Rep. Richard Raymond, D-Laredo, Takes Tough Stand Against TX Redistricting

Laredo is an economic anchor for the state and nation, but to continue to play that role it must take tough stands, State Rep. Richard Raymond told the Laredo Manufacturers Association members and guests Thursday morning.

The "tough stands" he was talking about are comparable to his and the state Democratic legislators' tough stand with regard to state redistricting.

Raymond was there to give the LMA an overview from his perspective of what has happened at the state level with regard to congressional redistricting, particularly during the regular legislative session, and just before the second special session called this summer by Gov. Rick Perry.

Redistricting is being sought on the Republican side, and opposed on the Democratic side; pretty much down party lines. The push for redistricting is reportedly led by Congressman and House Majority Leader Tom Delay (R-Sugar Land) to give the Republicans a majority of Texas representation in the U.S. House of Representatives, which is a product of elections within the Texas districts.

Since the last redistricting in 2001, following the census, the Republicans have come to control both state houses.

But in May, 51 Democratic representatives (including Raymond) stopped redistricting in regular session by breaking quorum and going to Ardmore, Okla. The decision to take flight was not an easy one, Raymond said, but the group felt it was the only way to effectively protest the Republicans' actions.

Raymond explained that he and several other representatives quietly organized the trip, eventually gathering support from nearly all of the Democrats in the House.

"We had planned to put small groups of five together," Raymond explained. Three of those would be staunch supporters of the plan paired with two others who were less certain about leaving, to ensure that the plan wasn't disrupted at the last minute.

But once they realized the amount of support they had, Raymond and the others decided that all 51 must stick together.

"At first we were going to scatter across the state, but when we realized how many people we had, we realized we had to stick together," Raymond said.

Well, you can't, Raymond said, so they decided they had to leave the state in order to succeed. One representative suggested going across the border to Nuevo Laredo, which at first sounded like a good idea to Raymond.

"I was thinking what a benefit it would be (to Laredo), all the hotel rooms and the publicity," when the press began covering the story, Raymond said jokingly.

But he felt the group should stay in the country. Another suggestion would have taken the group to Lake Charles, La., but that had problems of its own. For one, they were concerned that Louisiana has a Republican governor.

"We didn't want photos getting out of Democrats in front of the slot machines," Raymond said with a laugh.

So when someone suggested a little place they knew of called Ardmore in Oklahoma, the question was, "What's there?"

It sounded like the perfect, trouble-free spot to hide out - and Oklahoma has a Democratic governor, Raymond said.

Four days and several press conferences later, redistricting died in the House when the deadline for bringing the bill to the floor passed.

"I really didn't think we'd be gone for four days," Raymond said. "I really thought we would be gone one day and it would all come to an end."

But that still wasn't the end. After the 51 Democrats effectively killed the redistricting plan in the regular session, Gov. Perry called the first special session to take up the cause again.

So it was déjà vu, as 11 state Democratic senators - including Laredo's State Sen. Judith Zaffirini - took flight just before the start of the second special session, heading for Albuquerque, N.M., where they remain today.

While the representatives were able to do their stoppage in just a few days, the senators' stay away looks like it will last 30 days, the entire length of the second session.

Raymond explained why the Democrats took such drastic measure of shutting down the state legislature twice to stop redistricting.

The view of the Democrats, as stated by Raymond, is that redistricting was done following the 2001 legislative session by a three-judge panel, and it should not be done again until after the next census in 2010, which is a constitutional requirement.

The 2001 redistricting included statewide hearings and a sanctioning by the state's Republican attorney general, John Cornyn, now Texas' second Republican senator in Washington, Raymond reminded LMA attendees Thursday.

The Democrats, including Raymond especially as a member of the house redistricting committee, felt that the redistricting plan was something that was going to be done just because the Republicans thought they could, because of the majority now held in both houses of the state legislature.

He characterized the Republicans' actions as a "shove it down their throats" approach, which he says has helped to cause all the uproar, and the necessity of the Democrats to take such drastic action as shutting down the legislative system in Austin.

Asked after the LMA session if this response by the Democrats would set a precedent to where legislators (Republicans or Democrats) would leave in the future for any cause they were against, Raymond replied that the Democratic representatives tried to negotiate with the house speaker by saying if the redistricting bill would be removed, they would not leave on any other cause.

Raymond praised former Lt. Gov. (now Senator) Bill Ratliff (R-Mount Pleasant) for refusing to delete the "two-thirds" rule in the senate two years ago when he reportedly was approached by U.S. Congressman and Majority Leader Tom DeLay. The rule means that bills can't come to the floor without two-thirds of the senators agreeing.

Raymond said that Ratliff reported his conversation with DeLay Wednesday, noting that Ratliff said, "No." Raymond said that was the first push by DeLay to get what he wanted in redistricting.

Besides pushing for Texas redistricting, Raymond, characterizing DeLay's power, said that DeLay has recently stopped federal funding of a Houston light rail system, which is a referendum item on the November Harris County ballot, "Just because I can."

Despite DeLay's pressuring, Raymond said that many Republicans, including Ratliff, are also vehemently opposed to redistricting at this time, "but their political reality is they can't oppose it.

"We got a lot of calls from Republican supporters while we were in Oklahoma," he said.

And reflecting on the hearings that were conducted around the state on this round of redistricting, Raymond said they "did not amount to anything."

They were unfair, he said, noting that a hearing started in Austin at 9 p.m. on a Friday night, going through the night. Yet 95 percent of the people who did show up to testify were against it.

Raymond said the present maps would discriminate against certain voters, noting one map that would split Webb County in half and pair part of it with Austin.

Even with all the opposition to redistricting, Raymond conceded it could happen in yet another special session, but he said whatever comes will be challenged in the courts, all the way to the Supreme Court.

He noted again that the present three-judge plan that gives Democrats a majority in the U.S. Congress was countered by a lawsuit by MALDEF, and defended by the state all the way to the Supreme Court - and the state won.

Raymond proposes, as do others, he said, that a bipartisan commission be developed for redistricting because issues between parties can become too heated. It could be similar to the base closure commission that the Congress put in place, he said, which only allows an up or down vote once recommendations are made by the commission.

Like congressmen with bases in their states who want to keep them open, elected politicians don't want to lose power, he said.

Raymond served in the Texas House from 1992 to 1999 for the Benavides area, representing six rural counties. He won a Laredo special election in 2001 to replace Henry Cuellar, who had accepted an appointment as secretary of state, and ran unopposed the following year for a regular term.

Also in attendance Thursday at the LMA meeting were Jesse Hereford, region director for Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, and Josie Pappas, representing Zaffirini.

(LMTBusiness writer Chuck Owen can be reached at 728-2547 or email chucko@lmtonline.com. LMTBusiness editor Deirdre Reyna contributed to the story.)

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Every legislature in the nation has an obligation to reapportion itself once every ten years. So says the US Constitution. When the courts get into the mix and dictate a reapportionment -- as they did in Texas -- the court ALWAYS kicks the issue back to the legislature to act finally on its own -- as they did in Texas.

This State Senator is a liar, a fraud, and a poltroon for spitting on the Constitution by participating in keeping the Texas legislature from performing its constitutional duty. But is he ashamed? No, he brags about his perfidy and states in public how carfully he and others planned this outrage.

Shouldn't the Federal Trade Commission order the Democrats to stop using the word "democrat" as a matter of false advertising?

Congressman Billybob

Latest column, "In the Justices We Trust?" posted on FR, other publication to come.

So why not just keep calling special sessions right up until next November so the run-aways can't come back to campaign for re-election?

I wonder if there are rules regarding legistators that don't show up to take the oath and be seated at the start of a regular session.

Your idea sounds great, but I think it may have to do with the COST of the special sessions as to why the governor does not wish to call them repeatedly. However, I think it is a mistake not to call the next one immediately. Don't give the Albuquerque gang any relief from their NM exile.

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