Tag Archives: Texas GOP

State news

Step up, GOP lawmakers!

A nagging fear keeps rolling around my noggin concerning today’s expected impeachment vote involving Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton.

It is that Texas Republican legislators are as cowardly as their national colleagues. That is, they won’t vote to impeach a disgraceful “chief law enforcement officer” who’s been dogged by scandal almost from the day he took office in 2015.

National GOP members of Congress lacked the guts to impeach Donald J. Trump. I fear that same cowardice has afflicted the state’s GOP legislative caucus.

There are signs of hope. Such as the House General Investigations Committee’s unanimous vote to recommend impeachment. The panel, comprising three Republicans and two Democrats, stepped up and did the right thing to call for Paxton’s ouster after hearing from whistleblowers alleging widespread corruption within the AG’s office.

Will their House colleagues follow suit and provide the majority needed to force this guy to step aside while awaiting a trial in the Texas Senate?

Let us hope so.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

State news

Impeachment vote set!

Here we go, ladies and gentlemen. The Texas House of Representatives is set to vote Saturday on whether to impeach Attorney General Ken Paxton.

The question of the moment: Are there enough Republicans to grant the House the simple majority it needs to impeach the AG?

All 64 House Democrats are likely to cast affirmative votes to impeach Paxton. Of the 149 members of the House, that means just nine Republicans need to join their Democratic colleagues to impeach Paxton.

Here’s where it gets weird. An impeachment would require Paxton to step away from his office while the Senate prepares to conduct a trial that could result in his expulsion as the state’s top law enforcement officer.

This is the most serious intraparty squabble I’ve ever seen in the nearly 40 years I’ve been watching and covering Texas government.

Paxton has been under a mountain of trouble since being elected AG in 2014. A Collin County grand jury indicted him on allegations of securities fraud; whistleblowing lawyers quit as they alleged widespread corruption; they settled with Paxton, whom they had sued, but then Paxton sought to have Texas taxpayers foot the bill for the settlement. The allegations include bribery and even an extramarital affair.

It’s been nothing but a mess with this guy.

The bipartisan House General Investigation Committee voted unanimously to recommend impeachment.

So … on Saturday, the House will make that decision.

Texas House Vote on Impeachment of AG Paxton Set for Saturday (msn.com)

The 20-count impeachment lays out a huge array of issues. The 20th article of impeachment declares: “While holding office as attorney general, (Paxton) used, misused or failed to use his official powers  in a manner calculated to subvert the lawful operation of the government of the State of Texas and obstruct the fair and impartial administration of justice, thereby bringing the Office of Attorney General into scandal and disrepute to the prejudice of public confidence in the government of this State.” 

Now we get to see what the Texas House Republican caucus will do when presented with these most serious allegations.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

crime news

Reckoning arrives for Texas GOP

A moment of profound reckoning has just fallen out of the sky and landed squarely in the laps of Texas’s Republican legislators as they now must deal with whether to impeach a member of their party who happens to be the state’s attorney general.

Ken Paxton has been recommended for impeachment by the House General Investigations Committee, which has three Republicans and two Democrats serving. The panel voted unanimously to recommend that Paxton be impeached on allegations of egregious misconduct within his office.

This is, to borrow a phrase, a “big … deal.” You know?

Paxton has been operating under suspicious cloud cover ever since he took office in 2015. A Collin County grand jury indicted him for securities fraud that year. Then some whistleblowing lawyers in the AG’s office quit, citing allegations of bribery and mishandling of cases involving political donors.

Then Paxton settled with the lawyers and was ordered to pay $3.3 million. Only he wants taxpayers to foot the bill. That drew immediate push back from House Speaker Dade Phelan, a Republican from Beaumont, who said Texas taxpayers shouldn’t have to pay for Paxton’s settlement.

Then Paxton fired back, saying Phelan should resign, accusing the speaker of being drunk on the job.

The intraparty conflict has exploded into a full-blown firefight.

The task before the House GOP caucus is whether they want to join their 64 Democratic colleagues in impeaching the AG. As the Texas Tribune reports, the GOP caucus has been mostly silent about Paxton’s woes. Until now.

Even some of Paxton’s friends in the House and Senate now are taking a quieter approach to speaking out on this matter.

Republican-led effort to impeach Ken Paxton is a seismic political shift | The Texas Tribune

The ground is shaking and rattling under everyone’s feet in Austin these days. Ken Paxton, to my way of thinking, has shamed his office. No AG can function effectively as the state’s top law enforcer with the suspicion that has dogged Ken Paxton from the get-go.

We have a terrible mess on our hands and to my way of thinking, it is time for the House — and then the Senate — to do its job by impeaching the attorney general and then tossing him out of office with a conviction.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

legal news, local news, State news

AG Paxton is getting some serious heat … finally!

Well now, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton — who’s been under felony indictment nearly for as long as he has been in office — is facing even more trouble.

This time it’s coming from his fellow Republicans who serve in the Legislature.

Can it be that finally the AG is going to get his long- and well-deserved comeuppance? You may count me as one Texas resident who wants to see it happen to the former legislator who has disgraced the office he has occupied since 2015.

The Hill newspaper reports:

On Wednesday, four former state prosecutors commissioned by the state House publicly unveiled the results of their sweeping investigation into years of alleged misconduct by Paxton.

Headlining those allegations: charges that the attorney general took bribes from an Austin real estate developer, then fired four deputies for reporting it to law enforcement — and then leaving taxpayers on the hook for a $3.3 million settlement with the whistleblowers. 

Paxton is also accused of seeking a sweetheart job for a woman he was having an affair with and who had worked in his wife’s office. 

The House General Investigations Committee, which recommended the ouster of former state Rep. Bryan Slaton of Royse City, is now looking into Paxton’s conduct. The allegations against Paxton “curl my mustache,” said Committee Chairman Andrew Murr, R-Junction.

Paxton has managed to avoid a trial since a Collin County grand jury indicted him for securities fraud. That he has been re-elected twice as the state’s chief law enforcement official has been enough to make me question the wisdom of Texas voters. But he has and I accept the voters’ verdict, even if I disagree with it.

Still, the guy needs to go.

I have been alarmed at the notion of Paxton rising to call for the resignation of House Speaker Dade Phelan after a video emerged showing Phelan slurring his words at the end of a long day at the podium in the House chamber.

That such a call would come from an indicted public official is laughable on its face … except that I ain’t laughing.

Battle rages in Texas between AG Paxton and GOP-controlled House | The Hill

So, what can come from the House committee’s probe of the AG? Let’s say it out loud: He could be impeached and then put on trial in the Texas Senate.

I can’t stop shaking my head.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

local news

Paxton calls on speaker to quit? Huh … ?

Wow! That’s all I should have to say on this matter, but of course I’ll add a couple of cents’ worth.

Of all the elected officials serving in this great state of mine, it falls on an indicted Texas attorney general to call for the resignation of the speaker of the Texas House.

What in the world is wrong with this picture?

AG Ken Paxton, who’s been under criminal indictment almost his entire time as the state’s chief law enforcement officer, said this week that Speaker Dade Phelan was drunk while presiding over the House. Paxton said Phelan should resign at the end of the current session of the Legislature.

For the life of me I cannot fathom what in the world is happening to this state.

A Collin County grand jury indicted Paxton in 2015 of securities fraud, stemming from an allegation that he failed to notify investors of his relationship with a securities firm. Eight years later and the case hasn’t gone to trial … yet!

Then we have allegations of corruption within the AG’s office. There has been a settlement on that matter, but several top lawyers in the office resigned after blowing the whistle on what they said were improper relationships between Paxton and a key political supporter and donor.

Paxton is a joke! Actually, he needs to resign his office.

Now he declares that Dade Phelan has been sipping the sauce. A video of Phelan has gone viral, showing him slurring his words a bit while conducting the House’s business.

“After much consideration, it is with profound disappointment that I call on Speaker Dade Phelan to resign at the end of this legislation session,” Paxton said in a statement posted on Twitter. “His conduct has negatively impacted the legislative process and constitutes a failure to live up to his duty to the public.”

Ken Paxton calls on Dade Phelan to resign, citing apparent intoxication | The Texas Tribune

I suppose, of course, that Phelan’s resistance to some of Paxton’s top legislative priorities has nothing to do with the AG’s call for the speaker to resign. Texas’s top Republican officeholders have been squabbling a good bit of late. They can’t agree on some of the priorities being pushed by, say, Paxton, Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick and Gov. Greg Abbott.

Now it has come down to this, with the state’s indicted attorney general offering an armchair medical diagnosis of the House speaker.

Ridiculous!

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

local news

Slaton: GOP poster boy

Bryan Slaton is the newest poster boy for Republican Party hypocrisy, the type that allows pols to preach about family values while living a life that steers far, far away from such righteousness.

Slaton is the newly expelled member of the Texas House of Representatives. He hails from Royse City, just down the road from me in North Texas.

He campaigned for the office in 2020 claiming to be a champion against those who “groom” underage girls for sexual conduct.

Oops! What happened to Slaton? He got caught having sex with a 19-year-old intern at his Austin apartment; he also filled her with booze. All the while, this moron sought to preach about the family values he said he held dear to his heart.

The Texas Tribune reported: Slaton resigned Monday and was expelled from the House by a unanimous vote Tuesday, but his hypocrisy has cast a harsher light on Republican-led efforts to crack down on supposedly grooming-related activities, including drag performances, gender-affirming care for transgender minors and classroom discussions of sexual orientation and gender identity.

Bryan Slaton’s downfall could complicate GOP fight against “groomers” | The Texas Tribune

The Texas GOP surely needs to re-examine its message and the people it uses to convey that message to voters.

Politicians such as Slaton, those who get caught doing something far from the message they are preaching, deserve to be excoriated and condemned in the harshest terms possible. Slaton’s expulsion vote, which was unanimous in the House, serves as a graphic reminder of the penalty that awaits those who fail to live as they demand of others.

Whether the message that Republicans want to convey remains viable in the wake of Slaton’s lying and marital infidelity is to be determined.

My own advice for the GOP would be to lose the anti-grooming mantra. Every Republican who invokes the message will bring Bryan Slaton to the minds of those hear it.

That is not a good fit.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

local news

House boots Slaton

OK, it was a symbolic vote, given that a disgraced Texas legislator had resigned his office a day earlier, but it is a welcome signal that the Texas Legislature won’t stand for the kind of conduct on which it was voting.

The state House voted 147 to zero to boot former Rep. Bryan Slaton, a Royse City Republican from its ranks. The House needed a two-thirds vote to expel one of its members. Boy howdy, it got what it needed!

Slaton had sex with an underage staffer in his Austin apartment, getting the young woman too drunk to fend off any advances. The House Government Investigations Committee recommended expulsion for the second-term lawmaker.

Well, he’s gone now. I’m glad of it, given his extreme hypocrisy in boasting that he is a “family values, Christian conservative” politician.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

 

State news

Patrick picks needless fight

Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick just continues to piss me off to no end at all.

Why? Because the fire-breathing head of the Texas Senate insists that the entire state must kowtow to his idiotic notion that everyone in the state believes as he does. It ain’t so … Dan.

Patrick’s petulance is showing itself as he continues to feud with House Speaker Dade Phelan over the House’s alleged refusal to approve the socially conservative agenda that is part of Patrick’s mantra. Patrick has taken to calling Phelan “California Dade,” an apparent reference to Phelan’s inclination to stick to a more business-friendly approach to legislation and steering the House away from the divisive socially conservative views that Patrick wants to see become law.

Such as? Oh, according to the Texas Tribune: That list includes bills limiting medical treatments for transgender kids; a push to end tenure as well as diversity, equity and inclusion practices in public universities; and a “school choice” push to allow parents to use state dollars to send their kids to private schools, which opponents say would harm the funding of the state’s public education system.

Texas House, Senate leaders clash in final weeks of Legislature | The Texas Tribune

Phelan, meanwhile, touts the House’s fiscally conservative budget, which is more in line with traditional GOP principles. That isn’t good enough to suit Patrick, who is threatening to force Gov. Greg Abbott to call a special session if the Legislature — which is set to adjourn its regular session in about a month — doesn’t pass Patrick’s ham-handed agenda.

Look, I get that Texas voters elected this guy as the state’s No. 2 government executive. And that voters elected a conservative Legislature as well. However, there remains a significant number of Texans — such as yours truly — who dislike the tone and tenor of the agenda that Patrick wants to shove onto Gov. Abbott’s desk.

The guy is a MAGA loon who seeks to appeal only to those on the far right who buy into his nonsense.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

State news

Texas GOP: rigidity matters

Yep, by all means it is true that the Texas Republican Party has gone bonkers over its fealty to the gun lobby.

The State Republican Executive Committee voted 57-5 to censure state Rep. Tony Gonzales of San Antonio over his vote for gun-control legislation. No can do, said the GOP, which now has opened the door for the party to oppose Gonzales in the next Republican Party primary race in that district set for the spring of 2024.

What a sham! And a joke! Not to mention a disgrace!

Texas GOP censures U.S. Rep. Tony Gonzales | The Texas Tribune

“The reality is I’ve taken almost 1,400 votes, and the bulk of those have been with the Republican Party,” Gonzales said, according to the Texas Tribune. Ahh, but this vote was the deal-breaker.

The Tribune reported: Gonzales did not appear at the SREC meeting but addressed the issue after an unrelated news conference Thursday in San Antonio. He specifically defended his vote for the bipartisan gun law that passed last year after the Uvalde school shooting in his district. He said that if the vote were held again today, “I would vote twice on it if I could.”

Good for you, Rep. Gonzales.

His campaign issued a statement: “Today, like every day, Congressman Tony Gonzales went to work on behalf of the people of TX-23. He talked to veterans, visited with Border Patrol agents, and met constituents in a county he flipped from blue to red. The Republican Party of Texas would be wise to follow his lead and do some actual work,” campaign spokesperson Evan Albertson said.

Unbelievable, yes? Not really.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

State news

Texas GOP turns on one of its own

The late Texas state Sen. Teel Bivins of Amarillo once lamented how Republicans have this way of “eating their own.”

I didn’t quite understand what he meant when he said that to me. Now I am beginning to get it.

The Texas Republican Party has sanctioned a radio ad lambasting GOP Texas House Speaker Dade Phelan for continuing a longstanding Texas legislative tradition, which is to appoint legislators of the minority party to committee chairmanships.

What the hell?

Phelan is a Beaumont Republican serving his second term as the Man of the Texas House. Is he doing something radical? Something so completely out of the ordinary? Is he capitulating to those dreaded Democrats on policy? No, no and hell no!

He is doing what speakers of both parties have done for a lot longer than any of the whippersnappers who oppose this concept have been alive.

The Texas Tribune reports: In the minute-long ad, a narrator says the speaker is “teaming up with Democrats to kill our Republican priorities.” 

What in the name of good government is that narrator talking about?

I spoke this week with one of the GOP insurgents, state Rep. Bryan Slaton of Royse City, about his vote against Phelan’s bid to retain the speakership. He said Phelan is rewarding Democrats unduly with legislative power they didn’t earn at the ballot box. Slaton is one of the fiery members of the Texas Freedom Caucus who seemingly doesn’t understand the longstanding Texas political culture.

Republican Gov. George W. Bush forged a tremendous relationship with Democratic Lt. Gov. Bob Bullock and Democratic House Speaker Pete Laney when he took office in January 1995. Their cooperation with the governor continued a hallowed Texas tradition of good-government compromise between the parties. Laney made sure to appoint Republican legislators to committee chairs, as did his GOP successors appoint Democrats to chairmanships.

The current GOP caucus seemingly wants to change all that. Many of them believe Democrats should be ostracized. Not all of them share that view, according to the Texas Tribune, which reported:

Phelan’s office declined to comment on the ad. But by Friday, at least two of his allies in the House had fired back on Twitter.

Rep. Dustin Burrows, R-Lubbock, tweeted a screenshot of a recent fundraising email from the Texas GOP and wrote, “Wow! [Texas GOP]’s hypocrisy knows no boundaries! They are fundraising off the passage of the Heartbeat and Trigger Bills — to fund their attacks on the Speaker who helped make them law!”

Texas GOP launches radio attack ads against Republican state House speaker | The Texas Tribune

That takes me back to an earlier point, which is that Phelan isn’t a closet progressive masquerading as a conservative Republican.

The Texas Republican Party has lost its mind.

Wherever he is, Teel Bivins is laughing out loud.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com