$27 billion surplus raises stakes for GOP

CONTEXT: Texas Republicans sweep statewide workplaces, extending 28-year streak

Though the GOP agenda remains to be coming into focus, Republicans have made clear they view final 12 months’s decisive midterm wins as a mandate to construct on conservative insurance policies they enacted in 2021, together with additional overhauls of the state’s election and bail legal guidelines, and continued spending on border safety.

Also on the menu are a handful of thornier points, a few of which might pit the extra conservative Senate, helmed by Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, towards the House and Speaker Dade Phelan. They embrace proposals for a publicly funded voucher program to ship children to non-public colleges, extra reforms to the state energy grid, and the proposed legalization of casinos and sports activities betting.

The Patrick-Phelan relationship has been strained since 2021, when the lieutenant governor accused his House counterpart of slow-walking conservative precedence laws and mishandling Democrats’ summer season quorum break that held up a GOP voting invoice. Patrick can be thought to have instigated former president Donald Trump’s out-of-the-blue assault on Phelan later that fall, wherein Trump accused the speaker of “weak RINO leadership.”

“Dan Patrick is a very, very powerful elected official, and he likes to get things done in the fashion that he believes they should be done,” mentioned veteran Austin lobbyist Bill Miller. “And the House, by its very nature, is contradictory to the Senate as an entire.”

‘Conservatives are in charge’

As a statewide elected official, Patrick’s path to energy runs largely by way of Republican main voters, whom he has gained over with a unique grasp of the right-wing movement in Texas. Phelan solutions to a a lot completely different constituency: his personal chamber, and his comparatively secure southeast Texas district. He rose to the speakership by attracting assist from a mix of Democrats and Republicans.

Phelan is considerably insulated from Patrick’s assaults by the broad assist he enjoys amongst House Republicans, who in a closed-door assembly final month voted 78-6 to endorse him as speaker — an indication he faces little threat of being supplanted on Tuesday, when the Legislature will gavel in and the total 150-member House will formally choose a speaker.

Phelan is being challenged by state Rep. Tony Tinderholt, an Arlington Republican who’s among the many Legislature’s most conservative members. His speaker bid has centered across the long-standing custom, continued underneath Phelan, of Texas House audio system appointing members of the minority occasion to chair committees.

Tinderholt and different hardline conservatives, together with Texas Republican Party Chair Matt Rinaldi, have pushed to finish the observe, arguing the 13 Democratic chairs appointed by Phelan in 2021 — out of 34 standing committees — killed vital conservative priorities.

“Texans elected Republicans statewide by double digits and in both houses of the legislature because Republicans successfully made the case that Democrats shouldn’t be in power,” Rinaldi, a former state lawmaker, tweeted shortly after the November midterms. “They shouldn’t turn around and hand over power to Democrats.”

But Phelan has rebuffed the calls, arguing it will pave the best way for the kind of dysfunction that has come to outline Congress, the place the bulk occasion chairs each committee.

The speaker, who declined remark for this story, tweeted over the vacations that Texas “should never emulate” the method in Washington, which he referred to as “completely broken.”

“Only a few get a seat at the table,” Phelan wrote. “There is no attempt to work together. Never a consensus.”

BACKGROUND: Texas’ legislative leaders need to spend thousands and thousands on psychological well being, college security by finish of summer season

State Rep. Tom Oliverson, a Cypress Republican and Phelan ally, mentioned there was “few and far between, if any, significant conservative legislation that was killed by a Democrat chair” in 2021. He pointed to the laundry checklist of GOP coverage wins — together with the nation’s strictest anti-abortion law, an overhaul of Texas elections, a ban on “critical race theory,” restrictions on which teams transgender student athletes can join and a regulation permitting most Texans 21 and as much as carry handguns without a license — as proof Democratic chairs didn’t pose a menace.

“It’s very clear that under Speaker Phelan’s leadership, conservatives are in charge, notwithstanding the fact that he has members of the minority party who were in his leadership team,” Oliverson said. “That is obviously not an obstacle to having the most conservative session in Texas history.”

In the leadup to final month’s personal speaker vote, state Rep. Bryan Slaton, a Republican from Royse City and one in all two lawmakers to vote against Phelan for speaker in 2021, tweeted a listing of 5 payments he mentioned had been blocked by Democratic chairs, together with “monument protection legislation” that might have prevented “the marxists from tearing down our history.”

Bipartisan points

Republicans are once more anticipated to sort out a slew of so-called “red meat” points prized by conservative activists, together with restrictions on gender-affirming well being care. Lawmakers have additionally filed payments taking intention at “instruction regarding sexual orientation and gender identity” in colleges.

Beyond that, Patrick and Phelan have recognized a handful of priorities that lower throughout occasion traces, leaving a gap for Democrats to play a job.

“I think our No. 1 opportunity is in the crafting of the state budget,” mentioned state Rep. Armando Walle, a Houston Democrat who serves on the budget-writing House Appropriations Committee. “There’ll be a lot of opportunity to spread goodwill around the state with the amount of surplus that we have. And that surplus needs to be reinvested in human capital, in the infrastructure of opportunity for people to get a good education, get a good job, access to quality health care, and live in safe communities.”

READ MORE: For property tax aid, Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick pitches elevating homestead exemption to $65,000

Walle is one in all two Democrats on the influential Legislative Budget Board, which compiles draft budgets for the state’s spending plans every session. He’s aiming to place extra money into the state’s Flood Infrastructure Fund, formed by the Legislature in response to Hurricane Harvey to pay for flood control projects, and mentioned he is additionally engaged on sending extra to the Harris County Flood Control District “by whatever source of dollars we can use.”

Phelan has mentioned he wants to put at least some of the budget surplus towards patching up Texas’ decaying infrastructure and increasing it to satisfy the wants of the state’s swelling inhabitants. He has singled out broadband web and rural roads as areas badly in want of consideration, calling the highway high quality “atrocious” in components of the Permian Basin which can be closely utilized by oil and gasoline producers.

Oliverson agrees, saying the Legislature has “an opportunity to make some investments in our future.”

“If you talk to the comptroller, he will tell you that the only thing hurting Texas’ credit rating right now, globally, is that our infrastructure is in bad need of repair and expansion,” Oliverson mentioned. “We have all of these folks moving to Texas every day, and none of them are bringing new power plants with them, new roads, new fresh water supply, new high-speed internet or flood mitigation. So, that should be a big focus.”

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