August 23, 2024 12:24 PM People on the Move Heavy hitters, lobby moves, appointments, and more Well,
by now you already know Mike Toomey is joining Speaker Dade Phelan
as his chief of staff while DPS Director Steve McCraw is
on his way to retirement at the end of the year. It’s
a very newsy Friday. Meantime,
there are other significant career moves to apprise you of heading into the
weekend. For those who may not know, here’s the drill: If you want the entire Texas
Capitol community to know about your career move, or you heard of one that
we should all know about, send it on over to ksbraddock@gmail.com. Use POTM in the
subject line, please and thank you so much for all your submissions the past
couple weeks. Here’s
the latest edition of People on the Move. The rest of the story, subscribers only By Scott Braddock |
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August 23, 2024 11:30 AM Confirmed: Speaker Phelan appoints Mike Toomey as new chief of staff Phlean said “Mike is a storied titan of Texas politics, and his impressive experience in the public and private sectors—combined with a legendary work ethic and reputation as a seasoned strategist—make him exceptionally well-suited to lead our team. As we welcome Mike to our office, I also want to express my deepest gratitude to Enrique Marquez for his outstanding service and dedication the last several years." |
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August 23, 2024 10:25 AM DPS Director McCraw plans to retire at the end of the year He announced it at the end of a DPS recruit graduation ceremony this morning |
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August 23, 2024 9:00 AM HISD Superintendent Miles calls on Houston lawmakers to cease attacks on him and the school district
In
an open letter to members of the Houston area delegation to the Texas
Legislature, Houston ISD Superintendent Mike Miles wrote
about improvements at campuses and said: “It's
time for all of us to lead, follow, or get out of the way. Let’s end the
distracting public fighting and work together. HISD will not stop fighting for
our students. We will not stop working to change the parts of a broken system
that hold too many of our students back.” The full letter can be downloaded here. |
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August 22, 2024 9:57 AM Hobby School poll shows a 2 point race between Cruz and AllredCruz at 46.6%, Allred at 44.5% The
polling memo
is here. |
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August 21, 2024 4:27 PM RFK Jr. expected to drop out as soon as Friday and endorse Trump An announcement is expected before the end of the week, per ABC and NBC. Meanwhile, JD Vance says there's been communication between the Trump and Kennedy campaigns. Developing... |
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August 21, 2024 3:03 PM Abbott runs out of migrants to put on buses bound for Democratic cities “The reason for the lack of buses, Texas officials said, was not that the program had been halted. There have simply not been enough migrants to send.” It
turns out that while Gov. Greg Abbott was bragging at the RNC
about busing migrants to Democratic cities and leaders in Chicago worried he
would do it there during the DNC, Abbott’s administration ran out
of migrants to send north about two months ago after President Joe Biden took
executive action on the border. Reporter
Jasper Scherer tweeted the New
York Times story this afternoon:
“…the
fact that, in the midst of a heated presidential race,
no migrant buses have been sent to Democratic cities underscores how the steep
drop in crossings has made it more difficult for Republicans, including former
President Donald J. Trump, to maintain immigration and border security as a
central campaign issue. In July, for example, there were 7,200 migrant
encounters recorded by Customs and Border Protection in the area that covers
the border city of Eagle Pass, down from 71,000 in December. Across the entire
southern border, there were 56,000 encounters last month, down from nearly
250,000 at their peak in December.” |
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August 21, 2024 1:27 PM Rep. Thierry becomes political director for group that opposes gender transition for minors
Houston
Chronicle
reporter Caroline Wilburn has
this update: Rep.
Shawn Thierry is the new director of political strategy for Genspect, an organization that opposes
gender-affirming care for children and young people experiencing gender
dysphoria. The
organization announced on X last week that Thierry would be stepping into the
new role and praised her for "her commitment to protecting vulnerable
youth." Thierry,
a Houston Democrat drew backlash from her party last year after voting
alongside Republicans to pass Senate Bill 14, a bill blocking transgender
minors from receiving gender-transition care. The author of the bill, Rep. Tom
Oliverson, thanked Genspect for its support in
getting the bill passed. |
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August 19, 2024 6:52 PM HK: Despite timidity of Allred, this year is proving to be the best setup for Democrats in Texas since 1998With RFK Jr. on the ballot Trump is unlikely to match his 52 percent Texas performance from 2020; the Dobbs decision and women's health have never been fully litigated in a Texas election after the fall of Roe v Wade Note: Just
a quick explanation of my absence from the pages of Quorum Report. I managed
to injure my hand back and in April and have simply been unable to type. After
40 years of thinking through my fingers, dictation has become an acquired art. Nonetheless,
it looks like I might have finally gotten my arms around it. This is too
consequential an election cycle and upcoming legislative session to be out of
the arena – HK This may be an outlier
position, but this election cycle is obviously setting records for the use of
the term “unprecedented.” The national melodrama has been played out against a Texas
backdrop of Gov. Greg Abbott's destruction of the Texas House
Republican infrastructure, an impeachment with an outcome baffling to
many Texans, and just about every school district in the state in budgetary
crisis. So, here's the
drill on why this all helps to lay the groundwork for a possibly historic year
for Texas Democrats. The rest of the story, subscribers only By Harvey Kronberg |
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August 19, 2024 6:49 PM Abbott calls Nov 5 election to serve out remainder of Doc Anderson's term in officeDeadline for candidates to file is August 22 |
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Copyright August 23, 2024, Harvey Kronberg, www.quorumreport.com, All rights are reserved 