Let the record show something completely different: CHIP/immigrants
I’m shocked. (Shocked!)
That 136-5 vote is changing as we speak. Members are calling the journal clerk’s office all day to change their vote. The journal hasn’t been published, so this isn’t official. Details, details.
We’ll start with Rep. Dan Gattis, R-Georgetown, one of the five.
In the House Journal, he explains the reason he voted to save Linda Harper Brown’s amendment from The Table - when everyone and their mother voted to kill it.
Including Linda Harper Brown.
The amendment would have knocked 16,000 kids off CHIP because they’re legal immigrants but not citizens yet. Keyword here is “legal.”
At some point after last night’s vote (around 7:15 p.m. or so), Gattis submitted a written comment to the put in the House Journal, presumably so that anyone hoping to use his vote against him in the election will be stymied by the reason for that vote.
The spin he’s hoping to avoid from oppo researchers is that he voted to knock kids off of CHIP - and that doesn’t play well with voters.
I mean, ask Arlene Wohlgemuth.
Or, for that matter, anyone who was alive, breathing and not living under a rock during that particular post-2003 campaign.
Dan appears to be annoyed that Dawnna Dukes declined to back off and let LHB pull her amendment down without a vote. Dukes forced the vote, and Dan didn’t like it. Here’s his explanation of why he supported LHB in that weird little episode:
“I voted against the motion to table … because she had offered to pull the amendment down and not put the body through voting on a very divisive and emotional issue for many members. Pushing a vote on an item (ed note: lookin at you, Dawnna) only to cut up and divide the body or punish a member (ed note: LHB) for their position is not only disrespectful to the process but is disrespectful to the body, and to the legacy of this great institution called the Texas House.”
(I'm sorry, what's it called again?)
Other changes that had been submitted as of about 3 p.m. today.
Rep. Dan Flynn, R-Van, one of the five, reversed his vote and told the Journal Clerk he meant to vote “yes” on the motion to kill the bill.
Rep. Jodie Laubenberg, R-Parker, one of the 136, reversed her vote and said to put her down as a “no.” She’s friends with LHB.
Rep. Beverly Woolley, R-Houston, one of the 136, said she meant to vote “no.”
Rep. Allan Vaught, D-Dallas, was shown present but not voting. He wants to be shown voting “yes” to table.
Final tally would be, then, 136-6. At least until more reps call to change their votes for the record.
We’ll keep you posted.
Comments
This is the kind of Orwellian use of language I've come to expect from those who would govern us: offering a mean-spirited, divisive amendment with every intention of having it become law is responsible; forcing a vote on that amendment to show how out of touch that amendment's author is with her colleagues (and probably her constituents) is disrespectful. LHB deserves whatever justice her consituents mete out to her; so does Gattis.
Posted by: Boddhisattva | March 31, 2007 11:24 AM
Pot calls kettle "black".
Gattis is clearly one of these self-important politicians that thinks something is "disrespectful" only when it affects him. He apparently doesn't even recognize how disrespectful it is to Hispanic House members to offer such an amendment to begin with.
LHB, Gattis, et al deserved to get smacked-down 136-5 for offering such a divisive amendment to begin with. The amendment's intent was to divide and offend. Saying it was inappropriate to force members to tell voters where they stand (for kicking kids off of CHIP or against it) was the 100% right thing to do.
I'm not certain that Gattis can even see the tradition of the House from the high horse he is sitting on.
Gattis seems to miss the point that he supported an amendment being offered that amounted to little more than pandering to extremists and kicking 16k innocent kids off of CHIP.
Posted by: colin | March 31, 2007 3:54 PM