Jim Henson and Josh Blank

The House Select Committee investigating the storming of the Capitol on January 6, 2021 kicked off a series of televised public hearings Thursday night with a prime time event intended to reignite interest in the subject of their work and provide some teasers of what’s yet to come in future public hearings.  Data in the Texas Politics Project polling archive provides some context for how the resumed discussion of January 6 and related matters are likely to land among different groups of Texas voters.  

In thiis week's Second Reading podcast, we discuss the dynamics in the Texas Legislature in the wake of the resumption of business in the house now that quorum has been reestablished. 

Greg Abbott’s “State of the State” speech, simultaneously an update to Texans and a notification to the Texas legislature of what he will designate as "emergency items," added one more instance to the many examples of the effects of Donald Trump’s continued possession of the Republican Party – with nary an exorcist in sight. The governor’s speech found him embracing a strategy that relies on holding close an activated Republican base who are willing to go along with downplaying the pandemic, particularly in the presence of other partisan specters, like the made-up theft of the presidential election or the threat to social order posed by ineffectual and largely overstated efforts to “defund the police.” On some issues, divisions among Republicans provide opportunities for Abbott to nudge the party away from the extremes of such fever dreams. But so far, Abbott has generally spent little effort doing so, and, as the GOP turns inward for the Legislative session and the business of governing the state moves front and center, the speech shows the governor remaining most attentive to those who are loudest and most disruptive. There were explicit signals in what Abbott said in the speech, but just as significant were his silences.

The 2020 election has come, though as of this writing, isn't quite over. Jim Henson and Josh Blank talk aboout how some of the themes that were in focus prior to the election – the role of independents, the Latino vote, competition in the suburbs – played out, based on what we know so far.