He looks like he has to get permission to be out when the street lights come on.... and he's about as stupid as a 16 yr old too....
Texas GOP’s voting restrictions bill could be rewritten behind closed doors after final House passage
In a 78-64 vote, the House Friday passed a pared down version of priority GOP legislation to place new restrictions on voting. Now the bill will likely be reshaped in conference committee with the Senate, largely out of public view.
State Rep. Briscoe Cain, R-Deer Park, flanked by his Republican colleagues, answered questions regarding Senate Bill 7 on May 6, 2021.
As opposition to Texas Republicans’ proposed voting restrictions continues to intensify, state lawmakers’ deliberations over the GOP priority legislation could soon go behind closed doors.
The House Friday gave final passage to a pared down version of Senate Bill 7, leaving out various far-reaching voting restrictions that have prompted widespread outcry from voting rights advocates, advocates for people with disabilities, and local officials in the state’s biggest counties. The legislation still contains some provisions opposed by those groups — including a prohibition on counties sending unsolicited applications to vote by mail.
Facing more than 130 proposed amendments from Democrats when the bill first came to the floor Thursday evening — and a procedural challenge that could have delayed the entire bill’s consideration — lawmakers huddled off the chamber’s floor throughout the night to cut a deal and rework SB 7 through a flurry of amendments passed without objection from either party around 3 a.m.
But the final contours of the bill remain uncertain.
With a 78-64 vote to give it final approval, the bill now heads back to the Senate. It will then likely go to a conference committee made up of members of both chambers who will be able to pull from both iterations of the legislation in crafting the final version largely outside public view.
SB 7 has emerged as the main legislative vehicle for changing the state’s voting rules, though the versions passed in each chamber differ significantly.
As passed in the Senate, the legislation restricted early voting rules and schedules to do away with extended hours and ban drive-thru voting. It also required large counties to redistribute polling places under a formula that could move sites away from areas with more Hispanic and Black residents.
Those and other provisions fell off when it was reconstituted in the House Elections Committee, with little notice and without a public hearing, to match the House’s priorities contained in House Bill 6.
As the clock turned from Thursday into the early hours of Friday, lawmakers spent more time privately working to strike a deal to keep the bill on the floor than they did debating it.
As part of that effort, Republicans further amended the bill to remove a provision that would have required people assisting voters to disclose the reason a voter might need help — even if for medical reasons or because a voter has limited English proficiency. That measure raised concerns among advocates for people with disabilities that it could violate the federal Americans with Disabilities Act, and groups with a long history of fighting state voting laws later found to be discriminatory said it would target voters of color who are more likely to need assistance. Lawmakers also amended the bill to slim down provisions that broadly enhanced protections for partisan poll watchers and provisions that boosted penalties for voting related offenses.
"This bill took a lot of work. We've heard ideas from many members and constituents," said state Rep. Briscoe Cain, the Deer Park Republican who is shepherding the bill through the House, noting those amendments to the bill were crafted based on feedback from advocates for people with disabilities and the Texas chapter of the NAACP. "This bill protects every single Texas voter."
In keeping the ban on distributing applications for mail-in ballots, the House upheld its response to Harris County’s attempt to proactively send applications to all 2.4 million registered voters last year with instructions on how to determine if they were eligible. Other Texas counties sent unsolicited applications to voters 65 and older without much scrutiny. Those voters automatically qualify to vote by mail, but sending them unsolicited applications would also be blocked under the bill.
Under the deal House members cut to keep the bill on the floor, Democrats were able to tack on several amendments to the legislation. Most notably, they added language to the legislation in response to the controversial illegal voting conviction of Crystal Mason, a Tarrant County woman facing a five-year prison sentence for casting a provisional ballot in the 2016 election. Mason was on supervised release for a federal conviction at the time and said she didn’t know that made her ineligible to vote. SB 7 was amended early Friday to require judges to inform someone if a conviction will prohibit them from voting and require that people know why they are ineligible for an attempt to vote to count as a crime.
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Texas voting restrictions bill gets House OK, headed for negotiations | The Texas Tribune
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Texas GOP’s voting restrictions bill could be rewritten behind closed doors after final House passage
In a 78-64 vote, the House Friday passed a pared down version of priority GOP legislation to place new restrictions on voting. Now the bill will likely be reshaped in conference committee with the Senate, largely out of public view.
As opposition to Texas Republicans’ proposed voting restrictions continues to intensify, state lawmakers’ deliberations over the GOP priority legislation could soon go behind closed doors.
The House Friday gave final passage to a pared down version of Senate Bill 7, leaving out various far-reaching voting restrictions that have prompted widespread outcry from voting rights advocates, advocates for people with disabilities, and local officials in the state’s biggest counties. The legislation still contains some provisions opposed by those groups — including a prohibition on counties sending unsolicited applications to vote by mail.
Facing more than 130 proposed amendments from Democrats when the bill first came to the floor Thursday evening — and a procedural challenge that could have delayed the entire bill’s consideration — lawmakers huddled off the chamber’s floor throughout the night to cut a deal and rework SB 7 through a flurry of amendments passed without objection from either party around 3 a.m.
But the final contours of the bill remain uncertain.
With a 78-64 vote to give it final approval, the bill now heads back to the Senate. It will then likely go to a conference committee made up of members of both chambers who will be able to pull from both iterations of the legislation in crafting the final version largely outside public view.
SB 7 has emerged as the main legislative vehicle for changing the state’s voting rules, though the versions passed in each chamber differ significantly.
As passed in the Senate, the legislation restricted early voting rules and schedules to do away with extended hours and ban drive-thru voting. It also required large counties to redistribute polling places under a formula that could move sites away from areas with more Hispanic and Black residents.
Those and other provisions fell off when it was reconstituted in the House Elections Committee, with little notice and without a public hearing, to match the House’s priorities contained in House Bill 6.
As the clock turned from Thursday into the early hours of Friday, lawmakers spent more time privately working to strike a deal to keep the bill on the floor than they did debating it.
As part of that effort, Republicans further amended the bill to remove a provision that would have required people assisting voters to disclose the reason a voter might need help — even if for medical reasons or because a voter has limited English proficiency. That measure raised concerns among advocates for people with disabilities that it could violate the federal Americans with Disabilities Act, and groups with a long history of fighting state voting laws later found to be discriminatory said it would target voters of color who are more likely to need assistance. Lawmakers also amended the bill to slim down provisions that broadly enhanced protections for partisan poll watchers and provisions that boosted penalties for voting related offenses.
"This bill took a lot of work. We've heard ideas from many members and constituents," said state Rep. Briscoe Cain, the Deer Park Republican who is shepherding the bill through the House, noting those amendments to the bill were crafted based on feedback from advocates for people with disabilities and the Texas chapter of the NAACP. "This bill protects every single Texas voter."
In keeping the ban on distributing applications for mail-in ballots, the House upheld its response to Harris County’s attempt to proactively send applications to all 2.4 million registered voters last year with instructions on how to determine if they were eligible. Other Texas counties sent unsolicited applications to voters 65 and older without much scrutiny. Those voters automatically qualify to vote by mail, but sending them unsolicited applications would also be blocked under the bill.
Under the deal House members cut to keep the bill on the floor, Democrats were able to tack on several amendments to the legislation. Most notably, they added language to the legislation in response to the controversial illegal voting conviction of Crystal Mason, a Tarrant County woman facing a five-year prison sentence for casting a provisional ballot in the 2016 election. Mason was on supervised release for a federal conviction at the time and said she didn’t know that made her ineligible to vote. SB 7 was amended early Friday to require judges to inform someone if a conviction will prohibit them from voting and require that people know why they are ineligible for an attempt to vote to count as a crime.
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Texas voting restrictions bill gets House OK, headed for negotiations | The Texas Tribune
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