The Texas Report 5/3

The Texas Report 5/3

What’s Happening:

• Cleveland suspect shooting apprehended (More here)

• Greg Abbott and Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot duel (More here)

• Congressman Colin Allred announces challenge to Senator Ted Cruz (More here)

• Texas House investigate sets hearing for allegations of inappropriate conduct by a lawmaker. (More here)

• Biden Administration announces 1,500 more troops to southern border. (More here)

• Texas Legislative Update

Cleveland Shooting Updates

Texas massacre suspect Francisco Oropesa was arrested Tuesday evening following a multiple-day manhunt involving nearly 250 law enforcement officials.

Oropesa was found in a house just miles from Cleveland (where the shootings took place) and was “caught hiding in a closet underneath some laundry.” Sheriff Greg Capers told reporters during a Tuesday night press conference.

Capers added that “They effectively made the arrest; he is uninjured, and he is currently being taken to my facility in Coldspring,”

The FBI Houston office said he was found in the nearby city of Conroe. And a tip submitted through the FBI’s tip line led authorities to the suspect. Assistant Special Agent in Charge Jimmy Paul said the tip came in at 5:15 pm, and Oropesa was arrested at 6:30 pm.

Authorities are now investigating whether the suspect had any help hiding, San Jacinto County District Attorney Todd Dillon told CNN Tuesday night.

The victims have been identified as Sonia Argentina Guzman, 25, and her son Daniel Enrique Laso-Guzman, 9; Diana Velázquez Alvarado, 21; Julisa Molina Rivera, 31, and José Jonathan Cásarez, 18.

Next steps:

• Oropesa will appear before a magistrate in San Jacinto County Wednesday, and authorities will have 90 days to indict the suspect.

• (More here)

Governor Greg Abbott vs. Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot

On Sunday, Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot sent Governor Greg Abbott a letter urging him to stop busing migrants to Chicago, calling it "inhumane and dangerous.

In her letter, she says that Chicago has "shouldered the responsibility of caring for more than 8,000 men, women, and children with no resources of their own." And "Chicago is a Welcoming City, and we collaborate with County, State, and community partners to rise to this challenge." (Mayor Lightfoot's letter)

Abbott responded with a letter in response to Lightfoot encouraging her to "call on the Biden Administration to":

• Do its job by securing our border

• Repel the illegal immigrants flooding our communities

• Classify Mexican drug cartels as foreign terrorist organizations

• Intercept the deadly fentanyl endangering our country.

Abbott adds that "until President Biden secures the border to stop the inflow of mass migration, Texas will continue this necessary program." (Governor Abbott's letter)

Lightfoot responded to Monday on Twitter with, "Here's the response from the politician who continues to race to the bottom to score political points with no regard for the human lives involved or the consequences. And to be clear, asylum seekers paroled into the U.S. are not "illegal immigrants." Shameful but sadly expected." (Official tweet) (More here)

We'll find some updated numbers on the Texas busing program to help give additional context to the initiative.

Congressman Colin Allred potentially challenging Senator Ted Cruz

Congressman Colin Allred (D-Dallas) will challenge Senator Ted Cruz for reelection in 2024. Here is the candidacy video. To summarize, Allred begins by showing clips from Senator Cruz encouraging the events on January sixth and flying out of the state during the 2021 winter freeze. Allred highlight's his legislative achievements and touts a record of bipartisanship.

He adds, "Some people say a Democrat can't win in Texas. Well, someone like me was never supposed to get this far."

I've yet to say an official response by Senator Cruz. But the National Republican Senatorial Committee issued a statement dismissing his chances. Commenting, "Just like Beto O'Rourke before him, Colin Allred is going to quickly regret giving up his safe House seat to run yet another doomed, Democrat vanity campaign in Texas."

Allred is a former NFL player and civil rights lawyer first elected to Congress in 2018. For months there have been rumors he was considering whether to take on Cruz, and it was recently pointed out that Allred's campaign website was undergoing changes adding even more fuel to the fire.

Allred is considered a major underdog, as no Democrat has won statewide office in Texas since 1994. Beto O'Rourke ran the closest race in recent memory when he lost to Cruz in 2018 by less than three percentage points. He is considered a strong fundraiser. However, O'Rourke outraised Cruz 2-1 in 2018, which was still insufficient.

Allred will have to give us his congressional seat and will likely face significant primary competition. State Senator Roland Gutierrez (D-San Antonio) is heavily considering running and even threw down a debate challenge to Cruz yesterday on gun control.

Allred previously worked at the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development under President Barack Obama. A little more about Allred:

• Played football at Baylor University and spent five seasons in the NFL before suffering a career-ending injury.

• Following football attended law school and became a civil rights attorney.

• Allred currently serves on the Transportation and Infrastructure, Foreign Affairs, and Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government. Many democrats see him as an up-and-comer in the party.

Texas House Investigative Committee on allegations of inappropriate conduct

The Texas House Committee on General Investigating met Monday and unanimously agreed that a lawmaker may have been involved in inappropriate workplace conduct and set a due process hearing for Thursday.

The target of the investigation was not identified, with Representative Charlie Geren referring to the issue as only "Matter B." Supposedly, the committee is looking into the behavior of Representatives Jolanda Jones (D-Houston) and Bryan Slaton (R-Royse City).

In April, a Capitol staffer alleged that Slaton had sex with an employee (a woman under 21) and provided her with alcohol.

Representative Jones saw three members of her office resign in March, who explained in a letter they'd worked in an "abusive and hostile" work environment.

The investigative committee announced the due process hearing following a two-hour private executive session meeting on Monday. Four subpoenas were also issued in April, but it wasn't identified who they were for. (More here)

Biden Administration - Border Security

Tuesday, the Biden administration announced a temporary border deployment to assist agents ahead of an expected influx of migrants with the expiration of Title 42.

The service members, mainly coming from Army units, will not have a law enforcement role but instead will be performing monitoring and administrative tasks to free up Border Patrol officials processing migrant claims.

A U.S. official said service members would fill "critical capability gaps, such as ground-based detection and monitoring, data entry, and warehouse support until CBP can address these needs" through contracted staff. 1,5000 troops are set to be deployed and will join another 2,500.

They are scheduled to be there for 90 days and are fulling a request from the Department of Homeland Security. Some Democrats decried the Biden administration's decision, like Senator Menedez (D-New Jersey), who said, "There is already a humanitarian crisis in the Western Hemisphere, and deploying military personnel only signals that migrants are a threat that requires our nation's troops to contain."

However, the top Senate appropriator on defense, Jon Tester (D-Montana), said he wouldn't object to the move as an emergency measure. He added, "We need a secure border; if that's what we need to do now, do it." (More here)

Governor Abbott weighed in and said, "Biden says he will deploy 1,500 troops to the border — primarily to do paperwork. And only for 90 days. This does nothing to stop illegal immigration. I deployed up to 10,000 Texas National Guard to the border to fill the gaps created by Biden's reckless open border policies."

The White House said this "would not be necessary if Congress would act."

We're still reading through the full details of this new plan and hope to have more information this week. (More here)

TEXAS LEGISLATIVE UPDATES

The House State Affairs committee is set to take up the primary Senate priority bill related to strengthening the power grid on Wednesday. S.B. 7 is a major Senate and Lieutenant Governor priority bill intended to address perceived reliability concerns from federal subsidies targeting less reliable generators, which creates unfair advantages over reliable generators.

This is one of the biggest bills of the session. It'll be interesting to see if the legislation has as much bipartisan support in the House as in the Senate, where every Senator voted for the bill.

The Texas House was set to consider Senate Bill (S.B. 14) yesterday by Senator Donna Campbell and sponsored by Representative Tom Oliverson (R-Cypress). S.B. 14, among other things:

• Prohibit physicians and other health care providers from performing procedures or providing treatments for gender transitioning, gender reassignment, or gender dysphoria for children.

• This legislation would also prohibit public money or public assistance for these procedures.

Hundreds to thousands of protestors showed up to advocate against the bills, and several other groups at the Capitol supported the legislation.

• Before the layout of the legislation, a brief "demonstration" occurred in the House gallery that included an unfurled banner and chants against the bill. The House Speaker subsequently ordered the Sergeant at Arms to clear the gallery, and protests and chants continued outside the chamber.

Texas Department of Public Safety (DPS) troopers eventually cleared out the entire building after telling the protesters they were too loud and were preventing the House from being able to conduct business. The demonstrations continued on the steps of the Capitol. (Various videos here credit to Ryan Chandler)

The bill would end up not even being laid out as House Democrats introduced a procedural motion called a "point of order," challenging the bill analysis and forcing the legislation back to the committee.

• Points of order are used by both sides of the aisle as the main way to kill legislation when it reaches the floor, and the House Parliamentarians rule on the legitimacy of each one.

• The point must have been accurate in this case, as it was recommitted to House Public Health and voted out the same evening.

The Chair of the Calendars Committee that handles all the scheduling for House bills said it would be back up at some point this week.

Other bills on the move include:

• H.B. 19 was voted out of the House on Tuesday and would create a specific business trial court to handle issues in which the amount in controversy exceeds $10 million. These judges would have similar powers to district judges but would be appointed by the Governor and confirmed by the Senate instead of elected.

• S.B. 1993 by Senator Middleton passed the Senate Tuesday, would give the Secretary of State the authority to order a new election if the Secretary had good cause to believe that at least two percent of the total number of polling places in didn't receive enough ballots for one more hour after making a request. This bill is bracketed solely to Harris County.

Senator Middleton is also the author of S.B. 763, which would allow school districts to employ volunteer chaplains to provide student support, services, or programs. These chaplains would not be required to be certified by the State Board for Educator Certification. Middleton added on social media that "the bill will allow the important role chaplains serve for pastoral care and representing God's presence within our public schools." (Official Tweet)