Failed Attempt to Rebuke Lawmakers Riles Texas GOP

The Texas GOP has abandoned an effort to issue an official statement on the 84th legislative session, divided over a proposed resolution that initially would have accused individual lawmakers of standing in the way of gun rights legislation.

The resolution that named legislators never made it out of a committee of the State Republican Executive Committee (SREC), and the full body never voted on a version of it with softer language. But the very prospect of it riled some party leaders, sparking heated debate about the committee's role in the Capitol and seriously complicating party fundraising in at least one instance.

As proposed at the committee level, the resolution would have rebuked four Republican lawmakers for "their refusal to allow Constitutional Carry legislation or amendments to be heard in any form or otherwise debated on the merits of the issue at any time during the 84th session of the Texas Legislature." "Constitutional carry" is the unlicensed carrying of firearms. The legislators named included House Speaker Joe Straus of San Antonio, Rep. Dennis Bonnen of Angleton, Rep. Larry Phillips of Sherman and Sen. Joan Huffman of Houston.

During discussion of the resolution at the SREC's June 6 meeting, chairman Tom Mechler confirmed that a vendor whose fundraising work the party was soliciting had pulled out the day before after catching wind of the resolution.

Read more: http://www.texastribune.org/2015/06/13/texas-gop-scuttles-legislative/