Sen. Wendy Davis Filibuster For Texas Abortion Rights

For you folks who think progressive Democrats are extinct in Texas, au contraire.   I'm one of them. 

When a draconian unjust anti-abortion bill was proposed by the GOP oppressors, the Texas Democrats in the House and our allies used any means necessary to slow down and stop its progress.

We also got an assist from Gov. Goodhair because he added the abortion issue to the special session agenda late in the session, thus giving the Democrats a way to stop the bill and putting the Teapublicans under time pressure to pass it.

There was the 'people's filibuster' in which 700 opponents signed up to speak against the bill at a Thursday Austin hearing and dragged it out to 3:45 AM Friday morning despite State Affairs committee chair Byron Cook (R) trying to shut it down after midnight.  

The House Democrats showed up late to deny a quorum, used the rule book and basically did everything they could to frustrate and slow down the passage of that unjust bill.  The drama in the house led to the major gaffe by Rep Jodie Laubenberg (R-Parker) not knowing what a rape kit is for   

When it finally passed the House on a 97-33 vote,  Sen Wendy Davis was lying in wait to filibuster it, which started at 11:18 AM CDT this morning. 

And as a TransGriot public service and my effort to #StandWithWendy, I've got the live feed of the filibuster up in this post. 

She has to stay on her feet, stay on the bill topic, take no bathroom or food breaks and keep talking until midnight when the special session ends and killing the bill..




Governor Goodhair can simply call another special session, but the legislative process on that unjust bill has to start all over again.

And I would love to see Sen. Davis run for governor someday or the US Senate and replace either one of the two worthless excuses for senators we have desecrating them now. 

TransGriot Update:  Lt Governor David Dewhurst tried to stop Sen Davis filibuster at 10:03 PM claiming that her discussion of the sonogram bill they passed in 2011 wasn't germane to SB5.  That triggered a procedural floor fight by Democratic senators that lasted until  midnight and the Republicans having to wade through several procedural votes before they could even clear the decks to stage a vote to pass SB 5 which they attempted to do.  But since that SB 5 vote started after midnight, the bill was dead for this special session.