AUSTIN (Nexstar) — As of 6 p.m. Thursday, 834 bills were filed in the Texas legislature, one day before Friday’s deadline to file. In Texas, lawmakers only have the first 60 days of each regular legislative session to propose new laws, typically leading to a mad rush at the end — particularly for those newer to the State Capitol.
“There’s sort of a dual experience. There’s priority bills usually being filed by people in the majority party that controls the legislative process where you can get the help from the Speaker, you can get the help from the Governor or the Lieutenant Governor,” Former Democratic Texas State Rep. Mark Strama said. “There’s also the more junior members of the legislature or those in the minority party — or the worst of both where you’re a junior member in the minority party — and you might not have had your whole legislative agenda shored up before the start of the session.”
However, with only 60 days to file bills, their agenda needs to be shored up quickly.
“Then you’re rushing to get your bills passed through the administrative process of legislative council in time for the filing deadline,” Strama said. “If you’re just now getting your draft back from the legislative council and filing it at the deadline, you’re already behind the calendar because your bill needs to be set for hearing almost immediately and if you’re a junior member of the minority party getting a committee chairman to set your bill as soon as you file it is not an easy lift.”
Larger bills with priority from the lieutenant governor or House speaker are the most likely to pass among the sea of bills filed Thursday. On the Senate side, five of those were filed to achieve Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick’s goals to increase water supply, curb ‘nuclear verdicts’, establish a Texas Homeland Security division, reform faculty senates and protect Texas trucking.
Outside of exceptions for local bills, the only way to propose a bill after the deadline is with a 4/5ths majority vote in either the House or the Senate. Bills relating to emergencies set by the governor can also come in after the deadline.
“There is another tactic for introducing legislative ideas midstream during session,” Strama said. “In 1995, I was working as a staff member for Rodney Ellis and we attached a 200-page reorganization of the state’s workforce development agencies to an otherwise 100-page welfare reform bill that was a priority of then-Gov. George W. Bush. We amended it onto the bill on the Senate floor, shut down the Senate for four hours while they printed copies of the amendment and adopted it that night. That bill was not going to pass through normal means, but it passed as an amendment.”
“Some very crafty legislators over the years have passed almost entire legislative packages as an amendment on other bills,” former Texas House Speaker Dennis Bonnen said. “Doesn’t happen a lot though.”
The urgency to file bills grows even greater since the Texas legislature only meets every other year, meaning bills not filed Friday will have to wait until 2027. However, Bonnen said that’s the way it’s meant to work.
“Remember the founding fathers’ intent was conservative to not pass a lot of bills,” Bonnen said. “Last time I checked most Texans think we’re doing a pretty darn good job and we don’t need more government, more laws, more intrusion. And so the structure of the process is to make it very hard to change the law or have a new law.”
“We meet 140 days every two years, most Texans would probably prefer we meet two days every 140 years,” Strama said.
