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The speaker is elected from the legislature of Texas, by a vote of its fellow members.[1] On the first day of each regular session, the members may nominate a fellow member, and a record vote is held to determine who the speaker will be. The Secretary of State calls the House to order, and presides over the chamber until a speaker is elected. The Speaker of the Texas House of Representatives is the presiding officer of the Texas House of Representatives. The Speaker's main duties are to conduct meetings of the House, appoint committees, and enforce the Rules of the House. The current speaker is Dade Phelan, a Republican from Beaumont, who was elected Speaker on January 12, 2021. Locally, he touted his record delivering funding for district priorities like Lamar University and flood control over his decade in office.
There's been a history of hard landings
Prior to the GOP's 40-year sentence as the minority party, several of its speakers had risen to the top rung largely on their personal popularity among their colleagues. One was Joseph Martin of Massachusetts, who led the party in the House during two brief interludes of majority status after World War II. Both lasted only the minimum two years, the first ending with Democratic Harry S. Truman's surprise White House win in 1948. Martin was back four years later when Eisenhower was first elected president in 1952, but that tour at the top was cut short by his party's sharp losses two years later. The well-respected No. 2 Republican, Eric Cantor of Virginia, had lost his primary in 2014. The No. 3, McCarthy, soon ran aground over remarks in a TV interview and lacked the votes to be speaker.
Bills - Fourth Called Session of the 88th Legislature
Among Republicans in the House, Oliverson is viewed as a reliably conservative, genial, hardworking member who brings unique expertise as a medical professional. House leadership leaned on these traits last year when they put forth Oliverson as the face of Senate Bill 14, which banned gender-transitioning care for transgender minors. Jockeying for the speaker’s gavel has been going on behind the scenes since the primary results were tallied two weeks ago. Oliverson is merely the first candidate to go public with his intentions. That he did it before Phelan has officially been defeated — and 10 months before the House will convene to elect the next speaker — suggests he believes he can quickly consolidate support among the 150 House members who select the speaker.
Texas House speaker faces increased pressure to resign - The Dallas Morning News
Texas House speaker faces increased pressure to resign.
Posted: Mon, 02 Oct 2023 07:00:00 GMT [source]
Republican Dade Phelan Re-Elected as Texas House Speaker
Increasingly exasperated with his untenable predicament, Boehner simply resigned in October of that year. Those eight years actually made Hastert the longest-serving Republican speaker in history. But any luster left after 2006 was lost when he went to prison for bank fraud charges stemming from hush money payments he had made to a former student he admitted to having sexually abused decades earlier. Greene had vowed to press her challenge after Johnson announced a strategy to pass $95 billion in aid to Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan earlier this month.
If Paxton will break an oath to his wife and God, why would he tell Trump — or you — the truth? ” Phelan said, alluding to the details of Paxton’s extramarital affair, which became public during the trial. In floor debates on a topic that can easily become emotionally charged, Oliverson maintained the countenance of a doctor explaining something to a patient, avoiding the bombast that can make Republicans vulnerable to accusations of bigotry. Also in attendance was Wes Virdell, who won the seat vacated by state Rep. Andrew Murr of Junction, who led the impeachment effort in the House. Trying to further diminish the influence of Democrats — prompting them to retaliate by withholding support for any of the above — risks injecting the kind of partisan dysfunction into the Texas House that plagues the federal Congress. In an interview with Spectrum News, Phelan criticized Oliverson for announcing his bid while multiple House contests — including ones that involve mutual allies of Phelan and Oliverson — hung in the balance.
TikTok ban passed Congress with major sweetener for Democrats: ‘A political tool’
Phelan confident in political future as challenger emerges - Spectrum News
Phelan confident in political future as challenger emerges.
Posted: Fri, 22 Mar 2024 07:00:00 GMT [source]
But he voluntarily resigned after the GOP lost badly in the 2006 midterms, a defeat Bush called "a thumpin' " at the time. The Los Angeles Police Department arrested approximately 50 protestors at the University of Southern California after campus police gave a dispersal order to demonstrators, according to a CNN crew at the scene. Regardless of the outcomes in the upcoming runoff election and potential speakership battle, Phelan has already made a reluctant piece of House history in being forced into a runoff. "Dade Phelan has dodged debates since the beginning of the race for Texas House District 21," Covey said on Thursday in announcing his newest campaign ad. "Why? Dade Phelan can’t defend his liberal record to the people of Southeast Texas."
But conservative grassroots activists said the House had not gone far enough on conservative priorities like banning gender-affirming care for transgender children and have often butted heads with Phelan. Critics attacked him for appointing Democrats to leadership positions in the chamber, following a long-held chamber tradition to appoint members of the minority party as committee chairs. Phelan has not budged on the issue, indicating he once again plans to allow some Democratic chairs and arguing that the Texas House operates better on a bipartisan basis and eschewing the divisiveness seen in Washington, D.C. Phelan guided the House through the 2021 legislative sessions, which some observers called “the most conservative” in state history.
Lindsey Graham Shrugs Off ‘Catch-and-Kill’ Scheme to Help Trump Win Election

Technically, he died as speaker, but his party lost its majority before the next Congress convened and elected a Democrat to the job. Ryan, then just 45, was the youngest speaker in nearly 150 years but had already been party's vice presidential nominee on the 2012 ticket. Once he had Boehner's job, however, he experienced much the same internal strife. Ryan also had a strained relationship with then-President Donald Trump, with whom he had a falling out during the fall 2016 campaign. In April 2018, Ryan said he would not serve another term and left as the party was losing its majority that fall.
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The most recent Democrat, however, is Nancy Pelosi, still a House member and the House speaker emerita. She comes in at fifth on the longevity roster, having served one day shy of eight years from 2007 to 2011 and again from 2019 to 2023. The list of the 10 speakers who served in the job longest includes just one Republican (and in the ninth slot at that). That speaker was Joseph G. Cannon of Illinois, notorious as the autocratic "Czar Cannon" during three two-year tours as speaker that ended with his party's historic defeat in 1910.
Last week, I read a story about the local county hospital joining the 60% of rural Texas hospitals that no longer deliver babies. We should not leave this session without a firm commitment to reversing this trend. Because in my dictionary, the definition of "pro-life" includes ensuring access to affordable healthcare for all, especially Texas mothers and their babies. "It is a privilege to serve as a member of this distinguished body, and I am once again humbled by the opportunity to serve as Speaker of the Texas House," Phelan said in his opening day remarks.
Here you can find more information about the 150 men and women who represent house districts across the great State of Texas, as well as how to contact your Representative and stay up to date on the important work they are conducting on Texans' behalf. Joe Biden does not plan to visit Columbia University when he visits New York on Friday, White House and campaign officials told CNN. But the protesters are also calling for an academic boycott, which would end collaborations with Israeli universities and the establishment of a new Palestinian Studies program. Now in its third day, the protest encampment at UC Berkeley has steadily grown. Campus officials have also dismantled Palestinian solidarity encampments set up earlier today by students who are demanding for USC to divest from Israel, along with a ceasefire in Gaza where Israeli forces have killed more than 34,000 Palestinians.
The party settled on Ways and Means Chairman Paul Ryan of Wisconsin, who had not sought the gavel but agreed to take it. Like Johnson an era later, Hastert was a relatively quiet member of the leadership who enjoyed goodwill generally in the rank and file. Hastert was speaker through the last two Clinton years and first six of the George W. Bush presidency.
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