Texas House ready for business as three Houston Democrats return.
House members from Houston urge COVID school action
The Texas House, after six weeks, finally has a quorum, and a committee hearing on the contentious elections bill that triggered the standoff has already been called for Saturday.
The Legislature has been at a standstill since Democrats left the state during last month’s special session and have remained out of the Capitol since, an extreme measure taken to avoid a vote on the GOP priority election bill.
The gap closed Thursday after three Houston-area representatives reappeared in the chamber after weeks of absence. Their presence brought the chamber to the 99 members needed to restore a quorum and vote on legislation.
State Reps. Garnet Coleman, Ana Hernandez and Armando Walle, all from Houston, entered the chamber about 5 p.m. with Walle pushing Coleman, who’s recovering from amputation surgery, in a wheelchair. Chatter in the room came to a full stop as they walked through the door.
In a statement released min
utes before they arrived on the floor, the representatives said they returned to address the delta-driven COVID-19 surge and its effect on schoolchildren.
“It is time to move past these partisan legislative calls, and to come together to help our state mitigate the effects of the current COVID-19 surge by allowing public health officials to do their jobs, provide critical resources for school districts to conduct virtual learning when necessary, while also ensuring schools are a safe place for in-person instruction, and will not become a series of daily super-spreader events,” the statement read.
Coleman, giving the invocation on Thursday, told members he hoped they would “look inside about where we want this world to go, this state, this House, and look at it from the perspective of trying to find as much common ground as can be found.”
With a quorum present, the House was able to accept bills from the Senate, including SB 1, the elections legislation.
The Senate has also already passed a host of other bills on Gov. Greg Abbott’s 17-point agenda for the session, such as blocking transgender student athletes from playing on sports teams that align with their gender identity, restricting abortion-inducing drugs and reducing opportunities for cashless bail for serious offenders.
A committee hearing is set for Saturday morning at which the panel will consider both the elections and bail legislation.
The elections bill would limit early voting options, add new vote-by-mail ID requirements, create new criminal penalties on the state election code and expand the power of partisan poll watchers. Republicans say the measures are necessary to ensure the integrity of future elections, while Democrats say they are calculated to limit voting access and discourage involvement.
It’s yet to be seen whether the House will retain the minimum members needed throughout the rest of the session.
“Members, this has been a very long summer, we’ve been through a lot. I appreciate you all being here, and I appreciate the members who made quorum today,” Republican House Speaker Dade Phelan said as he adjourned the House until Monday. “It’s time to get back to the business of the people of Texas.”
House Republican Caucus Chair Jim Murphy, RHouston, interviewed just moments after a quorum was met, said it was “like prayers being answered.” Murphy said he and other Republicans had been applying pressure for weeks, urging colleagues to come back to the chamber for good-faith discussions.
With just a couple of weeks left in the session, there is limited time for the Legislature to move bills on Abbott’s agenda.
“We can get our work done, and those of us who have waited all this time, coming here every day for the last six weeks, feel vindicated,” Murphy said.
Some Democratic members expressed surprise and bitterness at their colleagues’ return on Twitter.
“Guess what the other defecting Democrats have accomplished by going back — NOTHING!” wrote Rep. Ana Maria Ramos of Dallas.
House Democratic Caucus Chair Chris Turner, DGrand Prairie, in a statement stressed that through the walkout, members had “secured major victories” and pushed up the timetable on federal legislation, including the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act, which could get a U.S. House vote next week.
“All 66 members of the Democratic Caucus oppose Texas Republicans’ efforts to erect deliberate barriers to voting, barriers based on the Big Lie,” Turner said. “We will fight with everything we have in this special session to protect Texas voters and push for real solutions to the actual issues families in our state face every day.”