Texas House Speaker, Joe Straus, Hammers Reps with Redistricting
Political Retribution Over House Speaker Race A Plea to Governor Rick Perry for a Veto
Joe Straus
April 29, 2011
Dear Governor Perry,
As you know there was a great deal of controversy over the election of the Texas Speaker of the House. Conservatives across the state elected 102 Republicans to the TX House of Representatives. We were confident this would be a good year for Texas with a Super-majority of Republicans in the House. But on the day after the election, the present speaker (who is very liberal) persuaded members of the House to sign pledge cards supporting him for re-election as speaker. Conservatives from across the state did not elect a super-majority of Republicans just to let a Liberal Speaker control the agenda of the House. We confronted our representatives, but most of them would not listen to their constituents and kept their promise to re-elect Speaker Joe Straus. Only 15 House members voted against Speaker Straus's re-election.
Just as we expected, Speaker Straus appointed liberal Republicans and Democrats to the important committees. The head of the redistricting committee is very liberal. He has drawn the districts so that many of the 15 House members who voted against the speaker are now in the same districts so they will be forced to run against each other. This means some of our proven conservatives will be defeated or many will simply drop out of the election rather than run against someone they admire so much. Many Texans feel this was a deliberate attempt to punish House members who did not vote for Speaker Straus.
A number of the conservative fifteen were moved into districts where the majority of the voters are Democratic. This looks like an attempt the get those Republicans defeated by a Democratic candidate.
Similar tactics were used in the re-drawing of the State Board of Education districts. The liberal committee chairman has deliberately tried to eliminate some of the conservative members by making them run against each other or by placing them in a district which is dominated by Democrats.
Soon these bills will be coming to your desk for a signature. Please veto these two bills which are deliberate attempts to punish conservative officials for voting their convictions and for voting as their constituents asked them to vote. Please tell the committee chairman to work with the conservatives and let them serve the people who elected them.
It is unethical to do what the liberals are trying to do.
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