Good morning,

Here is the Texas Minute for Flag Day – Wednesday, June 14, 2023.

– Michael Quinn Sullivan 

Patrick Says Phelan Has Broken 'Good Faith' Negotiations 

• With the two chambers of the Texas Legislature still at odds over differing approaches to property tax relief, Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick said yesterday that House Speaker Dade Phelan has broken the "good faith" approach to developing public policy. Brandon Waltens reports on the details of Patrick's Houston press conference.
       

• In calling the current special session, Gov. Greg Abbott has embraced a plan to buy down—or “compress”—local school property taxes. The House passed a bill to do just that, providing just over $12 billion in property tax compression, then adjourned for the remainder of the special session.

       
• Senators, meanwhile, passed their own version – dividing up the same $12 billion with a smaller amount of compression but adding an increase to the homestead exemption from $40,000 to $100,000. Patrick says that is meant to ensure that more of the relief goes to homeowners rather than businesses.
          

• Now the lieutenant governor is taking shots at Phelan’s priority corporate welfare legislation from the regular session.

       
• “Dade Phelan says, ‘I’m good giving a 10-year exemption to businesses… but I don’t want to give it to a homeowner who desperately needs a tax break,’” said Patrick. He was referring to House Bill 5, a Phelan priority that the Senate passed.
       
• Patrick said he didn't like HB 5 but passed it in "good faith" to get "more natural gas tax incentives."
       
• Patrick told reporters he recently had an hour-and-a-half conversation with Abbott, during which he said the governor indicated he would sign any property tax relief bill the Legislature sends him.

Phelan Stacks New Education Committee With School Choice Opponents

• With more special sessions yet to be called by Gov. Greg Abbott, Texas House Speaker Dade Phelan (R–Beaumont) has created a new select committee to consider issues that affect educational opportunities for school-age Texans. Emily Wilkerson has the story.
        
• Among the 15 lawmakers (nine Republicans and six Democrats) he appointed to the committee, most either voted against school choice or refused to cast a vote at all. Gov. Abbott, Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, and the Republican Party of Texas have all made school choice a 2023 legislative priority.
       
• The governor has yet to announce a special session dedicated to school choice, although he said earlier this week that he will focus on the issue after lawmakers deal with property tax reform.

Macias On What Died...

• In a new commentary, political observer Luke Macias explores the death of 48 pieces of conservative legislation that were killed by the Texas House.

Congressman Condemns Republicans For Inaction On Border

• A lawsuit has been filed against three Fort Worth-based illegal aliens for participating in a human smuggling ring. Soli Rice reports the lawsuit has prompted U.S. Rep. Chip Roy of Texas to condemn his fellow Republican members of Congress for failing to adequately address the border crisis.
      
• Law enforcement discovered the Fort Worth stash house – run by the three illegal aliens – after a man in Baltimore, Maryland, allegedly paid them to smuggle his wife and 2-year-old daughter into the United States. He claims to have made a payment of $1,000 to the smugglers. After the woman and girl were trafficked in, they were allegedly imprisoned in the stash house until the man could pay an additional $23,000.
       

• According to the federal lawsuit, the man was told the smugglers “would do things to his daughter he [would] not like” if he failed to make the payment.
      

• "While Washington is fiddling around doing absolutely nothing to secure the border—and Republicans recently punted any leverage we had to force Biden to secure the border in the debt ceiling—we have stash houses in Fort Worth, Texas, where human beings, little girls, are being horrifically abused for ransom," said Roy in an interview with Texas Scorecard.

UIL Rejects Proposal For Boys to Play on Girls’ Volleyball Teams

• Although lawmakers banned public school students from athletically competing against the opposite sex, Katy Marshall reports the quasi-governmental agency overseeing Texas sports was asked to allow biological males to be on female volleyball teams.

      
• The directors of the University Interscholastic League (UIL) turned down the proposal in a meeting yesterday, but they did approve the creation of boys' volleyball teams.

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