Texas House to Hear Public Testimony on Voting Bill After Quorum Restored
The House Constitutional Rights and Remedies committee is scheduled to hear testimony Monday
A committee will hear public testimony Monday on the voting bill after quorum was restored Thursday in the Texas House of Representatives, allowing discussion to resume over the GOP-backed bill.
Senate Bill 1, and others, have been stymied after dozens of Texas Democrats walked out in July in an attempt to stop the bill's passage.
The House Constitutional Rights and Remedies committee is scheduled to hear testimony on the voting bill and House Bill 20, which relates to censorship on social media platforms and email, starting at 8 a.m. Monday.
Despite the Democrat walkout, the Senate narrowly maintained enough members to conduct business. The chamber passed the voting bill last week after Sen. Carol Alvarado's 15-hour filibuster stalled proceedings.
The House had lacked the necessary two-thirds of its 150 members to have a quorum, but that came to an end Thursday after three House Democrats broke the 38-day holdout.
In a statement Thursday, the three lawmakers — Armando Walle, Ana Hernandez and Garnet Coleman -- defended their return by saying they had pushed Congress on voting rights legislation while pointing to the growing urgency of surging COVID-19 caseloads in Texas.
Nearly three dozen Democrats — more than half the group that fled to Washington, D.C. — signed onto a statement that did not say whether they would now return but took aim at the few who already did.
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Covering politics in the Lone Star State.
"We are disappointed that a few Democrats chose to return to the floor. We feel betrayed and heartbroken, but our resolve is strong and this fight is not over," the statement read.
The bill must reach Republican Gov. Greg Abbott's desk by Sept. 5. If it doesn't, legislators could face another special session.
Abbott has said that he will continue to call 30-day special sessions "to reform our broken bail system, uphold election integrity, and pass other important items that Texans demand and deserve."
Texas Republicans have tried to pass measures that would prohibit 24-hour polling sites, ban drive-through voting and give partisan poll watchers more access. While the House may make changes, Republicans have shown no indication that they will remove some of the most hotly contested provisions from the bill.
"I think that bill will be back and forth between us and the Senate a little bit," said state Rep. Jim Murphy, chairman of the Republican House Caucus.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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