May 17th, 2016 – Second Reading Podcast

[0:00:00] “The Republicans were in the Democratic Party because there was only one party chart. Tell people on a regular basis there is still a land of opportunity in America. Call Texas. The problem is these departures from the Constitution. They have become the norm. But I’m a Christian first, a conservative second in a Republican third, and I praise Jesus. At what point must a female senator raised her hand or her voice to be recognized over the male colleagues in the room.”

[0:00:42 Jim] Welcome to the Texas Politics Project podcast for the week of May 17th 2000 and 16. I’m Jim Henson,

[0:00:49 Josh] I’m Josh Blank.

[0:00:50 Jim] And this week the Texas Supreme Court saves the Legislature’s bacon by finding the public school finance system constitutional, Though pretty lame, the Republican Party of Texas had its statewide convention last week. There was lots going on there, including the Republican leadership doubling down on bathrooms, particularly now that they can fight it out with The Obama administration will start today with what is pretty much the biggest story in Texas, I think, and that’s the Supreme Court saying the school finance system is broken but still constitutional. So this is ah a huge legislative issue. It’s a huge issue in terms of Children across Texas in the feature of this state, and it’s something with lots of background. So Josh tell us a little bit about the school finance system in Texas,

[0:01:37 Josh] right? Well, the school finance system in Texas, and particularly its interaction with the justice system, has a very, very long history, and we’re only gonna look a tiny, tiny slice of it. Just just to be fair,

[0:01:47 Jim] you know, we want to do the whole thing.

[0:01:49 Josh] Why do the whole thing how much time you have

[0:01:52 Jim] given the public in the students? We have taken our

[0:01:54 Josh] an hour? Well, I’ll just let’s do the reason. Let’s do the reason will think about this later. This will be the extended version will do the whole thing. So in the 2011 legislative session, they were facing a huge budget shortfall on account of the financial collapse, and the result of that was that they cut $5.4 billion approximately. There’s still some argument exactly how much, but it seems the people settling at $5.4 billion from the Texas Ah public school system, so the problem is is that you know the Texas Constitution is very specific. And actually Article seven, Section one of the Texas Constitution, actually requires Texas to establish and make suitable provisions for a public school system. When the Legislature cut, it was $5.4 billion. A lot of the school districts cried foul, and actually 2/3 of them, which is over 600 School District’s, decided to sue the state. That made a lot of constitutional arguments, but the three sort of big ones that got the most attention where that one, you know, the state is mandating that they do a bunch of things, and they’re now not giving the money to do it to that. Basically, by continually underfunding public education, it requires school districts and sort of the taxing districts to increase property taxes to the maximum allowable rate, which in effect, was like a de facto property tax. That was the second argument,

[0:03:13 Jim] well, statewide property say why, you know

[0:03:16 Josh] that’s a huge now, now and then. Lastly, just that the funding was uneven, inequitable and especially between sort of property rich school districts and property poor school districts. So in 2014 Travis Country. Ah, Judge Jon Dietz agreed with school districts. Obviously, the state quickly appealed this, and there’s some more history and some back and forth between that decision where we got last week. We’ll set that aside. But the court ruled on Friday the system actually meets the constitutional requirements. That doesn’t mean it’s good. So Justice Don Willett run. This was sort of the big quote that was making the rounds. I’ll read it. It’s just our business in school funding system, and I should point out he puts system in quotes, which I like cats. Nice touch. Our Byzantine school funding system is undeniably in perfect with immense room for improvement, but it satisfies minimum constitutional requirements. So it is an audible gasp of relief around Austin. So why, why was that the case

[0:04:09 Jim] before answering that we should start by noticing that judge will it is becoming kind of the Rosetta stone of the Insider group of Texas politics. For those of you that on Twitter, find Judge will it On Twitter, he got national press for being the Supreme Court justice that love Twitter nonetheless. So why were people so responsive to this in the capital. Well, there’s two things going on here. One. The cliche that you see in textbooks in columns and every discussion as the Legislature comes into session is that the Legislature really has to do one thing, and that’s passed the budget. And this lawsuit was really hanging like the sword of damage, please, over the budget process and the Legislature. Really, it was about their last time, and they dodged the bullet. They can’t just skipped it because of the lawsuit. Now that the lawsuit has been resolved, the audible gasp of relief is that the Legislature isn’t going to have to come up with some way of finding money to fix the school funding system. So there’s that. In a related way, it also just means less work right when you come right down to it. In the history here is important in terms of the political history of school finance. This is not the first time the state has been sued over public school funding. It’s happened periodically in the state’s recent history, and when the courts have ruled that the school system needed to be overhauled, it has become the huge piece of heavy lifting in the legislative session. Now, given what we’re looking at right now as we go into the session, the state’s economy, given the price of oil and its ripple effect through the economy and what people are beginning to suspect, is a general economic slowdown. Right now, you’re not hearing so much about the Texas miracle like we used to anymore. There’s not going to be a lot of money to work with anyway. So the politics of this, if you take on alternate history, say the court had said You have to go fix the school finance system. It’s unconstitutional and had said even even worse So the property taxes unconstitutional. You’re talking about overhauling a fundamental part of the budget and a fundamental public service at a time when everybody that is looking at this straightforwardly and doesn’t have a stake and saying otherwise knows there’s gonna be less money. It’s going to be a tight session.

[0:06:34 Josh] Just your best guess, just for fun. I mean, how many special sessions would we have had if they had ruled

[0:06:39 Jim] They have been here all summer? I mean, there’s just No, there’s no way that have gotten it’s done in the regular session. As you look at the political currents, I think it’s hard to overstate how good this is for the Republican majority in the Legislature. There’s been a lot of action, particularly on the right wing of the party that we’ve talked about before trying to attack local taxation and a big piece of school finance. Given this property tax thing and given the way that it’s funded, has to do with local taxation, and that whole effort was likely to be derailed in a lot of ways. I think if they had had to, like, reconstruct the finance system,

[0:07:20 Josh] so they dodged at least two bullets, right? I mean, one bullet is just the whole, you know. How would they have even found the money to do this? Given in a tightening Texas economy? Another pieces, You know, we already know that a big agenda item going for in this legislative session is ways to restrict local entities from collective property taxes, and that would have made this, you know. I mean, that would invest butt heads instantly. Another sort of lesser thing that I’ve been thinking about two is just the experience, right? Jimmy Don Aycock, who is his longtime head, I guess of public ad with tons and tons of experience who actually proposed, you know, at least a path forward for sort of fixing this last session and then withdrew it, knowing that there was no political will to do so with this court case. That hanging, he’s retired, and I think that’s have 1/3 quiet bullet that was also dodged. There is that institutional experience?

[0:08:05 Jim] Yeah, well, I think that’s right. I you know, on one hand, every time an education chair leaves, I mean, the same thing happened when Hochberg left the Legislature. He hadn’t been chair, but he had been share before. When Scott Hochberg left a few years ago was the same thing. It’s like, Oh my God, who’s gonna Who’s gonna know about education? There’s always a couple people that the problem is it is so complicated and so difficult that that’s that’s almost 17 is the editor. Yes, it’s Byzantine to use, Judge, will it? So this has been a huge right now, I think we don’t want to be too cynical about this and say OK, well, the legislature now is not going to do anything about public education. Public education always is a close second to the budget in terms of it being something that the Legislature deals with every session. It’s expensive. It’s a moving target. Demographic change in Texas really has this on the agenda and anybody, frankly, who’s honest about it. I will admit that the reality is school districts are very different. I mean, you know this, you know you’re out there looking at school District’s young man child thinking about the future. I mean, you have to be completely in denial of reality to not say that school districts are unequal in the state

[0:09:22 Josh] in a totally self interested sense. I’m just happy that the status quo maintains so Aiken trying to figure out what I’m doing

[0:09:28 Jim] right. Well, then they’ll change it.

[0:09:30 Josh] Then they’ll change it. That’s

[0:09:31 Jim] OK, so no doubt will come back to that. Another big story this week is the fallout from last week’s Republican Party of Texas convention, which was just beginning Teoh convene when we recorded last week’s podcast. Now the basics of this of the state parties in our party system have conventions. The purpose is very depending on party rules. In Texas, they’re there to dominate the delegates that will represent the different candidates as a result of the primary election in Texas. They’re there, too. Elect the state party chair. And there was a big fight, kind of Ah far right versus the farther right fight between a couple of different contenders in which the far right candidate one not the further right candidate and probably most interesting in terms of where we are right now and in terms of some of the discussions going on this state, their their toe, adopt a state party platform and the platform fights in some ways were the things that became the most interesting. Even though we’ll talk about the platform fights and then talk about people, said the platform doesn’t matter.

[0:10:40 Josh] The truth is the platform doesn’t matter. But it for people who watch this stuff is really interesting. And in some ways the platform doesn’t certainly doesn’t get you any voters. It’s not as though you know that the Republican Party of Texas platform is something that voters are going through that I think they had, like 264 planks and nobody’s going through and saying, You know, on balance, do I this party represent me now? It’s really got in Texas. Certainly not anywhere.

[0:11:01 Jim] Republicans don’t lose general election fights because of the platform.

[0:11:05 Josh] No, I mean, this is really more so. I think about the media and the other party in a lot of ways. You know, I think the last platform they were talking about reparative therapy for for gay homosexuals that was the whole thing that I think Democrats kind of looked at as, you know, an opportunity. But it’s not something that really means anything going forward for the most part, for for anyone, really. I mean, this is serving insider thing, and I mean, that was on the interesting discussions going in. There was too little quiet discussions that I was watching just purely for entertainment value. One. You know, there’s this question comes of every time of is a Texas Republican Party gonna include, like a succession of meant or a plank in the party platform? And of course, they get into their is pretty skit since they weren’t going to. It’s a small group, but it’s always there, and that’s kind of interesting. The other was this idea of whether the platform should be this big piece of 260 planks or whether it should just be served smaller and broad principles. And this kind of actually think gets to what’s actually going on at this thing a little bit more. I think in kind of what I just said, which is, I think more of the elites, the people driving the party would much rather have this be a small thing, guided by principles, knowing that doesn’t mean much and can only have really kind of negative implications for them based on some of the more extreme elements who want to add some extreme pieces of orthodoxy to the party. And then the question was, general purpose, broad principles. Are we gonna vote on all every single plank and basically not surprisingly, grassroots kind of wins in these things and was 264 planks. I think they were all approved.

[0:12:31 Jim] The platform fights become almost like a kind of heat check in the party. I mean, I’ve gone to a couple of these conventions just to shoot video and to cover them, and it really is interesting. I mean, that we talk a lot recently about the division between elites and the Republican Party releasing the parties and the grass roots and the conventions air. Actually, another interesting layer is what they are. Is there activists? That means in some ways there the most active of the Republican true believers. And the same is true on the Democratic side. When you go to the convention, the smoke filled room is not at the state party convention. You know, the state party convention is where you have a few thousands of people there, and they are people that are very unlike most other average people that do politics. And so they here to fight over these.

[0:13:23 Josh] Come on, they’re paying for a hotel room in Dallas. To be at this thing is crazy,

[0:13:28 Jim] although, you know, you get the sense, you know, they’re spread out. Doing the conventions is really I mean, it would be a great thing to to use instructional E in some way. If you could take somebody and walking around the convention and introduce them to people, um, you know,

[0:13:41 Josh] it would be very instructive.

[0:13:43 Jim] Yeah, maybe alienating, but But the kind of people that you meet are very interesting, but not like your average voter they pay a lot of attention. They’re deeply invested. And this is why, in a way, I think you’re never in Texas anyway, in the foreseeable future, going to get the party platform to be about a bunch of general principles because people want their thing in their right. I mean, you know, when they discuss, for example, secession, even when they vote against it, there’s still a lot of cheering that goes on during the secession discussion. So the other thing about the parties it’s interesting, is that they’re magnets for the press, and I think the press coverage ultimately winds up giving a kind of distorted or handle literally amplified. It’s probably a better term version of what goes on there, and even in those stories that you’re reading, I mean, I read a story. I think it was in the Austin American Statesman talking about the secession plank in which the reporter actually included in this story the fact that the media gets blamed for over amplifying the secession story, which I think is actually very true, probably right. But it was kind of ah pissy little comment in the story, saying that nonetheless, there were lots of people cheering in the hall. Well, it’s an error of interpretation on their part, rather than the fact that it doesn’t exist. Yeah, the probably the major thing in the platform, at least in terms of media coverage this time, was our old friend the bathroom issue.

[0:15:12 Josh] So basically, in the ah, the language that they said was we urge the enactment of legislation addressing individuals, use of bathrooms, showers and locker rooms that correspond with their biologically determined sex. Until

[0:15:23 Jim] you get to the very end, it sounds like there’s, ah, hygiene plank.

[0:15:25 Josh] You know it sounds yeah, people

[0:15:27 Jim] would be more clear

[0:15:27 Josh] soap on a rope and ah, and sandals. So this is back to the politics of bathrooms again, which seems to be cropping up just again and again. So first broke. What is, You know, a bathroom bill just started the real basics hero. So bathroom bill is basically any law that seeks to allow Orban can go both directions. Transgender individuals from using a public facility, and usually they’re focuses bathrooms because it could be locker rooms or showers on they want. Do you know, basically making sure those publicos court they use the one that correspond with their gender identity. So either you can do this or you can’t. I was going back to thinking was the legacy. What’s what’s the history on this? And a lot of the recent history is actually the reaction to kind of a longer history that’s been going on quietly for for a little while now, right? And actually dovetails nicely with a lot of things. We’re talking about local control, kind of the state legislatures Pushing back on local ordinance. As early as 2009 a movement in Vermont was sought to make gender neutral bathrooms available to transgender teens and technically, all teens, right? It’s it’s for everybody. You know. A lot of states kind of moved ahead in a lot of area, like sort of small cities sort of pushed ahead on this kind of stuff. Some larger cities Austin, apparently in 2014 approved a law requiring gender neutral signage on single occupancy bathrooms because, right, what difference does it make? A Yes, other cities in some states and making sure the similar accommodations, the one that you’ve heard about more recently is in North Carolina. They passed this law HB two which requires people to use the bathroom of their birth gender. And this is actually a response to a Charlotte loss of Charlotte, basically said, You know, let’s allow people to use the bathroom, assist you their gender identity, North Carolina said. No Carolina legislation skyline electorally

[0:17:02 Jim] assembly or whatever they call it their right.

[0:17:05 Speaker 0] This is

[0:17:05 Josh] the one that you’ve been heard about, and this is the one where the businesses have sort of been pushing the backlash against this saying, You know, this is discriminatory. Artists have been boycotting North Carolina, you know, here in Texas, two bills sort of that would do. Similar things were filed in the 2015 session, ended up not going anywhere. Later that year in Houston, the Houston Equal Rights Ordinance, or hero, was repealed. It was a general equal rights ordinance, but it was repealed, largely based on the argument that it would allow sexual predators pretending to be transgender into women’s restrooms. Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick was a big player in this.

[0:17:38 Jim] Yeah, I think in a lot of ways, the Hero ordinance fight in Houston presaged a lot of the national politics that we’re seeing now and right and then it’s a way in which our lieutenant governor has been shrewd, maybe too strong a word. But you know, some mixture of shrewd and lucky and seeing something’s coming and getting in front of them. Ah, and on this, I think the lieutenant governor was well positioned as this became a national issue. So the latest chapter in this is that Last Friday, the Obama administration announced that they would be sending a letter to school districts essentially urging them to provide access for transgender students with the gender of that they chose to identify with and that this at employees and that they were sending this because it was consistent with federal law in particular Title nine of the civil rights loss.

[0:18:33 Josh] Needless to say, Dan Patrick was very upset.

[0:18:35 Jim] So Dan Patrick was very upset but so upset that he had a press conference that got national coverage almost immediately. So we have some audio from that, that press conference that actually got covered in front page of The New York Times the next day.

[0:18:48 Josh] He says he’s going to withhold funding in schools. Do not follow the policy well in Texas, he can keep his 30 pieces of silver. We will not yield to blackmail from the president of the United States.

[0:19:06 Jim] Now you get a clear sense that the lieutenant governor is going to be out front of this and the he obviously that he was referring to was President Obama. And President Obama is a very convenient and perpetual foil that I think in some ways I would say that the Republicans in the state will be sorry to see him go. But should Hillary Clinton when the presidency there and I will probably not miss much of a B. Yes, um, I would also point out that the 30 pieces of silver in the New Testament, as I recall that I don’t read a lot but was not about blackmail. I think it was betrayal. But that’s different.

[0:19:43 Josh] I don’t look at me. I’m an Old Testament guy.

[0:19:45 Jim] E think that just I just want to make sure. OK, so Dan Patrick insert himself in the national news. He was on the cable channels in The New York Times. I said the president so was raised that the ah later in the day at the press at the daily briefing by President Obama’s press secretary Josh Earnest. So let’s see what Josh had to say. The other Josh.

[0:20:07 Josh] Well, I think this does underscore the risk of electing a right wing radio host to a statewide elected office. Um, so let’s just walk through the facts here.

[0:20:20 Jim] I think the kids say Snap. Well, maybe the millennials. I don’t know. But so, uh, obviously the White House not particularly impressed with Lieutenant Governor Patrick’s response, But now that’s not. That’s not especially surprising, I don’t think. But the politics of this in Texas, er to some degree a no brainer for Republicans but also kind of resonate with the national political environment and what we’re seeing the Republican Party going through with divisions over over Donald Trump, etcetera Dutch Think,

[0:20:50 Josh] Yeah. I mean, you know, going back to the previous more time about the Republican Party convention in Texas. I mean, the other serve big news that came out of that was sort of what were the big statewide is doing in their speeches? What was Greg Abbott talking about? What was Deon Patrick doing? Although this really kind of sucks, this is most of the Dan Patrick stuff. In the end, you know. What was Ted Cruz up to? We’ve been talking about this a little bit. You know, to the extent that Donald Trump is sort of this, you know, it’s a typical I think that’s typical. That’s generous. A typical candidate, you know, the Republican Party is kind of dealing with the fact there’s there’s a little bit of a leadership vacuum. I mean, to serve a little. A little tiff that I think really illustrates is normally, you know, candidate secures the nomination, then the party apparatus, the Republican National Committee, the Democratic National Committee is sort of handed over to that candidate kind of wholesale. They started putting some of their own people that keep some people, but they take over that organization, really take over the party organization. And when Donald Trump basically secured the nomination, there was this sort of decision. Well, are we gonna hand this over? Exactly. What do we do now? This is just a little incident of this, but it kind of speaks to this general like so, are we all buying into this kind of question and that has created this space for some of these people to kind of try to fill, right?

[0:22:01 Jim] Yeah, I think the way I’m thinking about it is that what you describe is ah, ah, fight over the administrative apparatus and the kind of in the organizational infrastructure of the party. One of the byproducts of that is that candidates that are used to speaking for the more traditional and more ideologically dedicated and conservative wing of the party are looking around. It seems some room to run. So, for example, Donald Trump has been on the record saying that he really didn’t think this bathroom thing was a big deal,

[0:22:32 Josh] right? Essentially, what says, says Dan Patrick,

[0:22:35 Jim] not so says Lieutenant governor. And not so say a lot of people. They’re going to jump in that space, and I think what we’re going to see. And Patrick himself said that, you know, he would be you suggesting that he would be advising Donald Trump to take a different position on this. And Trump responded pretty quickly, saying that he thought it was something that should be left to the states, which, ironically, is a very reflexive old school political Republican moved to say. I don’t really know exactly how I want to commit to this, but it should definitely be left up to the States. Well, if Donald Trump is gonna leave that up to the States, you can bet that particularly in conservative states like Texas, they’re going to be lots of people ready to jump in that space and and fill it. And in an interesting way, this could actually provide cues for Trump and also help down ballot candidates by providing some other kind of messaging associated with Republican Party. As we head into a general election, I think

[0:23:33 Josh] right Donald Trump doesn’t necessarily have to be the person you’re represents Republicans. Overall, there’s a lot of other people who want toe lisp, even especially in Texas, who want to be sort of the avatar of conservative Republicanism. Even if Donald Trump is not running as a conservative Republican, right? So Greg Abbott is touring. I think he’s in New York right now on his book tour, which is, you know, basically, you know, and also I guess he’s also pushed to amend the Constitution, and some are ways in the server. All kind of you know, these things are there kind of munch together fairly, but

[0:24:03 Jim] yeah, and for that matter. Both Abbott and Ted Cruz, even as the bathroom issue was unfolding, got involved with pronouncements on international issues. So Abbott was pushing back against the Obama administration on the Iran deal, saying that you know, Texas would be probably that he was gonna ask the Texas Legislature to increase Texas sanctions against Iran.

[0:24:28 Josh] Great. Well, that Iran is upset about that. I’m sure.

[0:24:31 Jim] You know, Ted Cruz had, you know something that I had a New York Times op ed piece, and I think he just got unlucky in the time in the Obama administration stepped on him. There was also foreign policy, Middle East oriented. So you see all you know, a lot of these guys beginning to position themselves in into some of the space that that Trump has left open. Um, you know, and it works for their own political ambitions. Toe reestablish their position at the state level with, particularly with Abbott and Patrick, to make sure they continue to block out any potential challengers. Not that there are a ton. And even I think the bank ah, kind of plausible deniability in the event that, as we expect, Trump gets the can’t gets the candidacy and then loses and turns out to be a disaster. You could be the guy that was fighting the good fight, while Trump was out there being self, a grand eyes and wrecking the part

[0:25:25 Josh] right. You can run parallel, sort of, you know, to what he’s doing and still have your own brand, your own identity,

[0:25:30 Jim] and then claim that but claim at the same time that you were being You’re being a good soldier, definitely. So you’ve had Patrick be pretty direct about supporting Trump by name at the convention. In his speech, Abbott was much more coy, called for all the Texas Republicans to support the ticket, but did not utter Trump’s name In his speech. Cruz came back the next day and didn’t talk about Trump or really the ticket much at all talked about staying true to conservatism. So everybody continues to adjust to oppose Trump World, which is the one we all live in, so I think that’s what we’ll leave it for today. Thanks for listening. This is Jim Henson and Josh Blanks, and we’ll see you next week.