Author Topic: Texas House Democrats try to run out the clock in last-ditch effort to sink GOP priority bills  (Read 429 times)

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KVUE by James Barragan 5/25/2021

Texas House Democrats try to run out the clock in last-ditch effort to sink GOP priority bills

With only a few hours until the final deadline for passing Senate bills in the Texas House, Democrats were pulling out all the stops Tuesday to keep the body from considering GOP-backed legislation they oppose.

The House has on its calendar several of the Senate’s priority bills, including a bill banning social media companies from blocking users because of their viewpoint or their location within Texas, another that would ban local governments from using public funds to pay for lobbyists, and another would force transgender student athletes to play on sports teams based on their biological sex instead of their gender identity.

Republicans control all branches of Texas government, and Democrats have been trying to fight back these bills since the beginning of the legislative session in January. The midnight deadline to pass the bills might be the minority party’s last hope.

The chamber started the day at 10 a.m. with 129 bills on its agenda, setting up a marathon of debating, voting and political maneuvering. Members spent the first half of the day giving final approval to bills the House had initially passed Monday, a usually procedural move that went beyond banking hours Tuesday as Democrats barraged their fellow lawmakers with questions, compliments and tactical procedures to slow down the chamber’s progress.

The tactics in the House caught the attention of lawmakers in the Senate, whose bills floundered with each passing minute the Democrats delayed. With plenty of House bills locked up in the upper chamber, the senators also began slowing their progress and ribbing state representatives who visited them during a lunch break.

More: https://www.kvue.com/article/news/politics/texas-legislature/texas-house-democrats-chubbing/269-d52bdb40-b3be-4053-930d-ba3f7ba3cbd0