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Today's stories
With something nearing 100% certainty, Governor Abbott's office leaked a voicemail to the Texas Tribune last week to attack a major GOP donor.
Providing cover for the leak is the not so distant cousin of anonymously sourced, "obtained by open record request."
The voicemail, left in June as protests and rioting picked up following the death of George Floyd, is of conservative activist and donor Steve Hotze advocating that rioters and looters be shot on sight.
The call was to Abbott's Chief of Staff, Luis Saenz.
Of late, Hotze has been a consistent critic of the Governor’s response to the coronavirus, suing on multiple occasions to override shutdown and executive orders.
Abbott’s camp working with the media to run the Hotze hit is ironic given the healthy about of derision the press has directed at him of late.
A Houston Chronicle staffer on CNN this weekend decried journalist access to the Governor amidst the pandemic. Without ceding any future ability to mercilessly criticize the Chronicle for being fake news, in this instance, they're right.
Abbott has held limited press conferences, and the ones he has held have been heavy on filibuster and light on insight.
The move on Hotze is just the latest case of a Governor reacting defensively. This trend is likely to continue as the media, which has (until now) handled the two-time Governor with kid gloves, goes negative, and he falters with his base.
ECTOR COUNTY voted to censure Governor Greg Abbott over the weekend for "closing down businesses and mandating masks as in violation of core principles of the Texas Constitution."
Republican State Senator Charles Perry has joined members of the Texas House, including Representatives Biederman, Stickland, Tinderholt, calling for an immediate special session. Abbott has ignored entries for a special session.
JAMES DICKEY and the power-mad clique atop the Texas GOP, by hook or by crook, we're going to have a virtual state convention in 2020.
In an at-times tense meeting of the SREC on Sunday evening, Dickey sneakily midwifed a virtual convention into existence but not without push-back from a body that voted strongly for an in-person gathering last Thursday.
If there's anything, the ordeal has exposed it's that Chairmen need to have their wings clipped, and the SREC needs to work to empower itself going forward.
In addition to working on but keeping the virtual contingency plan secret from the vast majority of SREC members, the Chairman has been in discussions to shorten and limit the scope of the convention.
Also apparent in the rules wrangling from Thursday and again Sunday, the SREC is doing combat on an uneven playing field against a machine funded with party resources acting against the will of its members.
Future iterations of the SREC should dedicate party resources to the retention of general counsel and staff that answers to the SREC and isn't a party leadership lackey.
Hit the links
The rest of UT's latest poll drops at 10 AM
Many fear social isolation more than COVID-19
Mike Hailey amends forecast after critique of Fauci
Simpson's paradox in COVID data?
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Coming up
7/7: Texas Observer
7/15: FEC reports due
7/31: PFS filings due
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