Democrats bolt again – to New Mexico 
Senators trying to halt new special session on redistricting
07/29/2003
By GROMER JEFFERS JR. and WAYNE SLATER / The Dallas Morning News
AUSTIN – Eleven Senate Democrats bolted the state Monday rather than report for a second special legislative session ordered by Gov. Rick Perry in an increasingly bitter battle over congressional redistricting.
In a walkout mirroring the action by House Democrats in May, the senators boycotted the chamber, slipped out of the Capitol and boarded a pair of private jets to Albuquerque, N.M.
"Today, we 11 Democratic senators have availed ourselves of the tool granted to us under the Texas Constitution to break a quorum of the Texas Senate. This is not an action we take lightly," said Sen. Leticia Van de Putte, D-San Antonio, as the lawmakers took up residence at an Albuquerque Marriott hotel. "We didn't want to be here."
They were greeted by New Mexico's Democratic Lt. Gov. Diane Denish and several New Mexico state troopers on hand to provide protection – an apparent outgrowth of attempts by Republican leaders to deploy Texas Department of Public Safety officers to retrieve House members from Ardmore, Okla., in May during a similar protest.
"Without question, we did the right thing," Sen. Royce West of Dallas said of the walkout by all but one of the Senate Democrats. "We're playing by the rules. When the other side doesn't play by the rules, you have to find other solutions to deal with it." Mr. West said he is prepared to stay away for 30 days if necessary to kill the redistricting effort by denying the 31-member Senate the quorum it needs to do business.
With the lawmakers on the run, the secretary of the Senate issued a warrant for their arrest. But it was unclear that officials had the authority to round up the senators outside the state.
"I'm very, very disappointed," said Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst, a Republican. "Our Senate Democrats are putting their party affiliation over what they were elected to do."
Monday's escape was carefully planned and specifically timed to avoid any effort by the Republican leadership to keep lawmakers from fleeing Austin.
At midday Monday, Senate Democrats huddled in a third-floor conference room adjacent to the Senate chamber.
Mr. Dewhurst met twice with the group, appealing for them to work with Republicans on what he called a "fair" redrawing of congressional boundaries.
When Mr. Dewhurst left the room the second time to convene the day's Senate session, a cluster of reporters followed him. The senators then left the conference room and headed downstairs to waiting cars bound for the airport, where two private jets awaited. They belonged to constituents of Sen. Juan Hinojosa of McAllen – the David Rogers and Joe LaMantia families. Mr. Hinojosa said the transportation would be regarded as an in-kind contribution to the Democratic caucus.
"I didn't even know where we were going until we got on the plane," said Sen. Mario Gallegos Jr. of Houston.
New session
Without the 11 senators on hand, Mr. Dewhurst could not muster a quorum and adjourned the special session. The House followed suit, adjourning the session. Within minutes, Mr. Perry summoned lawmakers back immediately for a second 30-day special session.
"The governor has the right to call a special session over and over again," said Sen. Florence Shapiro, R-Plano. "They can't stay away 30 days, 60 days, 90 days. They will return at some point."
Mr. Dewhurst also vowed that a redistricting plan would eventually be passed.
"If I read the tea leaves correctly, we will pass a fair redistricting plan now or later," Mr. Dewhurst said.
Republicans in Austin and in Washington have pushed the effort to redraw the boundaries for the state's 32 members of Congress to produce more GOP seats.
Led by U.S. House Majority Leader Tom DeLay of Sugar Land and the White House, the attempt would undo the current configuration in which Democrats outnumber Republicans, 17-15.
The first attempt to pass a congressional plan died during the regular legislative session when more than 50 House Democrats boycotted the chamber, breaking a quorum, with many heading to Ardmore.
With the first special session ending in failure Monday, Mr. Perry summoned lawmakers for a second special session.
Although both the House and Senate were to convene for business Tuesday, the absence of the Democrats will shut down the Senate, where Republicans have a 19-12 majority.
Getting a tan?
Mr. Dewhurst predicted the wayward Democrats "will lose the public relations battle" by traveling to a vacation spot.
Asked whether he considered Albuquerque a vacation destination, the lieutenant governor said, "I certainly think it's more of a vacation spot than Ardmore."
Ms. Van de Putte said Democrats chose Albuquerque because of available medical facilities that could aid Sen. Eddie Lucio of Brownsville, recuperating from a heart attack earlier this summer.
"Even though my doctor opposed it, I knew how important it was to have 11," Mr. Lucio said.
Ms. Van de Putte warned the Republican leadership against trying to arrest lawmakers. Democrats complain that proposed maps would dilute the influence of minority voters.
Democratic state senators who left for Albuquerque on Monday:
Gonzalo Barrientos, Austin
Rodney Ellis, Houston
Mario Gallegos Jr., Houston
Juan "Chuy" Hinojosa, McAllen
Eddie Lucio Jr., Brownsville
Frank Madla Jr., San Antonio
Eliot Shapleigh, El Paso
Leticia Van de Putte, San Antonio
Royce West, Dallas
John Whitmire, Houston
Judith Zaffirini, Laredo REMAINING IN AUSTIN:
Kenneth Armbrister, Victoria |
|
"I think that would send a horrible message to the people of the state of Texas that their minority legislators are so opposed to the diminishment of voter rights for minorities that they did have to keep them locked up against their will," she said. Senate rules require that two-thirds of the chamber support a bill before it can be taken up for debate. Mr. Dewhurst has said he would bypass the rule so that only a majority of senators would need to support a bill for it to be debated during a second special session on redistricting.
That vow and one by Mr. Perry to keep calling special sessions until a redistricting plan was approved drove the Democrats from the state, Ms. Van de Putte said.
"When the lieutenant governor said he wouldn't honor the two-thirds rule, we decided to break quorum," she said.
One stayed behind
Sen. Kenneth Armbrister of Victoria, the only Democrat who did not leave the chamber, said he did not judge those who left. He said he stayed because he wanted to ensure that rural Texas had a voice in the process.
The House has already approved a map, which could have given the GOP as many as 21 seats in the delegation.
The House sponsor of the redistricting bill said that he continues to negotiate with his Senate counterpart and is open to talking across party lines – but not long distance to New Mexico.
"I'm willing to work with anybody Republican or Democrat. We need to do our work at the Capitol, where it's in the public view – no shuttle diplomacy," said Rep. Phil King, R-Weatherford. "When you leave town, you're saying we are not interested in negotiation. We just want to kill the process."
Attorney General Greg Abbott suggested that the senators could be pursued across state lines, not necessarily by the DPS, but by the Senate sergeant-at-arms and his staff.
Mr. Abbott issued an opinion advising Mr. Dewhurst that the sergeant and his deputies have the legal authority to arrest AWOL members "wherever they may be found."
But, as a practical matter, Mr. Dewhurst said, the missing members are out of reach.
"The Texas Constitution does not apply here. They [DPS officers] have no jurisdiction," said Sen. John Whitmire of Houston. "We are protected by the laws and due process of New Mexico."
The senators' situation took center stage in a hearing Monday on a continuing court fight over state police authority to hunt the House members who fled earlier. Visiting State District Judge Charles Campbell, who had earlier issued a preliminary ruling that DPS has no power to hunt lawmakers, told lawyers that when he issues his final order it is unlikely to include a ban on hunting senators, since no senators were parties to the lawsuit.
Assistant Attorney General Jeff Boyd said he would advise the DPS that there's no legal reason the agency could not be used to hunt the senators within Texas. But an attorney for the Democrats disagreed.
Staff writers George Kuempel and Pete Slover in Austin and special contributor Zelie Pollon in New Mexico contributed to this report.
E-mail wslater@dallasnews.com
Online at: http://www.dallasnews.com/latestnews/stories/072903dntexredistrict.d42fd54e.html
I wish there was someway to get them on misuse of tax-payer money or something? This makes me so sick.
What is worse is they will get re-elected because of the short term memory of the voters.
It would also be very interesting to know who owned the 2 private jets used to transport 11 Texas Senators. (I know we're over weight as a State, and that these Senators represent the State well in that regard, but *2* jets were necessary?)
If anyone's interested, the Democrat Party Headquarters is accepting phone calls on this issue, too at 512-478-9800. We need to let them know that the only polls that count are the elections!
Michael Ainsworth / DMN
New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson (center)
speaks at a press conference in Albuquerque
today as a number of Texas Senate Democrats
look on.
Texas senators stake ground in map battle07/29/2003
Associated Press
AUSTIN - Democratic and Republican senators dueled across the Texas-New Mexico state line Tuesday as each camp tried to score political points in the intensifying battle over congressional redistricting.
Republicans urged their Democratic colleagues to end their boycott and return from Albuquerque, N.M., to work on a fair redistricting plan.
"No Texas problem has ever been solved in New Mexico," said Sen. Todd Staples of Palestine, chairman of the Senate Republican Caucus.
But the 11 Senate Democrats who left the Capitol to break a quorum Monday just as Republican Gov. Rick Perry was about to call a second special legislative session gave no indication they would give in. The senators said they're prepared to remain out of state -- beyond the reach of Texas law officers sent to arrest them -- up to 30 days, the maximum length of a special session.
"There's nothing fair about a partisan redistricting effort that turns a deaf ear to the overwhelming majority of Texans and turns it back on the minority opportunity," Sen. Leticia Van de Putte of San Antonio, chairwoman of the Senate Democratic Caucus, said Tuesday at a news conference in New Mexico.
The Senate walkout comes less than three months after a similar move by House Democrats, who broke a quorum in their chamber and killed a redistricting bill by fleeing to Ardmore, Okla.
GOP-backed redistricting proposals could cause more than 1.4 million minorities in Texas to lose effective representation in Congress, Van de Putte said.
But Republicans denied that minority representation would be hurt under their plans. Staples, chief architect of the Senate's Republican proposals, said the maps would protect minority voting rights.
The Senate met briefly Tuesday, but without a quorum no business could be conducted. The Senate is to meet again Wednesday morning.
Across the Capitol, the House struggled to achieve a quorum, which means the presence of two-thirds of its 150 members. Once enough legislators showed up, the Republican-controlled House pushed through a redistricting bill, the same one the House adopted in the first special session over Democrats' objections.
Republicans want to gain a majority of the seats in the 32-member Texas congressional delegation. Democrats now hold a 17-15 edge and want to keep existing districts.
Democrats blocked a Senate vote on redistricting in the first special session because of rule requiring two-thirds of the 31-member chamber to agree to bring a bill up for debate. Eleven Democrats and one Republican opposed consideration, thwarting the measure.
In the new special session, Republican Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst is arranging the order of bills so that the two-thirds rule is not needed to bring up redistricting. That move, Democrats said, breaks Senate tradition and led to their walkout.
Van de Putte said the Democrats would return if Perry ends the second special session or Dewhurst reinstates the two-thirds rule.
"When either of these two requests are granted, we will be on the first flight home," Van de Putte said.
Dewhurst and Republican senators said no two-thirds rule has been used in the three other legislative sessions on redistricting that have occurred in the past 32 years.
Sen. Steve Odgen, R-Bryan, also said Democrats should return to address other important issues before the Legislature, notably a transportation bill that could provide for the appropriation of $231 million.
"Nobody in this state that I know of campaigned on the proposition that if you elect me I won't show up," Ogden said.
Dewhurst himself didn't speak publicly about the Democrats on Tuesday.
His spokesman, Dave Beckwith, said the lieutenant governor has been in contact with two of the absent Democrats. He declined to identify them or elaborate on the conversations.
"He's always willing to entertain compromise," Beckwith said. "They could come back now and have meaningful input."
On Monday, Dewhurst said he may consider hiring off-duty police officers to assist in returning the senators to the Capitol.
Beckwith said Tuesday he didn't know anything about "bounty hunters" that some Democrats said they heard might be after them. Beckwith wouldn't specify what actions the lieutenant governor is taking with regard to off-duty police officers or others to force the senators back to Austin.
"We're being deliberately vague about that at this point," Beckwith said, "because we are not going to telegraph what we are going to do in advance."
Online at: http://www.dallasnews.com/latestnews/stories/072903dntexredistrict.d81510ee.html
The Texas eleven State Senators holed up in New Mexico like common criminals fleeing bounty hunters or the Texas Rangers, whichever gets them first.
I say put a bounty on this post-modern Hole-in-the-Wall Gang and turn 'Dog' Chapman loose on them. He'd get 'em, just like he got that pervert rapist heir to the MaxFactor fortune who ran away and holed up in Baja California, Mexico.
This is getting a lot of radio coverage in Alb.....the afternoon guy is saying the Texas legislative redictricing is not on the up and up (bad Repblicans).In other words that it is not a normal occurance in the 10 year cycle ....What info have you got on this?
This has nothing to do with TX, but... On Brit's show today, he was talking about Oday (or the other one) talking to one of the Arab network reporters the other day. Paraphrasing: This Bush really means what he says. He's not like Clinton.
I have not seen or heard this anywhere. Has anyone else?
I'm moving to Austin, TX tomorrow, the liberal bastion of the conservative state.(from Ohio) Even worse, I'll be doing graduate studies at the liberal University of Texas. Maybe there I can spread the seed of doubt from within. I like Ann Coulter's choice of words: "beachhead of domestic anti-Americanism". Maybe I should run for what some would say are "vacant" seats.
Does Texas State law specify that a special session has to be held in Texas? Couldn't the Governor call a special in New Mexico? Surely the Marriott has a conference room big enough to sit a few more guests.
