The news of Texas covered today includes:
Our Lone Star story of the day: Understand this: My primary objections to the use of, and vote for, impeachment of Mr. Paxton by members of the Texas House stand fully without respect to the person involved. In other words, on the face of it this process, this use of the power of impeachment is wrong for many reasons no matter whether Paxton is guilty of things alleged, or not, or whether it was someone else like former Democrat attorneys general Dan Morales or Jim Mattox.
I address a small part of my arguments on today on the show. One of the most important, aside from the terrible tool for a House Speaker to coerce legislators and state officials this precedent sets, is the lack of “inherency” to the argument made by those show spoke for impeachment in the House.
In debate, we define the stock, or fundamental, issue of inherency as: Is there a law, statute, or barrier that prevents the status quo from achieving the affirmative’s goal.
What that means in this case is that to support even the roll out of the impeachment process, it needs be demonstrated that no other part of our existing systems (the status quo) are able to achieve the goal of “protecting the state” from Mr. Paxton. Yet no one has even bothered to put forward the argument that law enforcement, whether state or federal, is being prevented from investigating allegations against Paxton. And remember, despite the moniker “state’s chief law enforcement officer,” the attorney general does not actually run or control the state’s major law enforcement bodies.
Both of the last two Democrat Texas Attorneys General, Mattox and Morales faced criminal charges with Morales pleading guilty and Mattox being acquitted after a long jury trial, demonstrating that there is no fundamental reason that the standard law enforcement and court process should not be allowed to run its course with Mr. Paxton. (Unless of course that reason is purely political vendetta and you don’t think there is actually enough evidence for Paxton to be convicted of a serious crime.)
From the rushed, stacked-deck House debate on impeachment Saturday as reported in The Texan:
Responding to questions from Rep. Matt Schaefer (R-Tyler), Murr agreed that witnesses were not placed under oath and were not cross-examined by members of the committee.
Rep. John Smithee (R-Amarillo) opposed the impeachment resolution on the grounds that he believes the process was flawed and the evidence is not enough, a theme throughout.
“I’m not here to defend Ken Paxton. That’s not my job, I’ll leave that to someone else,” Smithee said.
Smithee asserted the evidence presented to members was “hearsay within hearsay within hearsay” and would not be admissible in any court of law.
“We do not need to be relaxing the fairness and due process concerns,” Smithee said, discussing the precedent the House set with an “indefensible” process.
Smithee said the chamber was considering impeachment in the “worst possible way.”
“What you’re being asked to do is to impeach without evidence. It is all rumor, it is all innuendo, it is all speculation,” Smithee said.
…
Rep. Tony Tinderholt (R-Arlington) pointed out that all of the investigators that testified before the committee were former Harris County employees and nearly all of them vote in Democratic primaries. Murr suggested he was uninterested in the political leanings of the investigators when considering the articles of impeachment.
“This body gave more time to debating tampon tax relief than we’ve given to impeaching the chief law enforcement officer in our state,” Tinderholt said.
Tinderholt said he was “sorry” Republicans in the House are “being used” to cram through an impeachment against a popular GOP official. He said it is “imprudent at best and gross abuse of power at worst.”
Rep. Brian Harrison (R-Waxahachie) spoke against impeachment, saying the allegations should be “left to the courts and to the voters.”
The only Democrat to come to Paxton’s mild defense on the floor was Rep. Harold Dutton (D-Houston), who said he does not believe Paxton’s due process rights have been respected.
“I don’t have enough evidence that (Paxton) did anything,” Dutton said.
Dutton expressed concern that the chamber was asked to vote on the impeachment articles virtually in the “dead of night.”
Our Lone Star story of the day is sponsored by Allied Compliance Services providing the best service in DOT, business and personal drug and alcohol testing since 1995.
Texas House on a rare day of real work.
Legislature: Members had time to do secret pseudo-investigations, attend untold number of lobbyist paid events, get drunk (Speaker Phelan it appears and many others for sure,) and more, but they didn’t have time to get to 4 of the 7 “emergency items” put on the agenda including property tax relief during their 140-day regular session.
As a consequence, Governor Abbott has called them back into Special Session immediately with tax relief and border security as the call for this first special. Abbott promises more with limited items each time on the agenda to force legislators to focus on the peoples’ business.
Texas manufacturing sector continues to decline – see the latest Dallas Fed report.
And, other news of Texas.
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