Patrick: Pass bathroom bill or risk special session
AUSTIN – Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick issued an ultimatum to House Speaker Joe Straus on Wednesday that the lower chamber pass the controversial bathroom bill, a scaled-back school voucher plan and legislation to roll back local property taxes or risk forcing the Legislature into a special session.
“Here’s the bottom line: I want to avoid a special session, but I am prepared to go into one,” the first-term Republican told reporters as he ticked off a list of initiatives embraced by several conservative organizations that have been bottled up in the House.
Absent action on the items that have already cleared the Senate, he added, “I will ask the governor to call us back again and again.”
The throw-down by the presiding officer of the Senate came one day after Straus’ office made public a letter the speaker sent to Patrick asking for his help resurrecting a key piece of legislation that died last week when a hard-and-fast House deadline passed.
Read more: http://www.elpasotimes.com/story/news/local/texas/state-bureau/2017/05/17/patrick-pass-bathroom-bill-risk-special-session/101795526/
