AUSTIN, Texas (CN) - The Texas Legislature convened Tuesday in a special session called by Governor Greg Abbott to address 20 of his priorities, including clamping down on abortions and restricting transgender people’s use of bathrooms.
Lawmakers have 30 days to tackle Abbott’s agenda, but first must pass a sunset bill to keep some state agencies, including the Texas Medical Board, from closing.
During the 140-day regular session, which ended in May, Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick prevented a vote on the sunset bill to try to force the House to pass a property tax bill and the controversial “bathroom bill,” requiring transgender people to use the bathroom that corresponds to their “biological sex.”
Both items made it onto Abbott’s special session agenda, which features a wide range of right-wing measures, including some of his own personal priorities, such as a bill that would prevent cities from regulating what property owners may do with trees on their private land. Abbott called such policies “socialistic” and “California-like.”
The regular session ended with a scuffle on the House floor — one representative even threatened to shoot a colleague.
The tension between Republicans and Democrats was still palpable Tuesday.
During the invocation in the Senate, Army Capt. Brett Anderson prayed that God would “save our leaders from themselves.” Then members began arguing whether to suspend the rules to fast-track the sunset legislation.
The Republican-controlled Senate voted to override a “tag” on the bills, made by Sen. José Rodríguez, D-El Paso, which would have required 48 hours public notice before a bill could be considered in a committee hearing.
The override was unusual, and decried by Democratic senators as undermining citizens’ right to participate in the lawmaking process.
“To vote to do the people’s business without the people’s input is wrong and unTexas,” Sen. Sylvia Garcia, D-Houston, said in a statement. “By not giving the general public time to study, comment and testify on legislation, we are saying that their opinions don’t matter. This is a bad harbinger of what is to come over the next 30 days.”
The bills were swiftly passed in committee, and the full Senate will vote on them Wednesday.
Rodríguez said in a statement that the tag rule had been in place and respected by the Senate since 1939.
“We’re going to rush through safety-net bills for an agency that issues thousands of licenses and oversees tens of thousands of doctors and other health professionals,” Rodríguez said. “We are pushing past that so that we can talk about what bathroom transgender people should use.”
The bathroom bills, referred to as privacy legislation on Abbott’s agenda, have the support of 44 percent of Texas voters, according to a recent Texas Tribune poll. Many business leaders, however, opposed the bills, for fear that discriminatory laws will scare off investment, tourists, and employees, as happened in North Carolina.