Austin Powers

A funny thing happened on the way to the quorum. There’s a Texas-sized voting rights fight going on in Austin that extends all the way to Washington, DC. In a way, there’s no bigger fight in America today than the one over voting rights, since how we vote fuels everything else. “In a last-ditch effort to block legislation making it harder to vote, Texas Democrats resorted to a tactic they haven’t deployed since the George W. Bush administration — fleeing the state in order to prevent the legislature from passing laws … much of the state House’s Democratic minority fleed to Washington, DC, in order to deny Republicans a quorum.” Vox: The GOP voting bill that literally caused Texas Democrats to flee the state, explained.

+ “After stepping off two chartered jets, they insisted they planned to stay until a highly unlikely scenario unfolds in which moderate Democratic senators kill filibuster rules used by the GOP to block voting rights reform.”

+ Texas Tribune: “The Texas House voted Tuesday to send law enforcement to track down Democrats who left the state a day earlier in protest of Republicans’ priority elections legislation ‘under warrant of arrest if necessary.'” (This is turning out to be the biggest Texas cliffhanger since Who Shot JR?)