The Texan Podcast - Land War in Asia, Birds of a Feather, Tilting at Windmills: Smoke Filled Room Ep. 16

Episode Date: May 12, 2025

In the latest episode of Smoke Filled Room, Senior Editor McKenzie DiLullo and Senior Reporter Brad Johnson talk the passage of Senate Bill 17, a floor fight over the colloquially termed “bird bill,” the ever-evolving relationship between state leaders, and campaign updates.Learn more about The Beer Alliance at:https://beeralliance.com/Listen to more Smoke Filled Room podcasts from our team wherever you get your podcasts. If you like what you hear, subscribe and leave us a review.

Well, howdy folks, it's Mackenzie with Bradley on another edition of Smoke-Filled Room. We are recording bright and early Friday morning, trying to get everything in, chatted through before the rest of the day hits. People are on the floor, bills are getting passed. You ready? I am ready. Yeah, it's been a long week and based on the floor calendar, the current floor calendar is going to be even longer weekend. But it's fun. You know, I was talking to a reading clerk, her name's Alyssa, and we were talking about session and, you know, how

that is going so far. And I said, you know, I would rather it be this drinking from a fire hose than be bored out of my mind. Like it will be after a session. Yeah, I love this stuff. Yeah. It's a lot of fun. The policy odds and ends the political fights. I don't know what I'm going to do with my life when this is done. Now, I'm exhausted. And so I'm very much reaping what I sowed right now.

But I wouldn't change it. Would you just say that that is how this job works though? Like campaign season, primary season, it is total feast or famine and we live for the feast. But also there's always in the back of our mind the inevitable end date that's like, okay, at this point I could take a nap Yeah, right especially for you and the reporters. I think that's just kind of how that works But then when it comes and you do get a chance to breathe two days later

Let's do it again. Oh, yeah Absolutely. I'm a sicko. I Said that I didn't say you were sicko on the my newsletter, but I'm a newsletter a few weeks ago I said that even about staffers and people in the building and folks who live in Austin who work in the political realm. It's the exact same for grassroots activists who are at the Capitol and make that their job to come and advocate for policy issues that they care about.

It's the same thing. Everyone is working so hard, which is amazing. And once we get to the end, everyone breathes a deep sigh of relief, but we wish it was happening again tomorrow. I mean, it's the nature of a five month session every two years, right? So that's just, that's just how it is. But last night was SB 17. Yeah. A long awaited debate over the China Land Bill, whatever you want to call it, that attempted ban on

hostile foreign nations and their agents from purchasing Texas land. This became kind of an unexpected big issue, particularly among Republicans. Unexpected? Why do you say that? Well, there were other higher profile bills like the gender modification bill Bayon that in previous sessions This wasn't really an issue in 21 the gender mod bill was an issue in 21 that didn't pass So going into the 23 session this kind of snuck up. I see what you're saying. As an issue. Yes, yes, yes.

And it got a lot of attention. It passed the Senate, did not pass the House, now it's back as kind of the big issue in that, you know, section of kind of policy. Like the one that got away, essentially, from the last session. Yeah. Yeah, obviously school choice set that aside because that's in a galaxy of its own. But this was long awaited. And Republican Party activists have been pushing for this for a while. The Senate passed their version.

The House moved on it in the last couple of weeks and then got it to the floor on Thursday. It'll pass on Friday, third reading. Then we'll probably go to conference, because there's a few differences that we'll talk about there were some amendments tacked on but this is a Texas GOP priority and for those that actually care about that they really care about that and it will be talked about in primaries, right?

And it will be used against members in primaries if they either right? And it will be used against members in primaries if they either don't pass the bill or pass a deemed insufficient bill. And there's a lot of debate about that right now. Which we'll get into. Yeah. But this is, you know, a big issue on that side. And then on the other side, Democrats really don't like this. And, you know, Gene Wu, who is of Chinese descent, he's Asian, he talked about this a lot on the floor. This was like his thing that he was fighting. Called a couple points of order. He was the first opposition on the mic. Yeah, he was very much at the forefront of this opposition.

And the question is, overarching question of this policy is, how do we prevent bad actors of foreign governments who are not our allies, in fact our enemies, from purchasing Texas land without catching up in the midst of it, people who are not bad actors, who are from one of those countries, who want to purchase Texas land, land in Texas, a house, whatever it is. The reason this is a big issue is because of the Chinese billionaire who's like a top level CCP member who purchased a ranch in South Texas and then tried to build a wind farm there. Well, the wind farm caught the attention of people down in that area because conservationists didn't

like it. You know, sticking these big ugly wind turbines in the middle of pristine Devil's River territory is not something they wanted to do. So they started digging and they found out that this guy owns it. And also guess what? It's close to Lackland Air Force Base. So I think that's the one down there right? Lackland? San Antonio? Yes. No not San Antonio. It's not Lackland. It's the one down in on the border. Whatever the base is down there. Lackland and Bear County. Okay, well whatever the base, the military base is down there, this plot of land was next to that. And so it caused a big uproar and conservatives rallied against it. Senate passed the bill last session, did not make it through the House and now here we

are. And so everything has with a lot of these policies, did not make it through the House, and now here we are. And so everything, as with a lot of these policies, everything was building up to the fight on the House floor. And that happened on Thursday after being delayed quite a bit. The delay was because there was a lot of going into this, there was a section highlighted by activists on, but particularly Twitter, that had an exemption in the law from this ban of if someone is purchasing a lease for up to nine up to a hundred years below a hundred years, they could still purchase land even if they met all the other qualifications

or at least some of the other ones. So that was a lightning rod. Now it needs to be pointed out, that was in the Senate version. That was not something put in the House, by the House specifically, but it was kept in the committee substitute. So it got found out and then was spotlighted a lot. And so we saw SB 17 get postponed multiple times on the floor. And that was because leadership was trying to negotiate with the conservatives on the right

in the Republican caucus and figure out a solution either a solution to this, get them to back down. Eventually that got basically nullified because there was a Mitch Little Amendment that brought that time span down to two years and then an amendment to that amendment by Steve Toth that made it one year. And that got tacked down, so that's in the final version.

Do you know anything about why it went from two years to one year? I don't know. I missed that part of the debate. I'd gone to get dinner. But I don't think there was much explanation given from the mics. It was just, you know, little one up there talked about it, rolled out his amendment and then had his amendment to the amendment. And of course, little was supportive. Well, the argument about the 99 year thing is it makes no difference for China to either purchase land or lease something for 99 years if they're trying to use it for nefarious purposes, right?

If they've got the land, they've got the land. They got the land, especially for 99 years. Like, what the heck's good? What's the difference there? There is. That's fair point. That's a fair point. But the thing that it was trying to fix was

preventing people who shouldn't be caught up in this from being caught up in this. And that was the whole purpose. We'll talk about the Shaheen Amendment too. That was a big part of this. That's the intention. You can argue whether that's effective or not or whether it achieved that, but that's the intention. You can argue whether that's effective or not, or whether it achieved that. But that's the intention of this.

And so they got that tacked on. I guess we'll talk about the Shaheen Amendment now. Let's do it. This is where I think post-bill passage, a lot of the conversation is centered, is on this amendment specifically Already conversations about how you voted on this may determine whether or not you get you know Targeted on this bill in the primary Republicans voted for this bill, right?

This is not something where it was a tough vote on the bill itself passage It's gonna be these individual amendments which happens most of the time with these marquee pieces of legislation. But this amendment is where the conversation is. Yes. So, excuse me, Matt Shaheen, Republican from Collin County, gets up, offers an amendment. And I was seeing this kind of develop on the floor. There was a lot of huddles going on. Shaheen, Jared Patterson like leading up to the layout yeah I think Harrison was at least close to that huddle I

don't know if he was in it Hefner the author of the bill they were all discussing stuff strategizing that's what you do on the floor, right? And so Shaheen's amendment would add language that says to the exception, and it's not lawfully present in residing in the United States at the time the individual purchases, acquires, or holds the interest. So that would add that language rather than being broader, it tailors the the ban language. But basically what's writing out is people who are here lawfully present and have residents in the state in Texas. So people it's not people that are already here legally and are here as a resident, it's writing them out of the bill out of the ban. So people, it's not people that are already here legally and are here as a resident, it's writing them out of the bill, out of the ban. So they'll be able to purchase

tax land. Now there's arguments that I saw on Twitter that this could allow any visa holder to purchase land. And what if that's a person's a spy, you know, back and forth, back and forth. The Shaheen argued this is necessary to prevent, you know, just an average Joe person from China or Russia or North Korea purchasing land to get away from these horrible regimes, right? Now, Andy Hopper, Brent Money argued that it kind of guts the bill. But the most interesting line of questioning was when Mitch Little gets up there, and I thought initially he was going to kind of take a hammer to this in the same way that money was. But no, he gets up there and he says something along the lines of Representative Shaheen, as I read this, even with your amendment,

people who are agents of the hostile foreign nation cannot buy land in Texas. And Shaheen says yes. Little votes for the amendment. I think 120 people voted for it, a mix of Republicans and Democrats. And it gets tacked on. And so then immediately the debate started over this and whether this gutted the bill. Look on Twitter and it's a dumpster fire. But I'm sure there are very valid questions about this.

In application, does it unnecessarily extend the law so much that it kind of undermines the purpose? Right? That's the question. Shaheen says it doesn't. Little says it's the question. Sheen says it doesn't. Little says it doesn't. Hefner says it doesn't. Some of the other conservatives say it does.

I don't know. You know, I'm not a lawyer on this, but it's it was a fascinating debate. Ultimately, the bill passed with 85 votes for it was basically party lines. I haven't looked through all the details. Maybe there's one or two Democrats that voted for this. I don't see Munoz on the I side, I don't see, oh Raymond did.

So one Republican, at least as I'm looking at it quickly now. Someone we're keeping a very close eye on as election season starts to inch its way closer and closer. Yeah, no doubt. So it was a long lead up to this. It was an interesting debate. Of course, you know, some, I was talking with some of the people, some of the onlookers on the side,

there are people that every time they get up and talk, they have something very interesting to say. Even if you know the position they're going to be taking. Like Chris Turner, Democrat, you know which way he's going to fall on this. But he always has a very interesting line of argument. You know, there are Republicans like that too. Um, but others just say the same stuff over and over again, literally on every single bill possible. They say the same thing. So dynamic difference.

Is it who I think it is? Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Okay. I mean, there were a couple, but yeah, one in particular. Yeah. So they went as expected. Everyone knew this thing was passing. The question is, what was added to it? What amendments were added? And then the reaction started pouring in. And then the reactions started pouring in. How long real fast would you say they stuck on the Shaheen amendment? I'm trying to remember or gauge how long it was. I think it was like 40 minutes or so. Overall the debate on this was like six hours long. And the number of amendments total that were offered on this bill, did it stay at 15? It did. Yeah.

Yeah, it stay at 15? It did. Yeah. Yeah. It stayed at 15. And it went as expected. Everyone knew which way this was going to go. Republicans were going to vote for this. Democrats were not obviously one exception. That's Raymond. And now there's going to go to, excuse me, it's going to go to conference and the Senate and the House will have to hash this out. Then we'll have another vote on this in both chambers, whatever the final version is. You know, there's obviously,

from the critical side of this, there's the argument that Shaheen Amendment undermines the bill. But the Senate version has the 99 year lease provision, which the House does not. How does that shake out? I don't know, but it's been a long road leading to this. And now I actually, I didn't mention this, but Abraham George, text

GOP chair had come out in favor of the house version when Heffner and his committee passed the committee sub. Which had the 99 year provision. Yes. And I guess people just didn't know it was in there. It's possible. These things are long and dense. Yes.

And committee substitutes are I've from a tracking perspective harder to follow. When you're on the phone my Twitter I posted it. On the House floor you have individual amendments you can pull up you can see the very specific items that each amendment is addressing. It's more itemized. A committee sub comes out as like a lump sum essentially which makes it a lot harder to parse through and often times it can be an entirely new bill we you know have seen in instances where it you know it goes from an 18 page bill to a hundred and twenty three page bill that happened very recently like that happens frequently with committee

substitutes so in the defense of folks who are trying to figure out this process committee subs are unwieldy to say the least, but regardless, he did come out in favor of the sub. Yeah. So I guess let's read off some takes from this. I would say from the right flank of the caucus, because that's where the division is, you know, that's the more interesting faction here. So. Andy Hopper, who got got up and spoke against this, he tweeted out his full two minute speech. He was critical of it.

He said, I'm going to vote for it basically. Uh, but let's be clear what this does and it's gutting the bill. And he tweeted yet again, the house had a golden opportunity to pass exactly what our voters and the GOP expected. Once again, the House chose to gut what could have been an outstanding bill with an awful amendment brought by Republicans. Hopper still voted for it. But you know, Conference Committee, that's going to determine a lot.

Brent Money responded or tweeted out, the bill we're about to pass deals very harshly with hostile foreign actors who buy Texas land and I will vote for it. What it doesn't do is prevent Chinese, Iranian, and North Korean citizens from buying Texas farmland, which is what I thought we were sent here to do. I think in his floor speech specifically, he said, this is better than what we have on the books.

Like that was the argument, which is what he's saying here, but that he explicitly said it on the floor. But this is not the Texas GOP priority that we thought we were coming to vote on. And Harrison got up on the back mic and reiterated that fact. And here's a counter take from Mitch Little SB 17 was debated live for over six hours. There were 16 amendments considered the house had to undo and redo complex modifications

to the bill over weeks of work. The bill is better today than my original bill endorsed by the SRAC and RPT. It's the strongest in the country. And we're talking about folks from the same faction of the party, which is what is so notable about this. It's just totally different viewpoints of, of this. And obviously they're different people.

They come to different conclusions, but it, but we're not used to seeing that kind of not lockstep movement from that sect of the party. I would argue that that is very uncommon. Yeah. I think you're, you're right. Yeah, I think you're right. But I don't know, just Mitch little came up to I was sitting with Renzo Downey and Tribune on the side. He walked by us and tells us this is we're about to pass the most the strongest bill of this kind in the country.

So like his support for this was unequivocal. It's going to be hotly debated for a while. And like I've said five times now, conference is going to determine a lot. But as it always does, it's easy to forget. But you know, imagine like the house wasn't here last time, able to pass something like this. Now it is now like the ball's being advanced for that side of the equation. Wouldn't you also say that in previous sessions, you know, you'd see members like Tinder Holt or Hopper who's a freshman this year but part of the same contingency of members offer amendments.

And oftentimes even if folks agree to the policy would vote down those amendments just because of who they were associated with I think that's changed a lot this session I mean you had folks the Brent monies the Mitch Littles offering amendments that were very marquee pieces of or changes to the bill that folks were very much eyeing and excited Steve Toeth, right? And having the support of the caucus, support of the bill author, right? I mean, you'd find ways, this is how legislative, which it can get so petty where somebody is like, yes, I might agree with legislation, but the author, I don't like the author. So I'll find a way as the author of the bill, not to support the amendment.

That it totally happens all the time, right? And we're not seeing that as much on these big pieces of legislation this cycle. Part of it is that group is larger than it's ever been. That's 20, up to 20 votes, let's say. Usually, I think it's about 15 on most things now. But then it can get up to like 24. 24, yeah, it depends on the issue, right? It's a lot to like 24. Yeah, the issue. Right.

It's a lot bigger than it has been in the past. And, you know, take the speaker vote. You know, was it 56 Republicans voted against boroughs? You know, on certain things that 56 group, that group of people, 56 is going to be in line on a lot. Right. So it's just, you can't ignore just four people. There's not just four people that you can ignore in this, right? Like there was last session. So I think that's part of it. That was my read on it. So yeah. I think the attitudes in the chamber are different too. And those that 50, how 54 that voted against Burroughs and the Republican, like I think that was 54.

Um, so that's the number you just said, right? I'm not, I thought I said 56. I don't remember. I think it was 56, but 50 something members, like way over the majority of the Republican caucus that voted against Burroughs in that instance. Now of course we're in a very different house now, or you could argue that boroughs has solidified a Republican majority of support, right? There's that's like, that's, that's yeah.

But regardless, that's a sizable contingency of members. It's a spectrum, even politically. And I think there's a lot of freedom they feel to vote on certain things in certain ways. And some of those members too have been added back into the leadership fold. Yeah. Well, you know, it's a sitting in the press box, I often see Tony Tinderholt, Brent Money, Mitch Little, Shelley Luther, go up and speak directly to the speaker. I can't hear what they're talking about because they're on the other side of the dais, but they're talking directly to him.

I don't recall that much at all last session. And there was a time, you know, several sessions ago where Burroughs and Tenderholt and that whole contingency were tight. Burroughs wasn't in that group, but he was very much on board with a lot of their policy preferences. And it's, it's a different relationship than like a feline who was never close to that camp politically, right? It's a totally different ballgame. Yeah. Did we beat that dead horse?

Probably. We tend to. Yeah, we tend to rephrase the same things each other says. Yeah, you got to stop that. I've got to stop that. Yeah. Okay tend to rephrase the same things each other says. Yeah, you got to stop that. I've got to stop that. Yeah. OK, great. So what else do you want to talk about that is interesting this week? Well, we have a couple of floor fights to talk about. I think the Bird Bill colloquially. Bird Bill. Yeah, I think we should talk about the Bird Bill.

Explain what this was. OK. So if you listen to the podcast, you've heard us talk about HB or SB 819, which was the big renewable siting fight requiring Parks and Wildlife Department to cite, to have siting regulations of these renewable generators. The arguments for and against for is that these things are going up everywhere and we don't want them in, you know, uh, state parks or, or even near them. Don't want them in, uh, you know, pristine landscapes, uh, like viewpoint, tourist viewpoints. Basically there just needs to be some oversight on where these things go and there isn't right

now. You know, the other side is this would inhibit the renewable power industry from profligating and it would. That's what regulations do. Make it harder and more expensive. And they would say that that is an unnecessary regulation. So there was this massive fight over this bill in the Senate. It passed.

It's been moved over to the House, hasn't moved in the House that I've seen. But one bill that has is I think it's HB 3556, which is by Cody Vasut. It's a much more tailored version of that SBA 19. It applies only to counties near, I think it's a national preserve or a state park and along the coastline. And the argument with this is these wind turbines, they spin, they spin and birds get caught up in them.

And this is, they argued, in the migratory corridor of a lot of birds that fly back and forth from North America to South America. So really, it's the same concept of there needs to be siting requirements on this stuff. It's just a lot more narrowed geographically. But there was a lot of fight on the floor over this and I frankly remind me, you're the one that brought this up, so I'm blanking on it, but I know it happens. And I think a ticket point of order? Oh, multiple times, I think. Yeah. Okay, go ahead.

Yeah. Well, I thought it was interesting because you had, you know, this is representative Cody Vassut was bringing this forward. Definitely somebody who was at the forefront of pushing against or pushing for House reform in the speaker's race has now found himself in a chairmanship. So it's a different dynamic, but part of the conservative sect of the caucus, um, bringing this bill forward. And then you had Democrats at the back, Mike talking about, you know, the rights of businesses and private property.

Right. Like it was very interesting because, um, this conservative Republican talking about conservation and it was very, very interesting, which is how a lot of these debates work is even if it's sound policy to whoever is slaying out whatever bill or opposing whatever piece of legislation, you can find ways to argue. We saw Democrats last night arguing, this is a fiscally responsible amendment. And obviously they're just trying to get Republicans to poke themselves in the eye with that statement. So whatever's argued from the back of my mind,

you have to parse through and figure out what's actually happening. But it was strange bedfellows, it was very interesting. And I thought watching the derby of it all was really what brought it home. Because- Oh yeah, because he got an amendment tacked on, right? Not just an amendment, he changed the bill

very, very substantively. And to the point where, well and also okay now I'm struggling to remember so correct me if I'm wrong but what I believe happened was representative Darby offered an amendment that initially failed to be tacked on but then the representative asked for a verification vote which then resulted in a change of results where the amendment did in fact get tacked onto the bill and essentially changed the entire bill.

And then representative Vassut was like, me and Mr. Darby's bill, like kept making the joke that it was no longer just his bill. And it was basically just Darby's bill. Yeah. Yeah. It was a pretty substantive. It puts a lot more restraints. It looks like I'm reading it right now on what the

agency can do. Limits timelines, all that stuff. So it just limits their purview on this. Scales it back a lot. I don't think Fasut went as far as to say it was gutting the bill, but he may have. It was pretty darn close. Yeah.

Yeah. So yeah, basically, and that's what they told me offline. They'll fix it in conference, right? First, it's got to pass the Senate. And you'll have a similar fight that we saw on SB 819 over that. So the Bird Bill, what a time. What a time.

Let's talk about the Bonin and Little fight over funding. You wrote about this in your newsletter. Yeah. Definitely folks go check that out and read it. It's fascinating, but let's run through it. This was a really interesting policy fight and philosophical fight. Like what is the role of government? That's ultimately what this boiled down to. You have it as whatever whatever it was, I forget the number. It would take $5 billion that is in the rainy day fund and move it into this investment fund that is still within the rainy day fund within the ESF but it would invest it differently than the rest of the ESF is so the rate the whole idea is to get

a bigger rate of return on this chunk of money that they can then use to supplement probably like incentives on you know, technology, technological innovation. That's the, that's what it's meant for. Um, the like, like nuclear develop power developments, uh, tech microchips. I'm tired. Uh, just any innovative technology. Okay. And that's the purpose. So Bond's argument is that we can get a better rate of return by putting these, this money in higher yield, higher risk investment areas. Then we're already then we're getting under current law. Now, the counter argument is that's not the role here of government.

That savings account exists there to have highly liquid available cash if we need it. And since this is an investment fund, it would not be highly liquid. Liquidity is just cash that you can have available at a moment. Yes. Right. And so Mitch Little gets up there and he's arguing against it. He also argues that the state of Texas with this large amount of money, $5 billion. That's a lot of money could move markets and be manipulated in a way that would advantage and someone in the market and disadvantage someone else.

For example, let's say, say the Texas wanted to dump all of its $5 billion, which is not going to happen with us because that's not smart investing, but let's say they want to do it. They invested, they dumped $5 billion into one company and that company had greased the palms of whatever legislator or legislators. First of all, that'd be corruption, right? Second of all, that would drastically change the stock price for that company and illegitimately so.

Just dumping in. Right. Yeah. Right. So that, I mean, that's the extreme example here. Well, it is possible. It's not going to happen like that. It's not common practice.

It's not how about, yeah, but. Little also criticize the potential for the board, people that are appointed to oversee this thing, this technology innovation fund, could be ripe for corruption in various ways. But it was Bonnen's counterpoint to that is we already have state funds invested in these things. This is a new fund but it's not really a new kind of fund. Or changing the status quo. Right. But it is cementing further the status quo. You know, there's pension investments, TRS is hundreds of billions of dollars.

The permanent university funds is invested the Texas University fund which is a thing created last session for you know state universities that aren't UT and A&M. Do you ever call it puff and tough? Yes yeah but you hate when I use acronyms so well sometimes we have to you know I don't hate when you use acronyms we just just have to define them. Okay, fair enough. Because I get hate emails. Oh, well, that sucks for you. So, the state's already involved in this, and the state has a windfall.

Now, the windfall is tax revenue taken from taxpayers. The ESF though is mostly severance taxes. So the taxpayer there is the oil and gas industry The the taxpayers for the general fund the rest of the budget are Consumers all kinds of different consumption taxes, but the biggest one is sales tax and that's basically everybody that pays sales tax so this actually mirrored or the paid sales tax. So this actually mirrored, or at least was related to a later fight in the Appropriations Committee that I thought was very interesting over an attempt to raise

the cap in the ESF by 5%. And so the thinking is, and Dan Patrick supports this, it was originally on his list of priorities, but they realized they just needed a constitutional amendment to do it. And so they swapped the slot that they had reserved for this for the elderly and disabled homestead exemption increase. Patrick, his argument, and I think he told you this at our event when you interviewed him. At some point, there's going to be a rainy day. At some point. his argument, and I think he told you this at our event when you interviewed him, at some point there's going to be a rainy day at some point. And that's the purpose of this

savings accounts. Which we're hearing more and more this session. Yeah, like in previous the last couple of sessions we have not heard that rhetoric nearly as much from state leaders and understandably so but regardless that's more and more of the conversation. Right. Well, the question so the ESF more and more of the conversation. Right. Well, the question, so the ESF is going to hit the cap. There's going to be money that would otherwise go into the ESF that can't this cycle because they have already hit that 10% cap.

So that money is going to flow into the general fund for them to spend on whatever else. There's competing lines of thinking here. First of all, the legislature is trying to be conservative in the small, low, in the lowercase conservative sense of the word by increasing the reserves that the state has whenever something bad happens economically, which could happen. For example, oil, the price of oil is below $60 right now. From what I'm told, it costs $65 to get a barrel of oil out of the ground. So they're losing money right now on oil. And that impacts severance taxes,

because those companies are going to react economically. Whichever one helps their bottom line, they'll either curtail production, which right off the bat reduces the amount of severance tax collected for this fund or they'll try and make it up by raising prices and that will cause a reaction or could cause a reaction from the consumer base. Very complicated. Every action has an equal and opposite reaction in this financial stuff but say lawmakers are trying to prepare for a time when things fall apart economically and they might have to make up the difference in the general fund with ESF and ESF injection. On the other side the

argument is that we have this money first of all we need to spend it on infrastructure that will help ensure the state doesn't collapse you know power grid wise. Like while we have the money make those, make those investments. Those like 50 year investments right right and then you have the side of the argument that this amount of money that's in there as a surplus or in the ESF is there because it's an excess of what the state budgeted for and therefore people are overtaxed. Now, I think at its simplest form that doesn't really, it's not really accurate overtaxed, but because it's not like they're passing a tax rate, right? Where you know what the appraisal amount is and what you're bringing in. To be very, very technical. Right.

They budget over two years and they have a sales tax, they don't know what that's gonna bring in, right? So it's not like they're making a conscious decision to overtax like a local entity would if they raise property taxes to a point where they brought in more money than they spent, right? It's different. Now, the fair argument is if we have this surplus after the fact, we should return some

of it to the taxpayers in terms of property tax relief. And Governor Abbott wants at least $10 billion in that. It sounds like the House and Senate, I think, might get there, which I didn't think was possible. But. Overall, this this debate was very interesting because you have these different philosophies on how you handle state money. And what do you put mainly what you put emphasis on, that's where a lot of this political breakdown comes. Where do you put emphasis in this case on spending money well even property tax debates same exact thing both chambers would love to cut you know property taxes for

the homeowners and and businesses that's not really the argument here the argument is where do you place the emphasis who gets the bigger slice of the pie in that session well what, and then what makes the biggest difference? What moves the needle? All that? Well, and then take property tax relief versus infrastructure spending. It's fair argument that what helps people more in the long run is ensuring there's enough water supply, not giving you a two year tax cut that will get wiped out by appraisal

increase. Right? So competing interests across the board. tax cut that will get wiped out by appraisal increase right so competing interests across the board I think something I think this unless the house really digs their heels and I think this ESF cap increase passes I think this jobs and innovation fund is something that the house can get as a horse trade with the Senate if they want it. Which there's still plenty of time to do horse trading. Right. So those were, if you have enough attention span to listen to the arguments, which admittedly, if you don't know what they're talking about, it's very difficult.

Especially when you have two of the smartest people in the chamber, a literal brain surgeon, Greg Bonin and Mitch Little, who is very intelligent and deals in securities law. I don't know the first thing about securities law, but they're going at it over this finance thing and it actually yielded a very fruitful debate. So did I talk enough on that? I think you did a great job. But you broke it down well Bradley. Thank you. Yeah, proud of you. We're going to take a quick break and hear from one of our sponsors. The Beer Alliance of Texas is proud to support its members who help deliver an annual economic impact of $35 billion and provide over 200,000 jobs to hard-working Texans. From local tax revenue to direct economic investment to

charitable contributions, their members are heavily invested in the success of our communities and our state. The Beer Alliance is dedicated to ensuring the safe distribution of alcohol throughout Texas. For more information, visit BeerAlliance.com. And we're back, Bradley. Let's talk about the Lieutenant Governor and the Speaker. Much has been said about their relationship. I think it's evolved quite a bit over session, much more behind closed doors than we even

know. But the rhetoric we're hearing, at least publicly, started with, you know, Jan Patrick saying, we'll see how this goes, we'll see how this goes, and Burroughs maintaining a very neutral tone, hey, we're gonna get things done, we're gonna pass school choice, whatever it is. And now we see the lieutenant governor saying, hey, I've actually had the best relationship with Burroughs that I've had with any speaker recently, like there is a change in, in rhetoric here between the two. How do we think session ends in this relationship? Well, Burroughs is the reason that they are on such good terms right now.

And that may change. Can I have this with, it can change on the dime, right? 24 days left in session? But they're communicating constantly, constantly, all the time. Probably every day. A huge change. Yes. Forget the breakfast, like if they're talking every day that's crazy. The only way feeling and Patrick at one point were communicating was throwing memes at each other on online. Right? Trying to one up each other. Yeah. I mean, literally, when the property tax breakdown happened in 23, it wasn't feeling who was negotiating with Patrick. It was Burroughs and Bonnet and Craig Bonnet. They were doing they were going

over and doing the negotiating on this stuff. So I how that played out, but there's just, I think Burroughs realized when he took office that the worst thing he can have for his speakership, and that will probably make him a one-term speaker, is that Dan Patrick goes to war with him. In addition to actually wanting stuff to pass, right? They all have their priorities. Burrows has said the biggest issue of the session for him is the education funding. It's not school choice. He's supportive of it and he pushed that through, but they need to get education funding across the line.

They're close. Brandon Creighton tweeted out that they were in agreement on $7.7 billion. Now there's going to be questions on how you actually apply that and where you apply it. But so right there you have school choice cross-align. You have this education funding basically across the line. You now have SB 17 in conference or about to be in conference. Those are three massive issues. The budget is already, I'm hearing is going to be out of conference next week, the week that we publish this. For the biggest

issues they've already got done and or at least mostly done and they're one constitutional requirement right now you have bail reform and there's reporting this week I think it was by the tree and that there are good conversations going on between Republicans and Democrats on a compromise there because you can yell and scream all you want but they need Democrats on this and I have to have Democrats on this. Yes, the hundred votes. Yep and Abbott did have a round table in Austin this week or Holly Hansen went to it and basically said there's been conversation behind the scenes of Democrats but it's not been sufficient. Sufficient was the word

he used so there's still a lot of the needle has to move. That's the other question is will Abbott veto whatever it is because he could do that. Because Democrats came out with their own proposal saying this is our public safety proposal where they'll end up will not be not be there. But what can they get in this bail reform proposal? How can they change it to make it more palatable to their members? Gene Wu, the chairman of the Democratic caucus, said that, um, we're open, but he's skeptical of the governor wanting to campaign on this issue, essentially

saying like, this is just a campaign issue for governor Abbott, which it's politics. Well, don't get me started on that. It is a campaign issue. It sounds like Abbott's going to put a good amount of money into Harris County next cycle To take back some of the courts that were lost in 2018 and they haven't gotten back yet But will there be a special session because lieutenant governor Dan Patrick has said repeatedly that he thinks this is an issue Big enough to warrant a special session. The governor has been much more reticent to explicitly state that yeah kind of leaving it open Yeah, and of course that's up to him whether there's

a special session. Up to nobody else. He gets to decide that. So that's going to be a big question. Can they get that across the line? That was the thing that would cause a special session. That was the thing that I thought would always cause a special session.

I think it still might. But it's looking like it's a lot closer to happening. And being being avoided a specialist on that than we've seen at all recently. Then you throw in SB3. That's something Dan Patrick has said. I will go to war on this. We will have a special if we do not pass this. Burroughs said in an interview with James Berrigan at Spectrum News that he expects something on this to pass the House. The-

This is the THC- THC ban, yep. The Senate passed across the board ban of the synthetic marijuana. The House's State Affairs committee changed it up a lot that was the bill earlier i was talking about that went from i think 18 pages to 123 yeah yeah that was that bill um one of the big changes is and this is something i think the senate might have to compromise on if they want to get something across the line is exempting the beverage stuff

to get something across the line is exempting the beverage stuff, the THC infused beverages. That's just a hunch. I don't know, like, somebody's going to have to give in on this some to get something that's passable in the house. But what are they willing to give in on? Will they take a ban on everything else in exchange for keeping the beverages out of it? I mean, if I were a legislator and I really wanted something cutting down on this, that might be a compromise I'm willing to make, right? Especially to

avoid a special session, which nobody wants. So there's a couple of big issues. Yeah, what else? What do you think is top items to watch going into this? I think you've hit him. I think what I'm watching is will, which I don't think will happen. Will the relationship between the speaker and the lieutenant governor devolve at all as we inch toward the end of the session? I don't think so. I don't think either benefits, I think like that the lieutenant governor could benefit more from, you know, any sort of devolving relationship than the speaker, certainly. But even he, I don't think is, um, you know, amped and ready for a fight like that.

I don't think there's that much. It's a different session than previous ones with Phelan. And the other factor is Patrick is up for reelection next year. And so he wants things to run on. His list of priorities is not like what we've seen in the last couple sessions. Okay another issue not talked about that I think is obviously huge, elephant in the room we've forgotten about, film incentives. That's huge and I think to your point ripe for horse trading. Yeah film incentives and what's what's the other one? Diprit, which they already got through the dementia prevention research. Those are two things that the House can

get something they want on Ford, especially the film incentives, especially that. But those are those are prime candidates for that. And the prime candidate for the house as a horse-drawn issue is nuclear fund the Senate has expressed skepticism about it I remember watching the BNC hearing on this and Senator Schwartner introduced basically a shell bill and he said it up front we we this is just an excuse for us to talk about this we have no idea what this is actually gonna look like the blueprint at which we want to advance here But the Senate or the house really wants this Cody Harris is

Pushing this pretty hard. He's authoring the bill. He's of course a lieutenant Obviously course a lieutenant. Obviously who knows what the final makeup looks like but this is the kind of trading that happens as we get to this point in session. It always happens. And this week as this podcast comes out we're dealing with deadlines which brings a whole new flavor because once that hits no new house bills can make their way. It's like what's passed in either chamber is all that's fair game. Yep and we've seen some while the lieutenant governor and speaker have been hunky dory we've seen some inner chamber fighting. Jeff Leach, chairman of judiciary which always happens. Oh my gosh. You know they get to the point where they're mad about house bills not moving in

the senate or senate bills not moving in the House and they just like scream at each other. Mr. Speaker, Parliamentary Unicorporate? Right. There were a bunch of those. Gene Wu did that a couple times. How many House bills has the Senate passed? No House bills have passed the Senate. is one of his biggest issues. His biggest issue is the NDA bill called trades law prohibiting NDAs in alleged instances of child sexual abuse, specifically hands of a priest or a pastor. And there were a couple instances of that up in, was it Missouri? Where's the Canuck? Cock-a-nuck, whatever it is. That really big camp, Christian summer camp.

really big camp, Christian summer camp. There was a big scandal that one of the, either a pastor or a staffer there had abused multiple kids. And one of them, Trey, I forget his last name, he signed an NDA and couldn't talk about it. And then ended up killing himself out of grief and guilt and just the weight of what happened.

And so now that is the cause of this Tray's Law. But that bill hadn't been moving. And then Leach got word that, according to him, the bill in the Senate that was going to be advanced was weaker than the one the house passed. Talk about stranger bedfellows. Leach and Mitch Little are big on this together. They're pushing it hard. And pushing it. Sorry, Lord Bradley, I'm struggling here. My voice is dead. Pushing it unambiguously. But on Thursday night when I was at the JCJ hearing over the

tort stuff he announced he was canceling a hearing. Leach was because the Senate was advancing a weaker bill in his mind. Well the next day they heard the bill and sounded all hunky-dory at least that I heard. Then we saw later a couple postponements happen of Senate bills. Well, you said it happens every session. Members get mad at one another. I think it's important to say Burroughs and Patrick, as much control as they have over their chambers, Patrick a lot more than Burroughs, they're still member to member infighting here. The question is not whether or not House v Senate will happen

each legislative session. The question is whether it will be the whole House versus the whole Senate if it's like a broad stroke or if it's individual issues, individual members who are like you said, having these conversations in committee at the mic or doing so in the back mic of the House floor and making their point. That's the question. Yeah, no doubt. Yeah, so there's that bill. I don't know, I lost my train of thought. Where were we? You did a great job. Thank you. I'm feeling very encouraging of you today. Yeah. So take advantage of it while you can. Let's talk about the speaker's interview with James Berrigan and it was like a

five-minute, at least what I saw, five-minute video on camera interview that I think is very noteworthy. Just kind of giving a little bit of a an update on session, where we're at, where we're at on bills, the speaker giving his very pointed answers, but I think the part that it mean this was approximately a five second portion of this interview. But what caught my attention the most was a question about Texas GOP chairman, Abraham George, that Berrigan asked the speaker, basically he's been critical of A, B and C what's your response.

And the speaker said he's not worth responding to. Thoughts pretty much been his position this entire time as speaker. Like when I asked him about it at our event, when I interviewed him, it wasn't that pointed, but it was the along the same lines and that wasn't exact. It wasn't specifically at George, but George was included in that group of people that burrows, But you asked me about it. And Burrows' position at my read on from the outside has been just exactly that. Like I'm not going to deal with people in his mind who are insatiable and will always

move the goalpost. And the counter argument is George is not, he's not conducted himself 100% like Matt Rinaldi who as chairman was really throwing bombs a lot. You know, they have, especially behind the scenes, work members tried to build bridges on certain things. For example, you have here in the docket praising Cody Harris over the nuclear bill. Which honestly was the exact same day the interview dropped.

So I think that's notable too. And Cody Harris, like you said, a lieutenant of leadership at the dais all the time, very much in the speakers, like top two members that he's working with and tasking with these kinds of things to ferry issues through the process. When I'm sitting there watching the floor, the two people, maybe three that I see negotiating within the Republican caucus so much, it's Cody Harris, Tony Tinnerall.

They're always working it. And it's pretty noticeable to see if you, I guess if you know what you're looking for. He's always, Harris is always talking to that group of members. And Tenoril is always talking to either Harris or other members or the speaker himself. Yes.

You know, they're working it and they're trying to build consensus. They don't always do it. Maybe they don't do it much at all, but they're trying, right? But I think we've seen some results in those conversations this session. Absolutely. Look, the biggest example is SB17.

As you insinuated in previous sessions, you would have these amendments put up by the Steve Tothes and the Tinder Holtz and they would be rejected immediately. The author would be like, well, I want to keep a clean bill. But that didn't happen. Heffner endorsed these. He put them on his own bill. Which in large part, not large part, in some part, I don't know to what extent is due to conversations had behind the scenes with folks who are part of the Texas GOP apparatus, right? Having these conversations saying, hey, this is kind of the bill we want. We want to help

you in your primary. We don't want to have to go after you. Like how can we get a bill across the finish line that, you know, pleases as much of all parties as possible? Well, and then until this Harris praise. Same day, like same day. George is kind of doing one thing privately and another thing publicly. He sent out the text threatening primaring members if they don't pass Republican priorities. Which arguably could be why as well the speaker felt emboldened to say this explicitly on front of a camera. Yeah but the

hostilities behind the scenes are not nearly as much as what they seem publicly and George is trying to extend all branches where they can be extended. Um, is he successful? The other part of this is, you know, obviously we're talking about the RPT priorities, not everyone cares about that. A certain segment really cares about that. Right. And Republican members to a certain extent will care about it.

Especially the, the activists who make these, who put these on in the convention, in the meetings. Now, the other thing is with these. And your voice really is going. I know it's really bad. The thing is with these, some of them, like no Democrat chairs, that's debated on whether that happens. There are no actual Democratic chairs, right?

But there are arguments that what was replaced, it was just as bad. They'll fight about it. Yada, yada, yada. But that's not a policy, right? That's not legislation. It's procedure. It's procedure. Then you.

Which is still very important. Right. Of course. To the grassroots activists, to anybody in the house. Right. But then you look at it, some of these other ones, you have some that are really specific, like banned taxpayer funded lobbying. That'll be a fascinating thing to watch.

That is not advanced through state affairs. Ken King is very, the chairman there is very much opposed to that. And he's, you know, I don't think he's going to budge. And when that referral happened where taxpayer funded lobbying went to state affairs, I think a lot of folks who are watching that bill were just like, okay, it's dead. Yeah, like that's our answer. Yep, and I Wonder if that was referred to the correct committee Because everyone knew where Ken King stood on that right and everyone knows he's going to die on that hill That's his opinion right like you can hate it. You can criticize him for it. But it's just reality. That's his position. Now, the interesting thing to watch is which chamber can suspend all the rules and move at lightning speed to advance something and redo it the Senate if they really want to

Pass this they're gonna have to File a new bill because the one in sitting in state affairs is neither going to be Passed through that committee nor is it going to be? recommitted So what the Senate could do and they have done this before I forget it was 21 there was one they did this on They did it later in session. Oh my gosh I know they did it on repricing but that was because the power grid created a new issue But there was one they did this on

Con Kerry comes to mind, but it wasn't con Kerry Son, I didn't want that. That was one the House pushed down their throat. Anyway, something happened. This has happened before. What they could do, the Senate could pass it, or suspend the rules because we're past the filing deadline, file a new bill, deal with themselves in which they could fix the Nichols amendment that was put on that really narrowed the bill. Like it wrote out groups like TASB or TAC, these local government

associations from the bill. School boards, counties. Yeah. And after that happened going into this, it was like, okay, not only is the House going to have to, if they want this to pass, House is going to have to pass it, which has been a lift. It's been impossible so far, but I think argument to me, especially with a pro TFL band speaker, Burrows is very much for this. Um, so not only would they have to pass it, do something they haven't done before, but they would have to pass it, do something they haven't done before, but they would have to. Oh, that's interesting. We have something interesting to talk about and what we're going

to discuss later. So not only would they have to do that, but they would have to make it a quote from that perspective stronger bill than the one the Senate passed by removing that, um, that carve out basically. So the Senate could kill two birds with one stone here by suspending the rules, proposing a bill, filing a bill, passing it out in the way that they wanted to pass it out. And I think we talked about this before, but guess who wasn't on the dais when that happened? Dan Patrick. I wonder if that would have, that amendment would have been tacked on if he was on the dais. Yeah.

So, you do that, get it funneled to a different committee in the House. I don't know, Doge comes to mind. That's dealing with government efficiency. Comes to mind. Yeah. And then the House advancing that bill. Comes to mind. Yeah. And then the house advancing that bill. So they could do that. And I think there's enough coordination and relationship between both chambers for that to be like worked through in cohesion.

Yeah. Right. That could very much happen. Absolutely. So, and that would solve another RPT priority since that is what's going to be the gauge on which they run primaries, right? Which I think we've also talked about this,

but the priorities this session aren't so cut and dry where it's like these eight big issues, it's a lot of little bills, not little bills, but smaller issues, very niche bills, specific, very specific is a better way to put it. Anyway, I got off track from the point I was making about these priorities. Some of them are very specific, like taxpayer from lobbying them.

Others are very broad, like stop sexualizing our kids. There's a crap ton of bills that fit that. Which then the party goes through and identifies bills that align with that priority. But it's a lot of bills. It's not one. It's a lot of bills. Right? And there's movement on that.

Patterson's removing, what was it? Another member of leadership who's received praise from the party is Jared Patterson for, I don't think it was specifically those bills. We could have also been for those bills, but he... What? Dang it. So he passed the bill that removes an affirmative defense to prosecution for putting these, for exposing children to sexually explicit materials. So the argument against it that Democrats were making is that this is going to make liable for prosecution librarians who do not remove a sexually explicit book from a library. The those supportive of it say, yeah, exactly.

An electric grid bills what they praised, Patterson and Kevin Sparks over the GOP. Oh, I didn't even see that. But they also praise Harris's nuclear bill is the power grid thing. Yes, but this is different. Right. So like, but that goes to the grid, right is a broad category. What the heck does that mean? So and they list like you said they list those that meet this But it's not as simple as just pass one bill like SB 14 child gender modification. It's not just that one bill It's right like they was previously Yeah, I think there might be some changes on how that works in future iterations of this just because it is so broad. But anyway, to put a bow on this

section, Burrows and Patrick, I think are as close to ever as not having a special special session, even though there's a lot of stuff that got to get done. And even though there's a lot of stuff that's got to get done. And if there is a special, it will be due to the gravity of just votes not being there for something. Like a constitutional amendment. Yes, then a breakdown between the two leaders of the chambers. So.

That's our at least prediction right now. What do you want to hit next? We're over an hour. I think Cameron and I hit the school choice thing. Do you want to talk about that at all? No. No, let's skip it. We've hit it a lot. I'll say if you want a good indicator of how big of an event and deal this was, just look at the photo for our article. There were 1,400 people. So many, oh my gosh, that's funny. I, in my newsletter said, Governor Abbott and 30,000 of his closest friends.

I wasn't that far off. I mean, that's really far off. You were in the thousands though. Yeah, but I did not think it would be 1,400. Yeah, 1,400. 1,400 people. Yeah, that's wild. Well, let's talk about a couple campaign updates before

you wrap this thing up. I think let's start with the attorney general's race. So the big development there was John Bash dropping out. He was the first person to jump in the race, a lawyer, not a legislator. He never run for office before, a former US attorney during the first Trump administration. But he announced that he was dropping out because his family had an unexpected illness, take a bad turn or something. So it clearly serious enough for him to drop a statewide campaign. So he dropped out and that leaves him as Middleton.

And right now, not just because he's the only candidate in the race, but he's by far the biggest figure and has the most money of anyone that has talked about getting in this race. Um, he, it's his lose right now. I mean, everyone in the building is talking, Oh, what attorney general mays Milton. It's just a done deal. It's wrapped up. No, it's not accurate, but at least not yet. But, um,

he is, he's by far and away the pack leader at the moment, but I don't think he'll be the only one that runs. So after we recorded the last podcast on the SFR, I talked to Joan Huffman, Senator from Houston and she said she's very much mulling a run for attorney general and I think she probably jumps in not because she feels like she can definitely beat Middleton she might be able to you know you never know what happens when you get on the stump someone catches lightning in a bottle but she's got a free shot she can run for this without losing her sentence. Unlike Middleton and unlike Brian Hughes.

So I think she'll probably jump in. Just that's my hunch. Then you throw in Mitch little was he do. Do you think Huffman does it after the session? Yes. Yeah, I agree. Yeah. Um, she can't raise money until then.

Um, then throw what does Mitch little do? He's definitely mulling it over. Is there enough space, is there enough of a lane for him with Middleton already in the race and wrapping up some of these house endorsements from conservatives? Steve Toth backed him, Brian Harrison I believe, right? I think so. I'll confirm that. He had a couple others. Now there was one interesting one. I was Backed him Bryan Harrison, I believe right I think yeah, I think so He had a couple others now there was one interesting one I was gonna say I was mentioned and then Middleton's campaign put out that Brent money had endorsed him And I Thought that was interesting because I would think money who's very close to little would reserve his endorsement for little if he was going

To jump in so the automatically the first thought is, okay, little has said he's not going to run for this. Yeah. Harrison. There it is. But you can say that about Toth. You could say that about like, you know, a couple of these members, right? Right.

But money specifically, they're fresh. They're both freshmen and they're constantly, they're the ones that are being groomed to be the point of order guys in addition to Cody the suit and briscoe king So your voice is really making me laugh. It's really bad So That was fascinating but then it turned out they jumped the gun on it and deleted the tweet because money did not give them permission to put out an endorsement for Middleton of

him. So a lot, a lot left to go on the AG's race. You talk now because my voice. You're doing a great job. Well, on the Senate district 11 front with Middleton, obviously not having that free shot at the attorney general's spot that Huffman would Dennis Paul or a state representative Announced on Thursday that he would be running for the seat. I think Initially was surprising to folks. I don't know five ten minutes later The lieutenant governor said dropped his endorsement of Paul and why are you smirking? That wasn't surprising Who put out the Dennis Paul Press release. No, the Dan Patrick thing wasn't surprising when you saw who put out the Dennis Paul press release.

No, the Dan Patrick thing wasn't surprising after you saw that. I think Paul himself is typically a pretty low profile House member. I think it can make sense once you start thinking about the chamber and how it operates that he would be somebody that would fit in well in the Senate. But it was surprising. This is not somebody who's at the mic very often. This is not somebody who has a crazy high profile. Why would he fit well in the Senate, but it was surprising. This is not somebody who's at the mic very often. This is not somebody who has a crazy high profile. Why would he fit well in the Senate, Meg? Bradley? Why would he?

I don't know, why would he fit well? You can't reverse card me on that. No, you answer the question. I think that there are, especially, okay, when you're talking about who the press release came from, Alan Blakemore, who is the consultant for Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick that's certainly his biggest client although he will have some other very big clients this cycle that will be very interesting

to watch. Don't know how it finds. Yes of which has a huge budget but regard and who's running for comptroller but that's who it came from right with the Alan Blakemore who is as soon as you see that, you're like, okay, count down to the Dan Patrick endorsement, right? Birds of a feather, it's how it goes. Alan Blakemore is kind of tasked with overseeing Dan Patrick's world.

Yeah. It's how that goes. Yeah. So when that came out. And who, in this last cycle, who were the two candidates that won, that won the new Senate seats, the open Senate seats? Hagenbu and Anahosa.

Who is their consultant? Both of them? Alan Blakemore. Which Pete Flores is in the same category, right, from a previous cycle. So this is all very familiar. And this is kind of how this tends to roll in the Senate. But it's also Alan Blakemore's chamber.

Totally, totally. So that's also Alan Blakemore's chamber. Totally, totally. So that's what I'm referring to here. Yeah, I mean, I think Dennis Paul does fit what Dan Patrick wants in a senator, which is someone who's not going to rock the boat, who's going to follow orders and do what Patrick wants to be done in his membership, which is build coalition and not throw bombs from the outside. One person whose name popped up a lot in this for this seat was Briscoe Kane, who very much has a reputation and a track record for throwing bombs from

the outside. Briscoe and, you know, Briscoe Kane and Dennis Paul could not be more different. That is absolutely true. So I mean, right there, that makes Dennis Paul people, a couple friends of mine in Tech Sledge World were texting me about this and they're like, all right, Senator Dennis Paul, next question. Done. Yeah. It's over. Because this also means the entire Patrick apparatus,

which is certainly formidable in terms of fundraising, in terms of the money side of this, immediately goes to Paul. Yeah, he automatically has a leg up over anybody else. Now, I don't know if he's the only one we'll see jump in. One other name that has been bandied about is Greg Bonin, who was in that district. Who has put feelers out. Oh yeah. I mean, pretty significant obvious feelers. He sent a text into a house district touting He sent a text into a house district touting the education, passage of the education funding. He sent a text message into a house district that isn't his, but is within SD-11.

Gee, what could that mean? I know also he's been running, somebody in his camp has been running polling, gauging his viability as a candidate. And he is formidable. If he jumps in, no longer would it be, all right, Dennis Paul wins this easily by a landslide. I'd still give Dennis Paul the upper hand, but Bonham could flip the script on that.

And I think that would be somebody who would, you know, Patrick would back his guy. But if Bonin were to win at the end of the day, that would be a pretty amicable relationship. And if Bonin does mount opposition, let's say he wins, if he does mount opposition to Patrick in the Senate, he's not going to do so publicly. He'll do so behind the scenes, which is how Patrick prefers it. Um, you know, let's hash out our differences in a closed, in a closed room, right? Um, so yeah, it's not like introducing a quote chaos agent into the Senate,

even if Bonnin wins. So that's gonna be fun to watch. We're gonna see more down in this fall. This stuff isn't done. Then you throw in the US Senate race which is the top one of the top dog. Where are we at with that? Wesley Hunt is still deciding whether he wants to jump in or not. I don't think he will. The longer he goes without announcing, the less likely it becomes. Um, you know, there's been a lot of talk about Cornyn dropping out a couple months time for now. He announced his senior campaign staff this week and includes Rob Jesmer.

He's been his general consultant for years, so that's not new, but his pollster is Tony Fabrizio, Trump's pollster. It also includes, um, Andy Hemming, a big Trump world staple as the campaign manager and, uh, Matt McCoviac as the comms director. That's going to be interesting to watch. He's going to be very, watch. He's going to be very, uh, he's very aggressive and he'll, he's going to say what he's going to say. He's already started doing it. Um, putting stuff out. He was, we mentioned this on, this was my Twitter on the weekly vibe. I'll say it here again. Kovac was very open to impeachment when it started. And then afterwards he became very critical of impeachment.

Well now, as the Cornyn spokesman, he's going to have to hit Paxton on impeachment, the thing he's been critical of a lot. That's campaign operative world. Like, if you're getting paid to say it, if you're getting paid to say stuff, you say what you're gonna say. You say what you're getting paid to say, right?

There's no principles. You are for all intents and purposes, a hired gun. Right. So I mean, that tells me Cornyn is, is probably in it for the long haul. And he really does not want Paxton to take his Senate seat, not just because that would mean he loses, but because he doesn't want his successor to be Ken Paxton, even if he wasn't running in this race. Long way to go. Maybe we have some developments, maybe hunt gets in.

Uh, he's definitely telling people that he's interested and he's making those insinuations publicly, but one session ends, this thing's gonna hit the ground running. We're gonna be in the middle of primary season. No question about it. It's happening very quickly. Happening rapidly. And I think even compared to the last couple sessions, it's happening much faster. Because at this point, I mean, think about this point last session, there was an impeachment looming, an expulsion

that had happened. Well, impeachment wasn't looming yet, but I guess it was, it was looming behind the scenes. Yes. 100% was looming. Maybe not publicly, but was it, were things happening? Yeah, absolutely. Sure.

Um, and look where we are right now. Look where we are. Okay, Bradley, anything else? Also the legislature, you know, we were recording this Friday. Um, they'll be doing all sorts of stuff over Mother's Day weekend in, well we have another Mother's Day massacre. I don't think so. I don't think so either. In fact, the Sunday calendar, like the, if it all goes according to plan, there will not be. You would have loved the Mother's Day Massacre. Yeah.

That's your chaos of it. Ugh. It was just delectable watching all of it go down. It was so good. Anything else Bradley? No. Okay. I am toast.

Your voice is definitely on its last legs. Let's get you out of here. Folks, thank you so much for listening and we'll catch you next month.