A thirteen hour filibuster by Wendy Davis ran out the clock on a special session of the Texas legislature, apparently defeating an abortion bill that passed 19-10 after time expired.
DMN (“Chaos erupts in Texas Senate after filibuster over abortion measure“):
The special legislative session erupted in chaos late Tuesday over an abortion bill, with an extraordinary protest from abortion-rights advocates watching the debate and uncertainty over whether the measure was properly passed.
Republicans contend that senators voted 19-10 in favor of the bill, almost entirely along party lines. But Democrats said that the vote came too late and that the matter could end up in court.
The extended drama came after Republicans used strict interpretations of Senate rules to knock Sen. Wendy Davis, D-Fort Worth, off her marathon filibuster. The final vote was delayed several minutes by loud applause from the gallery, drowning out the action on the floor.
That followed more than an hour and a half of tense debate over Senate rules and decorum, after Republican Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst ruled on a procedural point that the filibuster must end.
[…]
And it prompted a rancorous fight in the usually genteel Senate over fairness, with the Republican majority using a procedural vote to threaten Davis’ filibuster because she received help putting on a back brace. Senate rules require a filibustering member to stand alone and speak on the matter at hand — no leaning, no food or water, and no help from others.
The legislation would give Texas one of the most restrictive abortion laws in the country.
Abortions after 20 weeks of pregnancy would be banned. All clinics would be required to be upgraded to high-standard surgical centers, likely prompting many to close. Doctors would need admitting privileges at hospitals. And new restrictions would be placed on abortion-inducing pill procedures.
Both sides are claiming victory here, with Democrats correctly noting that the party-line vote occurred well after the midnight expiration of the special session and Republicans arguing that the vote was delayed only be “Occupy Wall Street” tactics from an “unruly mob” that had assembled to watch the filibuster and that therefore the vote should count. I don’t have any idea how the Texas courts will rule here but Democrats would seem to have the better of the argument.
Certainly, the live blog from DMN’s Christy Hoppe makes it appear that the bill was successfully filibustered. Indeed, she titles the post “After 12.5 hour filibuster, Senate Bill 5 is dead.” It’s worth reading just to gain an appreciation of the spectacle of the whole thing. Republicans were clearly frustrated by the filibuster effort, the very strict rules of which make it nearly impossible to carry off, and Davis likely did technically violate the letter of the rules by getting assistance to don a back brace.
Ultimately, Davis was ruled to have violated the rules of the filibuster by straying from the topic and introducing topics not germane to the bill at hand. CBS (“Long filibuster against Texas abortion limits suspended“):
Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst determined that Democratic Sen. Wendy Davis strayed off the topic when she talked about a sonogram bill passed in 2011 and how the new abortion restrictions only compounded the anti-abortion laws in Texas.
That’s rather transparently an unfair ruling; indeed, the back brace thing had more merit. Regardless, as HuffPo’s Laura Bassett notes (“Texas Filibuster By Wendy Davis Shut Down By Republicans As Pandemonium Erupts“), this third point of order ended the filibuster just in the nick of time.
With 12 minutes to go before the special session’s end at 12 a.m. local time, Senate Republicans tried to vote on the abortion bill. But the crowd of protesters in the capitol erupted into loud cheers and screams when state Sen. Leticia Van De Putte asked, “At what point must a female senator raise her hand or her voice to be recognized over her male colleagues?”
Amid the bedlam, it was unclear whether a vote was taken before the clock ran out on the session.
Republicans said it passed, according to the The Austin American-Statesman. Several Democrats told the newspaper the midnight deadline had passed while the vote was still being taken.
All in all, a very raucous and lively display that, depending on one’s perspective, either shows democracy at its finest or its worst.
