Update
Julie Straus, the wife of former Texas House Speaker Joe Straus, has been located and she is in good health, a Terrell Hills Police Department official said.
Original story
Julie Straus was reported missing from her home in Terrell Hills on Thursday.
Police released a notice Friday morning saying they were looking for a 64-year-old, white female with black hair, wearing a black sweater, black leggings, black and white tennis shoes. They also shared an image of Straus.
A family spokesman told the Express-News that she suffers from dementia.
The police department issued a silver alert saying Straus was last seen at 6:40Â p.m. Thursday in the 200 block of Geneseo Road in Terrell Hills.
A separate social media post said Straus was last seen walking east on Geneseo. Her caregiver had lost sight of her, the post said.
Julie Straus is shown here in 2017 stopping in the hallway outside the office of her husband, House Speaker Joe Straus, at the Texas Capitol. (Tom Reel, Staff / San Antonio Express-News)
“The Straus family greatly appreciates everyone’s love and prayers as the search for Julie Straus continues,” her family said in a statement. “We ask those who live in the Terrell Hills area to continue looking for Julie in and around your homes.”
Dustin Burrows, the current Texas House speaker, said in a statement on social media: “Our hearts are heavy as we pray for the safe return of Julie Straus, wife of former Texas House Speaker Joe Straus. Elisabeth and I are holding the Straus family close in our thoughts, and the entire Texas Legislature is embracing them with love and support.”
“Let’s join together as Texans and keep Julie and the Straus family in our prayers,” Burrows said.
Joe Straus served five terms as Texas House speaker, from 2005 to 2019, making him the longest-serving Republican speaker in the state’s history. He was known as a business-friendly moderate, and toward the end of his term, he clashed increasingly with social conservatives such as Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick.
A middle school in the Northside Independent School District is named after Straus. He represented House District 121, which extends from Alamo Heights, through San Antonio’s North Side and into northern Bexar County. The district is now represented by Republican Marc LaHood.
Joe Straus and his wife, the former Julie Brink, first met in the late 1980s at a political event at the Barn Door restaurant in San Antonio. At the time, Brink was an aide to then-Treasury Secretary James A. Baker 3d. The Strauses have two adult daughters, Robyn and Sara.
Staff writer Nancy M. Preyor-Johnson contributed.
This article originally published at Julie Straus, wife of former Texas House Speaker Joe Straus, has been found safe.