The Texan Podcast - Weekly Roundup - February 12, 2021

Episode Date: February 12, 2021

This week on The Texan’s “Weekly Roundup,” our reporting team discusses the Dallas Mavericks national anthem controversy, gun control proposals from Texas legislators, a proposed tax on natural gas flaring, reactions to Biden’s border policies, developments on gambling in Texas, proposed changes to gendered language in state code, a bar’s license suspension due to COVID-19 regulation violations, and more.

Welcome to another edition of the Texans Weekly Roundup podcast, wherein our reporting team discusses the political happenings of the week and the proper name for carbonated beverages. Stick around to the end of the podcast for that nonsense. We cover the Dallas Mavericks national anthem controversy, gun control proposals from Texas legislators, state budget discussions, a proposed tax on natural gas flaring, legislators criticizing Biden's border policies, developments on gambling in Texas, D.C. committee assignments, proposed changes to gendered language in Texas code, and a bar's license suspension due to COVID regulation violations. Folks,

thanks for listening and we hope you enjoy. Howdy, folks. Mackenzie Taylor here with Daniel Friend, Isaiah Mitchell, Hayden Sparks, and Brad Johnson. Already, prior to this podcast, we have been arguing with each other over the nature of to-do lists and dockets. So I think this episode promises to be spicy. I think we've cooled off enough, though. I think we're calm and we're ready to go. Okay. I think it will be very informative. It will be. I think the fun topic, there will be some angst released. Yes, there will be.

Don't you think, Daniel? I mean, as long as we keep the microphones to the people that currently have microphones i think we'll be good for those of you who don't know brad does not have a microphone in front of him because i'm hogging it that's a fun daniel that was a good addition to this conversation and it it pleased me um well on that note with brad's indignant posture currently just as the backdrop to this conversation hayden let's talk sports without brad does that sound good i think that does sound you're you're so mean to brad he's gonna start crying right here on the podcast well this week there was a lot of drama around sports, especially as it relates to the Dallas Mavericks up in Dallas. Mark Cuban, the owner of the Dallas Mavericks, made a quiet decision early on that the team would not play the national anthem before their games.

They didn't play it throughout the preseason or any of their home games during the regular season. So the Athletic reached out to Mark Cuban and just just asked the question have y'all stopped playing the national anthem and he confirmed to them that yes he had but he hadn't decided to make a big deal out of it because well no one had noticed yeah but they did make a decision that they wouldn't play the national anthem because in mark cuban's opinion there are some who don't feel represented by it and because he feels it's not inclusive, they decided to end that tradition. It was a conscious decision, not an oversight, essentially, is what it was. It was a conscious decision.

He just didn't publicize it. Right. So in terms of, you know, the backlash that followed, I mean, sports fans, you know, certainly had something to say about this. But walk walk us through what the aftermath looked like in terms of both what the NBA and the league had to say, as well as other sports teams in Texas. Well, the NBA has a longstanding policy that the national anthem is to be played before their games. So they doubled down on that policy and said that the national anthem will be played before games. That's not a decision that's up to individual owners and the franchise. They have to, or owners in the league, they have to play the national anthem before games. And they made that announcement after there was uproar over Mark Cuban's decision. And there was

backlash from all from many parties. But even here in Texas, we had Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick and Senator Ted Cruz condemn Mr. Cuban's decision. And they expressed their support for the national anthem and reiterated their positions that sports is a time when everyone is to relax and come together. They don't want that to be tainted with political quibbling in other words. So there were other sports that came there, or there were other teams that came out and the Dallas stars, which is the only national hockey league team in Texas decided that they would produce a statement that they are also going to continue playing the national anthem prior to games. And the Texas Rangers confirmed in a statement to us that they would also continue that practice. And you can hop on our website, the texan.news, to see the article for that specific statement. The Houston Astros actually

responded to us. They declined to comment. So they have not, apparently have not made a decisive statement either way. But the Texas Rangers at least will continue to play the national anthem before games. Yeah, certainly. Now, the lieutenant governor, you know, specifically had something that he came forward and proposed just really fast. Give us a 30,000 foot view the legislation, but what he had announced is, or what he announced yesterday was, he would introduce a bill that would require the national anthem to be played before any public events that receive be. I'll have to take a closer look at that and get back with y'all next week. But he wanted to express his strong support for the National Anthem. And it wasn't just that. He was on social media. He laid into Mark Cuban over this decision. So he called it a threat to the National Anthem that they were no longer playing it before Dallas Mavericks games. So his reaction was swift and strong when it came to this decision. And we may see some movement in the Texas legislature this session to put it into law

that the national anthem in Texas, at least as it relates to publicly funded events, will be protected. Yeah, absolutely. And I don't believe that, you know, a bill has been filed yet that there's any legislation that has been proposed. But, you know, the fact that the Lieutenant Governor came out with a statement along those lines and said that that will be happening in the coming days, you know, certainly was an opportunity that he seized. Daniel, real fast, just for some background, I wanted to come to you and talk about previous history with Mark Cuban, owner of the Mavericks, and elected officials in Texas.

Quickly give us a 30,000-foot-view perspective of a squabble between him and Texas' junior senator. Yeah. Back in October, Mark Cuban appeared on a podcast interview with Megyn Kelly kind of talking about the NBA. Went through a lot of different issues but one of the things that came up uh was the nba's business with china and he said he was okay doing business with china and you know this is in light of lots of growing tension between the u.s and china and you know there's all the protests in hong kong that became a really big point of controversy um and all the other human rights violations that China has committed.

And so he said he was defending the NBA's business with China. And then he got into a little bit of a Twitter feud with Senator Ted Cruz just about that issue, going back and forth with each person trying to outdo the other in the rhetoric. And yeah, it was just kind of a bit of a spicy conflict on Twitter. Yeah. We love some spicy Twitter conflict. Always, always fun. I think some also important context for this is the NFL fight over the national anthem as well that happened a couple of years ago and has kind of petered off but still remains.

But in light of the George Floyd protests and all of that, really kind of was reintroduced. True, yeah. And so all this stuff isn't happening in a vacuum. This has been building and building and building. And this Dallas Mavericks episode is just the latest. Even with the NBA, I know that there was some controversy with the jerseys that they were wearing. And they were allowing some players to, I guess, customize them in some way.

I don't follow sports too much. Yeah, what they did was, in place of their name, they allowed them to put a slogan of their choice. Now they have a selected list. But things like Black Lives Matter, I'm blanking on other ones, but Arce's name was another one. Obviously, these very progressive issue types, the slogans were allowed to be put on their jerseys in the NBA. And obviously, a lot of people took issue with that.

Other people loved it. So yeah, that was that. And it's interesting to see that uh divide between sports fans right who are a very diverse group of people um and you know the giants that lead the leagues right and we have kind of this corporate america and you know blue collar america divide even just in terms of what they value politically so there's so much at stake here, both financially for these leagues and these teams, as well as, you know, in terms of what Americans choose to watch on television. There's a huge divide there. There's also a divide between the average watcher of them made big platforms criticizing the various leagues for their lack of action on these issues, whatever it may be with whichever league.

And that's another divide. And another reason that many, many people are really angry with the decisions that have been made. Not only is their point of view being cast off to the side by the executives of the teams, but it's also being largely ignored in the media commentary. Yeah, certainly. Well, Hayden and Daniel, thanks for running us through that. Daniel, we're going to stick with you here. Walk us through that. Daniel, we're going to stick with you here. Walk us through. You've been covering a lot of the different laws that are proposed having to do with guns, Second Amendment rights here in Texas.

Walk us through your latest piece and what specifically you focused in on. Yes. So one of the things that I've kind of enjoyed writing about at the Texan is all the gun stuff. I've been doing that for quite a while now. I guess it really started back a year and a half ago. These counties, I think the first one that I wrote on was a democratic commissioner's court out in West Texas, uh, bordered County, um, passed a resolution to claim themselves to be a second amendment sanctuary. And that was, you know, one of the first in Texas to do that really interesting, you know, it's, it's a democratic County, was, you know, one of the first in Texas to do that. Really interesting. You know, it's a Democratic county for sure, but they passed that. And so I've been following gun

stuff ever since and really enjoying just looking at that issue from both sides. And one of the things that I dove into this week was looking at some of the proposals from Democrats, specifically along the lines of red flag laws. Back in the mass murders in El Paso and Odessa in 2019, which was a much less fun thing to write on, that after that, a lot of Democrats and Republicans even came out and said, you know, we need to look at some gun restrictions. And one of those things is red flag laws. And red flag laws are basically mechanisms that allow citizens to petition a court

to have a gun removed from a gun owner if they pose a threat to themselves or others. Now, it varies from state to state and in the laws that have been passed, you know, whether a family member can do this, whether a girlfriend can do this, or if it has to go through law enforcement or something, it kind of differs based on the laws. But that's the gist of it. Yeah, certainly. So where is support for these laws being derived from? And I think it's even where, you know, you mentioned the mass murders in Odessa and Midland. Walk us through a little bit more of, you know, where the support comes

from and what statewide leaders who are largely Republicans have had to say about this as well. Yeah. So obviously I think that the big thing really comes from Democrats. You know, these are the strongest advocates of gun control. They see a shooting like in El Paso where a man from the DFW area, you know, had a gun, went to this Walmart in El Paso, drove eight hours to go kill a crowd of people and kill as many people as he could. It was just sadistic, evil, demented. And people say, we need to try and keep him from getting a gun. And so they look at that and they say, what could we do to keep this person from getting a gun

or if they do have a gun, to take that weapon away from them? And so, you know, Democrats look at this and there's these red flag laws that have been passed in other states that allow kind of family members to take those or take steps to get those weapons removed. In the case of the El Paso shooter, his mother had called the police station and had said, you know, I'm kind of, was kind of calling for informational purposes, like, I'm kind of concerned. My son, he's very immature. Should he really be having this gun? Like, can he legally have this gun? And so Democrats pointed to that conversation. She didn't say that she was worried that he was going to hurt himself or hurt others with it. She was just concerned that he was immature in the call. But people pointed that call that she made and said, well, if these red flag laws had been available, she might have used that to have them take his gun away. And maybe this whole thing would have

been stopped. So that's their argument. And on the Republican side, you know, Republicans who see a tragedy like this, they say, you know, what are we supposed to do about it? And they like this idea that Democrats have of having these red flag laws, because there's a lot of Republicans who want to see that stopped. And so, you know, back in 2018, before the 2019 legislative session, Governor Greg Abbott actually released a report looking at different proposals. I think it was related to school safety. And one of the things that he encouraged lawmakers to consider was red flag laws. So that was from the governor telling them to look at this. And then after the 2019 shootings, another high-profile Republican in Texas, Representative Dan Crenshaw, kind of posted about different reforms that could be made.

And he said, red flag laws are something we should be considering. Now, other Republicans have said that, no, we should not do that. This is a threat to due process. If someone has a gun, like what's to stop some person who's mad at their cousin from going to the police and having their gun taken away? So those are the concerns. Certainly. What are some of the bills that have been filed so far? So there have been four bills that have been filed that I've seen. Two of them come from Representatives Terry Meza and Joe Moody. They're identical bills that have been filed in the House. And now these would, in that situation, allow family members to go to a court, have the court petition to have that gun removed.

And then that gun can be removed through a temporary ex parte order, which means that the person, the gun owner, doesn't have to be, to defend himself. The court can just look at the evidence presented by the petitioner and have that gun removed. Um, but then within 14 days of issuing that order, there's supposed to be a hearing, uh, where the gun owner can come and say, Hey, like you shouldn't take my gun away or explain the situation more fully from their perspective. Um, and so that's the bills filed by Meza and Moody in the House. And then in the Senate, Senators Boris Miles and Royce West have filed similar bills to that. Of course, there's like small differences between the bills

and, you know, the different penalties and whatnot, which I imagine Democrats will debate. You know, if it gets a hearing, we'll see. And then there's also, on the Republican side, interesting enough, there's actually an anti-red flag bill, which I think, I want to say Missouri passed a bill. No, it was actually Oklahoma that passed a bill similar to this, where they said that if there's federal or local red flag laws, law enforcement can't enforce that. So it's prohibiting those enforcements. Now, under the bill, a state law, a state red flag law could still be enforced.

So if the state passes Joe Moody's bill and Briscoe Cain's bill, there could be red flag laws. Certainly. Well, thank you for covering that for us. Certainly an issue so many of our listeners and our readers care a lot about. Isaiah, we're going to come to you. The Texas budget is a big deal for many reasons, but this week the Senate, the Texas Senate, started committee hearings talking through what they were going to be prioritizing and where they had concerns. Walk us through a little bit of what happened in those hearings. Sure. So in the Senate, the Senate Finance Committee, the budget process has

begun with a little bit of a stumble. The process is young, but on the other hand, the Legislative Budget Board and the Texas Comptroller Glenn Hagar have had, you know, all the time in the world to get their facts straight and be prepared to answer questions from the committee. And for the most part, a lot of the committee's questions in their first and even their second meeting that we watched the other day have remained unanswered. The only sure thing is that Senate Finance Committee Chair Jane Nelson, a Republican, has emphasized that the committee will prioritize funding House Bill 3 from last session. And if you're not familiar with that, that is the school funding commitment that the legislature made as part of an effort to

alleviate high property taxes and grant more pay to teachers. Certainly. So, you know, where are these, I mean, and certainly this is an incredibly difficult budget cycle in terms of, we don't like to say unprecedented, but there's a lot of new factors in play here in terms of, we don't like to say unprecedented, but there's a lot of new factors in play here in terms of what budgetary needs there are in the state from pandemic. Brad covers a lot of these issues in terms of what actually is happening with tax revenue. But what exactly are we unsure about at this point? Certainly, there's a lot of new factors taken into consideration. And like you said, they've had some time. But what items were of primary concern to legislators? Sure.

So for one, if Congress passes another stimulus package, Hagar said that the state cannot yet assess how that would affect our budget. So that's one thing. And when it comes to the more recent federal relief for like the coronavirus relief fund for schools and other relief packages for the state and the state agencies, the senators on the committee pressed Hagar and the legislative budget board on how, you know, for example, the DPS has spent the billions that went to them and among other agencies and how the TEA spent their money that didn't actually get into local classrooms as Senator West alleged. And they didn't really get a lot of clear answers on that. We know that these big sums of money went to state agencies, but getting an itemized budget as to how they got spent and how responsibly this money got spent, that still eludes the committee. Furthermore, despite being very behind on their deadline, nobody seems to have a solid answer as to how or when state agencies are going to comply with the governor's order to cut 5% of their budgets. So, you know, months ago in 2020, the governor and other state leaders ordered state agencies to cut 5% of their budgets.

And Brad, that only applied to how many? There are a lot of exceptions. Based on the initial exception list, it applies, it will only apply to like 40% of the budget. So there's 60% of the entire budget that is entirely exempted based on, yes, that will not be subject to these 5% budget cuts. So really in terms of the total budget, it's not a 5% cut. It's far less than that. So, right. And the 5% cut of that 40%, if you can follow the math still hasn't happened yet. Nobody knows quite when or how it will happen. Some of them has said, like the attorney general's office said in the hearing yesterday that they had, but there's no concrete list out there of how much has been cut for which agencies, which ones have actually followed through on it. It's all just

kind of hearsay. We don't have receipts at this point. Yes. Got it. So what other issues came up? We're going to see a lot of these hearings throughout the next uh few months here um budget night is somehow fast approaching despite the legislature not doing too much right now but walk us through what other issues came up and what other things were of concern well like you mentioned before um we're all very loath to use the word unprecedented because it's been beaten like a dead horse and um but when it comes to to gas tax revenue and things like that, electric vehicles are being used more widely. And so Hagar called those out and said that he would like to see more taxation

that can target electric vehicles because, as he put it, they're not collecting taxes from those consumers that would otherwise go to transportation and highway maintenance and things like that. And in a brief tangent, a few of the senators informally agreed to pursue laws that would clamp down private citizens' state-held information more tightly to alleviate the scourge of scam robo calls. So I get these calls all the time about my warranty and on my you know things like that yeah but um that apparently has something to do with state data that's being leaked out and sold by third parties and uh so there there was a bit of an informal quorum to try and tackle

that somehow through legislation yeah one of the things you mentioned earlier was the federal side of this um you know obviously it's no secret that the state's finances are kind of balanced out the loss in consumption tax revenues it's the federal money and that's not going to last forever um you know even if congress comes up with another stimulus it's not going to be constituted the same way as the cares act um you know there is a lot of talk about a lot about state and local funding being like $950 billion being put in for that. There's really no roadmap for how that is going to be regulated for expenditures. So there's just a lot of question marks there. And the fact that, you know, the state is in the black on revenues is solely because of the federal money coming in. And not because of not not even close to mostly because of, you know, projection, original projections improving as they they come to fruition.

So good stuff. Gentlemen, thank you for that. Isaiah, thank you for covering that hearing for us. Bradley, we're going to stick with you here. Walk us through a new legislative proposal from an Austin lawmaker that has to do with oil and gas and particularly flaring. Yeah, flaring is one of the big issues in the energy issue set. It is something that is talked about quite a bit. And explain what it, yeah.

Yeah, I will. Yeah. It's kind of become the hobby horse. And so to set the table, representing Vicki Goodwin from Austin, she has proposed a 25% tax on the gas flared by the companies. And so this would come, it would come from, um, you know, however much gas is, is flared and burned off, essentially that market value, which would be determined by the comptroller would then be taxed, uh, at 25%. So it's intended to discourage flaring. And so what flaring is, it is this function by which oil and gas companies, they burn off essentially excess gas that they can't repurpose into, whether it's product

or move it elsewhere. It's either economically inefficient to do so, or it can become a safety hazard. If you have too much gas buildup in a certain piece of infrastructure, whether it's a pipeline or a tankard, you know, it can cause safety problems. Like, you know, if it explodes. We saw something similar to that happen down in the Gulf last year. And so that is functionally why they do it. And, you know, it's, it's not a very, it doesn't write off, it doesn't message itself well, like, Oh yeah, we're burning this gas because we, you know, we don't want to, um, it it's sold as they don't care about the environment,

but really there's a, there's a functional reason for why they do it. But there's a lot of pressure from especially environmentalist groups who say that the state is not doing enough to discourage it. And, you know, it's kind of grown its own legs and become this massive issue that envelops the entire industry. What kind of legislative shot does something like this have in this legislature? I would say it probably doesn't have a huge shot because Republicans control most things. I would say it is possible that it gets out of committee if it goes to the right committee. That would be, I think, land and resources management that's controlled by a Democrat. Um, the other energy related, whether it's environmental, the environmental committee or the energy committee itself are both, uh, chaired by Republicans. So, um, I, I could see it getting out of, out of committee, but I don't think it has much of a shot. It's more of a, it's less of a legislative initiative and more of a public opinion attempt to change that.

And, you know, groups like Earthworks, they have talked a lot about how, especially in the Permian Basin, these producers are irresponsible with, you know, allowing methane, burning methane to excess or just letting it out in the atmosphere, which is the reason that they burn it. That way they're not just letting gas out in the atmosphere.

And so I would say this is more of to move the Overton window on the issue itself. I like it. And those are, you know, oftentimes we'll see those kinds of proposals, particularly from Democrat lawmakers, being that they are in the minority. Right. So it really does just get debate and discussion on topics that are important and flashy proposals, whether or not this is flashy is up, you know, not up to us, but proposals that catch the eye of either, you know, constituents or the press at least start some conversation and force other legislators to have to comment on it right so the other aspect of this is the financial side and as we kind of talked about earlier the state is obviously struggling financially and this a 25 tax on flaring would bring in a lot more revenue for the state which is one way to look at it the other way to look at it is these oil and gas companies are also struggling financially, and they're already a huge aspect of the state's finances with how much taxes they pay, whether it's severance tax or sales tax or whatever else. So,

depending on your view, you're going to be friendlier to one side or the other. On the financial side, someone's going to take a hit. And that's kind of inescapable. I like it. Thanks for covering that for us, Bradley. Daniel, we're coming back to you. This week, some Texas lawmakers in D.C. came forward with a letter to the president on an issue that is certainly of importance to Texas. Walk us through what happened there and what responses were. Yeah, so Representative Chip Roy, a little letter

signed by 50 other congressmen, including 11 or 12 from Texas, that was to President Biden concerning border and immigration. Right now, there is a kind of a big surge going on in immigration at the border and the number of illegal immigrants who are attempting to cross. And with the new administration, there's been a lot of policy changes. And so this letter was kind of a criticism of that and asking him to make some different changes and keep some things in place from the previous administration to kind of address the situation. Absolutely. So what exactly was in the letter that Roy sent and what was, you know, we saw other lawmakers sign on who was on board with this? Yes. So in addition to Roy, there was also representatives Michael Cloud, Pete Sessions, Brian Babin,

Jody Arrington, Dan Crenshaw, Michael Burgess, Louie Gohmert, August Pfluger, Ronnie Jackson, Beth Van Dyne, and Lance Gooden. Those were the Texas lawmakers who signed on to this letter. And of the things that they criticized, you know, there were several different aspects. One of them was obviously the ending of the construction border wall. So that was what Biden did day one of his administration. I believe he kind of ended that national emergency declaration that was used to funnel money to the construction of the wall. And so he put a freeze on a lot of deportations. Now, currently, that has been blocked by a Texas federal court. And so there's an ongoing litigation between the federal government and the state of Texas with Attorney General Ken Paxton leading a charge against that freeze on deportations. And so that's still ongoing, but it's something that the administration did.

And then another thing that they criticized was this halt to a program under the Trump administration called the Migrant Protection Protocol Program, more commonly referred to as the Remain in Mexico policy, which essentially what that did was if immigrants were referred to as the Remain in Mexico policy, which essentially what that did was if immigrants were trying to cross the border, and either if they were coming in illegally or if they were going to the border without the right documentation to get into the country,

the immigration authority, CBP, could tell people to go and wait in Mexico while they continue the immigration proceedings and processing their request for whether it be asylum or, uh, you know, whatever it is, instead of waiting in the United States, they would wait in Mexico. And so, uh, there has been a freeze on, uh, on a new applications to that program. Uh, so essentially if there are not other policies in place, which I'll get to in a minute, then they would have to be coming into the United States themselves and being processed there, which definitely kind of affects the capacity limits with the facilities on the border. Yeah, absolutely. So, you know, we're seeing these responses to changes in policy that have already been made by the administration, right? These are things that have already happened.

Some of them happened on, you know, the president's first day in office. Do we expect, one, to see this continue to be a bigger issue than it is right now? And why isn't it already making, you know, huge headlines in a lot of different – Yes. So right now it is significant because the number of apprehensions that have been made, you know, if you look at the statistics going back to 2000, which is when the data for the CBP, at least that I've seen, goes back to the number of apprehensions that they've seen at the border. 2000 was like a huge, huge year in number of immigrations. We haven't seen anything quite that big since 2000. It started going down in the 2000s. But around that time

in December of that year was when, or that fiscal year, which of course the fiscal year begins in October, ends in September. So in fiscal year 2000, that was when we saw like about 70,000 apprehensions in that month. And it hasn't been that high until December 2021 or 2020, this past December. So it's the highest December on record. Now the numbers have been higher back in the summer of 2019. There were months that had over 100,000 apprehensions. So it's really big right now. One of the reasons why it's not as significant or not making the headlines as much as it did in previous years hasn't gotten up to as high as it was in 2019. But also, under the coronavirus pandemic, there have been some new orders that have basically been unlocked.

You know, we talk about the executive orders that Governor Abbott has issued and the disaster declaration that's now been going on for like a year. But President Trump, under his disaster declaration, he also activated a disaster policy under U.S. Title 42 is what it's referred to, which unlike Title 8, the traditional immigration code, Title 42, under that U.S. code, the CBP can turn people away from the border immediately. So it's basically that the remain in Mexico policy is still in effect through this Title 42, where if someone is trying to cross the border illegally, and since there is the coronavirus pandemic happening, CBP can just send those people back across to the country of last transit, which in this case happens in Mexico. There's not as many people coming across the Canadian border. So that is something that is still in effect. Now,

the Biden administration has not yet rescinded that title. And so if the, or really when the Biden administration does that, that's when you're going to really see a big change in the capacity of the border of how CBP is able to handle the surge that is ongoing. And so that was something that the lawmakers in this letter to Biden warned him about is basically saying like, you shouldn't rescind this. They pointed also to an executive order that Biden signed last week where he essentially instructed his administration officials to look at this policy and look at how we can start processing more immigrants in the pandemic. He didn't explicitly mention Title 42 in executive order, but he definitely alluded to it. And you can see how the Biden administration is considering what to do with this code that's currently activated. Yeah, good stuff. Well, thank you for covering that for us, Daniel. Hayden, we're coming to you.

One of the big issues at the forefront of discussion for some lawmakers in Texas has been gambling. Yes. Now, the lieutenant governor made some comments on that this week that, you know, gave some light in terms of, OK, well, is does this have a chance in the Texas Senate? Walk us through what happened. Well, I just want to say, having hung around Daniel for long enough, I'm sparing you a lot of gambling and betting puns right now. So Las Vegas Sands, a company in Nevada that is a giant casino gambling empire has sent, last time I checked, 60 lobbyists to solicit support from lawmakers for expanding casino gambling in Texas. That number is ever growing because it seems like every time I check the Texas Ethics Commission records, they've added new lobbyists. But Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick said in a radio appearance on the Chad Hastie radio show recently, that because of the number of competing

interests involved with gambling legislation, it likely won't see the light of day. In fact, he said it's the reason why gambling legislation never really gets anywhere in the Texas legislature is because you have all these different competing interests. You have, of course, the state of Oklahoma and the state of Louisiana, they don't want to see legalized casino gambling here for obvious reasons. You have different companies who want to establish commercial casinos, you have tribal casinos and the conflicting interests that are involved with that. But there is support among at least some lawmakers for expanding gambling. It's just the more powerful individuals in the

Texas legislature don't seem to have the appetite for it that maybe some other state representatives and state senators do. Yeah. So let's dive into that. The lieutenant governor appeared on a radio show this week. What exactly did he say? Well, he stated that he doesn't think that the revenue argument is a strong argument. He cited some figures and he didn't happen to mention where he retrieved these figures, but he said according to the industry's own estimates, sports betting would only pay for one half of one day of the state's budget. He also mentioned that the casino gambling industry says that their tax revenue benefit for the state of Texas would only be about $700 million. And I say only, $700 million is a lot of cash. But in the context of a biannual state budget, it's not. It's only three days worth of the budget of 365 days, according to Lieutenant Governor Patrick. But several bills have been filed to expand gambling in Texas, casino gambling, tribal gambling. I've seen a couple of

bills related to cleaning up the gambling statutes. I've also seen legislation for eight liner machines being legalized at the local level. I've covered that. If you I recommend that you go check out the coverage on eight liner machines, because that's another area where there has been disagreement and but but Texas is one of the states where gambling restrictions are very stringent and other states have varying levels of restrictions, but Texas is one of the strongest in terms of prohibiting gambling. But Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick is the president of the Texas Senate. He wields a great deal of power.

And if he does not have a desire to see this legislation get through the process, it likely won't. Speaker Phelan has reportedly said that he is open to casino gambling as long as it is a long term commitment and not something that is done in haste to add a bandage to budget wounds that have been inflicted because of this pandemic. He believes that it should be something that is deliberate. And that is, I believe the way he put it was a long term commitment to the communities where the casinos would be located. But then there are concerns about out of state companies, establishing casinos, especially a giant corporation like Las Vegas Sands, and the the amount of resources they have, versus the resources and the political

clout that, say, a small community might have. So it's a complicated issue. But at this point, it doesn't sound like Dan Patrick, who is a man whose opinion matters greatly at the Capitol, has any desire to see this legislation move forward. I like it. Thank you for covering that, Hayden. And you'll continue to monitor that throughout the legislative session. Daniel, let's talk DC a little bit. Committee assignments have been handed down. It's not quite the same as how it happens here in Texas, but walk us through where Texas lawmakers landed. Yeah. So unlike in Texas, which Brad covered last week when those House committee assignments were released, where the House speaker just kind of hands these out, assigns them, all gets together, both Republicans and Democrats, this is really handled more on a committee-by-committee basis. So you have the Republican Party that steers the Republican Steering Committee that kind of drives the committee assignments for

Republicans. And you have a similar thing on the democratic side. And, uh, then on the committees you have then the, the chair and the, uh, ranking member from both parties, uh, kind of assign their members to the subcommittees. So, uh, it's kind of a complicated process and there's not really a good place to go that has all of these committee assignments together. So I did the hard work of pulling that together for the Texas lawmakers. And so, yeah, there are, there's several different committees and I kind of gathered them all, put them all on the website. You can go find what your lawmaker, what your congressman, what those committees that they're assigned to are. So in terms of the heads of committees, you know, Texas members that landed those kinds of spots, walk us through that.

So there are a few different senior congressmen who a lot of those were retiring because there's a term limit to Republicans on committee chairs. So when a Republican is a chair for three terms, that's as many terms as they're going to be the chair for that committee. Now, they could change those rules some in the future, but right now that's what it's set to. And so on the Republican side, of course, Republicans are in the minority. So the heads of the committee for the Republicans are the ranking members or the Republican leader for that committee. And there are three different representatives from Texas who are at the tops of their committee. You have Representative Kevin Brady, who is the ranking member for the Ways and Means Committee. This is going to be his third and final term. He actually started three and a half

terms ago, which the Senate recently amended their rules to provide that he could continue serving this term in that position. And so this will be his last term on that quite powerful committee. And then you also have another powerful committee, you have the Appropriations Committee with ranking member Kay Granger on there. And this is her second term, as well as the second term for Representative Michael McCaul on the House of Foreign Affairs Committee. And on the Democratic side, there's obviously fewer Democrats from Texas, but one, Representative Eddie Bernice Johnson, is the chair for the Science, Space, and Technology Committee. She also recently announced that this is going to

be her last term running. She was going to make the last term her last term, but then of course said, well, people are asking me to run, so I'm going to run one more time. And so she's presumably retiring. Of course, it's possible that she could change her mind again. Yeah. So then in terms of subcommittee assignments, where did some Texans land? Yes. So obviously you can go see the long list there. But there were two that really stood out to me. With all those Republicans who retired last time, there's a lot of freshmen coming in. But notably, there were two freshmen who actually assigned ranking members for subcommittees. And so you have Representative Beth Van Dyne from Irving, who is on the Small Business Committee.

And on that, she was appointed the ranking member of the Subcommittee for Oversight Investigations and Regulations. Now, it's worth noting that she was actually appointed to a housing urban development position under the Trump administration in Texas. So she has some experience there with the small business and kind of the government cooperation and involvement there. And then you also have Representative August Pfluger, who is in the West Texas District of 11, who is on the Homeland Security Committee, and he was appointed the subcommittee ranking member for intelligence and counterterrorism. And now he also has some military background. So, you know, I'm sure that experience has definitely played a role in his appointment to that position. I like it. Good stuff. Well, thank you for covering that for us. Isaiah, we're coming to you. You did a deep dive this week on

some Texas code and some changes that are being proposed by Texas Democrats. Walk us through a little bit of that. Sure. So speaking of DC and US Congress, it would be helpful to start with the US House. For this Congress, at the beginning, they changed their rules to stop using the masculine rule. Now, what is the masculine rule? It's kind of counterintuitive, but it's a grammatical rule that means the masculine pronoun, like he or him or himself, and such, aren't actually masculine when they're not connected to a real man in a sentence. So, this is helpful for keeping, you know, a particular sentence in the singular without using it, which sounds like you're talking about

an animal or a thing, or they, which, you know, takes a plural verb. So, like in the Constitution from the 18th century text all the way up to like 1960s, 70s amendments, it uses this rule. So like in the constitution from the 18th century text, all the way up to like 1960s, 70s amendments, it uses this rule. So it will say like a person commits an offense if he does X, Y, and Z and so forth. And Texas code has the same rule. Second thing they did at the U.S. house rules was a little bit more drastic. They, well, on top of abandoning the masculine rule, they also did away with gender terms in general. So brother and sister became sibling. Mother and father became parent.

And my favorite one, seaman, became seafarer. I like it. So then in terms of what's happening in Texas law, walk us through those proposals. Nobody has yet proposed taking on Texas's pronoun rule and using themself like they're using in the house rules now. That would actually be pretty controversial. But a few lawmakers have been pretty upfront about trying to remove gender neutral terms from the family code and other places. And that is like the subject of their bill. So for example, state rep Michelle Beckley has partnered with state Senator Nathan Johnson, both North Texans from the Dallas-ish area.

They've introduced a bill that would require Texas marriage law in the Family Code to adopt gender-neutral wording. Very upfront, gender is the subject of the bill. There's a similar bill that was filed by State Rep. Diego Bernal from San Antonio. And that would actually codify the largely academic understanding of a difference between gender and physical sex in the law. But what we've also seen are a lot of other lawmakers that introduce these bills with entirely everyday regular subjects that also, you know, while they're in there proposing these amendments to the code, will also make these same kind of changes to neutralize it and make it gender neutral. So one bill that deals with like the certification of seeds and plants, the state seed and plant board, some defunct sunsetted organization, a very boring subject.

But it also strikes all instances of he or she from the bill and replaces them with the person. State Rep Yvonne Davis out of Dallas has made a similar change in a bill that's concerned with like child abandonment. So we see this a lot in legislation from issues from liquor to trials to firearms, where we're, you know, erasing the masculine rule pronouns or he and she pronouns and replacing them with a bit more cumbersome the person or the same title that began the sentence. So there's one, an amendment from State Senator Sarah Eckhart on a constitutional amendment proposing a yearly budget.

All the sentences that begin with the governor and the relevant portion of code as it exists now continue with the pronoun he. The governor shall do this and he will you know such and such and so her amendment on top of the regular subject that it's on a yearly budget also you know while she's in there goes and snips away all instances of he and just replaces them with the governor even though in texas code currently it's known and established that when we see the word he that can include the feminine or neuter genders. Yeah, certainly. So they're chipping away at these kinds of instances in state code essentially. Well, thank you so much for covering that for

us. Definitely something to keep in mind. Bradley, I think one thing that we have, you know, covered a lot in the last year has been bar closures and just different businesses having to deal with regulations or restrictions imposed because of the pandemic. And largely, I think folks have turned, you know, their eyes away from a lot of these instances. There aren't as many stories. We're not hearing as much about it, but it's still happening. Right. Tell us about one instance that happened this week. Well, actually, it happened last week, but it kind of came to light this week. On February 4th, the agents with the Texas Alcoholic Beverage Commission visited Varsity Tavern in Fort Worth, a popular bar. And they found, according to them, evidence of social distancing violations and masking violations.

And so they levied a 30-day suspension to their liquor license. And in their order announcing it, you know, Executive Director Bentley Nettle, he stated, I have determined that the— Wait, hold on. His name is Bentley Nettle? Yes. That's an amazing name. Okay, continue. I have determined that the continued operation of the business would constitute a continuing threat to the public welfare. And so, as I talked a lot about back when these were really happening quite a bit last summer, all these powers are coming from the texas disaster act

and you know specifically this because it involves alcohol there there are two provisions within the disaster code that um you know permit the government to regulate these kind of things um you know one of them is explicitly uh regulating or limiting the sale of alcohol that's paired with firearms and explosives in the code. But the other one is regulating the ingress and egress to and from premises. So that's where the state kind of pulls its authority from. Now, there are arguments that that is not something the state should have the power to do, but that's where it's at right now. I like it. Well, thank you for covering that for us

and ensuring our readers are informed. Certainly something we'll just continue to keep an eye on. Good stuff. Okay, well, folks, our fun topic this week is something that has, frankly, divided the office more than most things do. It has wreaked havoc on the relationships and just personal, yeah, relationships.

More or less than the fight over whatever it was we were arguing about. Parking garages and leather shops? Oh, yeah. That was primarily you and I, Bradley. That's different. This is wreaked havoc. I think this has been more of a civil war.

Between the reporters. Yeah. Wouldn't you say so? Yes. Yeah. There's some agreement. There's some conceding. Ardent disagreement.

Yes. Yeah. There's a lot going on. Daniel, do you want to tell folks what we're talking about? So what is the proper way of referring to a carbonated sweetened beverage? Ooh. The two people who were actually born in this state, you know, the titular state of our organization call it Coke. And after that, you can say, well, what kind? Oh, root beer or Sprite, you know, the titular state of our organization, call it Coke. And after that, you can say, well, what kind? Root beer or Sprite, you know, whatever.

It seems like an inefficient way of choosing a carbonated beverage. You know what else is interesting? That there are actually three people who were born in Texas here. And one is not on a mic. Her name is Michelle, and she disagrees with that uh clarification so i'd say 33.33 percent of those who are native texans do not agree with that it's just like the other day when 25 of the reporters were gone you know it's one of you leaves and 25 is gone it just sounds much more dramatic um i think that uh most texans would agree with michelle's position which happens to be your position in my position as well wow

daniel i'm so glad you said something yeah that it's stupid to call all soda coke when that's a brand name yeah yeah i mean if you want to refer to a Coke, a Coca-Cola as Coke, then go for it. Like, there's nothing wrong with that. Absolutely. In fact, I would rather you say that because it's shorter. It saves time. Who says Coca-Cola? I'm going to have a Coca-Cola.

Nobody says that. Yeah. I'm going to have a Coke. But if I'm going to have a root beer, Lord have I, I'm going to have a root beer. And it's under the larger umbrella, the larger label of soda. Yeah. I'm going to drink a soda that happens to have a root beer. And it's under the larger umbrella, the larger label of soda. Yeah. I'm going to drink a soda that happens to be called root beer. But if you're on a road trip and it's kind of getting to that time where it's time to stop, somebody might say.

Because you've been drinking a lot of Coke? Because, well, what kind of Coke, Mackenzie? Because there are lots of different kinds of coke listen when i was little and i'd go over to my grandparents house my nana would always say there are cokes in the back if you want them okay that's cute and everybody would understand that to mean that there were cokes and dr peppers and sprites she didn't need to go down the list of all the different types of sweet and carbonated beverages that we might have had back there in order for us to know that they were there. It's a very efficient way of just saying, hey, there are Cokes. And it's a term that

means, as opposed to water or a healthy drink, it just means different types of carbonated, sweetened beverages. Certainly. But I think the question is not whether or not Coke is used as a label for that, but whether or not it is the most efficient label to use for that, which it simply is not because the brand name itself is Coke. So why would you call all sweetened carbonated beverages of any variety Coke? Isn't that like a copyright infringement, a trademark issue? See, and this is where I think you're overthinking it because everyone in the southern United States, if you say, do you want a Coke?

They understand that to me. And do you want a soda? Do you know where Coke is? And if you specify, and if you specify, I know. Dr. Pepper. But. Do you know which came first, Dr. Pepper or Coke? Dr. Pepper came first.

Dr. Pepper came first. But it's longer to first, Dr. Pepper or Coke? Dr. Pepper came first. Dr. Pepper came first. But it's longer to say. Coke is just a nickname for all sodas. Soda is four syllables. That doesn't mean. You can call it a pepper. You can call it a pep. That doesn't mean that you can't specify.

It's just a nickname. Now that gets close to calling it a pop. It's a nickname for sodas. That's all it is. Since Brad doesn't have the mic, we can make fun of him for saying pop. We can make fun of him. So at this time, I will yield the well to brad wow yield the well where are we here yeah well i mean isaiah probably has some thoughts on the uh coke side

of things yeah um well i was fixing to say for one would you say tissue instead of kleenex or would you say dry erase marker instead of exppo marker? 100%. Okay, would you say the long chemical name that constitutes aspirin instead of just aspirin? No. And Advil and things like that? No. What's the big deal? They're about painkiller. But ibuprofen, aspirin, painkiller.

I mean, to be fair, I think you bring up a good point. And I think this is the most persuasive thing that your site has to offer is if you say, get me a Tylenol and you go to the store you could buy the name brand tylenol but that stuff is expensive yeah you buy the heb brand which is not tylenol it's still a c-demyofen yeah it's like you don't refer to it as that yeah you don't just say like i want some bitrate bioflavonoid like you just use the brand name but to counter argue my my own defense of the coke position you know if i go to the store and i want a a coca-cola that's not really that much more expensive than a dr pepper or a pepsi or even the store brand sodas we're also not daniel you and i are also not arguing to call

things by you know long uh chemical compound uh words like we're saying soda yes it's two syllables it's four letters we are not arguing to say what the ingredients are we're simply arguing that there should be an umbrella term that refers to all of these beverages that is not a brand name you know what mac i agree with you. Oh my gosh, wow. And you know what? Something else? There's a word that has fewer syllables than the one you use. And it is pop. You know what I think of? I wish you all could see Brad's eyebrows when he said pop. From which I hail.

The great white north. Yeah. You're in key. Tell me about it. We say pop. We say pop. Brad, that was impactful really that should be on your your headstone we say pop very powerful if this is a real dial i'm looking at a map mckenzie why is this so dramatic and of course my home state of Ohio, it's in the section marked blue for pop. You know what else is?

You're going to say Washington State. Yes, Washington State. Look at that. So. I'm curious to know who was. You are rebelling against your kinfolk. Your kinfolk. I did not grow up around people who said pop.

When I think of the word pop, I think of two different types of people. I don't think of people from Ohio. Sorry, Brad. Maybe I will start thinking of that now that you have died on this hill. when I hear the word pop is someone below the age of eight or someone above the age of like 75 because well Daniel in spirit I am over 75 so that's that this is fair that is fair so this map um yeah great don't worry I'm not dunking on you anymore. Oh, wow. I just find it interesting because it has like, it's a heat map for the various regions.

Can you send it to me so I can see it? No. The Lord in heaven. And so you have from Washington across the continental United States down to Nebraska-ish, Kansas. Do we know the margin of error of this poll? Do we know who was polled? It's a heat map, so it varies based on intensity.

Y'all are overthinking this. No, I'm just adding something interesting to this. I'm with you on this one, Brad. It extends all the way over to western Pennsylvania and western New York, which is where my mom's from. Good to know. Yes, and so that is Over to western Pennsylvania and western New York, which is where my mom's from. Good to know. Yes. And so that is the region of pop.

The region of soda is California. You're on the side of Californians. How do you feel about that? You know, Brad, I'm really glad. Where are you going to add something interesting? Wow. Ouch. That's harsh.

I'm interested in this myth. You're also on the side of the East Coasters. Wow. This is really interesting. You're also on the side of the East Coasters. Wow, this is really interesting. You can test about the margin of error. Strangely, Southwest Illinois in Northeast Missouri. So that's where Soda is. Oh, also the Lake Michigan side of Wisconsin. Get to the point. The point is Coke is only in parts of Texas, Louisiana, Alabama, Mississippi, Tennessee.

The South. I'm not giving you crap on this. Hayden said that exactly. The very interesting thing is where Daniel's from is the only place in the country where they say soft drink, according to this man. Interesting. Good to know. Great. Other thoughts?

Well, I've got another thought for you. I'll tell you where you can put it in your pipe and flush it. And that's that language does not care about what's logical or not. It just evolves and words take their wording and the sounds that we apply to them just from... Some words are better than others. Words take their wording. Well, I wasn't meant to say definition. I mean, that would apply too. I'm going to make some

t-shirts. Isaiah, you're making a very good point. Thank you, Brad. I think that you should keep your pop. A lot of people are trying to convince Brad to stop saying pop because he's here, but I feel like it's distinctive. He's from a place that says pop. Now that he's here, you know, it's a little badge, a little Ohio badge.

Kind of like how I say you guys. And trying to come up with the most efficient way to say a word, that doesn't make sense. Like, that's not a language for us. It's not anything. It's not about efficiency. It's just the meaning and the sound that we've assigned to a particular thing. That's fair.

And around here, we can look at a bottled carbonated soft drink or whatever and say, Oh, that's a Coke. And that's slightly different in other places. But saying that one is more efficient than the other just doesn't make any sense. Like that's never, we don't ever just sit around a big table as the anglophonic world and decide what is the most efficient way to describe this thing? We can call it table. Somebody says, Oh, tape is so much more efficient. Let's call it a tabe we'll save so much time yeah it's it's pretty arbitrary yeah that's fair that's a really good point daniel i do feel as

though the two opposing uh teams have sided against us probably my fault yeah being a little aggressive but i still feel as though uh probably they're i think they're siding against us you know you have these people from the north like brad that say pop you have these people from the deep south from who want to like drive from atlanta and they say coke but i think if we want something that really unifies the country, like the American flag, like the star spangled banner. Wow. We can use the word soda.

Wow. I think it transcends. Michelle is air. Is that a thing? Air clapping. It is now. It is now. Wonderful.

Wow. I think Brad finally decided to share his map with us. Okay, great. Well, wonderful conversation, gentlemen. I do feel as though, Daniel, we should put out a poll tomorrow. Yeah. I mean, we'll be right. I think we're going to lose.

Just to prove ourselves. But that's true. But I think that we're going to lose mightily, considering the audience. We'll see. We'll see. We'll see. We'll see what Texans think. Well, folks, thank you so much for listening and bearing with us.

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