Thread by @John_Tedesco

The Texas attorney general's office is supposed to uphold the state's open records law.

Media outlets across Texas are asking why @KenPaxtonTX isn't releasing his own records:

houstonchronicle.com/politics/texas…

via @lmcgaughy, @MorrisReports and @byjayroot #openrecords #hounews

This collaboration was the brainchild of an amazing editor, @_SusanCarroll.

When I told her that officials were refusing to release all @KenPaxtonTX's messages during the riot at the Capitol, Susy wondered whether other news organizations were dealing with the same roadblocks.

As usual, Susy was right. She set up meetings with journalists at @statesman, @DallasNews, @ProPublica, @ExpressNews and @TexasTribune. We were all having trouble obtaining public records about @KenPaxtonTX from the Texas attorney general's office.

We discovered the Texas attorney general's office has no policy governing the release of work-related messages stored on Paxton’s personal devices.

The attorney general's texts and emails are subject to the Texas Public Information Act. But he wasn't releasing them. #openrecords

In one instance, @MorrisReports texted work-related questions to @KenPaxtonTX's cellphone. Then, @dallasnews requested all of Paxton's work-related text messages he received that day.

The response: No records.

Why didn't @KenPaxtonTX release copies of his texts? A spokesman said Paxton doesn't have to keep "unsolicited and unwelcome" messages.

The Texas Public Information Act doesn't work that way.

Officials aren't allowed to destroy public records if they don't like the content.

This important story about government transparency is being published on major news sites across Texas.

Here's our version: houstonchronicle.com/politics/texas…

Our friends at @dallasnews posted a version in Spanish: dallasnews.com/espanol/al-dia… #openrecords #hounews

Thanks for reading.