Capitol Inside
October 13, 2021

A Texas House committee appeared to be either bluffing or capitulating on Wednesday night when it approved a congressional redistricting plan that Senate Republicans crafted without an attempt to fashion a compromise first with GOP leaders in the west wing.

The Redistricting Committee voted 8-6 on party lines to advance the U.S. House map in Senate Bill 6 to the floor for debate before the current special session must end by midnight on Tuesday. But the House panel chose to accept the proposal without changes despite growing anger among the GOP's representatives over the cold shoulder that they received from Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick and the Senate in the development of the new voting districts for Congress in Texas.

The House committee's rubber stamp could simply be a sign that Republican leaders in the lower chamber are waiting to put their mark on the new congressional map when it's up for a vote on the floor in the coming days. The lack of resistance in committee could have been a strategy ploy designed to preserve the element of surprise.

The Texas House and Senate have a tradition of endorsing each other's redistricting bills without revisions. But the chambers have a history of teaming up on a new election districts for Congress that the Legislature has the responsibility to devise and to pass. The failure of a bicameral agreement at the statehouse in Austin would shift the job of redistricting to the federal courts where the Republicans wouldn't expect to fare as well as they would on the maps they compose.

But it's conceivable that the Republicans on the Redistricting Committee are concerned that a standoff with the Senate on the congressional map could put the House plan in jeopardy as a potential bargaining chip for Patrick.

The Republican lieutenant governor has a history of hardball in the crunch of sessions - and he has a fallback in the event of a stalemate that would send the House and Senate plans to the Legislative Redistricting Board on which he serves with GOP Speaker Dade Phelan and three other statewide GOP leaders.

Lawmakers would run the risk of having the primary elections here delayed for two months if they procrastinate in Austin.

more to come ...