Senate Republicans put the GOP first, not issues that matter

Forget the $9.1 billion drop in projected state revenues and the state's slowing economy.

Never mind the scandals in the Texas Youth Commission and state schools for Texans with mental retardation. Or that the Texas Department of Transportation made a $1 billion budget error, and not in the state's favor.

No, for Republicans in the Texas Senate, the most important crisis facing the State of Texas is: voter fraud. That's the first issue the Senate GOP majority addressed Wednesday — the second day of the 81st legislative session.

Voter ID legislation sounds reasonable: require voters to present identification when they vote. In practice, the requirement can be used to intimidate eligible voters — particularly minorities and the elderly — from voting. Minorities and the elderly are, on the whole, more likely to vote Democratic.

In practice, no one has ever shown that Texas has even a minor problem with ineligible voters casting ballots. Before they vote they have to register, and at registration they have to present identification. And voter fraud already is illegal.

But in Texas and other states, some Republicans hope voter ID bills help suppress Democratic voting. However, Senate Democrats in Texas have used the Senate's two-thirds rule to block voter ID legislation in previous sessions, including a dramatic and angry showdown in 2007.

The two-thirds rule effectively bars the Senate from voting on any bill unless two-thirds, or 21, of the senators first agree to bring it up for debate. The Texas Senate has 19 Republicans, 12 Democrats.

Thus, if Democratic senators can muster at least 11 of their 12 members to vote "no," they can block a bill from being debated and voted upon.

(A similar rule applies in the U.S. Senate, where Republican senators, who are in the minority, can use it to block Democratic legislation they particularly object to, or at least force Democrats to compromise.)

The rule is not used only for partisan reasons. Rural senators use it to block bills they think are too favorable to urban interests, for example, and gambling critics rely on it to stop gambling legislation.

But partisanship is exactly what Republican senators had in mind Wednesday. In fact, Sen. Tommy Williams, R-The Woodlands, acknowledged to the Senate that the proposal originally included legislative and congressional redistricting, as well as voter ID, but redistricting was dropped.

The Senate voted along party lines, 18-13, in carving out the exception from the two-thirds rule for voter ID legislation. Only Sen. John Carona, a Dallas Republican, broke party ranks; he said he favors voter ID legislation but objected to the way his party was getting it in light of voter weariness with partisan infighting.

Williams said voter ID has become such a partisan issue that it could not be resolved without bypassing the two-thirds rule. But voter fraud is not actually a problem, so there was no issue to resolve. For most Senate Republicans, party first, Texas second.