MATAGORDA, Texas (AP) — Beryl began lashing coastal Texas with rain and intensifying winds Sunday as residents boarded up windows, left beach towns under evacuation orders and prepared for the powerful storm that has already cut a deadly path through parts of Mexico and the Caribbean.

Beryl remained a tropical storm late Sunday as it churned toward the middle Texas coast but was expected to regain hurricane strength in the warm waters of the Gulf of Mexico before making landfall early Monday, the National Hurricane Center said. The storm was projected to come ashore around Matagorda Bay, an area about 100 miles (161 kilometers) south of Houston.

Tropical storm winds extended 115 miles (185 kilometers) from the center, and the hurricane center warned residents to be prepared for possible flash flooding in parts of middle, upper and eastern Texas as well as Arkansas as the storm gradually turns to the north and then northeast later Monday.

Texas officials warned the storm would cause power outages and flooding but also expressed worry that not enough coastal residents and beach vacationers in Beryl’s path were heeding warnings to leave.

“One of the things that kind of trigger our concern a little bit, we’ve looked at all of the roads leaving the coast and the maps are still green,” said Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, who is serving as the state’s acting governor while Gov. Greg Abbott is travelling overseas. “So we don’t see many people leaving.”

Along the Texas coast, many residents and business owners took the typical storm precautions, but also expressed uncertainty about the storm’s intensity.

In Port Lavaca, Jimmy May fastened plywood over the windows of his electrical supply company and said he wasn’t concerned about the possible storm surge. He recalled that his business had escaped flooding in a previous hurricane that brought a 20-foot (6-meter) storm surge.

“In town, you know, if you’re in the low-lying areas, obviously, you need to get out of there,” he said.

At the nearby marina, Percy Roberts showed his neighbor Ken Waller how to properly secure his boat as heavy winds rolled in from the bay Sunday evening.

“This is actually going to be the first hurricane I’m going to be experiencing,” Waller said, noting that he’s a little nervous but feels safe following Roberts’ lead. “Pray for the best but expect the worst, I guess.”

Farther down the coast in Freeport, Mark Richardson, a 64-year-old retiree, said homeowners were busy “trying to tie everything down” and worried that Beryl had people unsure about where along the Texas coast it would make landfall. He spent Sunday morning on the beach and said ocean swells were quickly rising.

“The ocean is getting very angry, very fast,” he said.

The earliest storm to develop into a Category 5 hurricane in the Atlantic, Beryl caused at least 11 deaths as it passed through the Caribbean on its way to Texas. The storm ripped off doors, windows and roofs with devastating winds and storm surge fueled by the Atlantic’s record warmth.

Three times in its one week of life, Beryl has gained 35 mph (56 kph) in wind speed in 24 hours or less, the official weather service definition of rapid intensification.

Beryl’s explosive growth into an unprecedented early whopper of a storm shows the literal hot water of the Atlantic and Caribbean, and what the Atlantic hurricane belt can expect for the rest of the storm season, experts said.

Texas officials warned people along the entire coastline to prepare for possible flooding, heavy rain and wind. The hurricane warning extended from Baffin Bay, south of Corpus Christi, to Sargent, south of Houston.

Beryl lurked as another potential heavy rain event for Houston, where storms in recent months have knocked out power across the nation’s fourth-largest city and flooded neighborhoods. A flash flood watch was in effect for a wide swath of the Texas coast, where forecasters expected Beryl to dump as much as 10 inches (25 centimeters) of rain in some areas.

Potential storm surges between 4 and 7 feet (1.22 and 2.13 meters) above ground level were forecast around Matagorda. The warnings extended to the same coastal areas where Hurricane Harvey came ashore in 2017 as a Category 4 hurricane, far more powerful than Beryl’s expected intensity by the time the storm reaches landfall.

Those looking to catch a flight out of the area could find that option all but impossible as Beryl closed in. Hundreds of flights from Houston’s two major commercial airports had been delayed by midafternoon Sunday and dozens more canceled, according to FlightAware data.

In Corpus Christi, officials asked visitors to cut their trips short and return home early if possible. Residents were advised to secure homes by boarding up windows if necessary and using sandbags to guard against possible flooding.

The White House said Sunday that the Federal Emergency Management Agency had sent emergency responders, search-and-rescue teams, bottled water, and other resources along the coast.

Several coastal counties called for voluntary evacuations in low-lying areas that are prone to flooding. Local officials also banned beach camping and urged tourists traveling on the Fourth of July holiday weekend to move recreational vehicles from coastal parks.

Beryl earlier this week battered Mexico as a Category 2 hurricane, toppling trees but causing no injuries or deaths before weakening to a tropical storm as it moved across the Yucatan Peninsula.

Before hitting Mexico, Beryl wrought destruction in Jamaica, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, and Barbados. Three people were reported dead in Grenada, three in St. Vincent and the Grenadines, three in Venezuela and two in Jamaica.

Beryl would be the 10th hurricane to hit Texas in July since 1851 and the fourth in the last 25 years, according to Colorado State University hurricane researcher Phil Klotzbach.

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Gonzalez reported from McAllen, Texas. Associated Press reporters Margery A. Beck in Omaha, Nebraska, Hannah Schoenbaum in Salt Lake City and Julie Walker in New York contributed.

AUSTIN, Texas (AP) — The former Uvalde schools police chief was indicted over his role in the slow police response to the 2022 massacre at a Texas elementary school that left 19 children and two teachers dead, the local sheriff said Thursday.

Pete Arredondo was indicted by a grand jury on 10 counts of felony child endangerment/abandonment and briefly booked into the county jail before he was released on bond, Uvalde Sheriff Ruben Nolasco told The Associated Press in a text message Thursday night.

The Uvalde Leader-News and the San Antonio Express-News reported that former school officer Adrian Gonzales also was indicted on multiple similar charges. The Uvalde Leader-News reported that District Attorney Christina Mitchell confirmed the indictment.

Mitchell did not return phone and email messages from The Associated Press seeking comment. Several family members of victims of the shooting did not respond to phone messages seeking comment.

The indictments make Arredondo, who was the on-site commander during the attack, and Gonzales the first officers to face criminal charges in one of the deadliest school shootings in U.S. history. A scathing report by Texas lawmakers that examined the police response described Gonzales as one of the first officers to enter the building after the shooting began.

The indictments were kept under seal until the men were in custody. It was unclear when Arredondo’s indictment would be publicly released.

Over two years ago, an 18-year-old gunman opened fire in a fourth grade classroom, where he remained for more than 70 minutes before officers confronted and killed him. In total, 376 law enforcement officers massed at Robb Elementary School on May 24, 2022, some waiting in the hallway outside the classroom, even as the gunman could be heard firing an AR-15-style rifle inside.

“Today is another day in an impossibly painful journey,” state Rep. Joe Moody, who helped the state lawmakers investigation, posted on the social platform X. “The hurt for them will never subside. Today, I pray that there is justice and some sense of closure for them in this process rather than prolonged suffering.”

The office of a former attorney for Arredondo said they did not know whether the former chief has new representation. The AP could not immediately find a phone number to reach Gonzales.

Arredondo lost his job three months after the shooting. Several officers involved were eventually fired, and separate investigations by the Department of Justice and state lawmakers faulted law enforcement with botching their response to the massacre.

Whether any officers would face criminal charges over their actions in Uvalde has been a question hanging over the city of 15,000 since the Texas Rangers completed their investigation and turned their findings over to prosecutors.

Mitchell’s office has also come under scrutiny. Uvalde city officials filed a lawsuit in 2022 that accused prosecutors of not being transparent and withholding records related to the shooting. Media outlets, including the AP, also sued Uvalde officials for withholding records requested under public information laws.

But body camera footage, investigations by journalists and damning government reports have laid bare how over the course of over an hour, a mass of officers went in and out of the school with weapons drawn but did not go inside the classroom where the shooting was taking place. The hundreds of officers at the scene included state police, Uvalde police, school officers and U.S. Border Patrol agents.

In their July 2022 report, Texas lawmakers faulted law enforcement at every level with failing “to prioritize saving innocent lives over their own safety.” The Justice Department released its own report in January that detailed “cascading failures” by police in waiting far too long to confront the gunman, acting with “no urgency” in establishing a command post and communicating inaccurate information to grieving families.

Uvalde remains divided between residents who say they want to move past the tragedy and others who still want answers and accountability. During the first mayoral race since the shooting, locals voted in a man who had served as mayor more than a decade ago over a mother who led calls for tougher gun laws after her daughter was killed in the attack.

Robb Elementary School is now permanently closed. The city broke ground on a new school in October 2023.

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Read AP’s full coverage of the school shooting in Uvalde, Texas: https://apnews.com/hub/uvalde-school-shooting

Friedman, 79, died Thursday at his family’s Texas ranch near San Antonio, close friend Kent Perkins told The Associated Press. Friedman had suffered from Parkinson’s disease for several years, Perkins said.

“He died peacefully. He smoked a cigar, went to bed and never woke up,” said Perkins, who was working as an actor when he met Friedman as a party 50 years ago when both were signed to Columbia records and movie contracts.

“We were the only two people with tuxedos and cowboys hats. Two Texans gravitating toward each other.” Perkins said. “He was the last free person on earth … He had an irreverence about him. He was a fearless writer.”

Often called “The Kinkster” and sporting sideburns, a thick mustache and cowboy hat, Friedman earned a cult following and reputation as a provocateur throughout his career across musical and literary genres.

In the 1970s, his satirical country band Kinky Friedman and the Texas Jewboys wrote songs with titles such as “They Ain’t Makin’ Jews Like Jesus Anymore” and “Get Your Biscuits in the Oven and Your Buns in Bed.” Friedman joined part of Bob Dylan’s Rolling Thunder Revue tour in 1976.

By the 1980s, Friedman was writing crime novels that often included a version of himself, and he wrote a column for Texas Monthly magazine in the 2000s.

Friedman’s run at politics brought his brand of irreverence to the serious world of public policy. In 2006, Friedman ran for governor as an independent in a five-way race that included incumbent Republican Rick Perry. Friedman launched his campaign against the backdrop of the Alamo.

“We’re gypsies on a pirate ship, and we’re setting sail for the Governor’s Mansion,” Friedman said at the campaign launch. “I’m calling for the unconditional surrender of Rick Perry.”

Some saw the campaign as another Friedman joke, but he insisted it was serious. His platform called for legalizing medical marijuana, boosting public education spending through casino gambling and supported same-sex marriage. Campaign slogans included “How Hard Could It Be?” and “He ain’t Kinky, he’s my Governor.”

“Humor is what I use to attack the windmills of politics as usual,” Friedman said.

Perry won re-election in 2006, and Friedman finished last. He did not give up politics, however, and unsuccessfully ran for state agriculture commissioner as a Democrat in 2010 and 2014.

Born in Chicago, Richard Samet Friedman grew up in Texas. The family’s Echo Hill ranch where Friedman died ran a camp for children of parents killed serving in the military.

Funeral services were pending, Perkins said.

AUSTIN, Texas (AP) — The families of 19 of the victims in the Uvalde elementary school shooting in Texas on Wednesday filed a $500 million federal lawsuit against nearly 100 state police officers who were part of the botched law enforcement response to one of the deadliest school shootings in U.S. history.

The families said they also agreed to a $2 million settlement with the city, under which city leaders promised higher standards and better training for local police.

The lawsuit and settlement announcement in Uvalde came two days before the two-year anniversary of the massacre. Nineteen fourth-graders and two teachers were killed on May 24, 2022, when a teenage gunman burst into their classroom at Robb Elementary School and began shooting.

The lawsuit, seeking at least $500 million in damages, is the latest of several seeking accountability for the law enforcement response. More than 370 federal, state and local officers converged on the scene, but they waited more than 70 minutes before confronting the shooter.

It is the first lawsuit to be filed after a 600-page Justice Department report was released in January that catalogued “cascading failures” in training, communication, leadership and technology problems that day.

The lawsuit notes that state troopers did not follow their active shooter training or confront the shooter, even as the students and teachers inside were following their own lockdown protocols of turning off lights, locking doors and staying silent.

“The protocols trap teachers and students inside, leaving them fully reliant on law enforcement to respond quickly and effectively,” the families and their attorneys said in a statement.

Terrified students inside the classroom called 911 as agonized parents begged officers — some of whom could hear shots being fired while they stood in a hallway — to go in. A tactical team of officers eventually went into the classroom and killed the shooter.

“Law enforcement’s inaction that day was a complete and absolute betrayal of these families and the sons, daughters and mothers they lost,” said Erin Rogiers, one of the attorneys for the families. “TXDPS had the resources, training and firepower to respond appropriately, and they ignored all of it and failed on every level. These families have not only the right but also the responsibility to demand justice.”

A criminal investigation into the police response by Uvalde District Attorney Christina Mitchell’s office is ongoing. A grand jury was summoned this year, and some law enforcement officials have already been called to testify.

The latest lawsuit against 92 Texas Department of Public Safety officials and troopers also names the Uvalde School District, former Robb Elementary Principal Mandy Gutierrez and former Uvalde schools police Chief Peter Arredondo as defendants. The state police response was second only to U.S. Border Patrol, which had nearly 150 agents respond.

The list of DPS officials named as defendants includes two troopers who were fired, another who left the agency and several more whom the agency said it investigated. The highest ranking DPS official among the defendants is South Texas Regional Director Victor Escalon.

The Texas DPS told The Associated Press that the agency would not comment on pending litigation.

The plaintiffs are the families of 17 children killed and two more who were wounded. A separate lawsuit filed by different plaintiffs in December 2022 against local and state police, the city, and other school and law enforcement, seeks at least $27 billion and class-action status for survivors. And at least two other lawsuits have been filed against Georgia-based gun manufacturer Daniel Defense, which made the AR-style rifle used by the gunman.

The families said the settlement with the city was capped at $2 million because they didn’t want to bankrupt the city where they still live. The settlement will be paid from the city’s insurance coverage.

“The last thing they want to do was inflict financial hardship on their friend and neighbors in this community. Their friends and neighbors didn’t let them down,” Josh Koskoff, one of the attorneys for the families, said during a news conference in Uvalde on Wednesday.

The city of Uvalde released a statement saying the settlement would bring “healing and restoration” to the community.

“We will forever be grateful to the victims’ families for working with us over the past year to cultivate an environment of community-wide healing that honors the lives and memories of those we tragically lost. May 24th is our community’s greatest tragedy,” the city said.

But Javier Cazares, the father of slain 9-year-old Jackie Cazares, noted that the announcement — which was made in the same Uvalde Civic Center where the families gathered to be told their children were dead or wounded — was sparsely attended.

“On the way over here, I saw the sticker, which I see everywhere, ‘Uvalde Strong.’ If that was the case, this room should be filled, and then some. Show your support. It’s been an unbearable two years. … No amount of money is worth the lives of our children. Justice and accountability has always been my main concern.”

Under the settlement, the city agreed to a new “fitness for duty” standard and enhanced training for Uvalde police officers. It also establishes May 24 as an annual day of remembrance, a permanent memorial in the city plaza, and support for mental health services for the families and the greater Uvalde area.

The police response to the mass shooting has been criticized and scrutinized by state and federal authorities. A 600-page Justice Department report in January catalogued “cascading failures” in training, communication, leadership and technology problems that day,

Another report commissioned by the city also noted rippling missteps by law enforcement but defended the actions of local police, which sparked anger from victims’ families.

“For two long years, we have languished in pain and without any accountability from the law enforcement agencies and officers who allowed our families to be destroyed that day,” Veronica Luevanos, whose daughter Jailah and nephew Jayce were killed, said Wednesday. “This settlement reflects a first good faith effort, particularly by the City of Uvalde, to begin rebuilding trust in the systems that failed to protect us.”

CANADIAN, Texas (AP) — A cluster of wildfires scorched the Texas Panhandle on Wednesday, including a blaze that grew into one of the largest in state history, as flames moved with alarming speed and blackened the landscape across a vast stretch of small towns and cattle ranches.

An 83-year-old grandmother from the tiny town of Stinnett was the lone confirmed fatality. However, authorities have yet to make a thorough search for victims and have warned the damage to some communities is extensive.

Known as the Smokehouse Creek Fire, the largest blaze expanded to more than 1,300 square miles (3,370 square kilometers) and jumped into parts of neighboring Oklahoma. It is now larger than the state of Rhode Island, and the Texas A&M Forest Service said the flames were only about 3% contained.

“I believe the fire will grow before it gets fully contained,” said Nim Kidd, chief of the Texas Division of Emergency Management.

The largest fire recorded in state history was the 2006 East Amarillo Complex fire, which burned about 1,400 square miles (3,630 square kilometers) and resulted in 13 deaths.

Walls of flames were pushed by powerful winds while huge plumes of smoke billowed hundreds of feet in the air across the sparsely populated region. The smoke delayed aerial surveillance of the damage in some areas.

“There was one point where we couldn’t see anything,” said Greg Downey, 57, describing his escape as flames bore down on his neighborhood. “I didn’t think we’d get out of it.”

The woman who died was identified by family members as Joyce Blankenship, a former substitute teacher. Her grandson, Lee Quesada, said he had posted in a community forum asking if anyone could try and locate her. Quesada said deputies told his uncle on Wednesday that they had found Blankenship’s remains in her burned home.

Quesada said she’d surprise him at times with funny little stories “about her more ornery days.”

“Just talking to her was a joy,” he said, adding that “Joy” was a nickname of hers.

Hemphill County Emergency Management Coordinator Bill Kendall described the charred terrain as being “like a moonscape. … It’s just all gone.”

Kendall said about 40 homes were burned around the perimeter of the town of Canadian, but no buildings were lost inside the community. Kendall also said he saw “hundreds of cattle just dead, laying in the fields.”

Tresea Rankin videotaped her own home in Canadian as it burned.

“Thirty-eight years of memories, that’s what you were thinking,” Rankin said of watching the flames destroy her house. “Two of my kids were married there … But you know, it’s OK, the memories won’t go away.”

The small town of Fritch, north of Amarillo, lost hundreds of homes in a 2014 fire and appeared to be hit hard again. Mayor Tom Ray said Wednesday that an estimated 40-50 homes were destroyed on the southern edge. Ray said natural gas remained shut off for the town of 2,200.

Residents are probably not “prepared for what they’re going to see if they pull into town,” Hutchinson County Emergency Management spokesperson Deidra Thomas said in a social media livestream. She compared the damage to a tornado.

Authorities have not said what ignited the fires, but strong winds, dry grass and unseasonably warm temperatures fed the blazes. Near Borger, a community of about 13,000 people, emergency officials at one point late Tuesday answered questions from panicked residents on Facebook and told them to get ready to leave if they had not already.

“It was like a ring of fire around Borger. There was no way out … all four main roads were closed,” said Adrianna Hill, whose home was within about a mile of the fire. She said wind that blew the fire in the opposite direction “saved our butts.”

Republican Gov. Greg Abbott issued a disaster declaration for 60 counties. The encroaching flames caused the main facility that disassembles America’s nuclear arsenal to pause operations Tuesday night, but it was open for normal work Wednesday.

The weather forecast provided some hope for firefighters — cooler temperatures, less wind and possibly rain on Thursday. However, the situation was dire in some areas Wednesday.

Sustained winds of up to 45 mph (72 kph), with gusts of up to 70 mph (113 kph), caused the fires that were spreading east to turn south, threatening new areas, forecasters said. But winds calmed down after a cold front came through Tuesday evening, said Peter Vanden Bosch, a meteorologist at the National Weather Service in Amarillo.

Breezy conditions were expected again Friday, and fire-friendly weather could return by the weekend, Vanden Bosch said Wednesday.

Kidd said the weekend forecast and “sheer size and scope” of the blaze are the biggest challenges for firefighters.

“I don’t want the community there to feel a false sense of security that all these fires will not grow anymore,” Kidd said. “This is still a very dynamic situation.”

As evacuation orders mounted Tuesday, county and city officials implored residents to turn on emergency alert services on their cellphones and be ready to leave immediately.

“We got a great response from the community when they were asked to evacuate. They did,” Kidd said. “We believe that saved lives, and we don’t want people going back if the evacuation orders are still in place.”

The Pantex nuclear weapon plant, northeast of Amarillo, evacuated nonessential staff Tuesday night out of an “abundance of caution,” said Laef Pendergraft, a spokesperson for the National Nuclear Security Administration’s production office at Pantex. Firefighters remained in case of an emergency.

Pantex tweeted early Wednesday that the facility was “open for normal day shift operations.”

The Smokehouse Creek Fire spread from Texas into neighboring Roger Mills County in western Oklahoma, where officials encouraged people in the Durham area to flee. At least 13 homes burned in fires in the state’s Panhandle region, officials said Wednesday.

The weather service also issued red-flag warnings and fire-danger alerts for several other states through the midsection of the country.

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This story has been updated to correct Greg Downey’s age. He is 57, not 30.

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Vertuno reported from Austin, Texas. Associated Press reporters Ken Miller in Oklahoma City, Lisa Baumann in Bellingham, Washington, and Christopher Weber in Los Angeles contributed to this report.

Legal advocates who sued on behalf of the families and doctors, including the American Civil Liberties Union, called the law and the high court’s decision Thursday “cruel.“

“Transgender youth and their families are forced to confront the start of the school year fearful of what awaits them. But let us be clear: The fight is far from over,” the advocacy groups said in a joint statement.

Last week, a state district judge ruled the pending law violated the rights of transgender children and their families to seek appropriate medical care, and violated doctors’ ability to follow “well-established, evidence-based” medical guidelines under threat of losing their license.

The judge issued a temporary injunction to block the law and state officials immediately appealed to the state’s highest court for civil cases.

The order from the all-Republican Supreme Court lifting the injunction and allowing the law to take effect did not explain the decision. The order did not address the lower court’s ruling that the law is unconstitutional, and a full hearing is expected.

More than 20 states have adopted laws to ban some gender-affirming care for minors, although some are not yet in effect or have been put on hold by courts.

The Texas law would prevent transgender minors from accessing hormone therapies, puberty blockers and transition surgeries, even though medical experts say such surgical procedures are rarely performed on children. Children who already started the medications being banned are required to be weaned off in a “medically appropriate” manner, the law said.

“Texas kids are safer today because of the Supreme Court ruling,” said Jonathan Covey, policy director of Texas Values, a conservative group that supported the law. “Protecting children from harmful and dangerous gender transition surgeries and puberty blockers is in the best interests of the child and something we all agree on.”

The lawsuit argued the Texas law will have devastating consequences for transgender teens if they are unable to obtain critical treatment recommended by their physicians and parents.

Several doctors who treat transgender children said they worry their patients will suffer deteriorating mental health, which could possibly lead to suicide, if they are denied safe and effective treatment.

The Texas ban was signed into law in June by Republican Gov. Greg Abbott, who was the first governor to order the investigation of families of transgender minors who receive gender-affirming care.

AUSTIN, Texas (AP) — Texas A&M University on Friday announced the resignation of its president in the fallout over a Black journalist who said her celebrated hiring at one of the nation’s largest campuses quickly unraveled due to pushback over her past work promoting diversity.

President Katherine Banks said in a resignation letter that she was retiring immediately because “negative press has become a distraction” at the nearly 70,000-student campus in College Station.

Her departure after two years as president followed weeks of turmoil at Texas A&M, which only last month had welcomed professor Kathleen McElroy with great fanfare to revive the school’s journalism department. McElroy is a former New York Times editor and had overseen the journalism school at the more liberal University of Texas at Austin campus.

But McElroy said soon after her hiring — which included a June ceremony with balloons — she learned of emerging pushback because of her past work to improve diversity and inclusion in newsrooms.

Her exit comes as Republican lawmakers across the U.S. are targeting diversity, equity and inclusion programs on college campuses. That includes Texas, where Republican Gov. Greg Abbott signed a bill in June that dismantles program offices at public colleges.

The A&M System said in a statement that Banks told faculty leaders this week that she took responsibility for the “flawed hiring process.” The statement said “a wave of national publicity” suggested McElroy “was a victim of ‘anti-woke’ hysteria and outside interference in the faculty hiring process.”

“I’m deeply grateful for the groundswell of support I’ve received, especially from Aggies of all majors, and my former and current students,” McElroy said in a statement. “There’s much more I could say and will say about what has unfolded. But for now, I’ll reserve those statements for a future date.”

American Association of University Professors President Irene Mulvey criticized Texas A&M’s handling of McElroy’s hiring, and called efforts against diversity, equity and inclusion in higher education a “misguided culture war.”

“This will surely result in chilled conditions for academic freedom in teaching and research,” said Mulvey, a mathematics professor at Fairfield University.

McElroy previously told The Texas Tribune that she had been “damaged by this entire process” and that she believed she was “being judged by race, maybe gender. And I don’t think other folks would face the same bars or challenges.”

Her work at the New York Times included research into the relationship between news media and race, notably in newsroom practices, Pulitzers, obituaries and sports.

Gary Bledsoe, president of the Texas NAACP, called Banks’ resignation a “wakeup call for all of us” and that Texas A&M’s reputation had been damaged. Hart Blanton, the head of Texas A&M’s department of communication and journalism, said in a statement Friday that he initiated McElroy’s recruitment and claimed that race had played a part in the “unusual scrutiny” of her hiring.

“The failed effort to hire Dr. McElroy is a great loss to A&M and surely caused her great unnecessary suffering,” Blanton said.

McElroy said the initial offer of a tenure-track position had been reduced to a five-year post, then again to a one-year job from which she could be fired at any time. The 1981 Texas A&M graduate rejected that offer and chose to stay at the University of Texas as a journalism professor.

In an interview with NPR in 2021, McElroy said journalists should be pushed to find information from beyond what she called traditional sources that “skewed white patriarchy.”

“We can’t just give people a set of facts anymore,” she said. “I think we know that and we have to tell our students that. This is not about getting two sides of a story or three sides of a story, if one side is illegitimate. I think now you cannot cover education, you cannot cover criminal justice, you can’t cover all of these institutions without realizing how all these institutions were built.”

A right-leaning outlet in Texas highlighted those comments in a story after McElroy’s hiring and the publisher Friday said it helped expose a “woke agenda” at Texas A&M.

“Just as a little sunlight sends the cockroaches scurrying, exposing the statements and writings of these #HigherEd propagandists sends them into fits of hysteria,” tweeted Michael Quinn Sullivan, the publisher of Texas Scorecard and previous head of a conservative group backed by wealthy GOP donors.

The Rudder Association, which describes itself as a collection of Texas A&M students, former students, faculty and staff who are “dedicated Aggies committed to preserving and perpetuating the core values and unique spirit of Texas A&M,” also has acknowledged complaining to school administrators about McElroy’s hiring.

“TRA believes that a department head should embrace the egalitarian and merit-based traditions that characterize Texas A&M’s values, rather than the divisive ideology of identity politics,” the group wrote last week.

At a meeting with university faculty on Wednesday, Banks said she was not involved in the changes to McElroy’s contract offer. The faculty then voted to set up a panel to investigate the matter.

According to the university, of its 4,062 faculty members, 2,156, or 53%, are white, and 139, or 3%, are Black. Asians made up 8% of faculty, and Hispanics or Latinos 5%. In fall 2022 student enrollment, 51% were white, 23% were Hispanic, 10% were Asian and 3% were Black.

On Monday, José Luis Bermúdez, interim dean of the Texas A&M College of Arts and Sciences, also announced he would leave that job and return to his faculty position. McElroy said Bemudez had warned her about mounting “hysteria” about diversity, equity and inclusion at Texas A&M and advised her to stay on at Texas.

Banks is the second major university president to resign this week amid turmoil. Stanford President Marc Tessier-Lavigne said Wednesday he would resign Aug. 31, citing an independent review that cleared him of research misconduct but found “serious flaws” in five scientific papers on subjects such as brain development in which he was the principal author.

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Associated Press reporter Acacia Coronado contributed to this report.

AUSTIN, Texas — Shaka Smart has been a hot coaching commodity since leading Virginia Commonwealth to the Final Four in 2011. He had reportedly shunned several big-time offers, but the lure of Texas was finally too much to turn down.

Texas officials formally announced the hiring of Smart as the Longhorns’ new basketball coach Friday and expect to introduce him at a news conference on campus. The announcement from Texas came a day after Smart met with athletic director Steve Patterson in Richmond to strike a deal.

Smart met with VCU players Thursday evening at the Siegel Center, the team’s home arena, and at least one player was seen crying when he left.

Smart, who has won at least 26 games in each of his six seasons at VCU, is bolting for a Texas program that hasn’t been able to unseat Kansas atop the Big 12. But the Longhorns also boast the wealthiest athletic department in the country and easy access to some of the nation’s most fertile recruiting grounds in Dallas and Houston.

Smart replaces Rick Barnes, who was fired last weekend after 17 seasons.

Terms of Smart’s contract were not immediately released and VCU said a statement would be released Friday. Barnes made $2.62 million last season, while Smart made $1.8 million with the Rams.

Patterson had zeroed in on bringing Smart to Texas immediately after firing Barnes.

Smart did not speak to the media gathered Thursday and VCU players were escorted from the building by university public relations without offering comments.

That Barnes was pushed out shows Patterson, a former NBA executive, expects big things from basketball. Barnes won three Big 12 titles and recruited elite talent to Austin. Former Longhorns T.J. Ford (2003) and Kevin Durant (2007) won national player of the year honors.

But the program had plateaued and the early-round exits in the NCAA tournament started to mount, despite rosters full of future NBA talent.

At VCU, Smart took over a program that had had great success under Jeff Capel, and then Anthony Grant. He hopes to avoid the pitfalls at Texas that his predecessors encountered when they left to take over programs at universities considered “football schools.”

Capel lasted five years at Oklahoma before being fired, and Grant spent six at Alabama before he was dismissed.

By leaving before May 1, Smart owes VCU a $500,000 buyout. His contract also contains a provision that if he became a head coach at another institution, that school would have to play VCU in a home-and-home series, or pay VCU $250,000.

Barnes led Texas to 16 NCAA tournaments in 17 seasons but his teams haven’t made it out of the first weekend since 2008.

His best years came from 2003-2008, when Texas made its first Final Four in more than 50 years and twice more reached the tournament’s final eight. Texas also earned the program’s first No. 1 ranking in the 2009-2010 season.

Smart had some success right away at VCU when the Rams won the CBI postseason tournament in his first year.

But it was VCU’s monumental run in the NCAA tournament the following year that really got Smart noticed. The Rams went from being a questionable selection, barely getting a bid and playing in the First Four in Dayton, Ohio, to beating five major-conference schools to reach the Final Four.

The Rams have been back in the NCAA tournament each of the past four seasons, but were eliminated in the round of 32 in 2012 and 2013 and lost their first game in overtime each of the past two seasons.

Beyond the Final Four run, this year might have been Smart’s best coaching job at VCU.

The Rams lost Briante Weber, the leader of their “havoc” defensive style, on Jan. 31 to a knee injury, and played the last month and a half with scoring leader Treveon Graham bothered by a high left ankle sprain, sometimes even sidelined.

VCU (26-10) lost six of 10 late in the season, enduring its first three-game slide in Smart’s six seasons, before winning five straight, including four in four days, to win the Atlantic 10 title.

Smart’s 26 wins in six consecutive seasons is a feat matched only by Duke. With the interest he has generated in basketball, a $25 million basketball practice facility is under construction and scheduled to be ready for use in the fall.