Time for the week that was in Texas politics with Juan Carlos Huerta, a professor of political science at Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi.
On the partisan makeup of the incoming Texas Legislature:
Well, the Democrats did pick up 12 seats, so … the Republican majority in the House is now 87-63. … [But] Democrats picked up one seat in the Senate.
On the kinds of bills lawmakers have been filing:
What I haven’t seen, as I’ve been following the news on this, is that kind of hard-edged, conservative type of legislation that we had in the last session. … I’ve seen that Democrats have been pushing some voting issues.
On a Texas federal judge’s recent ruling in favor of Texas’s lawsuit against the Affordable Care Act:
Judge [Reed] O’Connor did declare [the ACA] to be unconstitutional … [but he] allowed it to remain in place while it’s under appeal.
On how long it might be before the lawsuit is resolved:
It’s going to be a long timeline, because there’s lot of [counter] lawsuits, and the process can work slowly. We’re looking for at least the next year, the ACA ought to remain in place as it works its way through to the Fifth Court of Appeals. And people expect it to make it all the way to the Supreme Court eventually.
Listen to the full interview in the audio player above.
Written by Shelly Brisbin.
