Highlight: Forecast confidence for a cold late winter in the Central U.S. including Texas increases. Fig. 1: Climate Impact Company February 2023 U.S. temperature anomaly outlook. Discussion: The current Climate Impact Company (CIC) U.S. temperature anomaly outlook for February 2023 is cold and possibly very cold in the Central U.S. including Texas (Fig. 1). The CIC Outlook is based on a constructed analog most concerned with historical relationships large areas of anomalous sea surface temperature anomalies (SSTA) and prevalent in the modern-day climate. Specifically, the added attention generating climate forecasts is on the tendency of mostly warm SSTA patterns persisting in the middle latitudes of both the northern and southern hemisphere oceans. However, an added feature (for February) to validate the cold February forecast was discussed in research published in the Nov. 1, 2022, Journal of Climate article entitled “Role of Atmosphere-ocean-ice Interaction in the Linkage between December Bering Sea Ice and Subsequent February Surface Air Temperature Over North America” by J. Zhao, S. He and H. Wang. The research concludes that the tendency of below normal sea ice concentration early in the cold season as observed now in the Bering Sea and northward (Fig. 2) expanding mid-to-late winter and peaking in February as observed last year (Fig. 3) leads to a latent heat release that amplifies a high-pressure ridge north of Hawaii and sometimes over Alaska on average the past 20 years (Fig. 4) which is compensated for by a downstream polar vortex over South-central Canada causing a tendency for cold to very cold Central U.S. temperatures the last month of meteorological winter (Fig. 5). Fig. 2-3: The absence of sea ice in the Bering Sea (and northward) has become common during the early cold season of the past 20 years although expansion of sea ice is vigorous mid-to-late winter peaking in February as observed last year. Fig. 4-5: The February upper air pattern for 2001-2022 features a polar vortex signature over South-central Canada. The attendant temperature anomalies identify significant cold risk in the Central U.S. Summary: Forecast confidence in the cold February 2023 forecast for the Central U.S. increases based on the Bering Sea ice late season ice expansion correlation to the North America climate pattern.