TEXAS — Four weeks into the 87th Texas Legislative Session, and it may appear like it’s moving at a snail’s pace as legislators embark on the challenge of lawmaking during a global pandemic. That should change next week, as newly appointed House committees begin assigning and debating bills. So far, lawmakers in both chambers have filed more than 2,200 bills, so expect the pace of the 140-day legislative session to pick up in the coming weeks.


What You Need To Know

  • House Speaker Dade Phelan announced committee assignments, meaning lawmakers can now begin debating proposed bills

  • Gov. Greg Abbott laid out his priorities for lawmakers in his annual State-of-the-State Address. They looked a lot like what the lawmakers are already focused on

  • The House, Senate, and the governor have all submitted budgets. They, too, look very simpatico in their priorities

And the chair goes to...

The biggest news out of the Capitol this week was House Speaker Dade Phelan’s announcement of committee assignments. The assigning of new leadership shook up the State House as he put many new faces in leadership positions to replace the old guard. 

Committees overseeing some of the most critical issues of the 87th Legislature, including public education, budget-writing, and redistricting, all got new chairs this session. 

Phelan, who was elected speaker for the first time at the beginning of the session, selected his predecessor’s brother as the chair of the powerful House Appropriations Committee, which is responsible for appropriating funding to the state budget. Rep. Greg Bonnen, R-Friendswood, will chair the committee and takes over the leadership after his brother, Dennis Bonnen, in the previous session became wrapped up in a scandal in which he was caught on tape discussing fellow Republican lawmaker’s and making disparaging comments about local government officials. Dennis Bonnen was House Speaker at the time and later announced that he would be retiring.

Rep. Todd Hunter, R-Corpus Christi, will be in the spotlight this session as he takes the leadership of the House Redistricting Committee, which will oversee the one-in-a-decade redrawing of district lines. A delay in U.S. Census data this year means the committee is likely to continue its work in a special session this summer. 

Phelan kept the Texas tradition of allowing the minority parties to have a proportionate number of committee chairs, a unique aspect of the state’s House structure. Democrats will chair 12 of the House’s 34 committees. 

Rep. Harold Dutton, a Democrat from Houston, will chair the Public Education Committee at a time when lawmakers will be under pressure to keep their commitments from the previous session on more funding for public education. Dutton, in the past, has said he supports charter schools, going against many of his party colleagues. 

Rep. Joe Moody, D–El Paso, was appointed speaker pro tempore and will be responsible for convening and presiding over the House in the speaker’s absence. Moody served in the position in the previous session as well and will assist the speaker with the chamber's administration.

Phelan assigned five women as committee chairs. That’s the same number of female lawmakers holding chairs as in the previous session, despite the House having two more women in the 150-seat chamber this year. This session has 38 female representatives, but only seven of them are Republicans, making it a challenge to keep a proportionate representative in committee chair assignments.

State-of-the-State

Gov. Greg Abbott's wish list for state lawmakers as laid out in his annual State-of-the-State address on Monday looks very similar to what legislators were already working on. In the televised address, Abbott stressed many of the issues lawmakers have already put at the top of their priority lists, including passing a budget and finding ways to get the state’s economy back to its pre-COVID boom. 

Abbott also signaled support for expanding broadband internet across the state, and in particular, in the rural regions. This is largely a bipartisan issue, as many lawmakers see the benefits of extensive broadband in the state will have on education, business and telemedicine during the pandemic and well into the future. 

The governor’s address echoed issues that many lawmakers have already signaled they want to work on, including “election integrity,” a throwback to the battle over former President Donald Trump’s false claims of widespread voter fraud in the Nov. 3 election. Abbott also said the state should create protections for businesses who might be slapped with COVID-related lawsuits. 

Abbott’s annual address in many ways reflected the political divides seen across the county. In the wake of his dispute with Austin for reducing its public safety budget this year, Abbott said he would like to see a law passed in the 87th Legislative Session limiting local reworking of public safety budgets. 

On Friday, Abbott issued his own version of the budget, which can be viewed in its entirety here.