katie Freeway not affecting you inbound either. Twenty
four minutes from Grand Packway M and Westpark Tollway, your
big shots, you look good from Grand Lakes all the
way into the Southwest Freeway.

Speaker 15 (10:51):
That vote.

Speaker 11 (10:51):
Polar vortex doesn't show up on I put Peel's pocket
radar Terry. I'm Skymike in the Generator Supercenter dot com
twenty four hour traffic center.

Speaker 3 (10:58):
From r kat reached to tax defenders twenty four hour
oathers than a cord terry. Yes, say she had to
explain fog and today she's got to tackle the polar vortex.

Speaker 11 (11:05):
Every day is something they get Doppler nine thousand over
there every day.

Speaker 18 (11:08):
So you're speaking my language, honey, Oh.

Speaker 11 (11:11):
You're gonna geek out on me right here, aren't you.

Speaker 19 (11:13):
I'm going to try to contain myself, okay, talking like
I'd like to contain the polar vortex. Okay, So do
not be afraid. The polar vortex, uh is always there,
and it's uh just basically these winds that encircle the

(11:35):
North Pole and the South Pole, and they're always there,
they're always blowing. But what happens is occasionally we get
these little spinoffs from the polar vortex and it'll bring
some colder weather and everybody freaks out because it feels
like the Arctic has arrived. And yes, we will get

(11:55):
what I would call a modified air mass that will
make its way into Southeast Texas by early next week,
where our temperatures during the day likely in the fifties
and at night right now it looks like in the thirties.

Speaker 18 (12:09):
So we'll be watching it.

Speaker 19 (12:10):
There's other places in the country where this is going
to be a much more drastic and problematic change, but
it does look like we'll get some colder air what
like a week from now, so we'll watch it.

Speaker 18 (12:23):
Hey, there's cooler weather on the way today.

Speaker 19 (12:26):
That coldfront's making its way through Southeast Texas as we speak.
So we do have a little bit of fog, and
the fog should begin to thin out fairly quickly, so
a sunny day and it feels like it's December here
on this last day of December, mid upper sixties today
and dry tonight, and tomorrow's even cooler, low to mid sixties,
quick chances, some rain of forty percent chance of showers Thursday,

(12:49):
but then we dry out Friday and Saturday. We're going
to stay in the sixties for the temperatures really through
most of this week.

Speaker 3 (12:56):
Right now, sixty three at your official severe weather station,
seven k TRH. It's Houston's Morning News, brought to you
by New South Windows Solutions. Now back to Jimmy Barrits
and the Houston Morning News Team. All the info you
need to take on the day. So can you believe
it last day of the year New Year's Eve is today?
Of course, I will say this. I did notice, and

(13:20):
I and I do have a tendency to notice these
things because when I drive in it, like you know,
two forty in the morning, I notice when the traffic
patterns seem a little bit different. Traffic is relatively light,
I mean it always there is at two forty in
the morning, but I am noticing more police officers out there,
and I think, you know, you can count on the
fact that there is enhanced enforcement for d WY. So

(13:43):
the last thing you want to be doing today tonight
tomorrow is drinking and driving. It's just, you know, not
that you would do that. I just feel compelled the
that I do see an extra presence out there this morning.

Speaker 11 (13:54):
So you may want to mind your.

Speaker 3 (13:55):
P's and q's. Buy twenty time for traffic and whether
it's good to get they'll be around the ghet to. Yeah,
you might want to slow down just a little bit.
Today's guy, Mike.

Speaker 11 (14:03):
Yeah, we're just not going to go anywhere for New
Year's Eve. Let's do here's the deal downtown. I got
a fresh look here. I've also got some info from
tech dot. Boy, the people at Trendstar are so helpful
this morning. Thank you. No, seriously, not like the toll
way forty five North Pier salivated completely shut down right
before the b Someone bridge. This is an eighteen wheeler cab.
I'm seeing him flipped over. Okay, you got a box

(14:25):
truck on the side. They tell me has Matt's been dispatched.
So it's the whole thing gonna be like this for
a while. It's forty five Peer salvated northbound coming up
through downtown. They're forcing everybody up off to it east.
You can go over to Saint Arnold and take a
U turn off of McKee Street. It's not affecting you
if you're coming from the Baytown side to the KDI side.
And we'll have a we'll have another zoom in at

(14:47):
the five point thirty report and the Generator Supercenter, dot
Com Traffic Center.

Speaker 3 (14:51):
Carl Rovan Democratic Legacy for President Biden and what Republicans
need to do in January. We'll do that next verst
Our rh Top tax Defenders twenty four. Our Weather Center forecast.
There is a patchie vogg following partly cloudy near seventy today,
mostly Sunday sixty three Tomorrow Thursday clouding with occasional showers.
I hears sixty temperature right now is fifty eight. Nope,

(15:14):
make that sixty three at your official severe weather station.
News Radio seven forty k TRH. Get you caught up
on some of our top stories on this New Year's Eve.
Here's Cliff and we're brought to you Bymorrow.

Speaker 4 (15:25):
Mechanical and ongoing out It shuts down Texas DPS license
offices statewide until Thursday. Ice reportedly closes down two programs
that gave social services to illegals because of quote immense
costs and Texas Longhorns backup quarterback Arch Manning shoots down
rumors he lent you the transfer portal after the season.

(15:47):
Get the latest news anytime at KTRH dot com. Our
next update is at five thirty The ones that are.

Speaker 20 (15:53):
Under construction two eighty eight sixty ten accidents.

Speaker 2 (15:56):
Send alternate next on the ten line. Seven forty KTRH to.

Speaker 3 (16:01):
Twenty three is our time here on Houston's Morning News.
Right Carl Rove on Fox, You know, all the TV stations,
all the major TV stations are all reminiscing because it's
New Year's We're starting a brand new year tomorrow, twenty
twenty five.

Speaker 11 (16:15):
And here we go.

Speaker 3 (16:16):
Before we let twenty twenty four go, let's talk about well,
two things. First of all, what Republicans need to do
in January and what the legacy of Joe Biden will be.
Here's Carl Rove on both of those items.

Speaker 21 (16:28):
Well, they could start by focusing early next year on
things where success is possible and where it's being demanded
by the American people. Some of that can be done
through the executive for example, rolling back a lot of
the rules and regulations, an unnecessary red tape that's burdening
American business, particularly small business. But it is going to
require action in Cougres. So if you look at the

(16:51):
political landscape, the thing that they have the best chance
of pulling together something and getting it done relatively quickly,
meeting within a matter of months is probably something to
do with the border, because even Democrats are now realizing
that this is a political problem for them and a
huge challenge for the country, and that we better get
our act together. Well, it's not going to be pleasant,
at least in the short run. We're going to see

(17:12):
that history says you were the guy who was responsible
through the Build Back Better Actuality, American Rescue Plan and
other activities, in kicking off a gigantic burst of inflation.
We are already challenged by the fact that COVID had
occurred and that supply chains were stretched to the limit.
But even Democrats like Barack Obama Secretary of the Treasury

(17:34):
Larry Summers warned, if you spend this much money, you're
going to cause inflation. And it did, and it's caused
a huge problem. A gigantic reset is now under way
in America where people realize their paychecks are here and
the amount of money they now need to spend for
what they used to be able to match with that
paychecker now here, and the gap between the two is
not yet closed. The second thing that they're going to

(17:54):
remember him for is weakness on the international front, almost
from the beginning moment most visibly seen and the withdrawal,
the bloody, unnecessary withdrawal from Afghanistan that embolden the dictators
in Moscow, Tehran, Punyang, and Beijing to see America's weak
and led, in my opinion, directly to the Russian invasion
of Ukraine and to the embolding of our adversaries in

(18:17):
the Middle East in the attack on October seventh on Israel.

Speaker 11 (18:20):
So he's going to be seen as at home.

Speaker 21 (18:22):
Debilitating our economy, and abroad they're going to be seen
as a man whose weakness invited attacks on our allies
and our friends. And then we're going to be left
with the moment we saw on June twenty seventh, when
he debated Donald Trump and showed himself incapable of putting
two sentences together. He will be seen as a man

(18:43):
who should not have been there in the first place,
and certainly should never have considered running for a second
term because he wasn't up to fulfilling and finishing his
first term with strength and vigor, let alone trying to
seek eight years of office in the White House.

Speaker 11 (18:57):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (18:58):
Pretty harsh, but very accurate when you say, you know,
sometimes time helps a president. You know, sometimes you don't
really appreciate a president what a president did. I don't
think anybody maybe you and me did. But there's a
plenty of people who didn't appreciate what Trump accomplished in
his first term until they had a Biden term to
compare it to. But I don't think history will smile

(19:21):
very brightly on the presidency of Joe Biden. I don't
think time is going to help that at all. It's
five twenty six here on News Radio seven forty k TRH.

Speaker 22 (19:32):
Are Houston's News, Why there were traffic plus breaking News
twenty four to seven. This is News Radio seven forty
KTRH Everywhere with the IRF.

Speaker 2 (19:44):
More of what's happening now from the Sean Morris Services Studios.

Speaker 3 (19:48):
It is five thirty here on Houston's Morning News. I'm
Jimmy Barrett. Among our top stories this half hour, Seawan
Tier The's the new Harris County DA starting tomorrow, How
will things change?

Speaker 11 (19:59):
Why should we ca there?

Speaker 3 (20:00):
About Greenland and coming up at five thirty eight new
Texas laws that starts tomorrow. Etail's in the minutes ahead.
You're in Houston's Morning News first. We're checking out that
morning drive again. Here semi speed limit are they? I
don't think so? Scomish you all.

Speaker 11 (20:13):
Right, Let's go downtown forty five North right at the
v Someone Bridge. You've got this overturned eighteen wheeler cab.
I've got a super sized ninja on there. It sure
looks to me like everybody's okay, but it's a mess.
You've got the cab on the left side. You've got
the actual box trailer on the right side. The long
story short here is that forty five North is closed
coming out of downtown. They're forcing everybody over to it.

(20:36):
In east you can exit McKee and come back around
up the San Jacino Entrance. The rest of the way
east on the Beytown Freeway east to the Katie Freeway. Iten.
You can actually get by just fine. Don't worry there
skylike on the classic Buitt GMC Traffic Center from r
KTRH Generator super Center twenty four hour Weather Center areas
Apache Fogg to start our day, followed by Partley Clotti

(20:56):
SKYS nine.

Speaker 3 (20:57):
You're seventy. We'll get you the latest on the forecast.
Harry Smith is at the Weather Channel. We'll talk to
her in nine minutes. Tip it to right now sixty
three at your official severe weather station. News Radio seven
forty k TRH. It's time now for the news. Here's
Cliff Saunders.

Speaker 4 (21:12):
Thank you, Jimmy. Good morning everybody, five thirty one on KTRH.
Now our top story. As violent crime continues throughout Harris County.
A new district attorney takes office tomorrow.

Speaker 23 (21:23):
Sean Tier was narrowly elected in November after beating in
covet Da Kim Ogg in the Democrat primary. Tier is
a liberal backed by George Soros, promising to push things
like bail reform. Former Harris County GOPHR Jared Woodville says
it's up to the public to hold Tier accountable.

Speaker 24 (21:39):
First six months first year in office, we'll really be
able to see what kind of DA is, whether he's
a law and order DA for someone who's using the
office to target political opponents and use it as a
stepping zone for future advancement. I hope that's not the case.

Speaker 23 (21:52):
As for Ogg's corruption case against staff members in Lena
Hidalgo's office that has been turned over to the Attorney
General and the Texas Rangers.

Speaker 11 (22:00):
Cory Jolson News Radio seven forty KTRH.

Speaker 4 (22:02):
And by the way, according to campaign finance reports, SORROW
spent over two million dollars on tears campaign. One case
you will have to deal with is a North Harris
County man facing charges after allegedly threatening to kill a woman,
hitting her with a beer bottle, and then setting her
car on fire. Recently five point thirty two on KTRH,
we're learning more about what some of the victims of

(22:24):
Saturday's tornadoes went through. A conro woman suffered multiple fractures
after being trapped under debris.

Speaker 20 (22:31):
She had everything on top of her and my uncle
and my dad were actually the one stat we're able
to pull her out.

Speaker 11 (22:39):
And what kind of injuries did your mom, susame she.

Speaker 20 (22:42):
Has currently she has super broken legs, she has fractures
on her friend and back.

Speaker 4 (22:47):
The woman's daughter with our TV partner channel too. Montgomery
County Judge of Mark Keo signed a disaster declaration yesterday.
More on the outbreak and the cleanup at six o'clock.
Holiday travel, of course, was impacted my the storms, but
things seem to calm down yesterday and that trend continues
this morning. At Bush Airport. According to flight Aware, there

(23:07):
are eight delays and seven cancelations, a total of four
delays out of Hobby five point thirty three on KTRH
Here we go again, President Joe Biden sending Ukraine more
aid on his way out of office, announcing a three
point four billion dollar budget aid on top of the
two and a half billion dollars in military aid he

(23:29):
gave them yesterday. Meantime, President elect Donald Trump has floated
the idea of acquiring Greenland again, but would that be
of any use to US?

Speaker 17 (23:40):
Greenland's proximity to the Arctic, the US and Europe makes
it a critical asset.

Speaker 25 (23:45):
Given its geopolitical situation and its natural resources, it makes
sense for US to express an interest in Greenland.

Speaker 17 (23:54):
National security analyst Ed Trzanski says China and Russia likely
also have an interest in the island.

Speaker 25 (24:00):
Sunately, the Danish government has been rather inattentive to developing
military assets in that area.

Speaker 17 (24:07):
Trzanski says this may have been an attempt by Trump
to get the Danish government to do more to secure Greenland.
Even Buchanan News Radio seven forty KTRH.

Speaker 4 (24:16):
It is now five point thirty four on KTRH. There's
also this a South Korea. By the way, South Korea
has approved in a restward for President Yunsuck y'all, who's
been impeached over his decision to impose martial law. Earlier
this month. Well, according to the latest number, seventy percent
of Democrats say they're taking a break from political news

(24:37):
following Donald Trump's win on election Day. Maybe this is
why the MSNBC narrative that was being pushed all the
way through the campaign.

Speaker 26 (24:46):
I would say, Kate Harris over two hundred and seventy
electoral vote, I think she's gonna win.

Speaker 11 (24:50):
You rote Trump is toast. Do you stand behind that today?

Speaker 27 (24:54):
Oh?

Speaker 11 (24:54):
Even more so?

Speaker 4 (24:55):
James Carville and Michael Moore got it wrong. The poll
was conducted earlier in December. Looking at your Money, the
mainstream media claims holiday retail sales went up because of
Biden's strong economy. They ignored inflation. Though, yeah, you spent more,
but you got less. It's just the continuation of a
pattern of these last four years.

Speaker 28 (25:17):
Under Biden, unharrissed so far, the average family has actually
lost income, so they're poor today. And one of the
reasons for that is because a lot of these countries
are stealing jobs. We're not creating jobs in the areas
that we want.

Speaker 4 (25:31):
Heritage Foundation economists Stephen Moore, American households are looking at
an average of ten seven hundred dollars in credit card
debt these days. Credit cards, or rather credit scores are
dropping and debt piling up. Over the last four years.

Speaker 29 (25:46):
You have a low credit score, which sort of limits
your ability to open new credit and when you're carrying balances,
of course, those are going to come with very high
interest rates north of twenty two to twenty three percent,
so at some point the debt becomes unsustainable.

Speaker 4 (26:01):
That is while at hubs chip LOOPO. Another victim of
bidonomics America's retailers who are forced to close stores and
move online.

Speaker 30 (26:10):
And now that includes part of the prescription drug industry.
According to Lone Star College economics professor Hank Lewis, I
think a.

Speaker 31 (26:17):
Lot of it is going online. One of the biggest
competitors we're seeing these days for walreings and CVS to
talk about pharmacies is Amazon.

Speaker 30 (26:26):
Some of the best prices are being found online. Plus
Amazon can take your health insurance to lower your costs
even more. Professor Lewis says, as we go into twenty
twenty five, he's interested in seeing how well Mark Cuban
does with his competing pharmacy company. Michael Shiloh and News
Radio seven forty KTRH five thirty seven.

Speaker 4 (26:46):
Now ut faces Arizona State in the college football playoff
quarterfinals tomorrow at the Peach Bowl. Pregame at one on
Sports Talk seven ninety, kickoff at two thirty. By the way,
if you're looking for some local action this afternoon, it's
Baylor and LS you at NRG in the Texas Bowl.
They'll get that game started at two thirty. I'm Cliff
Saunders on Houston's news, weather and traffic station, News Radio

(27:08):
seven forty KGRH.

Speaker 1 (27:11):
Be informed, be on time.

Speaker 11 (27:14):
Houston's Morning News continues with Jimmy Arrett. Well, Texas law
changes every now and again.

Speaker 3 (27:23):
Tomorrow's January first, so there's some new Texas laws or
law changes that go into effect. Most quite honest, I'm
just going to kind of skim through this because most
of this you probably aren't going to either care about
or it's going to be hard to figure out what
it really means. One is the Property Tax Relief Act.
I know you care about that. Many sections of the
Centate Bill too, or the Property Tax Relief Act, have

(27:45):
already taken effect to amend the property tax system. But
there are two different sections that take effect starting tomorrow
that will grant additional federal funding to eligible schools if
local property tax revenue isn't keeping up with the expenses
due to tax limitations, such as those connected to elderly
and disabled homeowners whose taxes cannot be increased. Probably won't

(28:11):
impact most of you. It's not going to make any
difference on how much is being taken out in property taxes.
It makes a difference to some of the schools.

Speaker 11 (28:19):
I guess.

Speaker 3 (28:20):
The bill seeks to lessen property tax burdens on homeowners
and maintain predictable property tax rates, although we've already found
out that many municipalities, including the City of Houston, managed
to find ways to get around these things and to
go ahead and approve higher property taxes even though they
should be putting them up for a vote with that

(28:43):
whole hurricane thing declaring an emergency, Yeah, we need to
raise property taxes for an emergency. That's one of the
loopholes the state legislature left in there. The Texas Data
Privacy and Security Act takes effects starting tomorrow. It adds
a chapter to the Texas Business and Commerce Code. Most
of the chapter took effect in July. Just a little

(29:03):
bit more of it will take effect. Opt out mechanisms
taking effects starting tomorrow. The San Antonio River Authority fiscal
year has shifted. I don't think most of us care
about that. Here's here's the big one, of course, and
having already done this because I have a vehicle whose
registration expires at the end of January, I didn't have

(29:23):
to have a safety inspection per se I live in
Harris County, but I did have to have an emissions test.
Now it seems to be shouldn't shouldn't we be able
to not have to have an emissions test on a
vehicle that's after a certain year, like within the last
five six years, or even within the last ten years.
Shouldn't shouldn't most any vehicle produced during that time be

(29:44):
able to pass the emissions test? But Harris County is
one of those places where you have to still get that.
It's a seven dollars fifty cent fee. You don't have
to get the rest of the safety inspection, but you
do have to get the emissions test by forty time
for traffic and whether together.

Speaker 11 (29:57):
I don't like that inspection drop through the I guess
you can just drive around with no lights or breaks now,
as long as you're not putting out too much smag.
I guess guy, I am telling yeah, right, don't pollute,
but you know, drive around where we can have a
wreck here, Jimmy, And I'll tell you what. I have
never seen as many vehicles without lights, without tail lights,
without headlights as I've been seeing the last couple of

(30:18):
months too on the freeways. Let's continue to assume number one,
the other drivers are stupid and they're going to do
something dumb, and two that there's a refrigerator in the road,
or a dog or a freeway zombie or something. Let's
keep our heads up Houston, all right, forty five downtown.
I still think everybody's okay here. The way they're reacting.
We're looking at a closure of forty five coming off

(30:38):
the piers, celevated northbound. What they do is they've shut
it down at the before there be someone bridge, they've
shut you down. They'll put you on the East Freeway
exit McKee. Come back around like you're coming out of
San Jacino or right before San Jacento. You'll see it.
You'll hit the McKey exit going that way. And if
you're trying to hit the k D side or go
back to the North Freeway, easiest skip around is to

(30:59):
take the East text, Terry, if you're trying to get
around that, if you're hazardous, of course you'll have to
take six ' ten the loop. So I head that way.
Rest of our freeways rocking along for now. Oh I
do I do have a stall here? This is forty
five north southbound. That makes sense at the Beltway, right
before that ramp that takes you over to Bush Airport lookout.
And of course you have to have the roadwork at

(31:20):
all them Westfield westbound, that's the left line knocked out.
Some of you were like, well, Terry Smith, the people
on TV told me we were all gonna die from
the polar vot text and I'm gonna go out my
toilet paper and all that. So set them straight. I'm
in the classic Buick GMC traffic center.

Speaker 3 (31:34):
Here we go, get from r KTRH Generator super Center
twenty four hour will the center Terry is here. Yeah,
it's gonna cool off, but we're not expecting the great
frieze of two years ago, at least not at this point.

Speaker 19 (31:43):
Oh my goodness, boy, do I remember that? And no,
I don't think it's going to get that kind of cold.

Speaker 18 (31:52):
But we are talking, and this is next.

Speaker 19 (31:54):
Week, starting Monday, and then really through the week at
like temperatures during the afternoon in the fifties and at
night in the thirties. Not that deep freeze that we
had two years ago. There'll be other places in the
country that will be stuck in the deep freeze for
an extended period of time. So it is a big deal,

(32:17):
but it's not such a big deal for us. Fortunately,
you will notice.

Speaker 18 (32:21):
Some cooler weather today.

Speaker 19 (32:22):
Mother Nature's kind of easing us back into winter time.

Speaker 18 (32:25):
That's how I'm looking at it.

Speaker 19 (32:27):
The coldfront's moving offshore, the clouds and the fog that
will clear out of here shortly. We'll wind up sunny,
mid to upper sixties today. That, my friends, is what
it's supposed to do in December. Tomorrow cooler, low to
mid sixties. Thursday's our next chance of rain. That's the
next cold front, forty percent chances some showers Thursday. We're

(32:47):
dry Friday and Saturday. Now, Thursday, Friday, and Saturday temperatures
for the most part will be in the sixties. So
we're on track for where we should be this time
of year.

Speaker 3 (32:56):
Right now sixty three at your official Severe Weather station
news radios up in forty k trh.

Speaker 11 (33:01):
What you need to know for the day ahead.

Speaker 2 (33:04):
This is Houston's Morning News, brought to you by New
South Windows Solutions.

Speaker 3 (33:09):
So how much do you know about Greenland or Greenland
however they pronounce I'm not even sure how they That's
how little I know, not even sure how they pronounce it.
All I know is that President Trump has been talking
about Greenland and how they need to pay for their
own protection. But also I think he's been talking about
the strategic importance of Greenland. I don't know much more

(33:33):
about it, but we have a guy who does, Ed Tarzanski,
national security expert, will talk to Ed about it coming
up next first though, at five point fifty.

Speaker 11 (33:41):
It's actually bigger than Texas it's big. I really hesitate
to ever say that. I don't think it's that green. No,
I don't. I think it's I think it's white. I
think it's white like snow. But it's bigger than Texas.
All right, well, let me give mister Ed a lot
of extra time here. All I've got for now is
this forty five north thing downtown. Coming out of downtown,
right before the b Someone Bridge, we had a big

(34:02):
wreck k TM wheeler turnover. Blah blah blah. I think
everybody's okay, but and this is a big Texas but
they're putting you on the East Freeway, forcing you to
go toward Baytown. Hop off mckeid bust to you turn there.
I'm Skywike and Theegenerator Supercenter dot Com Traffic.

Speaker 3 (34:16):
Center from our KTRH Generator Supercenter twenty four hour weather Center.
We have areas apatche fogg to starter Day followed by
mostly sunny skies, cooler temperatures, high temperature near sixty eight
for tomorrow, mostly sunny to party Cloudie's sixty three Thursday
Thaddy with about a forty percent shower chance at a
high temperature near sixty temperature right now still sixty three

(34:36):
at your official severe weather station, News Radio seven forty
k TRH. Time to check out some of our top
stories here on this Tuesday morning, on this New Year's Eve.

Speaker 4 (34:46):
Here's Cliff, Thank you, Jimmy, brought to you by Marrow Mechanical.
A disaster declared in Montgomery County because of Saturday's tornadoes.
An appeals court did i as an attempt by President
elect Donald Trump to throw out the verdict in the
e Gen Carrol civil trial, and Harris County fireworks stand
gets hit by robbers over the weekend and loses ten
thousand and fireworks ahead of New Year's Eve. Get the

(35:09):
latest news anytime at KTRH dot com. Our next updates
at six.

Speaker 11 (35:14):
I live in Pasadena Sharptown Southwest.

Speaker 2 (35:16):
Next on the ten time saving traffic on seven KTRH.

Speaker 4 (35:22):
CAM.

Speaker 3 (35:23):
I guess they're big enough to have a song. Five
p fifty two is our time here in Houston's morning news. Right,
President Trump's sparking some concerns with some people. I guess
after floating a desire to control Greenland. Well, Greenland does
have some strategic importance. It's not very green, it's pretty white.
It is actually direct it's part of the Kingdom of Denmark.

(35:46):
They have their own language there, they speak Greenlandic. Their
currency is the Danish Krone. They are an autonomous territory
and they are the world's largest island. That's about all
I know, Edgarwsanski's national security expert. What else do we
need to know about Greenland and why would Greenland be
important to President Trump?

Speaker 25 (36:07):
Well, it's three times the size of Texas, eighty percent
of it is covered by an ice sheet. It's got
fifty seven thousand residents, making it the least sparsely populated
place on Earth, and it has lots of strategic significance

(36:28):
to the United States, the shortest distance between Europe and
North America in terms of movement by sea. But with
changes in climate, more and more minerals are now accessible
to development, especially rare earth minerals, which is what we

(36:52):
need to fuel the economy in terms of high tech. Also,
there is a gold rush, if you will, and not
just gold, but all sorts of strategic minerals between the
United States, Russia, and China right now. And the chances

(37:17):
are that you're going to be able to have travel
across the Arctic in a commercially viable way. We have
a major space facility in Greenland, and for a very
long time we have been complaining to Denmark that they

(37:39):
are not spending the kind of money they need to
in terms of securing the island from Russian and Chinese intervention.
And with Trump coming in and saying again I want
to buy the place, all of a sudden, Greenland has said, well,

(38:00):
we're going to spend one point three five billion dollars
on defense, which is just to put it in perspective, Jimmy,
it's less than the tenth of the cost of a
new aircraft carrier, So lots of years of under investment
in national security defense spending. The Chinese especially are very

(38:24):
aggressive about exploring that region for natural resources. And I
think Trump has eyes forward. Doesn't mean he's going to
get it, but he has certainly gotten the attention of
the government in Denmark and more but not oh, he

(38:45):
certainly is Look, this isn't This is a man who
can spot value, and he isn't always the most diplomatic
or tactful in how he pursues things. But Greenland first
came to the notice of the United States government in
eighteen sixty seven, Truman tried to buy it and Denmark

(39:08):
said no. And quite frankly, we're going to have to
break some eggs and offend some people as we express
our national security interests, and it's just not for our benefit,
but also for Europe.

Speaker 3 (39:23):
Sure, we're also we only have a few seconds left here,
and I'm sorry to give you a short shift here
on answering the question. But we're also have that same
level of interest right now, do we not? In the
Panama Canal, we.

Speaker 25 (39:36):
Do, and God bless them and rest of soul. Jimmy Carter,
I think mistakenly gave it away. China is very aggressive
in looking for choke points to keep us on our
side of the Pacific, and it has ambitions that go
well beyond their own neighborhood. So again, it it's become

(40:01):
a much smaller and much more complex world, and I
think Trump is recognizing it and speaking about it in
a way that Americans quite frankly, have not been exposed
to for a very long time.

Speaker 3 (40:15):
And thank goodness, he is ed, thank you so much.
National security expert Ed Tarzanski joining us is five p.
Fifty six.

Speaker 1 (40:24):
This is used radio seven forty ktrh Houston Live Everywhere
with Avenue.

Speaker 2 (40:31):
Now, the latest news, weather, and it's more of what
matters to you. From the John Morris Services Studios. Six
am is our time, Houston's Borning News. I'm Jimmy Barrett.
Among our top stories this half hour. Slowly getting back
to normal in areas hit by Saturday's tornadoes, Trump backs
Mike Johnson for speaker, and coming up at six o' eight,

(40:51):
how many people will occupy Planet Earth as of tomorrow?
Details in the minutes ahead. You're in Houston's Moorning News. First,
did you know what time mine?

Speaker 11 (41:00):
There are more than twice as many people in Pasadena
than there are in Greenland. I did not know that. Sorry,
so random. All right, trafficing weather. Here's me forty five downtown.
It's a complete shutdown, but it's an easy skip around.
I still think everybody's okay here too. This is what
the deal is. It's an overturn eighteen wheeler. The cab
went this way, the trailer went that way. Forty five
north coming out of downtown, right at the b Someone Bridge.

(41:23):
All right, that's Hogan Street. And what they've done is
they're forcing you off onto the East Freeway. Hip McKee
bust to U turn. Easiest skip around is sixty nine
East Text Freeway. Do that instead, or if your hazards,
of course, take the loop. I've offered Tammy Rose ten
dollars to say toe Treck Ninjas on Channel thirteen Skymike
and the Generator Supercenter, dot Com traffic Center.

Speaker 3 (41:43):
Broba RKTRH top tax Defenders, twenty four hour weather center
areas of patche Fogg, followed by mostly sunny and cooler
temperatures today. High temperature right about sixty eight. I think
we got as high as eighty eighty one yesterday. Terry
Smith will join us in eight business with an update
on the forecast right now sixty three at your official
severe weather station, News Radio seven forty KRH. It's time

(42:05):
now for the news. Here's Cliff Saunders.

Speaker 4 (42:07):
Thank you, Jimmy, Good morning everybody. Six ZH two on KTRH.
We are sponsored by Isopharmic. Our top story Montgomery County
declares a disaster after Saturday is tornadoes residents hoping the
state declares one too.

Speaker 32 (42:21):
A lot of us aren't going to be able to
afford even though okay, we have insurance, but there's still
that deductible. There's things that we do need help with.

Speaker 4 (42:29):
That woman talking to our TV partner channel too. In
Brazoria County, students at the Walt Disney Elementary School forced
to temporarily relocate because of storm damage.

Speaker 33 (42:40):
We're in the process right now, working with transportation and
families that we will bust them to another site, an
open school that we currently have that we were using
for training and things of that nature, but we have
to set it up as a whole new elementary.

Speaker 4 (42:53):
School official since they can do all of this without
kids missing any classes. As for the airports, things calming
down a little bit this morning. As of now at Bush,
I see seven cancelations in seven delays. At Hobby at
same number of four delays so far this morning. It's
now six oh three. On KTRH, President Joe Biden sets

(43:14):
state funeral services for Jimmy Carter, who died on Sunday
at the age of one hundred.

Speaker 34 (43:19):
January ninth is a national day of mourning. President Biden
says the nation will be tribute to former President Jimmy
Carter that day at the Washington National Cathedral. Flags are
flying at half staff for the next thirty days and
the thirty ninth president, is expected to lie in state
in the Capitol Rotunda, is twelve other US presidents have
done since Abraham Lincoln.

Speaker 4 (43:40):
That is Jared Halpern reporting. Congress returns to work and
will vote on a House speaker on Friday. The President
elect endorsing Mike Johnson to retain the gavel.

Speaker 8 (43:50):
He recognizes that what we need right now. I think
my colleagues recognize this as well. Is a proven fighter
and a true MAGA conservative.

Speaker 4 (43:59):
Johnson on Fox. Republicans have a two hundred and nineteen
to two hundred and fifteen advantage in the House. Johnson
can only lose one Republican vote. It's now six o four.
The President elect is prepared to implement his agenda on
day one with a flurry of executive orders. Political strategist
Flat Davidick says those orders will set the tone for

(44:20):
his new term.

Speaker 10 (44:21):
President Trump has a good two years to really build
on a strong record of success before the midterm elections,
and he's got an opportunity to send a strong message
and build a strong case.

Speaker 4 (44:32):
Meantime, Trump's return to the White House has more people
optimistic about next year. In fact, as Brian Kilmey points
out even Trump haters are on board.

Speaker 12 (44:43):
Elon Musk, who had walked off the President's Business Council
after what he thought was a controversy to Charlottesville, he
is now firmly on board, and those two are bros.

Speaker 4 (44:53):
According to you gov, forty seven percent of those polled
a year ago said they were hopeful about twenty twenty four.
Fifty seven percent say the same thing about twenty twenty five.
But to get here we had to deal with the
absolute absurdity that was twenty twenty four. Political analyst Jake
Novak says, there was one thing that happened that really

(45:14):
took the cake.

Speaker 35 (45:15):
Let's not ignore the element of the room.

Speaker 11 (45:16):
All the way through July before they pulled.

Speaker 14 (45:18):
Them off the thicket, we had to endure not only
people in a Democratic party, to people like Joe Scarborough
telling us that Joe Biden was sharp as attack.

Speaker 4 (45:27):
In fact, one CBS reporter on the Sunday Shows called
the decline of Biden mentally one of the most underreported
stories of the year. Coming up on six zero six,
the battle lines are being drawn between sanctuary cities and
the new Trump team, three weeks before it takes over.

Speaker 36 (45:43):
Local sanctuary laws say police cannot use government resources, meaning
computers or phones, to communicate with ICE about the release
of immigrant and custody, which is contrary to federal law,
which says the opposite that state and local government cannot
restrict police from communicating with ICE. ICE filed three hundred
thousand detainers in the last four years, telling cities and

(46:05):
state jails to hold immigrants for deportation.

Speaker 4 (46:08):
William Laugenesse reporting there there are calls for the new
Trump administration to reform the H one B visa program
after a heated debate about how important immigration is to
the tech industry.

Speaker 15 (46:21):
Maybe set a salary floor. In other words, you're not
allowed to have an H one B unless he's going
to be paid a minimum of two hundred thousand a year,
something like that.

Speaker 4 (46:31):
Mark Riccrian with the Center for Immigration Study says that
would help solve the problem of H one B visa
abuse while also allowing tech companies to bring in the
highly skilled workers they say they need. Meantime, a new
bill has been found in the Texas House ahead of
next year's legislative session that aims to create a framework
for responsible AI use in Texas.

Speaker 27 (46:53):
For instance, let us know when artificial intelligence is being used,
especially when there isn't a human in the loop, and
make sure that the decisions that make are explainable.

Speaker 11 (47:02):
State Rev.

Speaker 4 (47:02):
Giovanni Caprile, owned C says the bill will also help
with job training so that Texans can get jobs in
the state's growing AI industry. Finally, some of you are
going to get a welcome break when it comes to
your commute. In twenty twenty five.

Speaker 30 (47:17):
Well ktrh's sky Mike says, one of the most treacherous
traffic spots in the state is construction free.

Speaker 11 (47:25):
You have the worst interchange in the state, six ten
at the Southwest Freeway. Finally that one's finished for now.
They're talking about it KDE Freeway elevation increase from downtown
to to loop to alleviate flooding costs by White Oak byous,
So that's going to be a big deal.

Speaker 30 (47:41):
Sky Mike ads that Metros halted the University Corridor bus
route and the inner KD bus route. For now, they're
talking about merging the new HOVs with the main lanes.
Michael shilohone News Radio seven forty KTR.

Speaker 4 (47:54):
And I'm Cliff Saunders on Houston's news, weather and traffic
station KTRH.

Speaker 2 (47:59):
A New Years is always a news year. On Houston's
information station.

Speaker 1 (48:04):
New Journey is something new.

Speaker 11 (48:06):
It's two day in the New Year.

Speaker 1 (48:07):
Use radio seven forty KZRH.

Speaker 3 (48:11):
Hello earthlings the six o eight so our time here
on Houston's morning news. World population according to the US
Census Bureau. Hang on, is this the same US Census Bureau?
They can't tell me how many illegal aliens there are
in the United States? Why should Why should I listen
to them for this? According to the US Census Bureau,
there will be eight point zero nine billion people on

(48:36):
planet Earth on New Year's Day. The population increase was
seventy one million people in twenty twenty four according to
the Bureau's estimates. Put that one in air quotes. That
means we don't know for one hundred percent certain. It's
just an estimate. Four point two bursts and two point
zero deaths are expected worldwide every second. In January twenty

(49:00):
twenty five, US population estimated total three hundred and forty
one million on New Year's Day, So the world population
eight point zero nine billion people. US population three hundred
and forty one million, six ten time for traffic and
weather together.

Speaker 11 (49:15):
Almost as many people in Rosenberg as there are in Greenland. Greenland.
Not a lot of folks in green Lines gone. It's
kind of lonely up there. Let's go up the cold too,
you know what. Let's go downtown forty five first, and
then i'll take you back to Rosenberg. Downtown. I think
everybody's okay. Forty five North is shut down. The accident's
at the v someone bridge. Northbound of the cab is

(49:35):
over here, the trailers over there, there's flashy lights. I
got super sized ninjas on the scene here, but that
doesn't mean it's clearing anytime soon. Forty five coming out
of downtown completely shut down. They force you on to
iten east. You can bust a U turn at McKee,
get back around like you're coming up from san Ja Center.
The easy hack around that, of course, is fifty nine.

Speaker 35 (49:55):
Terry.

Speaker 11 (49:55):
I don't know what you're carrying, but I know it
blows up real good, So your hazards takes six ten instead.
Rest of our freeway's rocket along two ninety We look good.
Grand march of what from ninety nine? Your grand march
is just twenty two minutes here Katie Freeway looks good
here twenty one minutes and Southwest Freeway we're moving at
We're moving a little above posted speechs from the Brass

(50:18):
River all the way up in. I'm gonna take a
minute from Mike from Magnolia. He's coming up to ninety.

Speaker 37 (50:22):
Dude, heyst yeah, ninety no fog, no traffic.

Speaker 27 (50:27):
But back to Billy Beer.

Speaker 38 (50:28):
Resident Carter signing the law.

Speaker 14 (50:30):
In nineteen seventy eight a beer that.

Speaker 11 (50:31):
Allowed craft beer to take off. In nineteen seventy eight,
there were only ninety.

Speaker 27 (50:35):
Breweries in the US. Right now there's over ten thousand
craft brewis of thanks Jimmy Carter.

Speaker 11 (50:40):
You know, Cliff is very excited about that. Hang on,
did he say crap beer on a crap craft like
all that crazy stuff Cliff tricks, I thought, because I
thought Billy Bear was crap beer. I'm in the Generator
Supercenter dot Com traffic Center from r kat r H
stop tax defenders twenty four hour whathersent abyla way for
the record, they'll only blow up.

Speaker 3 (50:58):
The terry Smith has is the doll she uses on
occasion so she can drive in the hob lace.

Speaker 11 (51:04):
That's it. Oil gen has it blows up right, Terry.

Speaker 19 (51:07):
Yes, that's the only thing. And we have another name
for billy beer in the South.

Speaker 11 (51:15):
What is it?

Speaker 18 (51:16):
Moonshine?

Speaker 11 (51:17):
Oh, rock car I thought of that.

Speaker 19 (51:21):
Well, it's a modified version of moonshine. Anyhow, Yes, Billy
Carter quite a quite a character. Hey, listen, we got
a nice stretch of weather, folks, especially if you've got
plans today, tonight or tomorrow.

Speaker 18 (51:35):
You know, we got some big football games going on.

Speaker 19 (51:37):
People want to get outside and celebrate, and it is dry,
and the temperatures are cooler, a little more comfortable for December.
We'll wind up with plenty of sunshine today, mid upper
sixties this afternoon. Now, it's going to be a little
chilly tonight, so bundle up if you're heading out. Temperatures
will wind up mainly in the forties Tonight, Tomorrow, still

(52:01):
sunny and dry, lot mid sixties, then some rain Thursday
of forty percent chances. Some showers will dry out. Friday
and Saturday. We're going to stay in the sixties as
far as these temperatures go through Saturday.

Speaker 3 (52:14):
Jemperture right now sixty one at your official severe weather station,
News Radio seven forty ktrh.

Speaker 11 (52:20):
USE traffic and weather.

Speaker 2 (52:22):
You're starting your day right with Houston's Morning News, brought
to you Biden New South Windows solutions.

Speaker 3 (52:29):
So Elon Musk I think has changed to President Trump's
mind on H one B visas because Elon Musk pointed
out to President Trump that, hey, I wouldn't have been
able to come to this country and do what I've
done in this country if I didn't have an H
one B visa. So as as the Trump administration looks

(52:49):
for ways that they can reform immigration here in the
United States, one of the things that they're looking at,
or we're looking at, were H one B visas. We'll
talk about with Mark Ricoryon. He's executive director at the
Center for Immigration Studies. We'll do that next first though,
Traffic and weather together, starting with U Sky Mike.

Speaker 11 (53:07):
All right, everybody's okay, but forty five coming out of
downtown's completely shut down. At I ten, we'll go over
to McKee bus to U turn or just take the
east text that's easy. Albert from Kingwood, Young Albert from
Kingwood is on Grand Parkway. Monus guy, Mike, dude, Happy
New Year.

Speaker 25 (53:22):
Kingwood to Comball is snail free and it only took.

Speaker 11 (53:26):
Me twenty minutes.

Speaker 1 (53:27):
I'll see use traffic court.

Speaker 11 (53:28):
Bye bye, all right, I'm in the Generators Supercenter dot
Com Traffic Center.

Speaker 3 (53:32):
From r KTRH top tax Defenders twenty four hour weather
center for today are's Apache Fogg to Starter Day, followed
by mostly Sunday, Sky's Cooler near sixty eight Tomorrow Mostly
Sunday depart the Claudie with a high sixty three stepter
right now sixty one at your official severe weather station,
News Radio seven forty k TRH. Time to check out

(53:53):
some of our top trending stories on the Tuesday on
New Year's Eve.

Speaker 4 (53:56):
Here's Cliff, Thank you Jimmy, the Georgia Attorney General. Once
that stage Supreme Court to reject Fannie Willis's attempt to
get back on the case of prosecuting Donald Trump. A
Pentagon appeals court approves the plead deal given to the
nine to one one or that of the nine to
eleven conspirators they got they will no longer face the
death penalty and riddle me this. Oxford says, brain rot

(54:19):
was its word of the year for twenty twenty four.
But isn't brain rot two words.

Speaker 11 (54:24):
You would think?

Speaker 35 (54:24):
So?

Speaker 11 (54:24):
Yeah, get the latest.

Speaker 4 (54:25):
News anytime at KTRH dot com. Our next update is
at six thirty.

Speaker 11 (54:31):
I live at Katie. Your best ways are round Houston.

Speaker 2 (54:34):
Next on the ten on seven KTRH.

Speaker 11 (54:40):
He's not talking about the charge card, is he?

Speaker 3 (54:42):
No, because I don't really under stand language you're speaking,
But I'm pretty sure he's talking.

Speaker 11 (54:46):
About passports and visas.

Speaker 3 (54:48):
Mark reccorny is with us, the executive director Bartney at
the Center for Immigration Studies. All right, let's let's get
into this H one B visa thing. Elon musk As
I mentioned, I think told President Trump, you know, I
wouldn't be here if not for the H one B visa.
It's kind of an important program.

Speaker 35 (55:05):
Yeah, I mean, it's a supposedly temporary visa usually used
by tech companies. The thing is, there's kind of two
groups of people, if you want to think about it
this way, that take advantage of it. Some of them,
a handful, are people who really are best and brightest,

(55:25):
top people in the planet, you know, in their fields.
The problem is that most of the visas go to
kind of mid level average at best, you know, tech
people who are used as white collar, cheap labor. And
so the question is, and that's where the abuses all

(55:47):
come in. For instance, a number of years back, some
of your listeners may remember this was a big deal.
Disney fired all of its IT staff and replaced them
with h one bs from India. And to make it
even worse, it forced the Americans they hired to train

(56:08):
their replacements as a condition of receiving severance pay, and
their replacements frankly didn't know what they were doing and
had to be trained. So where's the best and brightest thing?
So people talking about this are conflating two things. The
tech industry people like Elon Musk and others are saying, look,

(56:30):
pointing to the real top people who get in with
this visa, the sort of maga people complaining about it
are pointing to the other majority of the people who
get this visa, who frankly aren't best and brightest and
are the reason abuses. So the question is how do
you fix this without getting rid of it? And you

(56:52):
fix it. You fix it by not giving them the way,
distributing the way it's done. Now, believe it or not,
they actually give this out by lottery. Lottery millions of
millions of come one hundreds of thousands of companies apply
and they picked randomly from them. That's no way to

(57:15):
get the best in Brighten. No, if they just changed it,
and the Trump administration the first time tried to change
it by giving the visas out based on the highest
salary first, you would satisfy both groups of people's concerns.
And that's something I tried to push for last week
in a piece.

Speaker 3 (57:34):
I wrote, this is some of this, though kind of
mark kind of subjective. In other words, you may be
hiring somebody who on paper looks, you know, middling or mediocre,
but turns out to be great, you know, after a
period of time, turns out to be one of the
best investments your company ever made. Can you make it

(57:55):
an objective decision about people just based on the salary
that the job is going to pay.

Speaker 35 (58:03):
It's look, it's a rough yardstick, there's no question about it.
But we're talking not about how companies in this country
are going to sort of take a chance on a
job applicant or something that you know that you're right,
that happens somebody you thought wasn't going to turn out
all that great surprises you.

Speaker 10 (58:22):
That's fantastic.

Speaker 15 (58:23):
But we're talking.

Speaker 35 (58:24):
About letting foreigners into the country to compete in the
American labor market, and we're going to have to use
some kind of objective, you know, measurement, and it seems
to me the way to do that is to let
businesses tell you who they think is really going to

(58:45):
be the best, who they value based on how much
they're willing to pay. That person's not going to be perfect,
but this is government we're talking about, and it's good
enough for government.

Speaker 3 (58:55):
Work and certainly better than what's being done now. Mark
is always good to talk to you.

Speaker 11 (59:00):
Thank you.

Speaker 3 (59:00):
Mark Grecoryon, Executive director of Center for Immigration Studies. It
is six twenty six here on News Radio seven forty KTRH.

Speaker 22 (59:11):
Houston's News, Why there were Traffic plus Breaking News twenty
four to seven.

Speaker 39 (59:15):
This is News Radio seven forty KTRH five Everywhere with
the IRP.

Speaker 2 (59:22):
More of what's happening now from the John Morris Services Studios.

Speaker 3 (59:26):
It is six thirty now here on Houston's Borning News.
I'm Jimmy Barrett. Among our top stories this half hour,
Shawn Tier is the new Harris County DA starting tomorrow,
Why should we care about Greenland? And coming up at
six thirty eight. They died looking for Bigfoot details in
the minutes ahead. Here in Houston's morning news. First, we're
checking out that morning drive again. Sky Mike's here all right.

Speaker 11 (59:48):
Forty five North still shut down. They're rerouting everybody after
the Ferris Wheelder forced you onto iten E's just hit mckeeth,
do a you turnaround and the best thing to do
is not get on forty five to the pier so
cause that's a big squiesh. Now, let's do the East
tex instead. If your hazardous take six ' ten two
eighty eight. So look at pretty good now Lake Jackson.

(01:00:08):
Half the population of Greenland. We're looking at free sailing
all the way into downtown. I'm Skymike on the Generator
Supercenter dot Com Traffic.

Speaker 3 (01:00:15):
Center from r KTRH Generator of super Center, twenty four
hour Weather Center areas of pache Fogg followed by mostly sunny,
cooler today with the high temperature near sixty eight. Lit'll
be cooler still for tomorrow on the weekend. We'll check
it all ouvent Terry Smith at the weather Channel. We
will talk to her in nine minutes right now sixty
one at your official severe weather station News Radio seven

(01:00:36):
forty k TRH. It's time now for the news. Here's
Stiff Saunders.

Speaker 4 (01:00:40):
Thank you, Jimmy six thirty one on KTRH, and our
top story is the fight against violent crime in Harris County.
Democrat Shawn Tier officially takes over his district attorney tomorrow.
Former Harris County Gophare Gerard Woodville, an attorney himself, says Tier,
We'll have to earn the public's trust.

Speaker 11 (01:00:59):
Yeah, nights of the a's office.

Speaker 24 (01:01:01):
We've seen that happen in New York against President Donald Trump.

Speaker 11 (01:01:04):
We saw it Abner and Harris County.

Speaker 24 (01:01:05):
We see it happen all over the nation when liberal,
progressive prosecutors who.

Speaker 11 (01:01:10):
Have an agenda come in.

Speaker 24 (01:01:11):
I am hopeful that Sean Tier will take a different.

Speaker 4 (01:01:13):
Approach Outgoing District Attorney Kim Ogg turned over the corruption
case against County Judge Lena Hidalgo's office to the Texas
Attorney General's office, so that case is likely to continue.
As Tier had indicated he would probably not move forward
with that case. Tier also comes in as crime continues
across the county. We're now expecting additional chargers to be

(01:01:36):
filed against a man accused of trying to disarm a
Precinct four deputy constable as he was being arrested for
reckless driving six point thirty two on k TRH. As
the cleanup from Sunday's tornadoes continues, we are finding out
more about some of the injuries people have been left
with sub broken legs.

Speaker 20 (01:01:54):
She has fractures on her friend and back. She has
her fracture from both sides. The top of her spine
is fractured, so any wrong movement she can be paralyzed completely.

Speaker 4 (01:02:07):
That Montgomery County woman talking to our TV partner, Channel
two about her mother injured in the EF three twister
that touchdown Inporter Heights. Holiday travel headaches are getting a
little bit better this morning. So far, we've got four
delayed flights out of Hobby, and we've got seven flights delayed,
seven flights canceled out of Bush according to flight Aware.

(01:02:30):
It's now six thirty three. President Joe Biden has three
weeks left in office, and he managed to give you
create another six billion dollars in aid yesterday, two and
a half billion in military help and three point four
billion in budgetary assistance. President elect Donald Trump raised eyebrows
after expressing an interest in purchasing Greenland, but it might

(01:02:53):
have just been an attempt to get the Dutch to
do more to secure that country.

Speaker 25 (01:02:58):
Clear Throat said he had a strong interest, and all
of a sudden, the Dutch government, which wasn't spending anything,
says we're going to spend a billion and a half
dollars of media.

Speaker 4 (01:03:08):
National security analyst Ed Turzanski says that both China and
Russia have an interest in Greenland, which is rich in
resources and incredibly close to the United States. The newest
polling from the Associated Press shows that seventy percent of
Democrats are taking a break from political news because of
the election. As for why, well, how about the narrative

(01:03:31):
they were fed. I think it's going to be a blowout.

Speaker 17 (01:03:33):
Actually, I don't think it's going to be a close race.

Speaker 11 (01:03:36):
We're tied on election day.

Speaker 16 (01:03:37):
As always, the polls will be tied and then he'll lose.

Speaker 4 (01:03:40):
The view got it wrong, so did Bill Maher. The
poll was conducted earlier this month, and The New York
Post reports that the Trump team has told its cabinet
nominees to stop posting on social media ahead of confirmation
hearings next month. Pete Hegseth's hearing for Defense Secretary is
scheduled for January fourteenth, approaching six thirty five, and the

(01:04:02):
mainstream media claims a growing economy is what led to
higher retail sales over Christmas. They ignored inflation and the
fact that your dollar didn't buy you as much as
it did a year ago. Of course, it was all
a different story during the first Trump presidency.

Speaker 28 (01:04:18):
The average family when Trump was president saw a five
five hundred dollars real gain in their incomes, and that
was true of virtually every single racial.

Speaker 4 (01:04:28):
Group, Heritage Foundation economist Stephen Moore. And there's this credit
card debt under Biden is out of control and it
has been since COVID.

Speaker 13 (01:04:38):
Credit scores are sinking and people are falling behind on
their payments.

Speaker 29 (01:04:42):
Credit scores did rise during that period, but of course
what happened there is post COVID, was the inflation took over.

Speaker 13 (01:04:49):
Writer and analyst at wallet Hub Shif Loopo says, managing
your credit card debt ultimately comes down to common sense.

Speaker 29 (01:04:55):
You want to create a budget and stick to it.
You have to be able to track your income and
your expand is especially in this era when everything is online.

Speaker 10 (01:05:03):
Everything's automated.

Speaker 13 (01:05:04):
Total credit card debt in the US is about one
point two trillion dollars. Charet Lewis News Radio seven forty
Key Chair eh.

Speaker 4 (01:05:11):
And according to the home selling website Zillow, empty nesters
are beginning to downsize, but those older homes aren't where
young Americans want to live, so they're not being bought.

Speaker 27 (01:05:22):
They want their kids to be plugged into these what's
considered the best school districts, of the best educational opportunities.
I still think there's going to be a huge set
even if you can work from home, that are going
to want to be in and around the metropolitan area.

Speaker 4 (01:05:35):
Real estate developer Easton Maka says that another option is
for companies to move closer to where these homes are,
but that would take years. Corporate America also suffering under bidonomics.
We had bankruptcies for big lots, Red Lobster, the Container store,
Party City. This as consumers cut back spending, causing businesses

(01:05:55):
to cut back.

Speaker 31 (01:05:56):
To especially seven eleven, Walgreens and CBS. Those companies over expanded,
they opened up way too many locations. I gotta know
about you. It seems like every block there's a CBS
and a Walgreene literally next to each other. But I've
also seen a whole lot of seven elevens closing over
the past year all over Houston.

Speaker 4 (01:06:13):
Well Star College economics professor Hank Lewis says you'll probably
see more stores closing in twenty twenty five. And finally,
the Texas Longhorns face Arizona State in the Peach Bowl tomorrow.
That is the college football playoff quarterfinal. Coverage on Sports
Talk seven ninety starts at one if you can't wait.
Baylor plays LSU at the Texas bullet and RG this afternoon.

(01:06:36):
And I'm Cliff Saunders on Houston's news, weather and traffic
station KTRH.

Speaker 11 (01:06:42):
I live in Spring, I live in Katie.

Speaker 2 (01:06:43):
You're reliable forecast next on the ten on seven forty KTRH.

Speaker 11 (01:06:51):
There he is not, like I say him. Wait a minute,
where'd he go? He'd like disappeared into the thin air.

Speaker 39 (01:07:01):
What.

Speaker 3 (01:07:02):
I don't know what you make of Bigfoot or Sasquatch
or Yetty's or whatever the heck you want to call them.
You know, people have been spotting them for generations, so
it seems like there's got to be something out there.
Somewhere right. But then again, if there were, where are they?
Where do they disappear to?

Speaker 35 (01:07:20):
Why?

Speaker 3 (01:07:20):
Why do we never find anybodies? Why do we only
find footprints and get some pictures every now and again
from a distance. You know, I'm not going to get
into the whole theory about interdimensional creatures or any of
that crazy stuff. But here, here's what I do know
that if if a buddy of mine, let's let's say
we're just hanging out, right, We're hanging out by a

(01:07:43):
national forest and it's wintertime, and my buddy, who's maybe
had a few too many beers, says to me, you know,
we really should go looking for sasquatch. I think I'm
trying to think at what points, how much alcohol what
I have to have consumed in order to say, yeah,
let's go do that. That's a good idea. I don't think.

(01:08:08):
I don't think there's enough alcohol to get me to
do that. Two men reported missing on Christmas Day after
venturing out to search for Bigfoot the previous day weren't
kids either. Fifty nine year old and thirty seven year
old appear to have died from exposure in the Gifford
Pinchot National Forest conclusion was based on weather conditions in

(01:08:31):
the area and the men's lack of preparedness for the situation.
In other words, they didn't have the right equipment, they
didn't have the right clothing, and probably did have enough
familiarity with the National Forest to kind of find their
way in or out. And that's what happened. And then
the herd. I guess six forty time for traffic and
weather together. Do you go searching for Sasquatch?

Speaker 26 (01:08:53):
Oh?

Speaker 11 (01:08:54):
Yeah, I mean I practically have up in Liberty County.
Do you think he's out there somewhere. Yeah, I think
he's in the River bottoms of you from Liberty County.
Know what I'm talking about? River bottom Woo. I have
to look there. My first wife came from the River Bottoms.
All right, North Freeway, I have forty five coming out
of downtown. Let's see right at the b someone bridge,
I see supersized ninjas on the scene. That's a complete

(01:09:14):
shutdown overturn eighteen wheeler. I still think everybody's okay. Jumping
Joe didn't give me any kind of he's a fireman.
He didn't give me indication that there was any kind
of injuries what we have is a shutdown forty five
coming out of downtown. They'll reroute you to Itees, do
the you turn at McKee or sixty nine. And of
course if your hazard, just just take the loop and
get around this. Rest of our freeways rocking along for now,

(01:09:36):
Golf Freeway, we don't have the usual record park Place
northbound North Freeway inbound, we haven't had our w record
Shepherd yet. I've got ghetto. Dave taken that right in
between the belt and the loop.

Speaker 27 (01:09:46):
Did a full moon in the hood over your mix.

Speaker 25 (01:09:48):
These people are driving around like thatch out of hades.

Speaker 15 (01:09:51):
Man.

Speaker 27 (01:09:52):
I have to do your budging all.

Speaker 11 (01:09:53):
Right, Dave, thanks so much. Banana stickers all around. And
I'm Skymike and the Generator Supercenter dot com Traffic Center.

Speaker 3 (01:09:59):
From a r RH Generator super Center twenty four hour.
Whether Sentaert Terry Smith is here? Not good weather for
search and for saasquatch this morning? Is it kind of
hard to see him through the fog?

Speaker 19 (01:10:09):
Well, and the fog is improving though, That's what I've
noticed here in the last hour or so. We still
do have some areas of fog, but the dryer air
is starting to make its way into southeast Texas, so
whatever low clouds and fog are out there currently will
quickly disappear. It'll be a nice day really, with the
sunshine and the cooler temperatures more in line with what

(01:10:32):
we would expect on the last day of December. Mid
upper sixties today, and we are dry tonight as well.
Bundle up though if you're heading out. Low's in the
forties overnight tomorrow, a sunny day, low to mid sixties.
We do have some raine of forty percent chance of
showers Thursday, back to blue skies Friday and Saturday, and

(01:10:52):
it's just a quiet stretch of December. Our temperatures will
be in the sixties through the rest of the week.

Speaker 3 (01:10:57):
Jepature right now is sixty at your official severe weather station,
News Radio seven forty k TRH six forty.

Speaker 11 (01:11:06):
D time here in Houston. This morning.

Speaker 3 (01:11:07):
He is right, Kevin o'larry. We'll finally figured out what
Kevin o'lary, you know, shark tank dude is trying to do.
He's trying to broker some sort of a a not
a Canada becoming the fifty first state, which was the
Trump joke, but some sort of a trade union between
the two countries, and evidently he's going to go pitch

(01:11:28):
the idea at mara A Lago to President Trump.

Speaker 11 (01:11:31):
Here's Kevin o'lary.

Speaker 32 (01:11:33):
Good, Frank Kevin O'Leary, who joins us this morning. Kevin,
we understand you headed tomorrow Lago to meet with President
elect Trump. You have said you want to broker a
deal that will create an economic union between the US
and Canada.

Speaker 15 (01:11:48):
Is that right?

Speaker 11 (01:11:50):
Yes, there's no reason to be fighting.

Speaker 26 (01:11:51):
We've been talking about this for decades, and I think
the time is right what I did, and I've been
doing this now for about forty eight hours, and I'm
getting a lot of feedback from the Canadian public. I
enjoy a very large social media following there.

Speaker 11 (01:12:06):
So I said to them, look, what deal do you want?

Speaker 26 (01:12:10):
And they definitely don't want to give up their sovereignty,
but they really want to explore this idea of an
economic union because Canada.

Speaker 11 (01:12:17):
But you know, you think about the.

Speaker 26 (01:12:19):
Forty million people size of California, unlimited resources, unlimited power,
unlimited guests, unlimited water, unlimited lumber.

Speaker 11 (01:12:27):
Unlimited everything, and they're not stupid.

Speaker 26 (01:12:30):
They're thinking, wait a second, what if we had free trade?
East west, north south, and we put all the resources
in the stead of squabbling on our own border between
Canada United States, and put all that money up into
protecting ourselves against the Chinese and the Russians up north.
That all makes sense to Canadians. They just don't want
to give up their sovereignty, just like somebody born in

(01:12:51):
Louisiana doesn't want to be born somewhere else. They want
to say, look, I was born in Calgary.

Speaker 11 (01:12:55):
Whatever.

Speaker 26 (01:12:56):
But the way to solve for that is a passport
no different than the EU. Any American get it, Any
Canadian can get it, get the background check. They're starting
to like that idea a lot more than the idea
of selling out the whole country.

Speaker 32 (01:13:10):
Interesting to see what kind of headway you can make
with the President elect.

Speaker 11 (01:13:15):
I feel like he would be open to something like that.

Speaker 26 (01:13:18):
I think he's a great negotiator and he throws out
these outlandish ideas and then what falls through the cracks
is the winning stuff. I really really think the two
countries should get together. And I'm licking my chops at
the opportunity of being involved, because right now we've got
a leadership that's collapsing. Justin Trudeau is on his way out,
so for the next five months, there's a void in Ottawa.

(01:13:42):
As I like to say, thank goodness, I'm here.

Speaker 3 (01:13:46):
It sounds like Kevin ol Lurry's ready to become the
Prime Minister of candidate. See if you can work that out.
Six fifty one. Time for traffic and weather together. As
we check out the drive again, here's guy Mike.

Speaker 11 (01:13:55):
Forty five North coming out of downtown at the be
Someone Bridge completely shut down. They're putting you on it.
In East Buster. You turn at McKee North Freeway, it's Kathy.

Speaker 37 (01:14:04):
It's going My nineteen sixty on ramp to forty five
is blocked toe truck, Ninjas and the fire department for
a little car accident. You have to turn around by
CALLI to get back onto forty five.

Speaker 11 (01:14:18):
Shock, how rock on that side. That's only on ramp.
It's not really affecting the main lanes. But Kathy, extra
points for burbage, bonus for being female. And I'm Skymike
in the classic puck GMC Traffic Center from.

Speaker 3 (01:14:30):
R KTRH Generator super Center twenty four hour weather Center
of areas of patche Fall. But that seems to be
thinning out rather rapidly this morning because the cool air
is moving its way in mostly sunny, cooler today with
the high temperature near sixty eight. Tomorrow mostly Sunday to
Bartley Clotdie with the high sixty three temperature right now
sixty at your officials Severe Weather Station News Radio seven
forty k t RAH. We're checking out some of our

(01:14:52):
top stories on this New Year's Eve. Here's clip, Thank you, Jimmy.

Speaker 4 (01:14:55):
A disaster is declared in Montgomery County after the tornadoes.
The House Ethics Committee clears two Texas Congressman Wesley Hunted
Ronnie Jackson from violating campaign finance laws. And yet another
reason to have concern about our nation's institutes of higher learning.
The University of Iowa is offering a poetry course inspired

(01:15:18):
by Taylor Swift songs. Get the latest news anytime at
KTRH dot com. Stop shaking your head, Jimmy. Our next
updates at seven o'clock.

Speaker 1 (01:15:27):
Used weather and traffic updates.

Speaker 11 (01:15:29):
It makes my day easier.

Speaker 22 (01:15:31):
Remember the rule of three can make the day better.
On Youth Radio seven k t RH. All of vartext
not here yet, but it's coming. And of course social
media is going crazy here in the Houston area because
everybody's thinking back to the big freeze from two years ago,

(01:15:51):
right in February. Yeah, it's been two years and how
we lost power and we had all sorts of other
issues because of you know, sustained below freezing temperatures. Before
you get overly excited about that, what's really fun to
me is to watch television meteorologists try to explain the
whole polar vortex thing. And I caught I think his

(01:16:13):
name is Pat Calvin over at KHOU eleven trying to
explain the polar vortex. Let's share some of that with you.

Speaker 40 (01:16:19):
So what's going to happen now as we get into January.
So here's a look at a computer model simulation. The
warmer colors here indicate warmer temperatures, and then the blues
indicate those cooler temperatures. But when you get into these
darker blues, these dark blue to dark purple colors, that
indicates that really frigid air mass.

Speaker 11 (01:16:37):
And it does look like we'll get a little bit of.

Speaker 40 (01:16:39):
An intrusion here of cold air for the Northeast getting
into this upcoming weekend. But going even beyond that is
what the social media posts are talking about in the
January eighth to twelfth time frame. So let's keep going here.
You can see some cool air starts coming and then
all of a sudden, this bowling ball of really dark
blue and purple color starts.

Speaker 11 (01:17:00):
To move in.

Speaker 40 (01:17:01):
That is that lobe of the Polar War text that
they showed you just a minute ago, breaking free from
the Arctic and plunging south. And so the question then becomes, Okay,
we get this big lobe of cold air coming into
the US. One, how cold does it get for the
areas that are underneath the worst of it? And two

(01:17:21):
does that cold air state to the east or does
it start to kind of spin and retrograde back and
impact us here in southeast Texas. And those are the
answers that we don't have quite yet.

Speaker 11 (01:17:34):
Aha.

Speaker 3 (01:17:34):
Okay, so he's not exactly going out on the limb
making of prediction. All I have is is the ten
day forecast from the Weather Channel, and yeah, we're gonna
get some cold temperatures, like starting around Monday, January sixth,
fifty three for the high, fifty one on Tuesday, forty
eight for the high on Wednesday. Yeah, that's cold, fifty

(01:17:56):
one on Thursday fifty three on Friday, so then the
entire week next next week is gonna be cold. But
the lows, at least the predicted lows are above freezing
each night, so we're not talking about a deep freeze thing.
And the other parts of the country are gonna get
deep freeze. But if that forecast hold's true, I don't
think I have to worry about a big deep freeze.

(01:18:16):
It's gonna be chilly, it's gonna be gold but it's
not going to be below freezing. Or if it is
below freezing, it's goun be you know, Conroe points north
probably that are gonna be a low freezing six fifty six.
Now here in news radio seven forty k TRH this.

Speaker 1 (01:18:33):
Is huge radio seven forty kt RH Houston.

Speaker 11 (01:18:36):
Five everywhere with the higher now.

Speaker 1 (01:18:39):
The latest news, weather and traffing.

Speaker 2 (01:18:42):
It's more of what matters to you from the John
Morris Services Studios.

Speaker 3 (01:18:46):
Seven AM is our time here in Houston's morning news.
I'm Jimmy Barrett. Among our top stories this half are
it's slowly getting back to normal in areas hit by
Saturday's tornadoes. Trump backing Mike Johnson for speaker and come
up at seven o eight, four Texas cities made the
Unhappiest cities in the America. List details and the minutes
ahead here in Houston's Morning News. First, we're checking out

(01:19:09):
they drive again. Here's sky Mike.

Speaker 11 (01:19:10):
Let's do some of my forty five coming out of downtown.
They've shut it off at Iten. They'll force you off
onto the East Freeway. If you're going north past the
ferris Wheel, you're stuck in that squish, so don't do it.
Do the East tex instead. They've completely shut down all
the lanes at the Best. Someone Bridge coming in from Crosby.
That's a happy town, Jimmy. Here's James from Crosby.

Speaker 25 (01:19:29):
Hey guy, Mike, I think me and about seven other
people are on Highway ninety today. So you know what
now that I've heard your voice so many times, you're
from nights.

Speaker 1 (01:19:37):
Landing, aren't you Night's Landing? See?

Speaker 11 (01:19:39):
I don't know it. It must be a nice neighborhood.
I'm Skymike on the Generator Supercenter dot Com traffic.

Speaker 3 (01:19:44):
Center from r KTRH top tax Defenders twenty four hour
weather sundery Today we are looking at some areas apache
Fogg that are lifting rapidly followed by mostly sunny and
cooler today, a high temperature of sixty eight. We weren't
sixty eight when we started this morning. We dropped eight degrees.
As they call for a new moved its way through.
We'll get the update on that from Terry Smith at
the Weather Channel in about nine minutes. Current temperature is

(01:20:07):
fifty nine at your official severe weather station, News Radio
seven forty k TRH. It is time now for the news.
Here's Cliff Sanders and.

Speaker 4 (01:20:15):
We're sponsored by ISO Farmer. Good morning everyone, it's coming
up on seven oh two. Our top story. Cleanup continues
from Saturday's tornadoes. Montgomery County officially declared a disaster after
getting hit by an EF three.

Speaker 5 (01:20:29):
We had plenty of damage, three hundred and two damaged
homes as our internal estimates, thirty of them were actually
destroyed completely flattened.

Speaker 4 (01:20:38):
County Judge Marko in Galveston County. Storms knocked out power
to Bolivar.

Speaker 6 (01:20:43):
All of Bolivar was out of power from Saturday approximately
one forty five.

Speaker 4 (01:20:49):
County Judge Mark Henry til kt KTRH. Rather, no one
was heard in Brazoria County, alvin isd says students at
the Walt Disney Elementary School will be tempor raoroughly relocated
because of damage from the storms. Things aren't calming down
at Bush and Hobby Airport. This morning's at Bush, I've
got seven cancelations in seven delays so far according to Flyaware,

(01:21:12):
and literally less than a handful of flights are affected
out of Hobby. Well, we know more about the memorial
services plan for former President Jimmy Carter following his death
on Sunday.

Speaker 7 (01:21:23):
Funeral services for the former president will begin on Saturday,
January fourth and run through the ninth. They include viewings
in Atlanta and Washington, d C. A ceremony at the
National Cathedral, and a stop outside his boyhood farm in
South Georgia.

Speaker 4 (01:21:40):
That is Fox's Jonathan Serry. In the meantime, President Joe
Biden while he signed an executive order closing all executive
departments and agencies of the federal government on January ninth.
Before that, though, the House votes on a speaker on Friday,
and President like Donald Trump weighing in fully endorsing incumbent
Mind Johnson.

Speaker 8 (01:22:00):
I really humbled an honored to have President Trump's endorsement
for speaker again. He and I work so well together,
so closely together, and we have a lot of big
things to do.

Speaker 4 (01:22:09):
But some Republicans, including Thomas Massey of Kentucky, won't support Johnson,
who voted with Democrats and worked with them to keep
the government open Earlier this month, Massey Carl Johnson on
social media, quote the next Paul Ryan, it's now seven
oh four on KGRH. President Elike Trump is set to
make waves with executive orders on January twentieth, day one

(01:22:33):
of his second administration.

Speaker 9 (01:22:34):
From mass deportations to addressing vaccine mandates. The engine revs
up in twenty one days.

Speaker 10 (01:22:39):
Beginning on an inauguration day, and that very first week
of the second Trump presidency, there are going to be
an extensive amount of orders that really change the direction
of the country.

Speaker 9 (01:22:48):
Political strategist fled Davidia Access He'll have two years to
build before the midterms, but the shift needs to go
more swiftly than that.

Speaker 10 (01:22:55):
I think that first three hundred and sixty five days
of his presidenc here are going to be key establishing
a successful second term.

Speaker 11 (01:23:02):
He says.

Speaker 9 (01:23:02):
The orders have already been drafted and things will move quickly.
On to Ray Perrard News Radio seven forty KTRH.

Speaker 4 (01:23:08):
Thank you, Andre Trump's return. There's a big reason why
new polling shows that Americans are optimistic about the new year.
No surprise to Foxes. Brian kill Me.

Speaker 11 (01:23:18):
Got the sense things will be different.

Speaker 12 (01:23:19):
In my view, when Jeff Bezos told people at Watchington Posts,
we're not going to endorse a candidate leading up to
the election, he had a bunch of people quit because
of that.

Speaker 4 (01:23:26):
Trump becoming president was the number one reason that people
were hopeful about the new year, ranked higher than personal
relationships and finances. But in order to get to twenty
twenty five, we had to deal with what may have
been the most absurd year ever in politics, perhaps the
most politically absurd thing we dealt with this past year,

(01:23:48):
President Joe Biden's quote unquote connective sharpness.

Speaker 14 (01:23:51):
This is the sharpest, most intellectually clear guy ever. There
will never be a time when this is an embarrass
that both to the people involved and to us.

Speaker 13 (01:24:00):
As American political and economic analyst, Jack Novak says Biden
was never mentally or physically fit to serve.

Speaker 14 (01:24:06):
Becoming clear now that this guy was not mentally capably
president from day one.

Speaker 13 (01:24:11):
Novak calls to cover up of Biden's mental decline the
biggest political scandal in American history. Jared Lewis News Radio
seven forty KRH.

Speaker 4 (01:24:18):
NOW seven oh five on KTRH. Border sanity will be
returning on January twentieth after four years of open borders
thanks to Biden.

Speaker 16 (01:24:26):
Right now the gate, We're going to concentrate in public
safety threats, and you want to talk about heartless. I
got mayors and governors who say they're going to do
everything can prevent me from from arresting.

Speaker 4 (01:24:34):
Public safety threats incoming borders are Tom Homan. A massive
debate is taking place over the H one B visa program,
which is backed by Trump and which lets citizens of
other countries come here for work.

Speaker 17 (01:24:47):
Tech companies say those visas aren't necessary. Others say they
hurt American workers.

Speaker 15 (01:24:52):
Legal immigration is an area where there's disagreement. There are, indeed,
ways of satisfying both sides of this concerned.

Speaker 17 (01:25:00):
Mark Gregorian with the Center for Immigration Studies says, we
could start by reforming the program.

Speaker 15 (01:25:05):
You would do that by giving the visas out based
on who is offered the highest salary, rather than by lottery,
which is the way you do it now.

Speaker 17 (01:25:15):
That would allow tech companies to still bring in high
skilled labor while also protecting American workers. Ethan Buchanan, News
Radio seven forty ktright.

Speaker 4 (01:25:22):
It's coming up on seven oh seven, And as you're
driving to work to think about this. If you thought
Houston's road construction was bad, now wait till next year.

Speaker 11 (01:25:31):
We're going to have some major major construction projects. The
one that worries me the most is that deal downtown
where they're going to retool forty five to follow along
with it and the East Text. Not only will that
be a huge hold up with traffic itself, look how
it will affect buildings, homes, businesses downtown.

Speaker 4 (01:25:52):
Yeah, that was sky Mike delivering the bad news. The
good news is that for people between Texas City and
League City, some frontage roads and intersections along the Gulf
Freeway will be opening next year. On Cliff Saunders on
Houston's news, weather and traffic station KTRH.

Speaker 1 (01:26:09):
You like free stuff. We all like free stuff.

Speaker 2 (01:26:12):
Guess what Our iHeartRadio app is free and free.

Speaker 11 (01:26:17):
Never sounded so good. This isn't about unhappy. This this
is about unhappy.

Speaker 3 (01:26:24):
It's a list of the twenty five Unhappiest Cities in America.
Of course, this is just a list done by a
company called insider Monkey, like that name, and basically what
they did is they took a look at income, of course, population, density, crime,
those types of things, as far as detarmining, which cities

(01:26:44):
are happy in which cities are unhappy. Four Texas cities
made the list on the twenty five Unhappiest Cities in America.
Number twenty five was Corpus Christie. The reason why they
said they put Corpus Christie on the list says they
took the twenty fifth spot. The city has a higher
crime than the national average, is located in an isolated
area where many residents report feelings of loneliness, so it

(01:27:07):
has a high depression rate. Casper, Wyoming, came in twenty fourth,
North Las Vegas, Nevada, twenty third, Tulsa, Oklahoma, twenty second,
Fort Smith, Arkansas, twenty one. Lubbock. Here's our next Texas city.
Lubbock came in at number twenty. It says Lubbock is
located in northwest Texas and suffers from rapid crime. Its
crime rate is thirty two percent higher than the national average.

(01:27:30):
The city has a population density of twenty fifty six
people per square island. Its residence reports suffering from high
rates of isolation. Baltimore, Maryland, number nineteen, Philadelphia number eighteen,
Saint Louis, Missouri, number seventeen. San Antonio came in number sixteen,
and they said that with a population more than one

(01:27:50):
point four million, it's the most populous city in Greater
San Antonio and the third largest metropolitan area in Texas.
It's considered one of the dirtiest cities in the US.
Really in ranks among the worst cities for mental health
in the country. Bet On Rouge came in number fifteen. Columbus, Georgia,
number fourteen, Memphis, Tennessee, number thirteen, Fayetteville, North Carolina, number twelve, Augusta, Georgia,

(01:28:14):
number eleven, Akron, Ohio, number ten, Mobile, Alabama, number nine, Jackson, Mississippi,
number eight, Gulfport, Mississippi, number seven, Birmingham, Alabama, number six, Toledo, Ohio,
number five, Cleveland, Ohio, number four, Shreveport, Louisiana, number three, Montgomery, Alabama,
number two. Number one most unhappy city in America Detroit, Michigan.

(01:28:34):
That should come as no surprise to anybody seven ten
time for traffic and weather together only.

Speaker 11 (01:28:40):
About corpus you no disagree with that. It's right next
to some of the most mellow people I've ever met.
It's right by Podre Island too. Well, that's the thing.

Speaker 3 (01:28:48):
It's a vacation getaway for a lot of folks. It
should be a little bit isolated.

Speaker 11 (01:28:52):
Right, And everybody wants to live in the rat race. Nothing. Also,
Tech's love, but you know it has tech. It's a
college party town. People come from miles and miles because
there's not allowed. Lot so love. It's fun. All right,
let's do this. Let's do this. Forty five north supersized
ninjas on. See now forty five north coming out of downtown.
Right at the b Someone Bridge, we had an eighteen wheeler.

(01:29:13):
The cab hit his side. I think everybody's okay. The
trailer went the other way and they shut the whole
thing down. Forty five It's easy to get around it.
They shut it down. Put you on iten east. You
can bust a U turn at McKee. Best thing is
to not get in that, so do the east text
terrier hazardous, so do the six to ten loop get
around that. We also had a wreck in the feeder
North Maine that's outbound, not inbound. Two ninety looks good

(01:29:35):
Cyprus in eighteen minutes, Katie's going whoom all the way
into downtown, completely unaffected by the problem. On forty five
and also forty five southbound. I don't even have the
wreck at the Shepherd Curb yet. Ghetto Dave gave us
a clearer ride in Kathy from Spring Clear to our
Schulenberg festival this morning. Also banana stickers James from Crosby
and Mike from Magnolia and I'm Skymichael the Generator Supercenter,

(01:29:59):
dot com traffics.

Speaker 3 (01:30:00):
From our KTRH top tax defenders twenty four hour whether's
under Terry Smith is here and Yep, it looks like
the fog is gone. We had some fog outside our
window earlier.

Speaker 11 (01:30:08):
It's gone. Nice clear skies.

Speaker 18 (01:30:10):
Yes, it's going to be a gorgeous day.

Speaker 7 (01:30:11):
Yeah.

Speaker 19 (01:30:12):
That front has finally moved far enough south that the
northerly winds are bringing in some drier air and some
cooler temperatures. That's the big thing for us the rest
of this week is that our temperatures are acting like
it's late December and early January, and we got a
lot of dry weather and sunshine for most of the week.

(01:30:32):
Today sunny, mid upper sixties. We're dry tonight, Tomorrow, sunshine
load to mid sixties Thursday. That's our next chance for
some rain and of forty percent chance of some showers
Friday and Saturday. Dry temperatures will stay in the sixties
the rest of the week.

Speaker 3 (01:30:49):
Right down fifty nine at your official severe weather station.
News Radio seven forty KTRH.

Speaker 2 (01:30:54):
It's Houston's Morning News, brought to you byen New South
Windows Solutions. Now to Jimmy Barrits had the Houston Morning
News team all the info you need to take on
the day, seven nineteen Coming up on seven twenty.

Speaker 3 (01:31:07):
Here in Houston's Morning News, Kim Ogg. Today is officially
Kim Ogg's last day in office as Harris County District Attorney.
I've heard some stories about what might be next for her,
but I don't think any of those are officially unless
something got announced last week and I happened to miss it.
But we do know who the new district attorney for
Harris County will be starting tomorrow, and that's Shawn Tier.

(01:31:29):
Shawn Tier is a liberal, certainly more liberal than Kim Ogg,
and he was supported by George Sorows. That might tell
us all we really need to know. But we'll talk
about it and see what we're expecting in Harris County
starting tomorrow when we talk with Jared Woodfield, attorney and
former Harris County GOP chair.

Speaker 11 (01:31:47):
Coming up next.

Speaker 3 (01:31:48):
First, we've got traffic and whether it's together, Starting with
you skyline.

Speaker 11 (01:31:52):
All right, lady on tv AH wearing black tooth clear,
forty five northbound coming out of downtown at the B
somewhe Bridge. He's engaged whatever still packed up the forty
five peer salivated slope from McKinney tallan educated Let's keep
doing I sixty nine goar around the east text instead,
he probably is a clean driving record. Rest of our

(01:32:12):
freeway's rock for now. She could have had Cows. I'm
SKYMIKEE and the Generators Supercenter, dot Com Traffic Center.

Speaker 3 (01:32:17):
From o r KTRH top Tax Defenders twenty four hour
weather center for today for it end up with lots
of sunshine with a high temperature right about sixty eight
tomorrow mostly Sunday to partly Cloudie's sixty three Thursday. Claudie
with a forty percent shower chance with a high temperature
right about sixty right now fifty nine at your official
severe weather station, News Radio seven forty k TRH. Check

(01:32:41):
out some of our top stories here on this New
Year's Eve.

Speaker 4 (01:32:45):
Here's clip Thank You Jimmy and out it shuts down
Texas DPS license offices until Thursday. The state funeral for
Jimmy Carter will be held on January ninth, and unrealistic
expectations are the main reason why percent of New Year's
resolutions fail by February. Get the latest news anytime at
KTRH dot com.

Speaker 41 (01:33:06):
Our next updates at seven thirty he living friends with
Your forecast is at the bottom of the hour on
seven forty KTRH seven twenty one our time.

Speaker 11 (01:33:17):
Here in Houston's Warning News.

Speaker 3 (01:33:19):
So we get a new DA starting tomorrow this You know,
elections have consequences, and this may be one of them.
Jared Woodfield joins US attorney and former Harris County GOP chair.
We know he's We certainly know he's not Kim Ogg.
We know that Kim Ogg lost the support of George
Sorows Sean Tierry is a Sorows back candidate. Is there
anything else we really need to know about him when

(01:33:41):
you get right down to us.

Speaker 38 (01:33:42):
Yeah, yeah, well you're right, Jimmy, we've got the past
two district attorneys were individuals that were supported by George Sorows.
But I think what's interesting about this last election is
was the margin of difference between the Republican candidate and
the Democratic candidate was about one percentage point. So this
particular da Sean tier goes in knows that he is

(01:34:04):
representing a county that's equally divided, and the question becomes
what model will he approach or take. Will he take
the Alvin Bragg Bonnie Willis model and use his office
in an attempt to go after his political opponents, or
will be someone who administers law and justice and goes
after violent criminals and cop killers and prosecutes them to

(01:34:24):
the full extent of the law.

Speaker 4 (01:34:26):
So that remains to be seen.

Speaker 38 (01:34:27):
But receiving a whole lot of money from George Soros
is not a good thing.

Speaker 11 (01:34:30):
No, it's not.

Speaker 3 (01:34:31):
And you have to the reason why Kim Odd lost
George Soros support is because she was tougher on crime
than he wanted her to be. So you've got to
think that Shaun Tier understands that if he loose and
he'll get primary next time out. If he goes if
he goes hard justice, then he's going to get primary.

Speaker 18 (01:34:49):
Yeah, And that's the question.

Speaker 38 (01:34:51):
What you know, will he have the fortitude to stand
up against his base and do the right thing or not?
And that remains to be seen. I mean, in kim O,
I'm no fan of kim Ogg. I mean, she was
an individual who went after her political opponents too, and
we represented an individual right now where she's prosecuting them
for standing up for election integrity and at the same

(01:35:11):
time an im a voter are proad to occur on
her watch. So you know, I always believe in giving
somebody a chance. But I am concerned about the backing
that he had. But hopefully the election results that one
percent margin will speak to him very loudly and clearly
and let him know that he's not a district attorney
who's there only for Democrats, but he's a district attorney
there for all residents of Harris County, regardless of party affiliation.

Speaker 3 (01:35:34):
Well, I would say that we probably are going to
get an indication fairly quickly, don't you think, Because there's
some high profile cases that Kim Odd put out there
just in the last month, you know, seeking the death penalty.
If he decides either not to prosecute some of her
cases or decides to pull the death penalty off the table,
that'll probably tell us a little bit more about where

(01:35:55):
he's going to be going.

Speaker 11 (01:35:57):
That's exactly right.

Speaker 38 (01:35:58):
I mean the cases that you're referring to or coming
up in the new year, and he will have to
make decisions with respect to those cases very quickly. And
so you know, if someone is killed a police officer
and the death penny's on the table, he needs to
use the death penalty to the full extent of the law.
And so that's a great point you made. Let's just
see how he handles the cases up there in his

(01:36:20):
first term. I think that'll give us a very clear
perspective as to what kind of DA he's going to
be for the next four years.

Speaker 3 (01:36:26):
Well, the other thing we found he's very good at
he's very good at punting. I don't know if he
ever played football, but he's pretty good at punting. If
he has a case, like an election fraud case, for example,
involving Democrats that he doesn't want to bring he'll punt
it off to you know, he'll punt it off to
another jurisdiction is so that he doesn't have to deal
with it.

Speaker 38 (01:36:45):
Yeah, you know in that particular case, you know, I
know Rodney Allis is very beholden to Lena Hidalgo. And
I'm actually thankful that Harris County is not handling that
case now and that it looks like the aid has
been handed over to the Attorney General's office and ain't
ken Pacton's office and may end up being with another
district attorney's office.

Speaker 42 (01:37:05):
But the reality is, we cannot use that office. We
can't weaponize that office in an effort to go after
political opponents. We've seen that on the national level with
President Trump, we saw it with Fannie Willis, and we're
seeing we saw with Alvin Bragg and so many others.
And that's when the DA's office loses its credibility. It
loses its integrity when people look and say, hey, that

(01:37:27):
office is only being used as a tool to go
after one's political opponents. That's got to change, and that
can't happen here in Harris County.

Speaker 3 (01:37:35):
Okay, Ma'm gonna put you down. Is realistically hopeful.

Speaker 11 (01:37:40):
Well, you know, I believe.

Speaker 42 (01:37:41):
And give it everybody a chance, and so I'll be
able to give you a very clear comment within the
first six months, I can tell you that much.

Speaker 3 (01:37:47):
That much, I'm sure too. All right, Thanks Jared Jared Woodfield, attorney,
former Harris County GOP chair. It's seven twenty six here
on News Radio seven forty kight TRH.

Speaker 22 (01:37:59):
Houston News Whether we're traffic plus Breaking News twenty four seventh.

Speaker 39 (01:38:04):
This is News Radio seven forty KTRH five Everywhere with.

Speaker 2 (01:38:10):
More of what's happening now from the Sean Morris Services Studios.

Speaker 3 (01:38:14):
Seven thirty is our time, Houston's Morning News. I'm Jimmy Barrett.
Among our top stories this half our Shawn Tier is
the new Harris County DA he takes over tomorrow, Why
should we care about Greenland? And coming up at seven
thirty eight, pizza is so good they're hiring task rabbits
to wait in line. Details in the minutes ahead. You're
in Houston's Morning News. First, you're going to believe that

(01:38:35):
we're checking out that morning Vibe with Skymine.

Speaker 11 (01:38:37):
We've cleared forty five North. That was the wreck at
the b Someone Bridge coming out of downtown outbound. The
onlines are still showing the closure. It's not there, it's gone.
East Text Lisa's from Splendora.

Speaker 29 (01:38:49):
Good morning, sky Mike.

Speaker 33 (01:38:50):
I love the east text Freeway from the City of
Swendora to downtown was completely clear.

Speaker 11 (01:38:56):
Happy New Year, Happy New Year, Lisa from Splendora. And
a sticker for your head and I'm skylike in the
classic Buick GMC Traffic Center.

Speaker 3 (01:39:06):
From our KTRH Generators super Center twenty four our weather Center.
Lots of sunshine today, a little bit cooler, high temperature
right about sixty eight. We'll get the complete fork ass
but Terry Smith at the Weather Channel in nine minutes
right now fifty nine at your official severe weather station.
News Radio seven forty k TRHS timed out for the news.
Here's Cliff Sanders.

Speaker 4 (01:39:26):
Thank you, Jimmy, Go get your coffee. Seven thirty one
on KTRHR. Top story. As violent crime continues throughout Harris County.
A new district attorney takes office tomorrow.

Speaker 23 (01:39:36):
Sean Tier was narrowly elected in November after beating incumbent
da kim Ogg in the Democrat primary. Tier is a
liberal backed by George Soros, promising to push things like
bail reform for Harris County. GOPHR Jared Woodville says it's
up to the public to hold Tier accountable.

Speaker 24 (01:39:52):
First six months, first year in office, we'll really be
able to see what kind of DA is, whether he's
a law and order DA for someone who's using the
office to target political opponents and use it as a
stepping zone for future advancement.

Speaker 11 (01:40:04):
I hope that's not the case.

Speaker 23 (01:40:05):
As for Aug's corruption case against staff members in Lena
Hidalgo's office that has been turned over to the Attorney
General and the Texas Rangers. Corey Jolson News Radio seven
forty KTRH. According to campaign finance reports, SORROW spent over
two million dollars to help here win. Coming up on
seven thirty three, we are learning more about what some
of the victims of Saturday's tornadoes dealt with. A conro

(01:40:29):
woman suffered multiple fractures after being trapped under debris.

Speaker 20 (01:40:33):
She had everything on top of her and my uncle
and my dad were actually the one staff were able
to pull her out.

Speaker 11 (01:40:40):
And what kind of injuries did your mom sustaining she.

Speaker 20 (01:40:43):
Has Currently she has super broken legs, she has fractures
on her friend and.

Speaker 4 (01:40:48):
Back that woman's daughter talking to our TV partner channel
to Montgomery County Judge Mark Kello signed a disaster declaration yesterday,
and so far the state has not signed one. Four
Montgomery County holiday travel was impacted by the weekend storms.
Things do look better this morning, at least they do
at Hobby Airport, where Flataware says there are only four delays. However,

(01:41:12):
delays are picking up at Bush twelve. To be exact,
seven flights have been canceled so far. It's now seven
thirty three. President Joe Biden sends Ukraine even more aid
on his way out of office, announcing three point four
billion dollars in budgetary aid on top of the two
and a half billion in military aid he gave them yesterday.

(01:41:33):
In the meantime, President elect Donald Trump has floated the
idea of the US acquiring Greenland again, but could we
actually use it.

Speaker 17 (01:41:42):
Greenland's proximity to the Arctic, the US and Europe makes
it a critical asset.

Speaker 25 (01:41:47):
Given its geopolitical situation and its natural resources, It makes
sense for US to express an interest in Greenland.

Speaker 17 (01:41:56):
National security analyst at Trzanski says China and Russia likely
we also have an interest in the island.

Speaker 25 (01:42:01):
Unfortunately, the Danish government has been rather inattentive to developing
military assets in that area.

Speaker 17 (01:42:09):
Tarzanski says this may have been an attempt by Trump
to get the Danish government to do more to secure Greenland.
Ethan Buchanan News Radio seven forty KTRH.

Speaker 4 (01:42:17):
There's also this. South Korea approves an arrest warrant for
President Yun Suck Yule, who has been impeached over his
decision to impose martial law. Earlier this month seven thirty four.
According to the latest numbers, seventy percent of Democrats say
they are taking a break from political news after Donald
Trump's win in the election. Maybe this is why the

(01:42:39):
narrative that was being pushed on MSNBC.

Speaker 26 (01:42:42):
I would say, Kay Harris, over two hundred and seventy
electoral vote, I think she's gonna went.

Speaker 11 (01:42:46):
You wrote Trump is toast.

Speaker 1 (01:42:48):
Do you stand behind that today?

Speaker 11 (01:42:50):
Oh even more so?

Speaker 27 (01:42:51):
Yeah?

Speaker 4 (01:42:51):
James Carvill wrong. Michael Moore wrong. The poll was conducted
earlier this month. Looking at your money, the mainstream media
says holiday retail sales were up because of a strong economy,
not telling you that because of inflation. You spent more
cash and got less for it. It's just the continuation
of the pattern under the Biden administration.

Speaker 28 (01:43:14):
Under Biden, unharrissed, so far, the average family has actually
lost income, so they're poor today. And one of the
reasons for that is because a lot of these countries
are stealing jobs. We're not creating jobs in the areas
that we want.

Speaker 4 (01:43:28):
Economists even more of the Heritage Foundation. American households are
also looking at an average of ten seven hundred dollars
in credit card debt these days, and where the credit
card score is dropping and debt continuing to pile up
over the last four year.

Speaker 29 (01:43:44):
You have a low credit score, which sort of limits
your ability to open new credit and when you're carrying balances,
of course, those are going to come with very high
interest rates north of twenty two to twenty three percent,
So at some point the debt becomes unsustainable while it.

Speaker 4 (01:43:59):
Helps chip loop. There and another victim of bidonomics America's
retailers who are closing stores and moving.

Speaker 30 (01:44:06):
Online, and now that includes part of the prescription drug industry.
According to Lone Star College economics professor Hank Lewis, I think.

Speaker 31 (01:44:14):
A lot of it is going online. One of the
biggest competitors we're seeing these days for walreags and cvs
to sort about pharmacies is Amazon.

Speaker 30 (01:44:23):
Some of the best prices are being found online. Plus
Amazon can take your health insurance to lower your costs
even more. Professor Lewis says as we go into twenty
twenty five, he's interested in seeing how well Mark Cuban
does with his competing pharmacy company. Michael Shiloh and News
Radio seven forty ktra.

Speaker 4 (01:44:41):
It is now seven thirty seven. UT faces Arizona State
in the college football playoff quarterfinals at the Peach Bowl tomorrow.
We'll have the pregame at one o'clock on Sports Talk
seven ninety with kickoff at two thirty. Baylor this afternoon
takes on LSU at the NR at the Texas Bullet
NRG Stadium. Off there at two thirty. And I'm Cliff

(01:45:02):
Saunders on Houston's news, weather and traffic station, News Radio
seven forty KRH. Crime is on the rise, Our schools
are in trouble the next four years.

Speaker 2 (01:45:12):
We'll have to get better telling the story of Houston
every day.

Speaker 1 (01:45:16):
Quite a story. Use Radio seven forty KTRH.

Speaker 3 (01:45:22):
Pizza seven time here in Houston's Morning News. I have
to I like New York pizza, I do. I also
like Chicago pizza, Detroit pizza, Houston pizza. I mean there's
no Houston pizza per se, but I mean we have
some fine pizza places. I just love pizza. But I

(01:45:44):
would have to say I probably wouldn't stand for hours
in a line waiting to get into a pizza place
just because the pizza is so good and just because
Taylor's Swift and Travis Kelcey eight there. But evidently there
are people who are so much so that they're hiring

(01:46:06):
what they called Have you ever heard this term before?
A task rabbit? You know what a task rabbit is.
A tax rabbit is somebody you hire to do things
like wait in line for you because you're way too
important and too busy to do that, right, So you
hired this person for howver much they charge. And in
this story, they're charging twenty bucks an hour to stand

(01:46:29):
in line at this pizza place called Lukali. They don't
take reservations. They are beloved by celebrities, and I mentioned
Taylor Swift recently ate there, in fact, the amount of
people requesting task rabbits to stand the line for them
at this restaurant went up thirty percent after Travis Kelcey

(01:46:51):
and Taylor Swift date there. It is the most by far,
the most requested restaurant for task rabbits.

Speaker 11 (01:46:59):
They're people.

Speaker 3 (01:47:01):
They stand in line for people all over the city,
for shows, for movies, for restaurants. That's what they just
stand in line for you at twenty bucks an hour
seven forty time for traffic and whether it's to task.

Speaker 11 (01:47:16):
Grabit could do. What's that? A task grabbit could could
be like here, I'm present in traffic Core, so you
know it perfect? Yeah, they could serve that boom. We
found a use for task rabbits here, let's do well,
look at the sunrise advisors. Let's go from your side
here Southwest Freeway, pretty sunrise if you're coming up northbound,
and it's kind of like a holiday on the Southwest

(01:47:37):
Freeway this morning too. We're looking at an easy twenty
one minute drive now from Sugarland up into downtown Katie Freeway.
You rock. And if you're coming in from Sinco Ranch,
that's an easy twenty six minutes. Throw into the President's heads.
Two to ninety inbound from Cypress. Let's talk about twenty
minutes here from it looks like Barker Cypress into the

(01:47:57):
West Loops sixteen easy going here. You're the thing if
you were wondering what was going on downtown. We did
clear that eighteen wheeler wreck that was outbound. Everybody's okay.
It was forty five north at the b Someone Bridge.
We are back to just about full speed both ways
here and even Graham Parkway up by the golf ball.
Terry Young Albert from Kingwood says it's completely wide open.

(01:48:18):
I'm like Norman cheers there. Oh, by the way, Terry,
are you sure we shouldn't be panicking about that polar vortex?
You know, I've got a ten foot utility trailer. We
could go pick up a palett of toilet paper if
you want. I'm Skymike at the Cleasic Buick GMC Traffic Center.

Speaker 3 (01:48:32):
Nothing worse than frozen toilet paper from our Katie rh
Generator super Center twenty four our weather center. Terry is here,
and no, she's not that worried about the bowl of vortex,
at least not for us.

Speaker 1 (01:48:43):
No, I'm not now.

Speaker 19 (01:48:44):
It is going to get colder next week it looks
like temperatures during the day will be in the fifties
and lows at night in the thirties. That's just kind
of a generality, and we're going to revise that and
refine it for you as we get closer. But there'll
be other places the country that are going to really
suffer with the cold air. Hey, it is cooler, that's

(01:49:05):
the big change for us today. Back to normal December
January kind of cool, so nice and dry today and tomorrow.
Mid to upper sixties today, load to mid sixties tomorrow.
No worries tonight either about wet roadway. So you're in
good shape if you've got New Year's Eve plans. Next
chance range Thursday, we'll get a front to swing through,

(01:49:25):
about a forty percent chance of some rain on Thursday.

Speaker 18 (01:49:29):
Highs will be around sixty.

Speaker 19 (01:49:31):
Then we're going to dry out Friday and Sunday it's
back to sunshine and temperatures are in the sixties. So
it's just I really like it when the weather just
is quiet and doing what it's supposed.

Speaker 4 (01:49:41):
To do for this time of year.

Speaker 3 (01:49:42):
Right down fifty nine at your official severe weather station,
News Radio seven forty k TRH. Yeah, what'd you like
all your products to be made in America? Sure would.
That's never going to happen. But you know, here's a
guy who's trying. He's got a c clothing line that
he's producing. He started up recently and it's really catching fire.

(01:50:07):
And I saw him on Fox Business, so I share
a little audio with you. He's excited about the Trump
administration because he thinks it's going to be a great
opportunity for companies like Kids that are made in America.
You know, right now, ninety seven percent of all clothing
is made somewhere else other than America. Stick a listen.

Speaker 1 (01:50:24):
Yeah, it's exciting.

Speaker 43 (01:50:25):
We've got a sweatshirt landing early January in Walmart that
expands on the T shirt program that you mentioned and bodeswell,
I think for their commitment for American maid and great
for us and great for American manufacturing. I'm not sure
because we're an American made brand from the cotton all
the way through that the tariff, the chance of teriffs

(01:50:45):
will impact us too much. But it's going to be
interesting to see what happens if and when they roll
out and the impact it will have on the supply
chain in the textile world narrowly. About forty years ago,
about ninety five percent of the clothing that American's blaw
was made in the US, and we're now down to
about five percent today. So there's been a profound shift
on the back of the trade deals we've had, primarily

(01:51:07):
with China. And for those of you that are interested
in looking into the details of those trade deals, they're terrible.
Our trade agreements with China are way out of balance.
So in my judgment, these corrections are long overdue. I
think it will be disruptive in the short term. I
hope that the administration rules them out methodically, but in
my judgment, they're going to help to rebalance that playing field.

Speaker 1 (01:51:29):
And when we do.

Speaker 43 (01:51:30):
I'm a big believer in American manufacturing and American workers
and their ability to really respond to a fair manufacturing
environment and be way more competitive than they are today.

Speaker 11 (01:51:42):
And right now, I.

Speaker 43 (01:51:43):
Think it's unreasonable to expect US manufacturers to compete because
the trade agreements are so imbalanced.

Speaker 11 (01:51:49):
So in my judgment, it's going to be a good thing.

Speaker 43 (01:51:51):
I hope it comes in slowly and methodically, but long overdue.

Speaker 3 (01:51:55):
By the way, the name of the company is American Giant.
They're clothing manufacturer. Every thing including the materials all come
from the United States, American Giant. If you want to
look it up. All right, time for traffic and weather together,
we're checking out the drive once again.

Speaker 11 (01:52:09):
Sky Mike's here. Oh pretty out there, but thanks for
the pictures. By the way, I'm super easy to find
on social media. Love your sunrise pictures here. Let's go
to forty five North and we're coming down from Spring
right in to the Beltway. You look good trying to
hit the airport if you want to do that North
Freeway that is wide open, concrete round Parker and tid

(01:52:29):
what we look good to made in America. It's an
easy twenty minute drive now from the Woodlands coming down
from Cyprus two ninety wide open. Also Grand Parkway looks
like a holiday to the west Loop six ' ten
Katie Freeway. Flip those visors down, Sinco ranch in and
easy twenty four minute stroll to the President's Heads. Let's
do some ship channel bridges at the eight o'clock news break,

(01:52:50):
Skymike and a classic at GMC Traffic Center.

Speaker 3 (01:52:53):
From r ktr H Generator super Center twenty four our
Weather Center areas of patchie fog are gone now just
enjoying some unshine, cooler temperatures, high righte about sixty eight
today mostly Sunday to part the called He's sixty three tomorrow,
shower chance on Thursday with the high right around sixty,
temperature currently fifty nine at your officials Severe Weather Station

(01:53:14):
News Radio seven forty k TRH. Just check out some
of our top stories this morning.

Speaker 4 (01:53:19):
Here's clip Thanks Jimmy, Montgomery County to closure disaster after
Saturday's tornados. The Treasury Department says a state sponsored Chinese
hack has gotten into desk's top computers of Treasury employees
and pop the pop the bottle, Jimmy, pop the champagne
because it is not just New Year's Day, it's also
apparently National Champagne Day.

Speaker 11 (01:53:39):
But tomorrow is no today. Oh, this is New Year's Eve,
not New Year's Day exactly.

Speaker 4 (01:53:44):
Okay, get the latest news anytime at KTRH dot com.
Jimmy's going to resolve not to do that anymore. Our
next update is at eight o'clock checking in.

Speaker 1 (01:53:52):
I'm um, money, why don't you call more?

Speaker 2 (01:53:55):
We all avoid it, but you'll better understand the world
around you. If you check in with US News Radio
seven KTRH.

Speaker 3 (01:54:05):
Well, President Trump is waiting and he is supporting his
Speaker Mike Johnson for another term. Is speaker if for
no other reason, I would think then to get on
with things, because as we discussed on the show yesterday,
they can't even certify the election. The House has to
certify the election. They can't do it until they name
a speaker. So Speaker Johnson grateful that President Trump has

(01:54:26):
come forward. We'll see if that's enough to get him
over the hump here. But here is Speaker Johnson. Yesterday.

Speaker 8 (01:54:32):
I'm fox No, I'm really humbled and honored to have
President Trump's endorsement for speaker again. He and I work
so well together, so closely together, and we have a
lot of big things to do. He recognizes that what
we need right now. I think my colleagues recognize this
as well. Is a proven fighter and a true MAGA conservative,
but also someone who can work with every single member

(01:54:52):
of our very diverse House GOP so that we can
get President Trump's priorities over the line.

Speaker 11 (01:54:57):
That's what's ahead of us.

Speaker 8 (01:54:58):
I think this could be the most consequential presidency and
Congress of the modern era, because we have to fix
everything and it has to start on day one, so
we can't waste any time. Well, we have to do
a number of things simultaneously. The budget reconciliation process is
going to be the key of the first one hundred
days because in order to fix all the things that
we've going to fix, we have to squeeze a lot

(01:55:20):
of policy changes through that process. And not to get
too deep in the weeds, but why that's so valuable
as it avoids a sixty vote threshold that's necessary in
the Senate under normal circumstances, So we can move the
Republican agenda, the American First Agenda through reconciliation. But it
takes a lot of coordination, planning, and executing those plans
with precision to get that done. And so you'll see

(01:55:41):
a lot of energy on that. We're going to fix
the border, we are going to get the economy humming again.
We are going to restore our stature on the world stage,
get our energy policy fixed, make sure that we don't
have the largest tax cut in US history imposed upon
the American people at the end of next year when
the tax cuts from the Trump era expire. So a
lot of big agenda items on the table, and you're right,

(01:56:04):
it's going to take a lot of work to build
a consensus among all the Republicans to get it done.
But I'm absolutely convinced that we can. We're going to
stay unified, and we are going to get.

Speaker 11 (01:56:12):
This job done.

Speaker 3 (01:56:13):
Huh unified, The man says, when have they ever been unified?
How much confidence do you have in Republicans staying unified? Luckily,
I think most of what the President has proposed is
part of his agenda. A lot of it he can

(01:56:34):
do on day one through executive order. Not that I'm
a big fan of the executive order that much, where
they have a Congress that actually works and can get
things done, but in lieu of that, there's a lot
of things that he can do on his own. And
my guess is the amount of executive orders that will
be given on day one will be staggering, maybe an
all time record. But as far as Congress, yeah, I

(01:56:55):
don't have a lot of confidence in Congress, at least
not yet. But we'll say that for another day. Happy
New Year, y'all, have a great day tomorrow. We're going
to take the day off. I'll see you Thursday morning,
bright nearly five am here in Houston's morning news. I
will be on this afternoon four on AM nine fifty
KPRC