In a tweet responding to a pro-life activist in his district, Republican State Rep. Mike Lang of Granbury implied pro-life legislation did not move because it wasn’t supported by Texas’ pro-life groups. He also criticized the Senate for not even filing one measure.
Lang was responding to Cisco’s Ruth York, who was passing on information that Georgia’s GOP governor, Brian Kemp, is receiving “44% of hispanic voters support” thanks to his staunch promotion of the “heartbeat” bill. That legislation bans abortions when a heartbeat is detected in the unborn child.
“I joint authored abolish abortion and one of 60 co-authors on the House Heartbeat bill. Not filed in Senate and No support from pro-life groups on either bill,” tweeted Lang, who chairs the Texas House Freedom Caucus.
Lang does not acknowledge, however, that both measures were killed by House leadership, leadership that Lang staunchly supported and defended throughout and after the session. As Brandon Waltens explained in the post-session “Autopsy Report” on pro-life issues, the bill to “abolish abortion” was killed in a committee chaired by Plano Republican Jeff Leach, while the heartbeat bill was not even given a hearing in the committee chaired by abortion-rights promoter Senfronia Thompson (D-Houston).
Disgraced House Speaker Dennis Bonnen (R-Lake Jackson) made the decision on which committees to send which of the measures. Lang has refused to criticize Bonnen for not moving the measures.
Lang’s comment attacking pro-life groups seems dubious on its face. For example, the “abolition” bill was supported by the pro-life group Abolish Abortion Texas. It was also a top priority of the Republican Party of Texas:
Pass legislation to abolish abortion; including, but not limited to, enacting legislation that would ignore and refuse to enforce any and all federal statutes, regulations, executive orders, and court rulings, which would deprive an unborn child of the right to life, as well as enacting life-saving legislation such as PreNDA or a “heartbeat bill.”
It’s not immediately clear why legislation with at least “60 co-authors” would not be given a hearing for any reason other than the measure was referred by Bonnen to committee helmed by a pro-abortion Democrat with the intention of killing it.
If explicit support of pro-life groups is Lang’s standard, why were bills like the Preborn Nondiscrimination Act, or PreNDA, also unceremoniously killed by the Texas House despite widespread support? That measure passed the Senate late in the legislative session but was literally ignored by the House chamber.
