![]() ![]() Patrick and Abbott - fellow Republicans - differ in temperament, Patrick being a former talk-radio host and Abbott having served on the state Supreme Court. The lieutenant governor presides over the state Senate and wields considerable influence, not least over the state budget. The lieutenant governor is elected separately from the governor, not as his or her running mate. It is, for all intents, a one-party Republican state. Read more: Bused from Texas to L.A.: Little food, sketchy bathroom facilities for 20 hours on the roadĪ few things to know about Texas politics: No wonder Abbott's political team was upset last summer when DeSantis arranged to ship a group of asylum-seekers from San Antonio to Martha's Vineyard. "Instead of competing for tech companies and whatnot, here now we have a competition among governors that want to appeal to a very particular part of the Republican Party." "It's a race to the bottom," said Jeronimo Cortina, who teaches political science at the University of Houston. In that environment, compromise is not a virtue, but a "sellout" to the other side.Īnd many Republicans, especially, find great gain in playing to partisan animosities, proving their "toughness" through stunts such as shipping hapless migrants from red state to blue. The drawing of district lines to ensure that one party or the other prevails has diminished competition for congressional seats the greatest fear many lawmakers have is losing a primary to someone considered more ideologically "pure." Worsening the conflict are partisan media and the pernicious practice of gerrymandering. (Immigration is an issue that has to be addressed at the federal level, as we've seen from the tension among states.) They meet somewhere in, or around, the middle.īut a solution, and compromise, has vexed Congress for decades in large part because of the growing chasm between the parties and the two sides' most fervent supporters. The other seeks accommodation for people already in the country without legal sanction. ![]() One side wants tougher border enforcement. The broad outlines of a political compromise are not difficult to see. If you want to know what ails our political system, look no further than the immigration issue. ![]() Read more: 'All we received was abandonment': Migrants sent to Sacramento by DeSantis speak out What's more, he added: "In Texas, you can never go wrong bashing California." "At a time Republicans in the state are at each others' throat, it's a sure score with the broadest swath of the base." "Immigration is the great unifier among Republicans, especially in Texas," said Jim Henson, who leads the Texas Politics Project at the state's flagship university in Austin. ![]() So how better to remind folks who's in charge than for Abbott to stoke the immigration issue and pick on some helpless, unwitting victims, packing them off to that most hated of liberal quarters. Gavin Newsom.īut he is caught up in an increasingly nasty feud with fellow Republicans in Texas, most prominent among them the state's lieutenant governor, Dan Patrick, who's turned an uneasy relationship with the state's chief executive into all-out war. They were lied to - promised jobs and attorneys to hasten their bid for legal status - but at least DeSantis got what he wanted: Several days of national news coverage to boost his enervated campaign and a chance to stick it to his blood enemy, Gov. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |