Texas Lawmakers Weigh In On Gun Modification Debate

This week in Texas politics with the Texas Tribune.

By Rhonda FanningOctober 6, 2017 12:36 pm, ,

Time for the week that was in Texas politics with Emily Ramshaw, editor-in-chief of the Texas Tribune.

Investigators have found that a device called a bump stock was used by the Las Vegas shooter to simulate fully-automatic gunfire. They’re legal, and were invented by a company here in Texas.

Now, lawmakers are weighing in on whether to ban the devices.

“Congressman Bill Flores was one of the first to come out and say, ‘these things are absolutely unnecessary, we need to ban these devices,'” Ramshaw says.

Others, like Senators Ted Cruz and John Cornyn, are taking a wait-and-see approach. But even the National Rifle Association is speaking up on bump stocks.

“I think its notable that even the NRA has come out and said its time to have a discussion about these, so I think the floodgates have opened,” Ramshaw says.

Also this week: A Texas district judge put a temporary stay on the Texas Secretary of State from turning over the state’s voter data to Trump’s voter fraud investigation commission.

“There’s next to evidence that there’s any kind of legitimate or serious voter fraud in Texas, or anywhere else,” Ramshaw says. “So a federal judge has now said, basically, Texas you don’t have to hand over that data that the feds are asking for.”

Meanwhile in Harris County: ongoing delays in jury trials after Hurricane Harvey. Ramshaw says there hasn’t been a single jury trial since the hurricane wreaked havoc on the area.

“What that means is you have a lot of people who are in jail for very minor charges – have not been convicted – who are spending extra weeks and months locked up waiting for a trial,” she says. “And they’re going to be sitting there for even longer as they wait. Its pretty amazing when you think about the delay in justice for these people waiting.”