Buster and bluster

It was a historic moment on the floor of the Texas Senate this week as Sen. Wendy Davis filibustered (prolonged speechmaking for the purpose of delaying legislative action) to stop SB 5 which would have radically altered access to abortion.  The proposal would have banned most abortions after 20 weeks of pregnancy and required abortion facilities to meet the standards of an ambulatory surgical center.  Having passed in the Texas House earlier in the week, it looked almost certain that 37 of the state’s 42 facilities providing abortions, including many operated by Planned Parenthood would be closing.

That is until Senator Davis tried talking the bill to death and a broad coalition of grass-roots groups (organizations which rely on activist citizen participation) eventually yelled the bill to death.   A number of liberal organizations came together Tuesday night to create such a racket in the Texas Senate chamber that the bill could not be properly voted on.

Senator Davis had been successful in her filibuster until Republicans successfully employed parliamentary maneuvers to end it. At that point, groups supporting pro-choice advocates including local Occupy movement groups, the International Socialist Organization, and GetEqual Texas, a gay rights group had members at the protest began chanting so loudly that business could not be conducted on the Senate floor. Finally at 12:03 a.m. (the special session ended at midnight), the vote was finally taken, but it was too late.

There was a bit of confusion when it was reported that the legislation had actually passed in time to meet the deadline, but Republicans had to recant later when it was discovered that the date time stamp had been changed.  After a meeting that lasted until 3 am, the bill was officially declared dead on arrival.

Another law that was killed this week was section 4 of the Voting Rights Act (1965) which mandates preclearance for all states which are required to comply because they have a past history of discrimination. As a result of the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision this week in two Texas cases, one involving voter identification laws, and the other involving a 3 three judge federal court which had invalidated a Texas redistricting map, the High Court held that states need no longer be automatically subject to the preclearance process.

That means that the two lower federal court decisions in those cases must now be reconsidered in light of the Supreme Court’s rulings to determine whether their initial decision should stand, or be busted.

 

 

 

 

Isn’t that special

This week, and as predicted, the legislature has gone into special session (a limited 30 day session called by the Governor).  At the conclusion of the regular 140 day regular biennial session (which meets only in odd-numbered years), the gavel came down in both chambers signaling the end, but within 10 minutes, the Governor invoked his state Constitutional powers.  Such authority allows the state’s chief executive to call the legislators into “extraordinary session…at any time and for any reason”.  The key is that the Governor must specify the issues or else face a runaway legislature (one where lawmakers focus on their own policy agenda rather than what the governor wants).

Several outstanding issues need resolution, but most salient is the need to adopt a redistricting map.  After the 2010 census required by the U.S. Constitution, the Texas legislature had to go through reapportionment of the Texas House and Senate, along with the U.S. House of Representatives.  Seats were reallocated into the different administrative or election districts, and then the state legislature had to redistrict (the process of drawing boundary lines for election districts in a state).  The new maps resulted in the filing of two federal court cases (one in San Antonio and the other in Washington, D.C. where Texas had to get approval from the federal government).  The San Antonio court found that the legislature had gerrymandered (illegally manipulated) district lines to favor one group over another.  The three-judge court then re-drew the maps to accurately represent racial minority interests—those maps were used in the 2012 election. The court in D.C. did the same thing about six months later.   

Now the state legislature has to vote on whether they want to approve the San Antonio map or try to draw up their own during the special session. 

Other hot issues that Governor Perry may press for during the special session include prohibiting abortions after 20 weeks, drug testing for welfare applicants, and allowing guns on campus. The Governor may have to call more than one session.  He can call an unlimited number, but each 30 day session costs about $1.3 million because of per diem costs—monies allocated to pay for funding, travel and staff during the session.  Perry hasn’t been shy about using his authority—he’s called 10 sessions during his 12 years in office.  

And in other census news, a new report highlights that Texas’ growth in the Hispanic population after the 2010 census means that immigrants have substantially contributed to the gross state product (total sum of all goods and services produced in the state in a given year).  According to the report, Texas’ immigrants produce about 69.3 billion in economic activity by spending in the state, contribute about $30.8 billion in gross state product, and account for approximately 403,174 of the state’s workforce.   The report comes at a time when the U.S. government is considering a major overhaul on immigration reform. 

Guess we’ll just have to wait and see whether the federal government thinks immigrant economic contributions are special enough to merit immigration reform.

Getting out the vote and giving up the fight

Next week the U.S. Supreme Court takes up a case which has ramifications for Texas.   Since the passage of the 1965 Voting Rights Act (VRA), the federal government has expanded authority to act as a watchdog over elections throughout the country.  The VRA prohibits state and local governments from restricting voting rights and access to minority voters by mandating preclearance procedures which require some state and local governments (including Texas and eight states) to submit all changes affecting voting and elections for approval to the U.S. Department of Justice’s Civil Rights Division or to the U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C.  That’s what happens every 10 years after the states conduct redistricting (the drawing of the geographic boundary lines to determine the representative structure for elections).

The question in Shelby County v. Holder (2013) is whether the preclearance process has outlived its purpose.  In 2008, then President Bush’s Justice Department filed a lawsuit against the city when it re-drew voting lines eliminating the only majority black city council seat.   Alabama argues that blacks were integrated into the population, and that continued supervision by the federal courts causes confusion and delay for elections–the South is a different place from 1965.

Texas agrees.

Or at least Republican leaders do.

Attorney General Greg Abbott has filed an appeal in a federal court case which struck down Texas’ 2011 redistricting plan.  Two different federal courts have found that Texas impermissibly interfered with minority voting rights with the plan, and Abbott’s appeal is likely to be on hold while the Supreme Court resolves the Shelby county case.

What do the rest of Texans think? Not everyone agrees with Abbott.  It might surprise you to learn that a recent public opinion poll found a slim majority of Texans (about 51%) including 1/3^rd Republicans think there is some place for federal supervision over voting rights.

And speaking of opinions, wonder what Governor Rick Perry is thinking as he watches other Republican governors giving up the fight with President Obama over Medicaid funding under the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare).  Under the law, Medicaid funding (the joint federal-state program providing health insurance to low-income persons) has been hard for governors to resist because it means more money for state budgets.  Eleven Republican are standing firm that they will not accept federal monies because they do not want to be under a national regulatory scheme (structure which allows the federal government to demand conditions from the states), while 12 Republican governors have not weighed in yet.

Trouble for Governor Perry is that this week Republican Governor Rick Scott, who had been resisting federal money, gave in and agreed that Florida will take Medicaid monies.   That draws attention to the fact that if the Governor changed his mind and let Texas participate by putting up the $15 billion (our share of the program costs), the state would receive $100 billion in federal funds in the next 10 years. Those funds could be used to expand  health care coverage for 2 million people–approximately 25% of Texans  have no insurance.

It promises to be a tough battle for the Governor.

The party line

Early voting begins in Texas one week from today, and the races are heating up. While most of us know the high profile elections, what about those elections people know little about?  Such races that are down-ballot—contests  are not high profile like president,  U.S. Senator, etc.–mean voters may not know who the candidates are, nor do they make informed choices, but they vote all the same.  For that reason, both political parties like to see voters chose the straight-ticket option-selecting “Republican” or “Democrat” and all of their votes automatically count toward the party of choice.

Is that a good idea? That depends. We know in races of lesser importance-like local offices and judicial races—such votes can make a difference, but is that what democracy is about?

The importance of straight-ticket voting cannot be overstated—in urban areas, it can sweep one party into office or another party out depending on the political winds.  Some complain it undermines democracy because the voters are taking a short cut, using party as a proxy for their beliefs. Isn’t that better than just relying on name recognition (the idea that you vote for someone based on the familiarity of the name rather than what his or her politics).   At least with straight-ticket you know you are getting someone who identifies with the same party as you.

Will straight ticket voting make a difference in what is considered to be the most hotly contested race in the state—the match-up between Sen. Wendy Davis (D-Ft. Worth) and challenger state Rep. Mark Shelton (R-Fort Worth)? That is anyone’s guess.  They had the second of four debates on Sunday, and they sparred consistent with the ads they have been putting out there. Most controversial has been the ad by Davis accusing Shelton of not supporting legislation for rape victims.

In the end, Texas leaves all options open by allowing us to select the straight-ticket option, but then letting you go through the ballot and vote for individual races on the ballot in specific races. And that can make all the difference in the world when those down ballot races are tight.

Texas Round-up

In the courts again—Former U.S. House Majority Leader Tom DeLay was back in court again regarding his conviction for money laundering and conspiracy charges related to the 2002 elections.

On the road again—Governor Rick Perry has begun previewing his policy priorities for higher education as he goes around the state. What is at the top of the agenda? Governor Perry is advocating for a tuition-freeze to keep a student’s tuition at the same level over the course of their education.  The governor is also supporting $10,000 degrees (the total cost for your degree), along with in-state tuition for undocumented persons.

Republican redistricting rejected

Even as the Republican party was gearing up for a big night of speeches from party favorites like U.S. Senate candidate Ted Cruz, Texas Republicans received bad news from a three-judge federal court in Washington, D.C. about the redistricting map drawn by the Republican dominated legislature. Redistricting is the process that all 50 states must go through every 10 years after the census to re-draw the voting districts based on population changes.  Reapportionment is the process of allocating or dividing up the 435 U.S. House of Representatives seats into the different states after population shifts.   If a state has increased in population it gets more seats in Congress, but it also loses seats if its population declines. The party in power tries to draw the lines to maximize their party’s influence.

Since 2000, Texas grew by over four million people with minorities accounting for 90 percent of the growth (Hispanics accounted for 65 percent) meaning that we were reapportioned to increase our congressional delegation from 32 seats to 36 seats.  Sounds good—more seats to go around—right?

Not exactly.

The problem is that Texas is one of the nine states under “preclearance” mandates pursuant to the Voting Rights Act of 1965 because of Texas’ history of discriminating against minorities seeking to exercise their right to vote.  This preclearance procedure means Texas must submit its map to the federal Department of Justice (DOJ) for approval.  Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott, rather than seek DOJ approval, opted to go to a special court in Washington, D.C. which can hear cases for jurisdictions seeking a bailout-a release of the preclearance mandate after ten years of steps to improve minority voting.  Texas’ Attorney General Greg Abbott did just that—and on Tuesday, the federal court in D.C. said that Texas had failed to show the lines were “not enacted with discriminatory purpose”.

This was a second defeat for Abbott who had already lost in a case earlier this year in front of a three-judge federal panel in San Antonio.  There the judges had thrown out parts of the Texas map because it diluted minority voting rights (divided Hispanics up into districts to undermine their majority power).  The judges then re-drew their own maps.  Attorney General Abbott said that he disagreed with that decision, and he was hoping that the federal court in Washington, D.C. would find the Texas map acceptable and allow Texas to avoid the DOJ preclearance process.

What happens next?  The map drawn by the federal judges in San Antonio remains the map that will be used for the upcoming November elections.  After that?   Well that depends on how well Gregg Abbott does with his appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Wedging out the competition

The upcoming election has a number of wedge issues (topics that are designed to divide a population, social, or political group), and among the hottest is immigration and undocumented immigrants (those persons who do not have the requisite proof that they reside in the country legally).  Democrats hope to capitalize on traditional popularity among Hispanics to turn out voters to support the party’s candidates and have accused Republicans of being anti-immigrant.   In turn, Republicans claim that they best reflect the traditional values of the Latino and Latina community—especially after the victory of Ted Cruz—a Cuban American—in the U.S. Senate primary race.  To further that image, the GOP (a short hand term referring to the Republican party as the “Grand Old Party”) has tapped Rep. Francisco “Quico” Canseco from San Antonio to speak at the Republican National Convention (August 27-30, 2012 in Tampa, Florida).  Canseco is a freshmen (first-term) lawmaker in the U.S. House who is running against another Hispanic—Texas House Representative Pete Gallego (Democrat from Alpine, Texas).

The two candidates’ positions about voter identification laws, which require a valid form of id to vote, have created a wedge issue among conservative Hispanics.   Thirty states have voter identification laws (three more have pending laws), but laws vary because different states allow various requirements for the identification.  There is a showdown in Texas over our new 2011 voter identification law which requires persons have a photo id to vote (in the past multiple forms of identification were acceptable, but the new law requires a picture). Canseco supports the law, and Gallego does not.

While the voter id law is being challenged in court, Governor Perry challenged the federal government’s directive that all undocumented immigrants who are on “deferred action” status for lawful residency applications be given a two year deferment.   President Obama’s action gives immigrants (who meet certain requirements) a work permit, and more importantly it gives them a photo identification. While it does not give deferred immigrants the right to vote, Republicans argue it could be used to vote fraudulently, while Democrats claim that Republicans are trying to disenfranchise and prevent immigrants from voting by having the voter id law. Perry was concerned that the president’s deferred action extension of 2 more years of lawful residency might mean that an immigrant could claim legal status. He responded to Obama’s action by clarifying that the photo identification could be issued, but that it did not confer any legal rights and that it should not be considered as some sort of pathway to citizenship.

It’s not known when a court decision will be handed down about the law, and it will most likely be appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court.  Hispanic voters render their verdict in November.