Texas Bullpen Podcast
Listen to the weekly Texas Bullpen podcast to stay up to date on all things Texas politics with hosts Brad Johnson, Jonathan Richie, and Cassi Schredder, along with special guests.
Texas Bullpen Podcast
Democrats Party on the Corpus Christi Bay - Episode 36
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Brad and Cassi recap the themes of, and fights during the 2026 Texas Democratic Party convention, and touch on some of the other Legislature-related happenings last week.
Good morning, everybody, and welcome to another episode of the Texas Bullpen Podcast. Apologies for the lateness of this episode, scheduling conflicts, me being in corpus at the convention, Richie leaving early for a wedding. It uh it it threw a wrench into the normal timing of this, but we're getting this out today. Uh Cassie and I are recording on Sunday afternoon. This should be going out Sunday evening uh as far as timelines. So it's uh we'll just get on with it.
SPEAKER_01I mean, it this was I mean there's a lot going on.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_01There's a lot going on. I think that it was really fascinating to read, you know, the reporting that you and and Richie uh had in in this week's, this past week's Daily Bowls about the convention. But one thing that I was thinking about is like if you had to explain the Texas Democratic Convention to an out-of-state friend, and you're not holding anything back, like you're just like, what are you saying?
SPEAKER_03Well, the takeaway that shocked me that I was surprised about most, um, you know, uh these conventions are the most active activists in each party. So you get a certain kind of person. Uh there were some crazy things we Richie and I overheard at uh restaurants uh before and during the convention. Uh there was also uh just your your your typical fights um that happened between different interest groups. Like there was a very fascinating fight over Israel-Palestine, and uh one side pretty clearly won on that. Um but so any the there were examples of that over at the Republican side too. But the thing that stuck with me more than anything else that I was shocked by was that it was a much older, uh rel at least relatively older uh attendance base than the Republican one, which I was very surprised by.
SPEAKER_01Interesting. Okay.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. I'm not sure of the reason for that, but um it was a smaller pool, so this was about just under 3,000. The Republican one was about was more than double that. Um you know, the the party, the Democratic Party had marketed this as there was a one email they sent out where they said 15,000 delegates. No way in hell they were close to that.
SPEAKER_02Okay.
SPEAKER_03Um that seems like a ridiculous projection to begin with, even in the the best of times for them. Uh but this was a pretty standard, it seemed, attendance level. Um and you know, if you if you look at the the the arena they were using in corpus, there were a lot of empty seats, uh particularly up in the higher levels. Um, but it was not sparsely attended either. Uh but it very weirdly, it was a lot older. It was very strange. Um of course there were young kids there of uh as usual, um, a lot of operatives, campaign staffers, things like that. But uh yeah, it it was very shocking, I thought. Um so I'd say that's my takeaway, big takeaway.
SPEAKER_01Okay.
SPEAKER_03Then there was this classic, you know, unity. I yeah, I I heard this so much at the Republican side, and uh Democrats did it as well. I just feel like the word unity is pouring out of out of my ears because I've heard it so much. I mean, it's just everyone's trying to make fetch happen with this, and nobody's really united. Uh the Republican side, you have this ongoing feud between uh corn voters and the rest of the Republicans who are all like either the pro-Paxan or uh indifferent and just backing the nominee. Uh they're still fighting over this. They're just trying to speak unity into existence, really. Uh Democrats have the same thing, and one of the big ones is with uh black voters, uh, particularly in relation to Jasmine Crockett uh losing, and she did not show up. Neither did Colin Allred. Um it it it stuck out like a sore thumb, and then you had Jelana Jones go up and give her speech.
SPEAKER_01Texas House member.
SPEAKER_03Texas House member, uh a black Houston representative, and she's uh half of her speech was spent on uh saying that you know you still need you have work to do to earn our votes back, um and you need to to give us resources and and things like that in order for to earn our our support back. You can't you need our votes, uh ours being uh black Democrats, and you need them to show up, and so you have to take that seriously. And uh I'm not sure what exactly uh Tal Rico isn't doing uh other than just giving up the nomination to Jasmine Crockett uh uh in order to earn the votes. Uh um, but it's uh that was a very strange that was kind of the that was the version of Corney v. Paxton among the Democrats at this event.
SPEAKER_01For sure. So Congressman Crockett was not there. Did her campaign give a reason why?
SPEAKER_03Well she she said she had to be up in DC for votes, but there were plenty of congressional members there for votes and committee hearings. I think there are plenty of congressional members there. Joaquin Castro was there. He near nearly ran on the statewide ticket, ultimately decided not to, ran for re-election. I saw him walking around. Plenty of that. It that was a convenient excuse, clearly. She did not want to go because it's sour grapes. And, you know, like uh Cornyn didn't show up at the Republican convention, at least not that I saw. And though those after such a heated, contentious primary, those wounds are clearly still fresh. And so um it was a yeah, it was a convenient excuse for her not to be there. But um yeah, we'll see how how the Talo Rico campaign solves this quandary, because um the a lot of the the black representatives are being very outspoken about this, um, including Jolana Jones who's saying it flat out on stage on the main stage at convention.
SPEAKER_01So has the Taller Rico campaign or the candidate himself like been asked a question to this to this extent? Press gaggles, like I don't know, did did uh did Taller Rico do a press gaggle at the convention or a press event?
SPEAKER_03No, not that I saw. Um But you know, he said like we are when he he has been asked this before and he gave a fairly vanilla response of we are reaching out and we want we welcome you, we welcome Jasmine Crockett supporters into this coalition because for them that you know they they know they need their votes in order to they need to maximize every bit of the base as possible and persuade people persuade crossover voters in order to even have a chance in this election. Uh so I mean it it they're they're trying, I'm sure, and um you know I'm sure they're pull pull out all the stops, but it's uh clearly still anger, there's still a lot of anger there.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, right. Okay, so that's intra-party anger that you just in terms of thematic elements that you witnessed at the convention. And then there was also, of course, like you know, just Dems taking the opportunity to criticize Republicans. Oh yeah. And you had two House members, right? State Representative Vince Perez and Anna Maria Ramos talk about House Republicans during their speeches. Is that right? Okay, what are the details there?
SPEAKER_03So first was Anna Maria Ramos, and of course she ran for speaker last uh last cycle and in 25, uh she finished third behind Burroughs and David Cook. Um I think she probably got 15 to 20 votes. So it she wasn't close to winning. But she got a lot of the the progressive Democrats who, much like the hard right Republicans, do not want to give do any power sharing. They don't want to participate uh because in their mind the other party is despicable and um should does not deserve to have any any power. Um so they're kind of an inverse of or a mirror image of each other from different parties. But Ramos gets up there and she um she goes at Burroughs and she calls him uh not just a a Trump, a Trumper, not just a uh right-wing uh hard rider, uh, but also calls him anti-immigrant, calls him anti-woman, uh some pretty personal attacks. And um it uh it it highlighted a lot of the growing displeasure with Burroughs and House leadership as things occurred last cycle, last year, um, among especially the more progressive wing of the Democratic Party. Um and I think we're gonna see a larger contingent of members that do not vote for the Republican uh Speaker as kind of a protest vote. And Anna Marie Ramos will for sure be part of that. Uh whether she's um running for speaker again or not, I don't know. But um then followed following her was Vince Perez, El Paso Democrat. He gave a speech towards, I think it was towards the end of session or it was during the redistrict, I think it was during the redistricting stuff when that map finally passed that just did not hold back on Republicans. Um and he has uh kind of taken that that tact, that lane, um unlike let's say Joe Moody, who is also from El Paso, Mary Gonzalez as well, also from El Paso, who have not been as not nearly as antagonistic towards House leadership because you know they're they're either on the periphery of it or they from a democratic side are part of it. Um but uh Perez is is not going that route and he is uh standing up on stage and with the thing he said that caught the most attention was uh the time to be cordial with our Republican colleagues in the House is over. Oh yeah. Um that's uh particularly when you get to session, 140 days together, that's a pretty strong statement. And what that means in terms of actions in the moment when we get there, I don't know exactly. But uh that that again highlights how upset a lot of Democrats are with how things played out last year.
SPEAKER_01So both Perez and Ramos were essentially trying to argue in their speeches just that House Democrats have gotten the short end of the stick under uh House Speaker uh Dustin Burroughs. Yes.
SPEAKER_03Okay, and then they just were kind of Well, also mm I I didn't mention this, but Ramos she didn't just go at Burroughs, she also criticized the Democrats who voted for him. And if you remember, of course, he was a majority Democratic elected speaker um in 25, and then he kind of then he short up his right flank and he governed. He didn't govern like a Democratic majority elected speaker, he governed like a uh near unanimous or very s highly uh Republican majority speaker. Um and I think that's probably if he if things don't go horrendously bad for Republicans this cycle, then that is gonna be the the governing coalition he's gonna have is uh almost all Republicans voting for him, maybe Sans one in particular. But um yeah, it uh it it was very strong language aimed at the um the House Speaker and and and other Democrats, uh many of whom were at the convention who voted for Burroughs.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. One thing that I think could be kind of interesting here, and I would love your uh much more informed opinion on this, is you know, just how big of a block could an Anna Maria Dramos type of lawmaker uh you know, how b how big could we be talking here? Are we talking one dozen House Democrats? I think more than that. Um and what is the range of what we could be working with depending on how November goes, you know? So I'm I'm sure it's probably a pretty wide range. And then the follow-up to that would be okay, if we're talking about two dozen Anne Maria Ramoses um in the Dem caucus, is that enough to, you know, fundamentally shift the ideology the the ideologically shift the caucus in a way to where, you know, I think House Democrats have for the most part been pretty, you know, scattered on issues. You have your leadership part of the pat uh of the group, right? Um you're talking about Mary Gonzalez, Joe Moody, right? Like there's uh a coalition. Oscar Longoria, the more the more moderate. Right. So I mean, if we're talking about two dozen Anna Maria Ramoses, is that enough to, you know, convince the caucus that they don't need to be at all uh voting for a Dustin Burroughs, right?
SPEAKER_03Uh I uh you will still see Democrats vote for the winner, which let's just say it's Burroughs. As of now, he's the only one running for speaker again.
SPEAKER_01Right. Um all necessary caveats, yes.
SPEAKER_03Yes. But I think you're gonna see a a significantly larger group of members protest vote uh as Democrats. Um now that doesn't mean that they'll wage perpetual war throughout session. Um, you know, we often see men like take Ramon Romero, um head of the Mexican American Legislative Caucus. He, I believe, was a Ramos voter uh for speaker.
SPEAKER_01In twenty twenty five.
SPEAKER_03In twenty twenty-five. Um I do not think he ended up voting for Burroughs but he during session became a very pivotal go-between and negotiator but between Democrats, particularly the Malk Democrats, and the House leadership. Um he wasn't acting as a burn it all down, Brian Harrison or Anna Ria Ramos type, you know. So just because they vote one way as a protest vote doesn't mean they're gonna act that way. But with how mad Democrats are, uh I think you will see uh a lot more than normal both vote for whoever the Democrat can Democratic candidate is and uh just try and you know throw wrenches into the legislative gears during session because they feel like they were wronged last year. Um so uh you know, another example is that in the chair race, you had Kendall Scudder win by a large he won with like 80% of the votes.
SPEAKER_01He's the incumbent or he was already the chairman.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, and the question was whether Monique Alcala could drum up enough um opposition to uh to Scudder in order to make a run at it. And it seemed like that was possible. You know, the Scudder has has his uh enemies within the party. He's very close with Texas Majority Pack, which has rankled a lot of uh uh Democrats who aren't in the cool kids club uh in terms of that. Also, um there's just always a group of people who think the current chair is not doing enough, not doing the right things um to uh to combat, to oppose the other party. Um but in the end, Scudder won by a quite a margin. A lot of uh a lot of that from what I heard on the ground was that uh Monique, she ran Colin Allred's campaign in 24, that a lot of Democrats are still very unhappy about how that how that went.
SPEAKER_01She was campaign manager?
SPEAKER_03I think she was campaign manager, yeah. And if not, she was an advisor. Uh and so I think it sounded like that hurt her quite a bit, and the more people found out about that. Um but Scutter gets another two years. More importantly than that, he gets the rest of this election cycle. It would have been very strange to me to see that Democrats willingly throw out current leadership, uh, you know, to one degree or another, destabilize the situation in the middle of this election cycle that stands to be pretty good for them, and they decided not to do that. Um but yeah, that w uh uh oh yeah, what I was saying on this was Scudder came out and s and uh urged Democrats to not vote for Burroughs for speaker.
SPEAKER_01During his what acceptance speech?
SPEAKER_03No, it in in the lead up to the the convention like weeks before he made a statement about or I think he wrote a letter saying that Democrats should not play along with House Le Republican leadership. And uh Alcala did not take that approach. She was more we need to stay out of this, out of speaker politics. That's really interesting. Yeah. Um and c one side of that clearly won. Now that wasn't the only factor here, but yeah, uh that shows you where things are going within the party apparatus.
SPEAKER_02For sure.
SPEAKER_03The other one more thing about the Scudder election. While Scudder won, there was actually uh quite a number of anti-Scutter uh candidates elected to the Senate, uh the the uh State Democratic Executive Committee, the executive committee that oversees the party, uh other than the chairman. And so that'll be an interesting theme to watch. Does does that cause problems for him running the next or overseeing this apparatus for the next two years? It also shows that it wasn't a clear um there were there were probably more problems with Scudder's opposition that outweighed the uh the displeasure with him uh that we did see play heavily down down ballot in these other races.
SPEAKER_01So that's really interesting. Uh if you're listening closely, you might have just heard Brad snap his fingers. Everyone must know that that was directed at his dog. He's whining. I don't know why he's whining. Who has joined us this afternoon for our podcast recording? So yes, fingers were snapped. And they were snapped at a dog.
SPEAKER_03And if you hear any whining, that's you know what that's from.
SPEAKER_01Um okay, so to go back just to this kind of reading the tea leaves, where's the where are things or where do things seem to be heading for, you know, I guess both state parties in a way. We're done with party conventions for the year, right? State party conventions. Now we have the election. I feel like conventions provide a pretty good snapshot of, you know, what you said at the beginning. Like this is almost a base of a base of people who are going to the, you know, who are taking time out of their days to drive to these events. With that said, I mean, was there any sentiment that was present, even to half the level that you're describing with Democrats being anti-Burroughs at the GOP convention in Houston?
SPEAKER_03It was more just anti-Republicans, anti-Ken Paxton, anti-Trump. It the the Burroughs thing is, of course, it it's directionally the same as the broader theme of Republicans suck and they've been running the state for 30 years, and so uh elect us and you know it it hasn't it hasn't worked with them running things, so what can go wrong with you electing us? Uh or what could how could it be worse? Um that's the kind of the case they're making. But no, Burroughs, the Burroughs thing was just more inside baseball specifically with with those House members, you know. Yeah. Um But this you know, Tal Rico, he's tack he's tacking to the middle um because he has to in order so I slipped into a um a Texas majority pack um uh briefing or meeting? Yeah, they basically were having these meetings at the convention. At the convention for delegates to give them kind of an inside look into how they're viewing the ability to win the state. And uh nothing was really groundbreaking, but Texas Majority Pack, uh according to them, they view their role as maximum. base turnout and it's on the candidates to persuade the crossover voters with their messaging. No, it's not just Talarico. We're talking all down ballot. But the math the the the the scenario they came up with was excuse me with um under a 2018 like scenario according to TMP Democrats would still be five hundred thousand votes short of uh winning this a statewide seat being namely being the Senate race. And so they are their theory of the case is and I heard this so many times and I think it's I think it it's more lip service and preaching to the choir than anything because I don't think they these people actually believe it. They're s far too smart. And I also that the guys I talk to that are at these upper levels of of democratic strategy, they think it's silly too. But you keep hearing over and over again Texas is not a red state it's a non-voting state. Just not true. And if that is actually their guiding philosophy, I think that is a flawed way of approaching this. In this briefing TMP was saying that you know we that 5000 it is really just eight percent of the nonvoting population of Texas. So if we can get put all of our resources in and get eight percent of that then we'll win as Democrats. And that of course will drive success down ballot candidates' actions don't don't reflect that because they know they have to Talarico tacking to the middle no me shows that he knows he can't just maximize Democratic based turnout and win. He has to persuade independence and soft Rs to cross over uh by either making Paxton untenable or making himself more moderate and um appealing or both. And so I I don't buy that that is their actual view of this race. But as far as the numbers go, yes, if they do net 500,000 more votes under this uh projection, then they win a seat. They win a statewide seat. And that would be huge for them of course and you know Republicans started slowly turning the state when John Tower took the seat in what was that the 70s I think um they basic basically set a uh they gained ground and dug a trench right there and they never lost it and they continued building upon that. Well that's what Democrats are hoping to do this cycle particularly with this uh U.S. Senate seat but um I was yeah I was kind of shock I was kind of surprised to hear that slogan come out of the uh TMP operatives' mouths because it's just not that was Crockett's whole philosophy in this race in the primary and it did not work out for her. I remember in the first poll that her campaign put out I was on the in the briefing uh about it and sh her poll her poster said the same thing and look what happened. I mean I think it just shows a a misunderstanding of the state um if they actually believe that wow okay thank you for that so how long were you in the briefing for? Uh about forty five minutes. Oh yeah okay that's exciting um yeah it was it was interesting I don't remember Republicans ever doing something like that for their delegates. So um clearly it was an attempt to to build up belief and show these average activists who they need to be mobilized in their communities to get all these people to vote. Show them that you know that this stuff's being taken seriously.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. Okay this is my last convention related question and then we can move on to news out of Austin. Did you go to the um Abbott campaign's taco truck? They were what? Like the campaign was just trying to run some counter programming at the convention?
SPEAKER_03Yeah they had various things they had the taco truck with some pejoratively labeled uh tacos for Talerico um also they had handed out these squish balls that were that are poop emojis um they also had a live Longhorn bowl there that had on the side of it don't believe the bowl. So it was just there was a press conference as well with uh four Republican lawmakers it does doesn't do anything drummed up some attention on social media it it's just it was more organized than any opposition that I saw from Democrats at Republican convention but like it ultimately it's not gonna move any kind of needle. But uh uh it was it was pretty comical I'll say that um before we move on I I do want to touch on one of the biggest themes that I saw uh biggest uh events really was the Bernie speech the closing speech at convention and it I'm viewing this from the the lens of okay repo Democrats really feel like they have a shot and they do have a shot you see the um they're they're top of the ticket tacking to the middle trying to make himself more more moderate relatively and their lead their capstone uh speech is one of the most progressive left calls himself a democratic socialist uh officials in the entire country and he talked like it too and really it was I was sitting there with some other reporters and I'm like I've heard this speech many times because it's the same speech he's been giving since he ran for president in uh 2016 but he ran through all kinds of you know is his classic tax the rich um uh build up labor unions um all these very uh progressive full uh ideas and policy desires the one that got the most reaction out of any of them uh in terms of an applause line was to not give uh any more military aid to Israel and that was a huge fight at this at this event um there was um one of the I forget who it was but one of the the party officers who was overseeing one uh either platform or uh rules or whatever it was goes got up and give just mentioned the report that had been sent by the committees and he says uh well hold on first I I forgot something and he takes a Palestinian flag shawl and puts it over his neck um contrast that with another meeting that I was in earlier that day was a Jewish coalition uh Democratic Jewish coalition group and they were talking about the guy who actually um oversaw the platform is Jewish his name's Adam Schwartz he's a JP I forget from where uh he's an interesting looking dude uh he looked like kind of a white trash Mario uh he was wearing a red tank top a red ball cap he had facial hair kind of like Mario um when I saw him talking it's just very funny. Uh but he uh he gives the report about like what they were doing to try and prevent the uh the really anti hugely anti-Israel language from going in the platform uh and and wanting to preserve language for a two-state solution. This is clearly a very a huge pressure point within the party. We know that uh but again that's an example of um you know the the party especially the activists really tacking left on this specific issue rather than sticking to something that might be palatable for a a broad brush of of their their base. And you know the Jewish voters are are more and more it's not like republic they're all Republicans are even close to majority Republican, but we are seeing more and more Jewish Democrats get um disaffected from this heavily pro-Palestinian anti-Israel uh messaging in the um in the in in the upper echelons of the party and the the the more avid activist space uh within these these gatherings and the fact that Bernie's biggest applause line was on this shows that um that's another uh another thing that they have to uh deal with um in terms of trying to win a red state and that's not really gonna help them um particularly if it's emphasized so uh I thought that was interesting uh clearly the fact that they picked Bernie to be the the key note speaker on the the closing day of uh the event it shows you that you know the the progressives still own the Democratic Party um and I think they're because of what happened last year they're getting even more disaffected with Republican majority uh which is giving them license to go left and you know it I don't see how that pays off super well for them uh in this election but you know Hope Springs eternal maybe it does so thank you for sharing your insights yeah I mean that's what that that is what I'm here for um uh I don't let me see oh yeah one more thing to mention about this the democratic platform was democratic platform and a lot of the speeches were very anti-data center which does kind of lead us into uh some of the things that were happening in Austin this past week but um it was it it matched up the polling that came out last week from UT that showed gosh it was like eighty ninety percent of Democrats are opposed to to data centers it matched up that what I saw there was uh proof that that number is is totally accurate because they were almost across the board against this uh very strong language in the platform against data centers for moratoriums um and uh it was it was one of the things I was watching and um it's this is a bipartisan problem for the the data center lobby.
SPEAKER_01For sure that's interesting. Okay.
SPEAKER_03I think that's all I got about conventional anti-data centers okay yeah okay well thanks for making actually actually no sorry I got one more oh man yeah there's a lot there's a lot of stuff that happened yeah so uh I I should have mentioned this with the Bernie thing one of the other things he he said in his speech along the lines of the the very progressive left uh positioning was that we need a transition to sustainable energy well earlier John Rosenthal gets up and gives his speech and he was introduced by Hawk Dunlap who was third or fourth place in the Republican primary for Railroad Commission. Dunlap ran as a libertarian in 24, uh ran as Republican this time and leading up to the convention they made a big show and deal about Dunlap endorsing Rosenthal over BeauFrench and that showing that you know this is the moment of bipartisan ship elect the guy as they say that's more qualified the argument is that BeauFrench is not um and Democrats really feel like that's because of French's uh bombast in public they feel like they can win that seat. I'll believe it when I see it uh Rosenthal has struggled to raise money but maybe that comes in um and maybe it's supplemented by let's say Texas majority packs $30 million they say they have for this cycle uh but Rosenthal gets up and his speech is a lot different than what Bernie said on the issue Rosenthal was we need to be Texas needs to lead the way in all of the above energy uh and that includes specifically he said he didn't just skirt over it he said natural gas he said oil um he also said wind and solar and there's a two that's two different paths for this um and and of course Bernie's not the one running for office in the state talerico Hinahosa Goodwin Rosenthal E.T. all are are are the ones doing that um but you know can does the party base can they abide a statewide candidate specifically supporting uh fossil fuel energy when it's been such a hobby horse of of the Democratic Party and particularly uh the progressive wing of it to be anti-fossil fuels um I I don't know if it's gonna affect anything um but it was an interesting dynamic there between the two um in terms of how they're approaching this and but and who wins out who's the who's the the guiding light for uh Texas Democrats and you hear constantly Democrat from Texas Democrats they realize that the the National Party has an image problem in Texas and that's why they act differently or they try to act differently hard to do that when your keynote speaker is Bernie Sanders you know so I think that's all I got on the convention unless you have anything else you want me to touch on. You're probably sick of hearing me talk about it.
SPEAKER_00Hi everyone we'd like to thank the sponsor of today's podcast the Lowy Law Firm for over 20 years Adam Lowy has helped injured Texans recover and heal. From car accidents to dog bites Adam Lowy is there to help and gets results. Go to LowyLawfirm.com to find out more and get a free consultation. Adam of course is very well known on Twitter for his commentary and observations on Texas politics so be sure to give him a follow as well.
SPEAKER_01Thanks to our sponsor the Lowy Law Firm I wouldn't say that but you know there was other news in Texas this week so some state lawmakers were at the Capitol right this past week uh for some interim committee hearings and is it just essentially that they that the committees that did meet just rehashed data center issue insurance issue is just kind of more of the same or was there anything new out of these hearings?
SPEAKER_03Okay I'm sure there were some uh some minor things like for example on the in the data center one which was natural resources uh chaired by Cody Harris uh I think it was Brad Buckley that pointed out that uh only twenty-three percent of the d the developers of data centers looking to come and build in in the state filled out a report in terms of water needs electricity needs things like that that was sent out by the state and Buckley's point is that well that's incomplete data how do we make any decisions with that little that that small number of respondents um you know we're hearing that the the the demand projection if all these things that have filed for interconnection if they were all approved and built which is not it will not happen but if they did our electricity demand would jump above 4000 gigawatts or sorry 400 gigawatts right now we're around a hundred gigawatts so four times the amount of energy that we'd need to support it uh and so you know Buckley's argument was how can we make any decision with that little amount of information about what these projects need and so I think that was the big one on um on data centers but yeah it was it was mostly rehashing what we've heard in business in commerce in uh state affairs and there'll be more discussions of this on the insurance side uh I don't think there was much new um it was a pretty standard discussion uh the insurance commissioner came in and testified uh you had a lot of um there were some policy recommendations made specifically about they brought in this guy from Alabama who is a professor at University of Alabama and he studies this and Alabama has fixed its after a hurricane they've they revamped their insurance regulatory system and it apparently has worked pretty well and they asked him what the best things to do were and he said one of them was to mandate uh better building standards uh so for example requiring fortified roofs so that if a hail storm or a windstorm hits your roof doesn't get damaged by the hail or uh blown off by the wind or tornado or hurricane or whatever it is. Um but then you had a representative of of the Builders Association come in and say we already do that and we're still seeing costs go up and up and up and up and um one thing they did kind of settle on um in terms of the witnesses that were testifying not the the lawmakers uh although Schwarten was kind of egging this on and in trying to build the case for bringing back up tort reform um you know the the insurance in industry is is a mess because costs are rising across the board and the cost for replacing a car replacing a roof or an entire house because the materials are pricier it costs more to do that. And so therefore uh you need to raise premiums in order to pay for that because that's how insurance works. Well another cost contributor is that um is is the the lawsuit issues particularly uh not even the issuance of nuclear ver so-called nuclear verdicts but the threat of getting one what it has caused is a lot of these insurance companies are deciding to settle disputes uh pretty quickly rather than fight it in court and so if you're thinking about the amount of money that's that's paid out in these you can either uh come uh challenge the lawsuit and maybe you win and then your payouts zero and that will probably happen or have a small payout that'll probably happen more often than not but you could also get a $10 billion nuclear verdict levied against you and so what they're doing is they're raising the bar of constant payouts because of uh increased rate of settlement but they're not getting hit with the m the uh the extreme but that causes uh uh premiums to rise uh because that has to be paid for um now an argument that has been made in the other way is that the uh the insurance companies they had record profits last year yet premiums are still going up this is one thing discussed in the hearing the counter from them is that well we're indexing this year's premium over a five year projection of payouts of expected damage and last year was in Texas apparently a a very low uh low point for damage uh property damage you know you had the flood that we've talked about a lot but it as far as hurricanes and other other uh uh stone kinds of storms wildfires that hasn't that did not happen to the level that we saw in the years before twenty twenty five so it was actually a pretty small so that's the reason According to them, that the profits that last year were so high because they raised premiums expecting a high payout year like they have had the previous years, but they didn't. And so uh the higher rate premiums just netted them more money. A lot of discussion on this. This is going to be one of the top issues in the state next year. Um it's a very weedy, convoluted, complicated one, but it uh it is it it matters. I mean, the affordability issue is huge politically, and one of the biggest aspects of that is insurance premiums.
SPEAKER_01So um well, thank you for your little explainer.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_01That was very helpful. Anything else to say about the interim hearings, or shall we get to our last topic?
SPEAKER_03Yeah, let's move on to the last topic because it does it is related to what we just kind of talked about.
SPEAKER_01Yes, in related news. You wrote about a new white paper from that was published by TCI.
SPEAKER_03TCCRI.
SPEAKER_01And um it just seems to have implications on you know this tort reform topic.
SPEAKER_03It was specifically about yeah, I mean it's it's kind of foreshadowing what will be sought and the fights we'll have next year. You know, white these white papers, they make arguments. The only it doesn't really matter unless people listen to it and just decide to act on whatever it is that they're arguing. Um but it I can see read the tea leaves in it a bit in in that they put this paper out. Uh the title is something about you know tort reform in Texas, and specifically on uh the trial attorney lobby that is ramping up its political spending in this state. And we've talked this issue is one of the uh ones we talked about most on this podcast, I think. But uh the twist I saw here is that first of all, that paired with what Schwartner said in the insurance committee, um it it shows they're gonna bring back SB 30, I think. Uh maybe it won't be exactly as it was. Uh I'm sure they'll have adjustments. SB 30 was the so-called nuclear verdicts bill, at least as it was originally filed. When it finally got to the floor, it basically just became a a medical-related uh uh uh piece of legislation because the opposition was just so staunch to anything uh related to non-economic damages. But that was the recommendation in this in this paper, which is a Republican, uh conservative, uh friendly think tank, um was to to bring that back, to take try another stab at that. Also, they recommended looking at, I think it was a Shaheen bill about election law, something about um uh a timeline for challenging for investigating uh election fraud problems. I I don't think I mean for the people that authored it, for the people that supported it, it's a consequential bill, but it kind of stuck out as odd to me. Uh uh very strange stuck out like a sore thumb to be included in this. So I started thinking about it, and the only conclusion I could come to on this uh was that on the tort reform stuff, one of the big issues that caused problems for the pro-tort reform side, TLR, any of the others that supported this, was uh the general feud with Paxton as Attorney General and the supporting of Court of Criminal Appeals justices who either wrote or were in the majority for the Stevens decision. And that Stevens decision was the the finding that uh the Attorney General couldn't just go prosecute election fraud. Excuse me. He had to get he had to be invited in to do that from county TAs. And in my mind, that was the only explanation for why it was included in um in this paper about tort reform in in the trial lawyer lobby. But um overall it it it could fuck shit.
SPEAKER_02Okay.
SPEAKER_03Okay, three, two, one. Overall, it it it sets the table, along with a few other things, for what's gonna come next session on this fight uh that will probably be uh pretty significant and pretty heated again as it was last year.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, totally, totally. Thank you, Brad, for letting me join the podcast today and for walking us through everything. I mean, we covered a lot of ground.
SPEAKER_03You've covered a lot of ground on what uh as you were getting uh uh uh things from us, tidbits from us about Kadem Convention, what uh and seeing stuff on social media, what stuck out to you?
SPEAKER_01A lot of what you said, like I was just kind of going through and I was like, oh, that I remember seeing, or you know, hearing that or reading that. Um I just I think it's it's just what I said earlier, which is that you just have every couple of years a really good opportunity to get a read into what the state parties like where they're both at, right? Because they just they seem to go through massive evolutions between election cycles, right? With new party chairs. Um, I mean, wasn't James Dickey like the only recent state party chair who served more than one term?
SPEAKER_03Uh am I wrong?
SPEAKER_01Just in recent memory, because I'm thinking it's Alan West, Rinaldi, Abraham, and I mean they've all just served, right? I might be doing I might be missing something.
SPEAKER_03I think you're right. Uh although did did Dickie Yeah Dickey was elected in a special election, right, in 17.
SPEAKER_01I think that's right.
SPEAKER_03So he won one term.
SPEAKER_01He You're right, you're right.
SPEAKER_03So that would that same thing would apply to uh Rinaldi, who was elected to replace West in a special election at the SREC and then won a term.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, you're right.
SPEAKER_03But still, I mean your point stands that I think the last one we've had that served full multiple terms was Steve Ministeri.
SPEAKER_01Right.
SPEAKER_03Wild. And first of all, it's a very unpleasant job. Why would anyone and first of all, nobody enjoys doing it, but why would ever anyone want to do it? Uh and so you end up with uh, you know, uh a smaller talent pool for these positions, and then you get just the the really anti-incumbent flavor of these activists uh that does play in time and time again, you know, personalities clash, uh policy decisions aren't uh viewed well.
SPEAKER_01And also just in terms of like party apparatus, you know, I know that more like certain party chairs for for both parties, right, have been more organized on fundraising and helping down ballot candidates and offering some sort of party infrastructure to help candidates that they want to recruit to run for office, right? Like just the quality of those contributions um or that you know, those roles, I guess, that the state party is supposed to play. Like that can vary widely from cycle to cycle. So all I was meaning to say with my point was that it's interesting to hear your reporting and your observations and Richie's and every other reporter that was there because you just get a a good feel for where that that base is. And that's interesting heading into what I know we say it, it seems like we say it every two years, like wow, like really a big election year. But the reality is every single election is consequential and has implications. So, yes, of course, it's November's gonna be a big deal.
SPEAKER_03I am quite sick, though, of hearing this is the most consequential election of our lifetime. Every election. I know, both, yeah, absolutely. Both parties are guilty of it. Yes. It's just ridiculous. Yes. Everyone, every election is the most consequences. Come on, no. I know, I know. Come on, I know. Yes. All right.
SPEAKER_01Um so that that was interesting to me, but it'll just be something interesting, you know, to see continue to develop. Um as you know, we head into November. Yeah, that's all.
SPEAKER_03And how do we already saw Ken Paxton uh break with his party on one thing, which was the IVF uh plank of opposing IVF. Right. We'll see. Undoubtedly, some of the stuff put in this democratic platform used against Telerico, and he'll probably distance himself from those. Uh it it's the natural give and take of an election cycle where you have a heavily activist democrat or party convention on either side, and then a competitive midterm uh or a competitive general election where you have to crossover voters are important, you have to get them. Um and so uh it's it's it's a bit of a dance between the two the within the strategy of how to market to the the base and how to market to the crossover general election voters. Uh it's always interesting to see how these candidates bob and weave that.
SPEAKER_01Yes, I agree. But I think that now you have to kind of like go take a Benadryl or something, right? Laughing attacks. Yeah.
SPEAKER_03I have to go uh shoot myself.
SPEAKER_01No, no, that was a joke. I would not do that. That was a joke. Um well thank you. Thank you.
SPEAKER_03Have a good time. Thanks for joining, and uh hopefully we get this out pretty quickly. I think we will, and um yeah, we'll be back next week as we always are. Oh, I know.
SPEAKER_01Which what are you doing for the fourth of July?
SPEAKER_03Uh finding a pool somewhere and probably drinking a lot of alcohol.
SPEAKER_01Oh you know, water's good, everyone's gonna be.
SPEAKER_03Well, of course, of course. That's what that's what the pool's for, right?
SPEAKER_01Okay. Okay. You and Winston have fun.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, you guys or anything?
SPEAKER_01No.
SPEAKER_03Okay.
SPEAKER_01No, we're just gonna, you know, enjoy the fireworks.
SPEAKER_03Yep, that'll be nice. Um make sure to subscribe at Texasbullpen.com to get all of our offerings, all of our newsletters in your inbox every day. Uh and tell your friends to go either listen to the Texas Bullpen podcast or and actually, and or uh go to TexasBullpen.com and subscribe. Uh, we're growing a lot and it's uh we just want to keep it going. And this is gonna be uh the most important election of our lifetime, followed by the most important legislative session of our lifetime.
SPEAKER_01And don't you forget it.
SPEAKER_03And yes. And uh follow along. We'll be here the whole way. So talk to you next week.