Governor Abbott puts election rigging before flood relief in Texas special legislative session

Austin, Texas – On July 21, Texas lawmakers returned to Austin at Governor Greg Abbott’s request for a special legislative session on flood relief, emergency preparedness, mid-decade redistricting, and a plethora of other policy issues. Three days into the special session, Governor Abbott admitted to tying flood relief and preparedness with the hyperpartisan process of redistricting in a thinly veiled attempt to prevent Democrats from breaking quorum. Improving the state’s preparedness and response to ever-intensifying natural disasters should be the Legislature’s top priority after 137 people, including nearly 40 children, tragically died in the July 4 flooding in the Hill Country and Central Texas. Texas House Democrats have told Republican leadership that they will refuse to work on any other issues this special session until flood relief and emergency preparedness are addressed.

Instead of using flood survivors as pawns, the governor should listen to Texas State Representative and Legislative Budget Board member Armando Walle, who has argued that the governor doesn’t need a special session at all to make an emergency transfer of funds to aid impacted communities and offer meaningful relief. Or, the governor can remove redistricting from the call and allow lawmakers to finally engage with the issue of climate change, which is driving increasingly frequent and intense extreme weather and natural disasters in states like Texas.

“If emergency relief for devastated communities is so important to Governor Abbott, why is he burning so much time and political capital on rigging maps for Washington instead of keeping eyes on Texas? The sad, cynical truth is the governor looks at this community that has lost so much and sees the political leverage to do Donald Trump’s bidding,” said Sarah Eckhardt, Central Texas state senator and Texas State Advisory Board Member at Climate Power. “Governor Abbott has an opportunity to do now do what he should have done from the very start: pull this rigged redistricting from the call and allow the full focus and force of the Legislature to address flood relief, emergency preparedness, and the climate resilience policies needed to avoid disasters like this in the future.”