Can anyone imagine Gov. Greg Abbott pressuring legislators to pass a bill diverting high school graduates bound for one of the University of Texas or Texas A&M campuses or any of the other state universities to instead attend one of the Christian universities in the state?
What a bad idea.
Equally bad is Abbott’s demand that legislators pass a K-12 school voucher bill in a special session he has called for Oct. 9. The governor didn’t get what he wanted in the regular session when House Republicans joined with Democrats to reject the bill passed by the Senate. This time around, Abbott is threatening Republicans with consequences if they continue to defy him.
“If we do not win in that first special session, we will have another special special session and we’ll come back again,” Abbott said last week in a tele-town hall about the issue, according to the Texas Tribune. “And then if we don’t win that time, I think it’s time to send this to the voters themselves.”
Abbott and others supporting Republicans call it “school choice,” but that’s deceptive wording at best. It’s using public money to enroll students in more costly private schools.
Readers will recall that legislators divvied up a $32.7 billion surplus in the regular session — the largest in the state’s history — without agreeing on a bill to improve public school funding in a time of crisis or increase teacher salaries. A proposed onetime teacher cash bonus plan also failed. Meanwhile, thousands of teachers fed up with poor work conditions, political meddling in the classroom and low pay have left the profession, leaving public school districts short on qualified teachers.
Teacher pay raises and improved school funding were collateral damage in the Senate-House standoff. No vouchers? Then no new money for teachers or schools. It’s an unsavory quid pro quo, holding educators hostage while pushing legislation that will only make their jobs harder in the years to come.
Such blatantly transactional government is not in the public interest. Texas citizens do not want public school funding, already inadequate, to be further undermined by by this long-running scheme that predates Abbott. Yet there is a real fear that House Republicans who have opposed proposed voucher bills for two decades will now cave rather than risk losing their seats to a primary challenger backed by Abbott and Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick.
Some legislators believe passage of the bill is a foregone conclusion and that House Republicans, so recently vilified for impeaching Attorney General Ken Paxton, won’t have the backbone to vote their conscience and resist the governor’s pressure. The 60 House Republicans who voted for impeachment know they already have a target on their back painted by Paxton. Some Democrats seemed to be resigned to passage of a voucher bill as the only path to winning improved teacher pay and school funding.
“Our majority party wants vouchers. That’s a fact. Our state leadership wants vouchers. That’s a fact,” Rep. Barbara Gervin-Hawkins (D-San Antonio) said in a panel appearance at the Texas Tribune Festival last month. “We can continue to fight and waste a lot of time fighting and see who comes out winning, but guess who’s losing? Our teachers, who are trying to pay their rent. Who’s losing? Our children, who are not getting what they need.”
Other Democrats are unwilling to strike such a Faustian bargain.
“We are facing a historic crisis in our schools,” state Rep. James Talarico (D-Austin) remarked at the same panel discussion. “Compromise is not a virtue when our kids are on the line and when our teachers are on the line.”
For Republican House members who showed the mettle to vote “yes” for impeachment, the next special session will prove to be the real test. The twin threats they face from Abbott and the political alliance with Patrick and Paxton are real. So they face a stark choice: Stand their ground or surrender their vote.
House Speaker Dade Phelan should take the lead and bet his speakership on the outcome and rally his Republican majority. Patrick and Paxton are targeting him, and the only way bullies back off is when they find themselves in a fight they can’t win. Let’s hope Phelan and his supporters prove to be fighters who won’t be bullied.
