5-Day Royal Chubbing" Marathon in House Will Kill Emergency Issues in Legislature
Have visited with legislators from both sides of the aisle now and from both the House & Senate Chambers. Suffice to say that every Session ends in disappointment for seemingly unnecessary various reasons … and this Session is no different. Just it is being said like none ever seen before.
Take for instance the fact that the Texas Windstorm Insurance Association (or TWIA) emergency legislation" which from the beginning of the session has been included on every list of bills that have to be passed" is now a likely casualty of the just expired 5-day Democratic filibuster undertaken successfully to kill a bill requiring voters to show sufficient ID prior to voting. The so-called Voter ID Bill.
The reason the TWIA Bill is even on the agenda this session is due to the 2007 House adhering to its operating rules stating a bill will be printed & distributed for 24 hours" in order for legislators & the public to review or analyze its contents prior to its being debated and voted upon.
Just yesterday the House miraculously passed a waiver to its existing rules that allows for cherry-picked bills to
NOT be printed & distributed for such analyses … just delivered & made available on members computer screens will suffice. This was done as a favor to Legislative Counsel" who simply didnt have enough time to print all the backlogged bills now that 5 days have been wasted on the filibuster.
And TWIA may now be one of the bills considered after waiving of the House rule.
Yes the House has gone paperless of sorts but what about the other 500 or so bills which will die a hideous death due to the filibuster? What if the House decides to break its rules again effectively taking a Get Out of Jail Free" card in order to not be held accountable for the repercussions of the Voter ID filibuster?
Speaking of the 5-days long delay undertaken by House Democrats to filibuster & kill the so-called Voter ID Bill we were reminded by numerous members this morning that a couple Sessions ago House member and now Border & Intergovernmental Affairs Committee Vice Chair Richard Raymond helped kill another voter disenfranchisement effort. Only that effort would have
empowered a certain group of likely voters. Raymond earlier this week gave what he said was his first-ever Personal Privilege speech to passionately but hypocritically explain why he was one of last weeks filibuster and Voter ID Bill killing leaders.
His Personal Privilege claim? That he would never ask another member to go against their conscience to disenfranchise their constituents. Yet just a couple years ago Rep. Raymond was a leader to disenfranchise military or overseas personnel from voting asking such questions as Where are your credit card bills mailed to? Or Where will these voters sleep on Election Night … in Texas or overseas? as proof they should be excluded from voting.
Seems he was concerned about specifically disenfranchising military personnel form voting one would surmise based upon what statistically would show their more conservative voting patterns.
And then over the weekend a
little noticed comment from Texas Monthlys own Paul Burka who commented on why Texas Democrats undertook their 5-day filibuster to kill the Republican-backed Voter ID measure:
In a phone interview earlier today (Saturday) Craig Eiland (D-Galveston) told me that the Carter-Baker commission testified that the Voter I.D. Bill would result in 150000 voters being disenfranchised statewide. That is an average of 1000 per legislative district. If this average held true based on the electoral numbers Democrats would lose 7 seats in the House."
Nuff said.
Today here in Austin after the Senate scrambled until 2:30 a.m. this morning tacking previously thought dead" bills onto other unrelated pieces of legislation in hope of saving the important business the Texas House and Senate both went to work at 11 a.m. Most House members feel theres nothing of consequence on their agenda today as they wait for other House Rules (not yet waived) requiring legislation coming from the Senate to sit in Members inboxes for the required 24 hours of consideration.
From here House members can only consider the Senates amendments or hash things out in Conference Committees or who knows maybe other Emergency Issues" will suddenly be taken out off of the mortuary slab and revived by changing the rules so legislators wont have to own up to the repercussions of the Democratic filibuster effort.
Stranger things have happened.
So after the 5-day royal Chubbing" marathon in the House the Senate had only a day to transform their bills into amendments and tack them to anything with life in it - all this before midnight last night. Having not quite accomplished all they wanted by the midnight deadline the Senate clock was stopped at 11:58 p.m. while activities proceeded finally adjourning at 2:30 a.m.
The TWIA (emergency windstorm insurance) bill was attached to HB 4409 late yesterday a bill by Reps. Larry Taylor Craig Eiland & Ryan Guillen addressing Texas emergency preparation and management procedures. If the House agrees to the amendment the Legislature could avoid a much-rumored Special Session the governor has said he will call should TWIA not be addressed.
Late Wednesday afternoon Democrat members were waxing eloquent on the House floor saying how gracious" Lt. Gov. Dewhurst had been to send over 400 filibuster-busted bills effectively giving them the chance to save face for the Voter ID filibuster. Virtually every Austin prognosticator said the Senate was none-too-happy having been forced to
not move legislation earlier and in a more thoughtful manner due to the filibuster yet House Democrats continue to claim theyre not in control of the calendar" similar to defining what the definition of is" is.
Theres also the Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT) Sunset Bill a truly massive & wide-reaching 1000 page bill whos future is all but certainly dead given the filibuster.
The Texas Racing Commission looks like it will go out of existence for lack of deliberation as may the Texas Residential Construction Commission whose responsibility it is to protect homeowners & buyers from builder abuses. Oh well.
Dont forget that the Department of Public Safety (DPS) Sunset Bill either it now has 25 amendments read previously killed important legislative business" attached to it.
Theres also the Texas Youth Commission (TYC) which is awaiting its own 2-year extension after more than a year of high-profile focus and high-minded calls for reform. No one is willing to predict its future.
And who can forget Senator Kip Averitts (R-Waco) SB 16 relating to the enhancement of air quality including the capture and storage of carbon dioxide and development of a greenhouse gas registry the development of emissions reduction technologies and the improvement of energy efficiency in buildings vehicles and appliances" which found a home on a House carbon sequestration bill.
Averitt also added his CHIP-expansion bill onto a newborn screening bill. For those fans of Roberts Rules of Order the CHIP amendment could probably ruled as not being germane however desperate times call for creativity.
Not pretty no way to run a railroad.
Having said that Rep. Beverly Woolley (R-Houston) commented earlier this week Ultimately you have to have one leader and one captain of the ship. There are too many strong personalities here who will go out and do their own thing without regard to the rest of the body."
Said House Speaker Joe Straus The members have to make these decisions. They cant be dictated to under these circumstances. And its not my intention to do that. Im encouraging people to work through it. Thats been working all session."
Only passage of the next four days will tell how successful its been and if in fact its worked.
