Just one day after House Speaker Dade Phelan announced he was dropping out of his race for re-election to lead the House, the Republican Caucus has selected Mansfield Republican State Rep. David Cook as their nominee for the position.
His opponent, Lubbock Republican State Rep. Dustin Burrows, said shortly after the vote that he had enough votes to win with Democrat support.
The decision came after an hours-long caucus meeting held at the state capitol on Saturday.
Ahead of the meeting, dozens of grassroots activists from across the state gathered in the halls of the Capitol to support reforms ahead of the vote, with shouts of “we’re counting on you!”
Ultimately, the race came down to two candidates: Cook and Burrows.
While Cook entered the caucus meeting with the support of reform-minded members due largely to his pledge to end the practice of placing Democrats in leadership positions (a priority of the Republican Party of Texas), Burrows instead had spent much of his limited time in the shortened race attempting to appeal to Democrats.
While many Republicans embraced those activists who showed up to cheer them on, Burrows and his closest supporters instead entered the conference room where the caucus meeting took place through back hallways.
On Friday night before the vote, the House Democrat Caucus released a statement explicitly endorsing against Cook.
To clench the Republican nomination, multiple rounds of voting took place during a secret ballot. The first two rounds required that a winner receive two-thirds support.
After neither candidate was able to do so in the first two rounds, the threshold dropped to three-fifths.
While all 88 incoming Republicans were present at the start of the meeting, an effort by Burrows’ team to walk out meant that there were 62 left by the time of the final vote—48 supported Cook and only 14 supported Burrows.
The bylaws of the Republican Caucus stipulate that members must support the caucus nominee on the floor of the House.
Shortly after the vote, the State Republican Executive Committee—which was holding its quarterly meeting nearby in Austin—voted to pass a resolution stating it would censure any member that does not support Cook for Speaker. New party rules mean that any censured member could be removed from the primary ballot for two years.
The 26 members that walked out of the vote were Keith Bell, Greg Bonnen, Brad Buckley, Dustin Burrows, Angie Chen Button, Giovanni Capriglione, Drew Darby, Jay Dean, Stan Gerdes, Charlie Geren, Sam Harless, Cody Harris, Cole Hefner, Lacey Hull, Ken King, Stan Kitzman, Stan Lambert, Brooks Landgraf, Jeff Leach, Will Metcalf, Morgan Meyer, Jared Patterson, Dade Phelan, Angelia Orr, Carl Tepper, and Gary Van Deaver.
Later Saturday evening, Burrows released a list of 38 Republican and 38 Democrat supporters.
At least 8 members on Burrows’ list, however, have said they in fact do not support Burrows, including Don McLaughlin, Gary Gates, Paul Dyson, Josey Garcia, and Charles Cunningham.
The official vote will take place on the first day of the legislative session, January 14.
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