Texans want bipartisanship, but they want stiff spines, too
For the most part, Democrats who serve in the Texas Legislature are willing to work across the aisle to get something done.
Even the more progressive members of the caucus are prone to fraternizing with the enemy.
Those who have a blanket objection to doing so should be fired. I would say the same about their Republican colleagues. That’s just common sense, even in the Trump era. I spent some time last week pondering the question of what it means to collaborate with a corrupt regime, which has emerged as an issue in the special election that will be held Tuesday in Harris County for a seat in the Texas Senate.
The seat in question was vacated by Democrat Sylvia Garcia last month, after she was elected to represent Texas’ 29th congressional district. The leading contenders are Democrats Carol Alvarado and Ana Hernandez, both of whom serve in the Texas House.
In terms of their policy views, Alvarado and Hernandez are effectively indistinguishable.
I cannot decide which of the two seems better equipped to accomplish anything in the Texas Senate next session. My colleagues on the editorial board of the Houston Chronicle endorsed Alvarado, but they think the Texas Senate is dominated by Republicans. I think the Texas Senate is dominated by Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, who doesn’t even pay lip service to bipartisanship and is quick to trample all senators, even Republicans. Sunday, December 9, 2018
Alvarado serves as chair of the Urban Affairs Committee, for example, and has forged working relationships with Republican state senators like Joan Huffman. Hernandez, by contrast, has said she would be reluctant to compromise her values by doing such things.
There’s underlying context that comes way of the sweeping crackdown on “sanctuary” policies, SB4, that the Texas Leg-
islature passed in 2017 after a debate that attracted relatively little attention, compared to the saga over the bathroom bill.
Speaker Joe Straus has been rightly commended for the courage he showed in opposing the right wing on the bathroom bill. It’s not clear that he could have thwarted the passage of SB4, but he didn’t even try.
I can understand why the passage of SB4 would have had a radicalizing effect on House Democrats because, frankly, it had a radicalizing effect on me.
The version of bipartisanship that would expect Democrats to compromise their values for Republican convenience is deeply pathological. House Republicans didn’t realize how much harm the passage of SB4 would cause in Texas months after the inauguration of President Donald Trump. Some of them wouldn’t have cared, of course. But others might have.
All things considered, then, I don’t think Democrats like Alvarado are compromising their values by working with Republicans. But the passage of SB4 illustrated that Democrats like Hernandez can help Republicans avoid doing so.
And Republicans would be well-advised to consider the possibility that Texas Democrats like Alvarado aren’t actually more docile than Democrats like Hernandez. This is Texas, after all. They’ve had to think strategically.
Democrats — who could retake the Texas House in 2020 — have proved that they’re willing to work with Republicans but also to stand up to them; that’s ultimately the version of bipartisanship that Texans want.