In an extraordinary move brokered with Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker, dozens of Texas House Democrats aim to deny a quorum as the GOP is set to draw new maps.

In an extraordinary move brokered with Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker, dozens of Texas House Democrats aim to deny a quorum as the GOP is set to draw new maps.

The roughly 30 Democrats are expected to stay for the week in a plan brokered with Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker, who had met with the Texas caucus late last month and has directed staff to provide logistical support for their stay. A news conference with the governor and Texas Democrats is expected later Sunday.

Last week, Texas Republicans released a proposed new congressional map that would give the GOP a path to pick up five seats in next year’s midterm elections. It followed President Donald Trump’s public pressure for a new map in the state as he works to retain a majority in Congress in what historically is a difficult year for the party holding the White House.

The proposed map would shift district lines in ways that would target current Democratic members of Congress in and around Austin, Dallas and Houston, as well as two already endangered Democrats representing south Texas districts that Trump carried last year.

    • @[email protected]English
      3•9 days ago

      We do have a lot of local elections with community support across much of the country. We mostly only see the stories where this process has been trampled or ignored, but we often lose sight of just how massive the country is and get absolutely no insight into how local jurisdictions work or don’t work. There are vast stretches of the US where the people are getting on just fine (by societal standards) and vote for their local school boards, their mayors and sheriffs, etc.

      The system is strained and in many places completely collapsed, particularly when it comes to federal representation, but we have to understand that there’s still value in our country. If we all worked harder to preserve that and reclaimed our flag much earlier we might have had a stronger fighting chance.