(C) Texas Tribune This story was originally published by Texas Tribune and is unaltered. . . . . . . . . . . The Blast - August 18, 2025 [1] ['The Texas Tribune'] Date: 2025-08 26 days until sine die 82 days until the candidate filing period begins 112 days until the candidate filing deadline At least one person did call the tip line warning DPS of Democrats’ arrival at Austin Bergstrom International Airport. Yet, no one was arrested. Despite the show of force by Burrows and the House to rope Democrats back to the House floor, some conservatives are upset that no one was arrested, even though in-state members’ whereabouts were reportedly known. There’s also some confusion about the deployment of DPS officials. Not every member who returned has a DPS officer tailing them. Others are being followed so closely that they’re being accompanied to and from the airport on their way home from Austin. Does House Administration Committee Chair Charlie Geren have any more of those heated blankets? “I refuse to sign away my dignity as a duly elected representative just so Republicans can control my movements and monitor me with police escorts,” Collier said in a statement. The House Administration Committee locked the doors to the floor and the gallery after reporters started interviewing her from the gallery. Now, the House Democratic Caucus is advertising that Collier is available for live interviews “from her confinement.” Throughout the afternoon, Rep. Ann Johnson of Houston told anyone who would listen that the escorts were illegal and unprecedented. “Political prisoner” Nicole Collier of Fort Worth refused to sign her permission slip and appears ready to spend the night or two on the House floor. “I am going to try to get away at some point,” Romero joked. Some Democrats appeared to be making nice with their escorts. Rep. Toni Rose of Dallas tried to rope hers into a photo even after calling the chaperones a waste of taxpayer resources. Rep. Ramon Romero of Fort Worth, chair of the Mexican American Legislative Caucus, said he was going to become friends with his officer and have some good Mexican food together. The DPS work now includes following the members who skipped town, at least until the House reconvenes on Wednesday. One question facing Democrats is whether Speaker Dustin Burrows and the Texas House will punish the absent members for torpedoing the first special session. So far, the extent of the punishment is the accumulating fines, budget cuts and Department of Public Safety overtime to drag members back to Austin. With the end of Texas House Democrats’ quorum break, the Legislature is back to its regular special session programming. Unlike the Legislature, candidates don’t have to live in-district to run for a given congressional seat, so Toth’s federal aspirations aren’t necessarily stalled. One of the notable ripple effects impacts TX-02, where state Rep. Steve Toth , R-Conroe, is challenging U.S. Rep. Dan Crenshaw , R-Spring. Conroe now falls within neighboring TX-08. Crenshaw is listed as an in-district incumbent in the reworked TX-02, according to the Texas House. The bulk of the changes to the map center on the new GOP-leaning 9th congressional district, with ripple effects impacting Southeast Texas. TX-09, in which state Rep. Briscoe Cain , R-Deer Park, says he is considering running, would be a Trump +20 district instead of a Trump +16 district under the latest proposal . It would still be more than 60% Hispanic under the proposal. The panel did not take public testimony on the maps. The House didn’t waste any time getting back to work. The House disaster committee voted out six bills today, and the redistricting panel advanced a committee substitute for the congressional maps by a 12-8 vote. The Texas Tribune thanks its sponsors. Become one . The following seven House members racked up two offenses and voted for Burrows: Lawmakers could still be docked under a tenet of the core party principles , and the report isn’t the end-all-be-all for censurable offenses. The task force report leaves the option open for county parties to argue what they believe is a censurable offense. Texas GOP Chair Abraham George barred a vocal segment of the SREC from including the vote for Dustin Burrows in the task force report, but members could still approve that as a censurable offense when considering censures during the panel’s Oct. 11 meeting. And just because someone didn’t rack up three strikes doesn’t mean they’ve escaped without a Rule 44 censure. The task force report only dealt with the legislative priorities half of the potential censurable offenses. Accumulating three strikes on the Legislative Task Force Report does not ensure a censure or removal. Even if a county party censures a member, two-thirds of the SREC would have to approve it to levy a punishment like banning them from the ballot. Given some of the margins this weekend, that may be unlikely. The three remaining lawmakers are House State Affairs Committee Chair Ken King of Canadian, former House Speaker Dade Phelan of Beaumont and Sen. Robert Nichols of Jacksonville. Nichols is retiring, and many speculate that Phelan won’t seek reelection after giving up the gavel following a grueling primary season and speaker’s race. It was a major victory for House Republicans, of which nearly half faced a potential censure under the Texas GOP’s Rule 44, which has yet been tested in court. Under that rule, county parties can ask the state party for permission to bar elected officials from the primary ballot if the official committed at least three violations against the Texas GOP’s legislative priorities or party principles, as outlined in the party platform’s preamble. After six hours of meetings split across Friday and Saturday night, the State Republican Executive Committee significantly watered down its naughty list from its task force report on the 89th regular session. The number of state lawmakers with enough party-certified censurable offenses to be blocked from the primary ballot fell from 42 to three. HOW THE SREC DOUBLE FEATURE WENT DOWN The task force report was supposed to be finalized over a week ago. But with the final tweaks, approved after days of lobbying by House Republicans, the Texas GOP was left with a report that proponents and critics alike viewed as inconsistent at best. The purpose of this weekend meeting(s) was to put the final touches on the task force report after a last-minute decision on Aug. 9 to seek input from lawmakers. Texas GOP Chair Abraham George said the party received 23 responses from lawmakers — dozens of pages worth. House Republicans pushed back against three strikes in particular: Seconding Rep. Jared Patterson ’s motion to close debate and amendments on the House rules, the signatures behind the “nuclear option” HB 805, which would have called for a study on the Texas grid’s connection with Mexico HB 1359, which would have created an electric bill assistance program for low-income users There’s a lot of confusion around the nuclear option strike. The SREC removed the offense for members who signed Patterson’s petition, not the actual 107-35 vote to close debate. That strike remained. The most vigorous removal effort took place on HB 805. On Friday, the SREC voted 30-29 to keep the GOP votes in favor in the report. But between Friday night and Saturday night, the Texas GOP’s general counsel, Rachel Hooper, wrote a memo to SREC members regarding HB 805 and the committee voted 29-28 on Saturday to reconsider the decision to leave it on. Ultimately, the committee pulled it after a similarly narrow 29-27 vote, highlighting just how contentious the topic was. During the revote on Saturday, SREC member Milinda Morris, representing Senate District 13 in Harris County, opposed removing HB 805 simply because it ensnared so many Republicans. “Either we’re going to treat all this equally or we’re going to be picking and choosing, which is going to make all these results skeptical,” she said. “Sorry so many Republicans voted for this and you’re having to address this issue.” SREC member Rolando Garcia, representing Senate District 15 in Harris County, warned that the SREC must be careful with what they include in the report because county executive committees are likely to lean on the report. “Before anyone says that we’re just providing information, we are providing a list to CECs that they will then use in censure violations when they ask us to kick people off the ballot,” Garcia said, calling that page of the report a flimsy strike that will be indefensible in court. The day before, SREC member Jeneria Lewis, representing the newly flipped Rio Grande Valley Senate District 27, pushed back against concerns that the report had implications for potential censures and ballot removals. “Ultimately, the worst we could do is remove them from the Republican Party ticket. That’s not even our primary goal. Our primary goal is to just inform the CECs of where our bills went to die.” House Calendars Committee Chair Todd Hunter of Corpus Christi saw the most improvement during the weekend meetings. All four of his strikes came off the board. The Capitol’s “Man in Black” joined SREC members at the Governor’s Mansion on Aug. 9 and has communicated with party officials throughout the year. By the end of the process, it sounded like the majority of the SREC was willing to defer to the Calendars Committee chair’s judgment on which bills still had time to pass the Legislature as the end of session neared. 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