Now that lawmakers have convened in Austin, private citizens and PACs are no longer able to make political contributions, so the sole financial influence on lawmakers during the legislative session comes from lobbyists. In fact, in session and out, lobbying is by far the biggest source of money in Texas politics — and taxpayers are footing the bill for a lot of it. This look at the City of Houston is the first installment in our series analyzing the top taxpayer-funded entities in Texas.

The most closely watched battle in Texas state-level politics is the effort by Democrats to flip the Texas House to blue this November. If Democrats can hold the 12 seats they gained in 2018 and take nine more, they will control the Texas House for the first time in more than two decades. The upcoming redistricting process, set to happen in 2021, redraws the legislative maps for both state and federal legislatures and makes this election even more consequential.

Texas politicians and PACs are required to file reports with the Texas Ethics Commission listing all their campaign contributions and expenditures. The most recent reports — which include all transactions for the last half of 2018 — were just released. Two major things to pay attention to in these reports: 1) final numbers on both donations and spending for the 2018 Election Cycle, and 2) perhaps even more interesting, a list of all donations made to Texas politicians after the election.