House Democrats in the state of Texas have reportedly flown the coop Monday in an attempt to prevent the passing of alleged Republican voting reform legislation.
“Today, House Democrats left the state and broke quorum to fight back against state Republicans’ continued attack on Texans’ freedom to vote,” the HDC said in a press release on Monday.
Texas House Democratic Caucus Chair Chris Turner, Mexican American Legislative Caucus Chair Rafael Anchia, Texas Legislative Black Caucus Chair Nichole Collier, Legislative Group Caucus Chair Garnet Coleman and Dean Senfronia Thompson, released the following statement on the decision to break quorum.
“Today, Texas House Democrats stand united in our decision to break quorum and refuse to let the Republican-led legislature force through dangerous legislation that would trample on Texans’ freedom to vote.
“We are now taking the fight to our nation’s Capitol. We are living on borrowed time in Texas. We need Congress to act now to pass The For The People Act’, and The John Lewis Voting Rights Act to protect Texans – and all Americans – from the Trump Republicans’ nationwide war on democracy.”
A handful of the lawmakers have gone to Washington to urge other lawmakers to enact voting rights legislation. “We are determined to kill this bill in this special session, which will end on August 07,” said Chris Turner, the Chair of the state House Democrats at a press conference Monday. “And we will stay out until then, in order to do that.”
“Our democracy is on the line,” Representative Trey Martinez Fischer told reporters. “It became very clear to us this weekend that any attempts to negotiate some Democratic concessions were cut off, making it very clear that Republicans were hellbent on having it their way.”
Governor Abbott released his own press statement:
“Texas Democrats’ decision to brake quorum of the Texas Legislature and abandon the Texas state Capitol inflicts harm on the very Texans who elected them to serve. As they fly across the country on cushy private plans, they leave undone issues that can help their districts and their state.
“The Democrats must put aside partisan political games and get back to the jobs they were elected to do. Their constituents must not be denied these important resources simply because their elected representatives refused to show up to work.”
Speaking of partisan political games, it wasn’t too long ago that Abbott played his own political game, blaming green energy for the failure of the states power grid during February’s winter storm, as “Cancun Ted” skipped his responsibilities to head down to Mexico while thousands of Texans froze and more than a few died.
As Ryan Cooper wrote in an article in The Week, about Cruz’s Cancun get-away back in Februrary:
“It was all darkly amusing. But what Cruz did is emblematic of the Republican party’s mode of governance. The reason Cruz felt comfortable leaving Texans to freeze solid on the sidewalks of Houston is the same reason the Texas power grid crumbled under the winter storm. Theirs is a party in which catering to the welfare of one’s constituents, or indeed any kind of substantive political agenda, has been supplanted by propaganda, culture war grievance, and media theatrics. Neither he nor anyone else in a leadership position in the party knows or cares about how to build a reliable power grid. They just want to get rich owning the libs…
“Liberty,” to people like this, means that conservative elected officials never have to use their positions or authority to do anything when their constituents are suffering and dying. That, you see, is “socialism.”
“Whining is the beginning and end of Republican governance.”
Not to mention, the partisan Political games they played during the pandemic to play defense for a president who did virtually nothing while he blamed the Democratic party for his own failures, as hundreds of thousands of people died. It’s the perfect way to own the libs.
Sources: Politico, NBC News, Texas Tribune, texashousedems.com, gov.texas.gov., The Week.
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