Worst 10 Texas House Members on LGBT Issues

The 82nd regular session of the Texas Legislature has come to an end. It was perhaps the best legislative session for queer Texans ever, but all was not rosy. Along with major victories on anti-bullying legislation and HIV medication assistance programs some truly hateful legislation was introduced. Fortunately all of the anti-LGBT legislation was, by and large, defeated, but it wasn't thanks to these people, the 10 worst members of the Texas House on LGBT issues:

#140 (tie)

Lois Kolkhorst (R-Brenham)

Score: -4 points Grade: F- Having voted for both HB 1386, the teen suicide prevention bill and HB 2229, which makes permanent the Texas HIV Medication Assistance Committee, Kolkhorst has more good votes on the nine votes used in this scoring than any other member of the bottom ten. He authorship of HB 3098, however, insured her a place amongst the worst of the worst. The bill was the House companion to SB 723 and would have, among other things, banned opposite-sex marriage for people who have had their legally recognized sex changed. Fortunately the bill died in committee.

#140 (tie)

Linda Harper Brown (R-Irving)

Score: -4 Grade F- Harper brown would have managed a perfect set of nine "nay" votes on LGBT issues this session if not for her support SB 2229, which makes permanent the Texas HIV Medication Assistance Committee (although she only voted for it after an amendment allowing a pilot needle exchange program in Bexar county was removed). What really solidified her spot on the bottom ten, however, was her co-authorship of HCR 110 which called on the Obama administration to defend the so-called "defense of marriage act."

#140 (tie)	Four Price (R-Amarillo)
	Score: -4 points Grade: F- Price has an identical voting record to Harper-Brown and the other House member tied for #140th, Charles Schwertner - it's hard hard to say if they were copying from each other, or just playing from the same Teabagger playbook, but anyone who thinks DOMA is in anyway defensible deserves to be on a worst legislators list.

#140 (tie)	Charles Schwertner (R-Georgetown)
	Score: -4 points Grade: F- See above Re: Harper Brown, Price - Schwertner begrudgingly supported making the HIV Medication Advisory Committee permanent after the needle exchange program amendment was removed, and co-authored HCR 110, how unoriginal.

#144 (tie)

Wayne Christian (R-Center)

Score: -10 points Grade: F- Christian manged to be only member of the House to pass anti-LGBT legislation this session with his amendment to require state universities that have LGBT resource centers to equally fund "family and traditional values" centers (the amendment was later removed by the Senate). If not for his "yea" vote on HB 1386, the teen suicide prevention bill, he would have been ranked the worst member in the House, but we have to give the guy some credit for being against teen suicide, right?

#144 (tie)	Erwin Cain (R-Paris)
	Score: -10 points Grade: F- Cain voted against the best interest of the queer community on all nine of the record votes considered in this ranking. That, combined with his co-authorship of HCR 110 (which would have called on the Obama administration to defend the so-called "defense of marriage act") make his ranking as the third worst House member much deserved.

#144 (tie)	Dan Flynn (R-Canton)
	Score: -10 points Grade: F- Like Cain (and Taylor and Zedler (below)), Flynn voted against the best interest of the queer community on all nine of the record votes considered in this ranking and was a co-author of HCR 110.

#144 (tie)	Van Taylor (R-Plano)
	Score: -10 points Grade: F- Like Cain and Flynn (and Zedler (below)), Taylor voted against the best interest of the queer community on all nine of the record votes considered in this ranking and was a co-author on HCR 110.

#144 (tie)	Bill Zedler (R-Arlington)
	Score: -10 points Grade: F- Like Cain, Flynn and Taylor, Zedler voted against the best interest of the queer community on all nine of the record votes considered in this ranking and was a co-author on HCR 110. Seriously, do these guys call each other the night before to make sure that their votes will match?

#149

Warren Chisum (R-Pampa)

Score: -14 points Grade: F- No list of Texas politicians who are bad on LGBT issues would be complete without Warren Chisum, the architect of Texas' version of the so-called "defense of marriage act." Chisum has announced that this will be his last session in the House, but he couldn't leave without throwing a few homophobic punches. Chisum's HB 2636 would have massively expanded the powers of the state Attorney General to interfere in same-sex divorce cases (Chisum himself attempted to interfere in a Dallas same-sex divorce case last year by filing a brief encouraging the judge to declare the divorce illegal). Luckily his attempt to expand the powers of state government died in committee. Only Chisum's support of the Texas HIV Medication Advisory Committee keeps him from taking the throne as the worst House member on LGBT issues.

#150

Paul Workman (R-Austin)

Score: -15 Grade: F- Workman voted yea for "super" anti-bullying bill HB 1942 on one of the two recorded votes on the bill, that's the only good thing you can say about him. In addition to supporting Christian's attempts to defund campus LGBT resource centers Workman managed to out-Chisum, Chisum by filing HCR 110, which encouraged the Obama administration to defend the so-called "defense of marriage act" in court. Although the legislation would have had no binding effect on the federal government (and was defeated) signing on to it as a co-author became the easiest way this session for House members to prove their homophobic bona fides. Thank you, Paul Workman, you made it much easier to spot the bad guys.

The list of the Top 10 Texas House Members on LGBT Issues was published yesterday. We'll publish the full ranking of the 150 members of the House soon, and are working on a similar ranking of the 31 Senators. You can take a look at how LQ arrived at the scores if you'd like and and tell us what you think. Any ranking system like this naturally involves the biases of the people compiling the list. LQ welcomes comments, suggestions, rants and criticisms regarding the rankings

Day 106: Cyber-Bullying, HIV Medication and Unfunded Mandates

Today is the 106th day of the 82nd regular session of the Texas Legislature. Both the House and Senate reconvene at 11 am. Today marks the beginning of the final fourth of session. With just five weeks to go the already harried pace of session is only going to accelerate.

In the broad conversation on legislation designed to combat cyber-bullying HB 1666, by Rep. Joaquin Castro (D-San Antonio) has largely stayed under the radar. By law created in 2009 it is illegal in Texas to create a fake profile on a social network site with the intent to "harm, defraud, intimidate or threaten another person." HB 1666 would expand this prohibition to include other, non-social networking, sites. The original legislation creating this law was written by former Republican Representative Brian McCall and passed with broad bi-partisan support, mostly due to McCall's descriptions of little old ladies being taken in by MySpace scams. But the law might also make schoolyard bullies think twice before setting up fake web pages or profiles designed to humiliate their peers and the logical expansion of its reach to non-social networking sites is welcomed. HB 1666 is scheduled to be debated on the House floor today.

Also scheduled in the House today is HB 2229 by Rep. Garnet Coleman (D-Houston). HB 2229 would make permanent the Texas HIV Medication Advisory Committee. Texas has a program that provides medication assistance to low-income HIV-positive people, which is managed by the Texas Department of State Health Services. The Advisory Committee is made up of Doctors, Pharmacist, Nurses, Care Providers and low-income HIV-positive people in the program. It's designed to provide input from people who are on the ground dealing with the day-to-day functioning of the program.

Earlier this year the Department of State Health Services Commissioner, Dr. David Lakey, declined to renew the Advisory Committee when the rule creating it expired. After a massive outcry from Texans he eventually reappointed the committee and they had their first meeting on April 1st. Coleman's bill is designed to prevent future commissioners from taking similar steps and simply creates in the statute what is already happening. HB 2229 was voted out of committee with only one member objecting (Rep. Van Taylor (R-Plano)). Continuing to do what is already being done doesn't cost the the state anything extra, and allowing people who are directly affected by a program to have input in how it functions makes since.

Over in the Senate SB 205 is on the Intent Calendar (a list of bills Senators intend to bring up for a vote), as is HB 1:

SB 205, by Sen. John Whitmire (D-Houston) is one of several anti-bullying bills filed this session. Currently school districts must create student codes of conduct which are designed, in part, to discourage bullying. Whitmire's bill specifies requirements for the anti-bullying portions of those codes, while still allowing a great deal of leeway for the district (read LQ's original review of SB 205).

HB 1 is the budget. Each regular session versions of the budget are filed in both the House and the Senate as HB 1 and SB 1. The two bodies alternate whose version eventually winds up being the "real" budget, but both have an opportunity to edit and change it. This is a House budget year so HB 1, in some form, will likely become the budget for the State of Texas for the next two years.

When the House was creating the budget Rep. Wayne Christian (R-Center) stuck an amendment on it that requires public universities that have GLBT resource centers to also create, and equally fund, a "Center for Family and Traditional Values." (read LQ's analysis of the floor debate on the amendment). The student Senate at Texas A&M has already passed a resolution supporting funding its "Center for Family and Traditional Values" by cutting the GLBT resource center's budget in half. Given the tight budget at public universities and that Christian did not provide and additional funding as part of his mandate, it is likely that, if the amendment becomes law, other schools will be forced to similarly defund, or eliminate completely, their GLBT resource centers. Which, I'm certain, was Christian's intention. (The full text of the budget is HERE, the Christian amendment is on page 459)

The amendment must be removed in the Senate, which will likely tackle HB 1 this week, or it will become law. After the Senate passes it's version of HB 1 a "conference committee" made up of House and Senate members will meet to hash out compromises between the two bodies' versions of the bill. The conference committee is only permitted to make changes to portions of the budget that are different between the two versions. So if the budget passes the Senate with the Christian amendment still intact the conference committee will be unable to do anything to remove it. This is the last chance, at least for the next two years, for Texans to defend this important campus resource from an unfunded mandate designed to deprive queer college students of one of the few places on campus specifically designed to meet their needs.

You can find the contact information for your Senator HERE.

SB 723, the anti-trans-marriage bill, is still on the Senate's General Calendar, but it is unlikely that it will be voted on this week.