Texas Democrats on Friday once more defied Republican Gov. Greg Abbott and the state GOP and didn’t present up for a vote on a controversial Republican-proposed redistricting plan.
The GOP-proposed new congressional maps that may give Republicans extra seats in Congress — doubtlessly permitting the GOP to maintain management of the U.S. Home of Representatives in Washington.
Regardless of threats of arrest, dropping pay and calls from the governor that they be faraway from workplace, the vast majority of the Democrats didn’t seem for the particular session when it began at 2 p.m. ET and no quorum was reached.
U.S. Congressional District maps are displayed because the Senate Particular Committee on Congressional Redistricting meets to listen to invited testimony on Congressional plan C2308 on the Texas State Capitol on August 6, 2025 in Austin, Texas.
Brandon Bell/Getty Photographs
Democratic state Rep. Gene Wu, the Texas Home minority chief, earlier informed ABC Information Thursday that he believes his caucus would maintain out on Friday and as soon as once more deny the legislature a quorum, although he stated they might be keen to come back again to Austin if state Republicans promise to focus solely on different points earlier than the particular session, together with flood mitigation and catastrophe preparedness.
Members who have been current Friday don’t have to return in particular person till Monday at 2 p.m. ET, when the Texas Home Republicans will try to achieve a quorum for the fourth time.
Democrats who’ve fled the state seem more likely to keep away till Aug. 19, the top of the particular session.
The defiance passed off as Abbott has additionally requested the Texas Supreme Courtroom to take away Wu from workplace. The court docket gave Wu till 6 p.m. ET Friday to answer the governor’s case.
Texas Lawyer Basic Ken Paxton informed Fox Information on Friday that he’s keen to take different Democrats to court docket if they do not return.
“In the event that they present up right now, we’re all glad, we will get our enterprise performed, and all people is sweet. If they don’t present up, we will likely be in an Illinois courtroom … [trying] to get them again to the state of Texas, maintain them in contempt, and in the event that they refuse to come back, hopefully put them in jail,” he stated.
He shrugged off issues that the optics of arresting Democrats would give them a public opinion win.
“I believe in Texas — I do not know what it is like in different states, however I do know in Texas, individuals anticipate their representatives to go to work,” Paxton stated.
Paxton stated on Friday afternoon that he had filed a lawsuit with the Texas Supreme Courtroom petitioning for 13 of the over 50 Texas Home Democratic members who left the state to interrupt quorum to be faraway from their positions.
The submitting argued that these members “have absented themselves from the State with the specific function of denying the Home a quorum in order that the Legislature as an entire can’t perform its constitutional lawmaking operate.”
“These cowards intentionally sabotaged the constitutional course of and violated the oath they swore to uphold. Their out-of-state rebel can’t go unchecked, and the enterprise of Texas should go on,” the AG stated in a press release.
Texas Home Speaker Dustin Burrows focused the wallets of the absent Democrats in an effort to attract them again.
On Thursday, he despatched a memo to all members and their staffs requiring that any member who’s absent from the particular session to interrupt quorum should accumulate their month-to-month paycheck in particular person. Direct deposits have been suspended for these skipping out till the Home reaches quorum, in line with memo.
Burrows says that he expects extra fits filed in different states to come back after the one filed by Abbott Thursday to attempt to implement the civil arrest warrants out of state, and that one other legislator contacted the Sergeant at Arms of the Illinois Home of Representatives asking for his or her help in bringing again members.
He added later that if the Division of Public Security civilly arrests “our absent colleagues” in the course of the weekend, legislators are on name and wish to come back again to Austin with a minimal of six hours’ discover.
Abbott has referred to as for the Democrats’ arrest, and Republican Sen. John Cornyn has referred to as on the FBI to trace down these elected officers.
Congressional Democrats who sit on the Home Judiciary and Home Oversight Committee despatched a letter Friday to U.S. Lawyer Basic Pam Bondi and FBI director Kash Patel asking them to make clear and clarify if and the way their companies are concerned in finding Democratic Texas lawmakers who left the state to stop a quorum to be able to cease the brand new congressional maps.
“We write with nice concern concerning the abuse of federal public security assets for utterly political functions and with no regulation enforcement rationale that’s reportedly happening proper now,” the members wrote.
The governor stated in a podcast launched Friday that he was keen to go additional than creating greater than 5 new seats the GOP might flip if the Democrats continued to dam the GOP effort.
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott speaks throughout a roundtable dialogue with President Donald Trump, first responders and native officers at Hill Nation Youth Occasion Middle in Kerrville, Texas, throughout a tour to watch flood injury, July 11, 2025.
Jacquelyn Martin/AP
“We might make it six or seven or eight new seats we’ll be including on the Republican aspect,” he stated throughout an interview on the podcast “Ruthless.”
Within the meantime, Texas Democrats have fled to varied blue states, together with Illinois and California.
Texas Rep. Gene Wu speaks in entrance of Democratic members of Congress and Texas Home Democrats throughout a information convention, August 4, 2025 in Warrenville, Illinois.
Kamil Krzaczynski/AFP by way of Getty Photographs
California Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom is slated to carry a information convention with these Democrats Friday afternoon, together with Rep. Nancy Pelosi and California state Democrats to point out their help.
“The governor and state leaders have floated a possible statewide poll measure that may reaffirm California’s dedication to nationwide unbiased redistricting and permit voters to quickly modify the state’s congressional map provided that Texas or different GOP-led states manipulate theirs,” Newsom’s workplace stated in a press release.
California Democrats are getting ready to answer Texas Republicans’ proposed new congressional districts by probably focusing on 5 GOP-held districts within the Golden State, sources not too long ago confirmed to ABC station KGO-TV. However the workplace of the California Secretary of State informed ABC Information that if legislators do not transfer quick, it turns into almost unimaginable for the state to run a statewide election that meets federal requirements.
ABC station KGO-TV’s Monica Madden contributed to this report.
