Texas House Democrats end their protest over voting bill

The saga of the Texas Democrats comes to a close. It was back in July that Texas House Democrats fled the state and sought refuge in Washington DC to escape having to deal with a voter regulations bill.

The self-described heroes lasted 38 days. Republican Speaker of the Texas House of Representatives Dade Phelan signed arrest warrants for the 52 derelict Democrats last week.

But now, three stragglers say it’s time to bring the state back together.

According to CNN, it was Democratic Reps. Garnet Coleman, Ana Hernandez and Armando Walle returned to the floor and gave the House the two-thirds needed for a quorum on the election legislation.

“We are proud of the heroic work and commitment our fellow Democratic caucus members and we have shown in breaking quorum in May and again over this summer.

"We took the fight for voting rights to Washington, DC and brought national attention to the partisan push in our state to weaken ballot access.

"Our efforts were successful and served as the primary catalyst to push Congress to enact voter protection legislation. Now, we continue the fight on the House floor.”

Afterwards, the statement talks about the importance of COVID-19 making a comeback. It also points out contradictory messaging from state officials.

Ironically it was three Texas Democrats who, after their maskless close quarters travel to Washington DC, ended up testing positive for the virus. The posse spread COVID-19 to both Pelosi’s and Biden’s aides. Psaki denied this phenomenon was a superspreader event.

It was indeed this same crowd that began demanding mask mandates in Texas. Something that Texas Governor Greg Abbott outlawed by the end of the month.

The moves from Coleman, Hernandez and Walle came as a surprise to other colleagues.

Representative Ana-Maria Ramos was visibly frustrated.

"We were literally on caucus calls for 2 hours this morning, and none of the defecting Democrats mentioned they were planning on helping the Republicans pass voter suppression bills. Guess what the other defecting Democrats have accomplished by going back—NOTHING!"

On why Texas Democrats decided to come back:

"It is time to move past these partisan legislative calls and to come together to help our state mitigate the effects of the current COVID-19 surge by allowing public health officials to do their jobs, provide critical resources for school districts to conduct virtual learning when necessary, while also ensuring schools are a safe place for in-person instruction, and will not become a series of daily super-spreader events."

It was around this time last week that the Texas Senate approved an election integrity bill despite a filibuster attempt.