Opening seats may shift state more to the right
More than two dozen members of the Texas Legislature are retiring or running for a different seat next year, creating a slew of vacancies that could push both chambers to become redder and more polarized by the time lawmakers reconvene in 2023.
Many of the outgoing members are center-right or establishment politicians with years of experience, opening up seats for younger and more ideologically extreme replacements. In many cases, their districts were redrawn to strengthen the GOP’s hold on the Legislature, eliminating all but a few of the battleground contests that tend to attract more moderate candidates.
Those changes, paired with new political maps that leave little opening for Democrats to gain ground in November, have laid the groundwork for an even more conservative Legislature, even as Republicans toast the 2021 legislative session as the most conservative in the state’s history.
“The tides are shifting again,” said state Rep. Dan Huberty, a moderate Republican from north Houston who is not seeking re-election. “You have different political leaders, and the constituency has a view of what they want. You’re going to see a shift. I would assume it’s going to be more conservative.”
The Capitol is also poised to lose some of its longest-serving legislators to retirement, draining “a generation of policy expertise” on areas such as health care, education, agriculture and the border, said Brandon Rottinghaus, a political science professor at the University of Houston. The average tenure of the departing members is 13 years.
Still, it’s not unusual for a mass reshuffling after a redistricting cycle, the once-a-decade process of redrawing
the state’s political maps. In some cases, the new maps make re-election harder for incumbents, either by drawing them out of their districts or by changing the political lean. In others, the changes could open up new opportunities for sitting representatives to run for higher office.
Twenty-five representatives in the 150-member Texas House don’t plan to return next year, a total that was solidified Monday, the deadline for candidates to file for the March primaries. Two incumbent Democrats are also facing off against each other in the same district, and only one can come back.
In the Senate, the more reliably conservative chamber, just one member is seeking a higher office. Four members plan to retire, including the chamber’s most moderate members on both sides of the aisle — Sen. Eddie Lucio, a Brownsville Democrat, and Republican Sens. Kel Seliger of Amarillo and Larry Taylor of Friendswood.
In all, 31 members definitely won’t return to the Capitol in 2023, and that list could grow if sitting members lose their primary or general election contests. Following the 2012 elections, after the last redistricting cycle, the final total was 49.
Refueled polarization
In both chambers, redistricting shored up GOP support across the state, making it likely that even more Republicans will head to Austin for the 2023 legislative session.
Republicans hold 18 seats in the 31-member Senate, and that could grow after next year’s general election. Former President Donald Trump carried 16 state Senate districts in 2020, but the new map would increase that total to 19.
It’s the same story in the House, where Republicans hold 85 seats. Trump secured 76 of those districts last year, but he would have won 85 of them under the new setup.
“This cycle will shape Texas politics as much as any other we’ve seen in the past decade,” Rottinghaus said. “The effect will be profound on the legislative process. I think the balance of power will lead to Republicans having a lot more control, because they’re able to develop and harness the authority of leadership.”
The new vacancies have also created a field for more ideologically extreme members to run for office — a trend seen nationwide as both state and national politics become increasingly polarized and as money floods to those candidates, said Jennifer Clark, a political science professor at the University of Houston.
“It seems that increasingly moderate members are being sidelined and not stepping up and running for these seats,” she said. “And then this is self-reinforcing, of course, because then we see growing polarization and even more of a reluctance on the part of moderates to enter into these races.”
Moderates departing
In 2011, Huberty was one of 37 mostly Republican freshmen in the Texas House — a mix of conservatives and moderates who rode the tea party wave into office, including three members who had served in the House previously, lost their seats and then gained them back that year.
By 2023, few of the moderate new members elected from that class will remain, with most of the remaining holdouts — including Huberty, John Frullo of Lubbock, Lyle Larson of San Antonio and Jim Murphy of Houston — declining to seek re-election next year.
Huberty rejected the idea that moderate Republicans are leaving Austin because they are fed up with the direction of the Legislature or are being pushed out by more conservative members.
“It’s just the nature of the business,” Huberty said. “The average tenure of a state rep is about five years. It’s like a running back in the NFL: It doesn’t last very long. I don’t see anything that’s a cause and-effect, like, ‘Oh my god, everything’s gone so far to the right, I just don’t want to do it anymore.’ ”
The 2023 session would be far from the first time the Legislature’s makeup has shifted to the right. But when that has happened in recent years, the more conservative freshmen were largely constrained by House leadership, led by former House Speaker Joe Straus, a moderate Republican from San Antonio. The current speaker, state Rep. Dade Phelan of Beaumont, rarely stood in the way of conservative priorities during his first year wielding the gavel.
“The speaker is definitely not Joe Straus in terms of his ideology,” said Jon Taylor, a political science professor at the University of Texas at San Antonio. “He’s much more conservative. ... He’s not as conservative, obviously, as (Lt. Gov.) Dan Patrick, but nonetheless more conservative. So, I think you’ll see a push by those more on the right side of the Republican Party in the Legislature next session.”
State Rep. Mayes Middleton, a Wallisville Republican who chairs the conservative House Freedom Caucus, praised the “awesome” slate of GOP candidates running for the Texas House this cycle.
“I’ve talked with a lot of them,” Middleton said. “They have the fire in the belly that it takes to go fight for our shared conservative values and make sure these policies get across the finish line.”
Middleton, one of the most conservative members of the Texas House, is now running for a vacant state Senate seat with Patrick’s endorsement.
The direction of the Legislature has also prompted some House Democrats to call it quits, though it’s unclear if they will be replaced by more liberal members.
One of the departing Democrats, state Rep. Ina Minjarez of San Antonio, said she decided to forgo re-election and run for Bexar County judge in part because she was fed up with the Legislature’s hardright turn — a trend she expects will continue next session.
“We’re not working on the issues, on the policies that really make the quality of life better for people in this state,” Minjarez said. “To me, it’s become nothing but a bunch of rhetoric and a bunch of political games.”
Senate getting redder
In the Senate, Lucio’s seat could be the sole competitive race next year. The other open districts are solidly Republican, and those who are likely to replace the outgoing members are ideologically further right than their predecessors — or are, at least, closely allied with Patrick, the leader of the upper chamber.
Seliger was known for frequent fallouts with Patrick, defying him at times and blocking passage of priority bills. But state Rep. Phil King, the Weatherford Republican vying to replace him, has already earned Patrick’s stamp of approval.
Taylor, one of the most moderate members of the Senate, is also poised to be replaced by a more conservative successor. Those running to replace him include Middleton and Robin Armstrong, a physician backed by Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, a tea party favorite. (Armstrong gained attention last year when he controversially administered hydroxychloroquine to COVID-19 patients at the Texas City nursing home where he works.)
It’s difficult to say whether ideological shifts in the Senate may help pass some conservative legislation that had failed this year, such as a ban on COVID vaccine mandates, Seliger said. Those who replace outgoing GOP members will also be Republicans who share many of the same values as their predecessors — and some could dissent behind closed doors, he said.
“The things that go all the way through are the things approved by the lieutenant governor,” he said. “That will not change.”