Dutton, Patrick entangle ed bills, staff pay
One GOP priority passes committee
A House committee on Tuesday advanced a controversial bill that would further limit the way teachers talk about racism in the classroom, reviving a priority of Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick less than 24 hours after the committee chair had blocked the bill and challenged Patrick to put his “big boy pants on.”
Until Tuesday’s meeting, state Rep. Harold Dutton of Houston had refused to hold votes in the Public Education Committee on two of Patrick’s priority bills: one that would restrict which teams transgender student athletes could join, and another that would strengthen a ban on socalled critical race theory passed during the spring session.
Dutton said Patrick had vowed to block a bill that would restore funding for the legislative branch — which is set to expire at the end of September after being vetoed by Gov. Greg Abbott — if Dutton’s committee failed to advance the education bills.
Dutton, who has the authority to kill any measure that is assigned to his committee, ended a meeting Monday night without holding a vote on either bill. He then scheduled a new meeting Tuesday afternoon and allowed the Republican majority on the committee to pass the critical race theory bill.
With committee members unable to agree on the path forward for the transgender sports bill, Dutton adjourned the committee meeting without voting on that measure for the second day in a row. He said the meeting was not spurred by pressure from House Speaker Dade Phelan, a Republican who appointed him committee chair.
Still, Dutton struck a far different tone Monday evening, when he criticized Patrick for allegedly threatening to cut off the legislative funding, or Article X of the state budget.
“What I’m told is that if we don’t pass these two bills, the CRT bill and the transgender bill, the Senate is not going to consider trying to fix the funding in Arti
X,” Dutton said Monday night. “So, I want to see if he has his big boy pants on. This meeting is adjourned.”
Patrick did not respond to a request for comment.
Dutton’s committee meeting redo on Tuesday marked the second time this year that he has abruptly allowed the Public Education Committee to pass controversial legislation after suggesting otherwise. During the spring session, he angered members of his party when he helped Republicans pass an earlier version of the transgender sports bill, shortly after telling reporters it would “likely die” because it lacked support from a majority of the committee.
Still, Dutton’s move to continue defying the lieutenant governor on the transgender sports bill threatens to upend the final days of the special session, which can end no later than Sunday. Most of the bills prioritized by Abbott and Republican lawmakers have yet to reach the governor’s desk, though major overhauls of the state’s election and bail systems cleared the Legislature on Tuesday.
Staff funding uncertain
The development casts further uncertainty on the salaries and benefits of more than 2,000 employees of the state’s legislative branch. Their fate has been uncertain since June, when Abbott vetoed the section of the state budget that funds the Legislature as retribution for a walkout by Democratic lawmakers that killed Repbulicans’ priority elections bill.
Funding for the legislative branch was originally set to expire Wednesday, when the next two-year budget goes into effect, though Abbott, Patrick and Phelan extended the fundcle ing for another month.
Democrats have accused Abbott of using his veto power to hold legislative staff as “hostages.” They say the governor is violating a provision of the Texas Constitution that establishes three separate and independent branches of government.
The all-Republican Texas Supreme Court rejected that argument in early August, deciding it was up to lawmakers to restore the funds during the special session.
When the session began on Aug. 7, the Senate moved swiftly to pass priorities of Abbott and Patrick, including the two contentious education bills.
The Article X funding bill was left almost untouched until a Senate committee advanced it Sunday to the Senate floor. Patrick could kill the measure by declining to bring it up for a vote, as Dutton suggested.
One of the education measures would require transgender student athletes to play on the school sports team that aligns with their sex at birth rather than their gender identity.
The other would build on a law passed during the spring that limits the way teachers talk about racism, including a ban on discussing the concept that some people are “inherently racist, sexist, or oppressive, whether consciously or unconsciously.”
The final bill included a number of amendments from House Democrats that established a list of certain historical documents and figures that must be covered in social studies curricula for public schools.
The measure prioritized by Patrick would remove most references to women and people of color from that list and ensure that the new law applies to teachers of all subjects, not just social studies.
On Tuesday, Dutton’s committee also advanced a bill that would require middle school and high school students to be taught about child abuse, family violence and dating violence.
Abbott vetoed a similar bill that passed the Legislature in the spring because it did not allow parents to opt their children out of receiving the instruction. The latest bill now includes that provision.