Austin — The Texas House floor vote on a proposed child gender mutilation ban has been delayed once again by a Democrat point of order.
The delay comes following Tuesday’s debacle, where leftist activists staged a protest resulting in the House gallery being cleared and protestors being arrested for assault. On that day, the bill was also sent back to committee due to a procedural error with the bill.
When the legislation was brought back on Friday, it was delayed once again.
State Rep. Mary Gonzalez (D–San Elizario) once again called a point of order, pointing out an issue with the bill analysis, this time claiming that the “background and purpose” in the bill analysis is “too short.”
State Rep. Tom Oliverson (R–Cypress), the House sponsor for the measure, told GOP activists a couple of weeks ago that they had prepared for this.
“The written-up paperwork is being passed to a half a dozen true experts in parliamentary law that are doing what we call scrubbing, which is where they look at all the documents, they watch 24 hours of testimony to make sure the witnesses names are all correct and everything’s correct, because like I said, those are the only things left for the other side to hang their hat on,” said Oliverson.
“If they can’t beat us on the paperwork, they’re going to lose spectacularly on the House floor,” he added.
The paperwork was not as “bulletproof” as Oliverson has claimed while thanking Texas Values and Alliance Defending Freedom for their hard work on the measure.
The measure at hand, Senate Bill 14 by State Sen. Donna Campbell (R–New Braunfels), will protect children from being chemically castrated by puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones and from receiving mutilative surgeries to “transition” them.
SB 14 was recommitted to the House Committee on Public Health for revisions and is expected to return to the floor early next week.
State Rep. Dustin Burrows (R–Lubbock), chair of the House Calendars Committee, promised the legislation would return to the floor next week without being “watered down.”
SB14 will be heard next week. It won’t be watered down. It will pass and become law.
— Dustin Burrows (@Burrows4TX) May 5, 2023
Banning child gender mutilation has been a Republican Party of Texas legislative priority since 2020, and red-shirted activists filling the gallery in support of the ban were once again disappointed with the delay.
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