Texas Tribune
SCOTX Judge John Devine rails against “brainwashed” colleagues
by Robert Downen, The Texas Tribune – 2024-02-27 06:00:00
SUMMARY: Texas Supreme Court Justice John Devine criticized his peers for prioritizing legal process over constitutional fidelity, a stance stemming from his critique of a ruling against Jeff Younger regarding his child's gender identity care. Devine, a former anti-abortion activist with deep conservative roots, is depicted as prioritizing his religious beliefs, raising questions about his impartiality. His re-election campaign is challenged by Brian Walker, who highlights ethical concerns. Devine's tenure reflects a growing trend of politically vocal judges that some argue compromises the impartial image of the judiciary. This shift coincides with a legal war with the Obama administration led by Texas and the rise of conservative Christian legal movements, with Devine viewed as an ally in defending religious liberties.
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Speaking to a group of East Texas voters in September, state Supreme Court Justice John Devine cast himself as the antidote to his “brainwashed” colleagues on the all-Republican bench.
Their “Big Law” backgrounds, he said, had taught them to worry more about legal procedures — “standing, timeliness, or whatever else” — than their duty to uphold the Constitution.
“At times I feel like they would sacrifice the Republic for the sake of the process,” Devine said in the speech, a recording of which was obtained by The Texas Tribune. “My concern is that they all bow down to the altar of process rather than to fidelity to the Constitution. And when I say that, it's not meant to be malice towards my colleagues. I think it's how they were trained — how they were brainwashed.”
Particularly egregious, he said, was their ruling against Jeff Younger, a former Texas House candidate who had for years waged a public war against his ex-wife over their young child's gender identity. In 2022, Younger asked the court to stop his ex from moving their child to California, which had recently passed a refuge law shielding parents fleeing from states that restrict gender-transitioning care for minors from prosecution.
The court declined to hear Younger's lawsuit, which two justices argued was riddled with errors and based on “tenuous speculation” that the ex-wife would violate a standing court order that already prevented her from pursuing gender-transition therapies for the child.
Devine was still angry at his colleagues when he spoke at the September event.
“I'm not going to stand here sanctimoniously and say, ‘Well he didn't cross a T or dot an I,'” he said of Younger. “We are talking about great constitutional issues here that will determine whether we survive as a representative republic or not. Are we going to just have it stolen from us? Over process for crying out loud?”
The audio is a rare glimpse into Texas' typically-insular high court and window into the judicial philosophy of Devine, a former anti-abortion activist whose tenure as a jurist has been shaped by his religious beliefs and deeply conservative politics — sometimes, his critics say, at the expense of his impartiality.
Those concerns are now the focus of an unusually heated primary election for the relatively unknown Texas Supreme Court. Devine is the only justice with a challenger in the statewide, March 5 race, and his opponent, Second District Court of Appeals Judge Brian Walker, has centered his campaign on questions about Devine's ethics dating back to the mid-1990s.
“We have a judge who just continues to violate ethical rules and the code of judicial conduct that's written by the Texas Supreme Court itself,” Walker said in an interview. “And if the people can't trust that judges are going to follow even their own rules, then they'll have very little confidence that the rule of law truly will prevail.”
For 30 years, Devine has been a stalwart of the religious right. He claimed on the campaign trail that he was arrested 37 times at anti-abortion protests in the 1980s and 1990s, and says church-state separation is a “myth” that has shrouded America's true Christian roots.
As a justice, Devine has earned praise from conservatives and repute as a bulwark between religious liberty and the activist judges they feel threaten it.
“He's very principled and passionate about his role, and about standing firm and exercising that role even if someone has a different opinion or they're trying to put some political pressure on him,” said Jonathan Saenz, president of Texas Values. “To me, it's a reflection of what the people of Texas want and expect.”
But to others, Devine's tenure and September comments reflect what they say is a decadeslong erosion of norms that once dissuaded jurists from airing their political grievances or speaking on topics that could one day be in front of the court out of concern about the appearance of bias.
“Judges usually didn't speak that way,” said Sanford Levinson, a longtime legal scholar at the University of Texas at Austin School of Law. “And I don't think that trash talk is a particularly healthy phenomenon.”
That's not an apparent concern for Devine, who in his September remarks also took aim at a number of Texas officials over a variety of legal or political disputes. Texas' all-GOP Court of Criminal Appeals — which ruled that Attorney General Ken Paxton's office could not unilaterally prosecute local voting crimes — is controlled by “RINOs” and “trans-Republicans,” Devine said. He also railed against Democratic leaders in Harris County, accusing them of “Democrat dirty tricks” and trying to “bastardize our election code” to steal elections.
Devine did not respond to interview requests or a list of questions, and a Texas Supreme Court spokesperson declined to comment on excerpts of Devine's speech.
His comments have been criticized by Walker who, in the lead up to the March 5 primary, has also blasted Devine for missing half of oral arguments as he campaigned this year; auctioning private tours of the Texas Supreme Court for a 2023 GOP fundraiser; and not recusing himself from cases in which Walker argues that Devine had conflicts of interest.
Earlier this month, the Tribune reported that Devine did not recuse himself in a high-profile sex abuse lawsuit against Southern Baptist leader Paul Pressler and his former law partner Jared Woodfill. The plaintiff in the case, a former employee of Woodfill and Pressler's firm, said he was sexually abused by Pressler at the same time that Devine also worked for the firm.
Devine has defended his decision not to recuse himself in the sex abuse lawsuit, previously telling the Tribune that he had no financial or other ties to the lawsuit or Woodfill and Pressler's firm. He's also downplayed his absences from oral arguments this year, calling it a “non-issue” and natural consequence of having an elected judiciary.
“The fact is we're elected and part of our job is to run for reelection,” Devine told Bloomberg Law, which first reported on his absences this month. “It doesn't do you any good if you don't get reelected.”
Forged by a movement
After moving to the Houston area from Indiana in the 1980s, Devine enrolled at the South Texas College of Law and jumped head-first into Texas' nascent anti-abortion movement.
“It was very small and fragmented — nothing compared to what it is now,” said Joe Pojman, executive director of Texas Alliance For Life. “We were very hopeful. But there hadn't been much accomplished tangibly at that point.”
With relatively few powerful allies or ways to spread their message, some in the movement turned their attention toward protests outside clinics. Among them was Devine, who later said that he served 34 days in jail for blocking the entrance to an abortion clinic during one protest.
One inflection point came in 1992, Pojman said, when Eileen O'Neill, a state district judge in Harris County, barred protesters from being within 100 feet of abortion clinics ahead of the Republican National Convention held in Houston that year. It was an “insulting” ruling, Pojman said, that they believed trampled on their First Amendment rights.
Later that year, the then-32-year-old Devine challenged O'Neill as a write-in candidate. Centered on the concept of “Christianity in American Law,” his campaign was supported by figures such as Steven Hotze, an anti-gay activist and longtime powerbroker in Houston's conservative Christian movement.
Devine also faced opposition: Ahead of the election, 11 local Republican precinct chairs issued a letter opposing his endorsement by the state and local GOP, saying Devine did not honor the “wall between church and state.” Devine got some-40,000 write-in votes — a local record, but not enough to win.
Two years later, he again challenged O'Neill, casting her as an incompetent and unethical judge who was “absent from the bench almost as much as she has been present.” (Now, in his primary challenge, Walker is attacking Devine for missing 28 of 50 oral arguments before the court this term.)
In a Republican wave that was bolstered by straight-ticket voting in Harris County and anti-Clinton sentiment, Devine won the judgeship by a half of a percentage point — a victory, he said, for the “little people like myself” against the “bar association” and its “arrogant lawyers.”
Soon after taking the bench in Harris County, Devine adorned his courtroom with a copy of the Ten Commandments and spearheaded the refurbishment of a monument outside of a county courthouse that featured a Bible. Both moves drew lawsuits and controversy that Devine dismissed as attacks on religious liberty.
“We are at war now over the systematic elimination of Christian tradition from civil government,” he said in 2004, after a judge sided with a woman who sued over the Bible monument. “This is just one more battle. If they take the Bible, the battle will continue for the heart and soul of America.”
In 1996, Devine used his courtroom for an after-hours event to announce a congressional campaign, earning a sanction by the State Commission on Judicial Conduct for using the “prestige of judicial office to advance the private interests of the judge or others.” And later that year, he presided over a lawsuit between a major labor union and U.S. Congressman Steve Stockman over political advertisements. Devine acknowledged that the outcome of the case could affect his ongoing campaign for a congressional district near Stockman's, but declined to recuse himself until the next day — and after using the hearing to publicly blast the union.
Devine lost that congressional race, but was reelected as a Harris County state district judge and, in 1999, ran for the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals on a promise to be “short on words, but long on sentences.” He lost, but returned to district court until 2002, when he resigned to run for Harris County Attorney.
During that race, Devine was criticized by the Texas Ethics Commission, which found that he had not disclosed his position as president of a real estate company on financial forms dating back to 1994. The State Commission on Judicial Conduct also said that Devine may have violated other rules by listing his county phone number for the business.
Devine corrected his financial disclosures but denied using his office for personal business. He eventually lost in the 2002 primary.
“Devine intervention”
Throughout the aughts, Devine kept at his quest for elected office. He lost a second congressional race, in 2004, during which his campaign was accused by three GOP figures of mailing phony endorsements on their behalf. His 2006 bid for the Texas House failed, as did his 2010 campaign for a Montgomery County judgeship.
Still undeterred in 2011, Devine announced his challenge to incumbent Texas Supreme Court Justice David Medina in the statewide GOP primary.
Devine's campaign focused heavily on the decision by him and his wife, Nubia, to carry a seventh child to term despite doctors warning that the child and Nubia could die. The child died almost immediately, but Nubia Devine survived.
Along the way, he picked up endorsements from religious figures such as David Barton, a prominent Texas activist who, like Devine, falsely claims that church-state separation is a “myth.” Also backing Devine was Texas' Tea Party movement, which had coalesced around intense fears that President Barack Obama would use his second term to persecute Christians en masse.
The mood of the grassroots was reflected by a San Angelo woman who, in a letter to her local paper, compared American Christians to Jews in Nazi Germany and begged for a “Devine intervention.”
“If we don't get back to our Christian principles, like the Ten Commandments and honoring the Constitution of the United States, we are lost and so are our children and grandchildren,” she wrote.
What followed was a dark-red, anti-establishment wave. Tea Party darling Ted Cruz shocked the nation by beating Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst in a GOP runoff for a U.S. Senate seat. Donna Campbell, a little-known emergency room physician, ousted a 20-year incumbent in the Texas Senate.
Devine beat Medina by 6 points in a runoff and cruised to victory in the November 2012 general election.
The grassroots' jurist
Devine's rise to the court came at a pivotal moment for the movement that forged him.
By 2012, Texas — led by then-Attorney General Greg Abbott — was in the throes of an all-out legal war with the Obama administration, frequently taking his administration to court over environmental rules, the Affordable Care Act or other policies that GOP critics decried as federal overreach. Devine's election also coincided with the growth of a broader conservative, Christian legal movement that has since been ascendent across the nation.
Devine has proven an ally of that movement: Since taking the bench, he has continued to praise “Judeo-Christian principles” as the bedrock of the nation's founding. And he has at times been a key dissent from his colleagues on issues favored by the Religious Right.
Just before the U.S. Supreme Court's recognized a constitutional right to same-sex marriage in 2015, Devine issued a 15-page dissent in which he criticized his colleagues' decision in a separate lawsuit involving same-sex couples. At issue were two women who married in Massachusetts and, after moving to Texas, were granted a divorce in Tarrant County.
The state appealed, arguing the couple had no right to divorce because their union was never valid under Texas law. The court majority later sided with the appeals court, ruling that the state had no standing to sue because it had failed to intervene when the divorce was in trial court.
The next year, Devine issued a lone dissent after the court's majority declined to hear a legal challenge to the City of Houston's decision to extend marriage benefits to the spouses of gay and lesbian city workers.
Texas, Devine wrote in his dissent, had a long history of dictating spousal benefits in order to encourage procreation or other societal goods.
“Surely the State may limit spousal employment benefits to spouses of the opposite sex,” he wrote. “Only these spouses are capable of procreation within their marriage, and the State has an interest in encouraging such procreation.”
Devine's dissent was praised by conservative leaders, including Abbott and Paxton, who publicly criticized the court's decision and campaigned for Devine's colleagues to take up his position.
In a rare move, the Texas Supreme Court eventually revisited the issue, unanimously ruling in 2017 that the right to marry does not “entail any particular package of tax benefits, employee fringe benefits or testimonial privileges.”
Saenz, of Texas Values, was involved in that dispute, which he said catalyzed Devine's reputation in conservative Christian circles as a defender of religious liberty who “is not going to be pushed around, bullied or bought.”
In Devine, Saenz sees the reflection of a movement that has grown from the at-times disjointed energy of the Tea Party era into something much stronger and better organized. Those voters, he said, have been increasingly attuned to the state's judiciary. And in Texas, where judges are elected in typically low-turnout primaries, they have wielded their voting power to push courts toward their conservative legal and political views.
“Voters expect judges to follow the Constitution at the state and the federal level, and not see it as this living, breathing document that they can change depending on what the facts are of some case that may not fit their own political ideas or agenda,” Saenz said. “Judges like Justice Devine understand that this is what the voters expect, that this is what his role is. And he's very committed to it.”
Levinson, the longtime constitutional scholar, agreed that the judiciary has been increasingly shaped by voters. But he worries that trend has further polarized the country, opening up a “Pandora's box” that has allowed intense, existential rhetoric to cloud nuanced and much-needed conversations about the role of religion in democracy.
“I think that's a perfectly legitimate topic for discussion and debate,” he said. “But we seem incapable of having it.”
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Texas Tribune
UT-Austin offers probation to students arrested in protests
by By Asad Jung, The Texas Tribune – 2024-07-05 17:44:44
SUMMARY: The University of Texas at Austin is disciplining students arrested during pro-Palestinian protests in April by offering “deferred suspension,” allowing students to avoid suspension by proving educational growth. Deferred suspension requires students to take an exam on university rules and avoid appealing the decision. Some students, like Ari Lenahan, see this as a relief compared to harsher penalties faced by peers at other universities. Over 130 protesters were arrested, but Travis County Attorney Delia Garza declined to pursue criminal trespassing charges. The university's heavy-handed response has sparked criticism from students, faculty, and free speech advocates.
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The University of Texas at Austin has begun disciplining students who were arrested in pro-Palestinian demonstrations in April, scolding them for their actions but offering them a path to avoid suspension.
In letters sent out to students this week, first reported by KUT, university officials said it would be appropriate to suspend them for their actions during the protests but would give them the option to take “deferred suspension” instead, a form of probation that would allow students to remain in class and keep the disciplinary action from appearing on their final transcripts.
“Recognizing our commitment to educational growth, we want to offer you an alternative path to avoid suspension by proving that you have learned from this experience,” reads one of the letters obtained by The Texas Tribune.
Students who choose deferred suspension must agree to take an exam testing their knowledge of the university's rules and agree not to appeal the decision. The status would be active until July 7, 2025.
Those who decline that option would be suspended, the letter says. Students may also appeal the disciplinary sanctions through a university hearing.
Ari Lenahan, a UT-Austin student set to graduate in December, said he was relieved the university offered him deferred suspension since students at other universities across the country are facing harsher punishments after participating in pro-Palestinian demonstrations. He said it may be the best choice for him since he aims to graduate this year.
“It's a lot clearer where I stand now, at least in the university's eyes,” he said.
Lenahan still has a hold on his account preventing him from registering for classes in the fall but said the letter he received Wednesday states any holds will be removed once his case is resolved.
Anne-Marie Jardine, a recent graduate, received a sanction letter concerning her involvement in an April 24 pro-Palestinian demonstration. Jardine was told she would be under deferred suspension for one year if she were to re-enroll at UT-Austin. Jardine said she hasn't received her official diploma from the university yet.
Many other students under investigation have not yet been informed about how the university plans to move forward with their cases. Sam Law, a PhD candidate who was arrested on April 29, said that he expects the university will contact him soon.
More than 130 protesters were arrested at pro-Palestinian demonstrations on UT-Austin's campus in late April. In resolute efforts to dispel the protesters, law enforcement at the time deployed pepper spray and flash-bang explosives and charged students with horses. State troopers were deployed by Gov. Greg Abbott to help quash the protests and had a hand in the arrests.
Those arrested were charged with criminal trespassing but Travis County Attorney Delia Garza declined to pursue those charges.
In the aftermath of the protest, many students, faculty and free speech advocates questioned UT-Austin's heavy-handed response to the protests and criticized state GOP leaders' support of the arrests. Just a few years ago, Abbott had championed state legislation that protected free speech on college campuses, leading free speech advocates to ask who gets to enjoy free speech protections in Texas.
UT-Austin leaders, meanwhile, have vowed to carry out discipline against students who violated campus policies. Seniors in the class of 2024 were afraid their diplomas would be withheld, though they were permitted to join graduation ceremonies in the spring.
Sneha Dey contributed to this story.
Disclosure: University of Texas at Austin has been a financial supporter of The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization that is funded in part by donations from members, foundations and corporate sponsors. Financial supporters play no role in the Tribune's journalism. Find a complete list of them here.
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Hurricane Beryl likely to hit Texas coast Monday
by By Emily Foxhall, Berenice Garcia and Stephen Simpson, The Texas Tribune – 2024-07-05 16:47:07
SUMMARY: Texans are being urged to prepare for Hurricane Beryl, expected to make landfall as a Category 1 or 2 storm along the Texas coast on Monday. Currently crossing Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula, Beryl could hit anywhere from northern Mexico to the mid-Texas coast. Officials stress vigilance and preparation, especially for those along the Gulf coast, and advise stocking up on essentials like food and water. Emergency measures include distributing sandbags and readying evacuation plans. Beryl, an unusually strong early-season storm, has already caused significant Caribbean damage, with forecasters predicting a highly active hurricane season exacerbated by climate change.
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Texans need to prepare for Hurricane Beryl, which is likely to make landfall on the state's coast as a Category 1 or 2 storm on Monday, state emergency officials said.
The record-setting storm was moving across Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula on Friday, leaving forecasters still unsure exactly where along the Texas coast will see the worst rainfall and wind.
As Beryl left behind a trail of destruction across Caribbean islands, state officials urged Texans along the entire Gulf coast to pay close attention and prepare for a dangerous storm, particularly people vacationing during the July 4 holiday weekend.
“Everyone along the coast should be paying attention to this storm,” Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick said at a news conference in Austin. Patrick is serving as acting governor as Gov. Greg Abbott travels in Asia on an economic development trip.
Residents should be gassing up their vehicles and making sure they have food and water for themselves and their pets, Texas Division of Emergency Management Chief Nim Kidd said.
“A lot of people are out having fun right now, and that's a good thing, and we want them to continue to do that, but we also want them to prepare,” Kidd said. “We need a prepared community, not a panicked community.”
Boarded windows at the H-E-B Plus! grocery store in Brownsville on July 5, 2024.
Credit:
Michael Gonzalez for The Texas Tribune
Officials in the Rio Grande Valley and Corpus Christi have been distributing thousands of sandbags to help people prepare for potential flooding. South Texans have been eager for rain because the two major reservoirs on the Rio Grande have reached near or record lows in June.
Forecasters on Friday expected Beryl to make landfall anywhere from northern Mexico to the mid-Texas coast. The storm appeared likely aimed for South Texas but experts warned its path could shift north to Corpus Christi or Matagorda Bay.
Tropical storm-level winds would likely arrive Sunday night, according to the National Hurricane Center. Areas from Brownsville to Corpus Christi faced the greatest wind threat under the current forecast.
Heavy rain could begin Sunday and last through Tuesday. The National Hurricane Center predicted four to eight inches to fall along the South Texas coastline, with higher amounts in some spots, and up to six inches from Corpus Christi to Matagorda Bay. Forecasters expected the storm to slow over land, which would increase the risk of flooding.
Rip currents and high seas starting late Friday will make coastal conditions dangerous.
In the Rio Grande Valley, officials were preparing for possible flooding.
The eastern part of Hidalgo County tends to be hit the hardest during heavy rains, but the county was taking steps to mitigate flooding there, said Ricardo Saldaña, Hidalgo County's emergency management coordinator. Officials have placed water pumps near flood-prone areas and worked with contractors to prevent flooding at drainage project sites by covering up excavation holes.
Saldaña warned residents to make their own preparations by stocking up on food and water, preparing an emergency kit, and making arrangements with friends and family to relocate if necessary.
Sandbags at a county facility in Brownsville on July 5, 2024.
Credit:
Michael Gonzalez for The Texas Tribune
Cameron County Judge Eddie Treviño, Jr. recommended that people in recreational vehicles leave county parks.
“If you don't feel safe, evacuate,” said Tom Hushen, Cameron County's emergency management coordinator.
If there is flooding, Hushen said they were prepared to mobilize fire trucks and ambulances to help people evacuate. But high winds could pose another threat. Winds of more than 90 miles per hour could cause those vehicles to topple over. In that scenario, county officials would have to deploy larger vehicles like dump trucks.
Hushen said any power outages would prompt the opening of emergency shelters. He also advised residents to tie down any loose items in their yards and to bring in all patio furniture because high winds could turn those objects into projectiles.
“Listen to the warnings,” Hushen advised residents. “Things could change at a moment's notice.”
Beryl has astounded meteorologists with its strength so early in the summer. Warmer-than-normal ocean temperatures helped Beryl rapidly strengthen into a Category 4 storm in late June — becoming the first recorded Category 4 storm to form in June, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
Beryl strengthened into a Category 5 and tore across the Caribbean, causing devastation in Grenada and Jamaica. It pushed onto the Yucatan Peninsula early Friday as a Category 2 storm.
“Beryl is so out of place historically given how early in the season it is and how strong it got,” said Houston-based meteorologist Matt Lanza, who helps write a blog on tropical weather called The Eyewall. “Typically you don't see that sort of thing until August — not the end of June, beginning of July.”
Federal forecasters expect this hurricane season, which began June 1, to be a bad one. They predicted to see 17 to 25 named storms form, which was more than they had ever forecast before a season's start. They believed four to seven of those would be Category 3 storms or stronger.
Climate change driven by people burning fossil fuels is causing oceans to warm and makes hurricanes more likely to be stronger. Scientists also say climate change may make rapid intensification of storms more likely — as happened with Beryl.
“To look at a satellite on June the 30th or July the 1st and to see a storm of Beryl's magnitude is almost unbelievable,” said Michael Lowry, a hurricane expert for WPLG TV in Miami.
Reporting in the Rio Grande Valley is supported in part by the Methodist Healthcare Ministries of South Texas, Inc.
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Texas Tribune
Michael McCaul seeks waiver to stay Foreign Affairs chair
by By Isaac Yu, The Texas Tribune – 2024-07-05 05:00:00
SUMMARY: U.S. Rep. Michael McCaul seeks a waiver to extend his chairmanship of the House Foreign Affairs Committee. During his term, McCaul, a Republican from Austin, led efforts to ban TikTok, supported Tibetan self-determination, and condemned the Chinese spy balloon. He also played a crucial role in passing a bipartisan Ukraine aid bill and has been active on global issues, including Ukraine and Taiwan. McCaul aims to maintain U.S. strength abroad amid growing isolationism in his party. Facing a six-year term limit, he needs special permission to continue, with several colleagues aiming for his position. His leadership's fate will be decided by the Republican Steering Committee.
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WASHINGTON — U.S. Rep. Michael McCaul isn't quite ready to give up his gavel.
In his two years as chair of the powerful House Foreign Affairs Committee, the Austin Republican has been busy; he spearheaded the charge to ban TikTok, authored one resolution on Tibetan self-determination and led another condemning the infamous Chinese spy balloon. Just last month, he helped shoulder a bipartisan Ukraine aid bill through Congress over many colleagues' loud objections. He's also traveled the globe, shaking hands with Volodymyr Zelenskyy in Ukraine, receiving a blessing from the Dalai Lama in India, and gifting Taiwan President Lai Ching Te with a cowboy hat.
To keep his leadership post on one of the most coveted committees in Washington, he'll need special permission, having hit his six-year term limit. Several colleagues are already gunning to replace him.
McCaul confirmed last week that he would indeed seek a waiver to serve another term as top Republican on his committee, which would need approval from a steering committee and then the full House Republican caucus.
“It's not time to change horses right now,” McCaul said in an interview. “It's a dangerous time where the world is on fire.”
If his quest is successful, McCaul pledges to keep supporting key allies around the globe and stay aggressive on adversaries like Russia and China. If not, defense hawks in Washington could lose a powerful voice in charge just as the GOP prepares to redefine its approach to foreign policy under a potential second Trump administration.
Closing out his twentieth year in Congress, McCaul is well-connected and one of the most experienced members of the Texas delegation, having chaired the Homeland Security Committee from 2013 to 2019. The Foreign Affairs Committee under his leadership has been the most productive House committee this term, his office said, with 67 measures and 18 bills passed by the full chamber.
McCaul is making the case that his relationships on the Hill — including a friendship with Speaker Mike Johnson that helped push Ukraine aid over the finish line — justify him staying on an extra term.
Johnson had voted against sending aid to Ukraine before becoming speaker, part of a growing wing of conservatives who believed foreign aid came at the expense of funding for border security. McCaul, a steadfast supporter of Ukraine, helped sway Johnson's thinking and the speaker ultimately threw his support behind a package to send $60 billion in aid to boost Ukraine's arsenal against Russia.
The decision was opposed by a majority of Republicans and drew the ire of hardline conservatives, including Rep. Marjorie Taylor Green of Georgia, who filed a motion to vacate the speaker, which failed.
“I think I feel compelled to do it not for myself, but I don't think anyone would be able to do what I do or shepherd the [Ukraine] supplemental the way I was able to,” McCaul said.
McCaul has also been a leading China antagonist this term, leading an effort to force the sale of TikTok to an American company. His visits with Taiwanese leaders and the Dalai Lama, who China views as a separatist threat, have drawn strong condemnation and sanctions from Beijing.
His efforts on Ukraine, Taiwan and elsewhere are linked by a desire to project U.S. strength abroad, even as the isolationist wing of his party grows.
“If we abandoned Ukraine and allowed [Vladimir] Putin to take over Ukraine and threaten Eastern Europe, that would be a big mistake, and it would send a message to Chairman Xi [Jinping] that Taiwan's fair game,” McCaul said.
House Republicans set six-year term limits for committee chairs, including years spent as ranking member when the party is the minority. The GOP last voted to keep the term limits at the beginning of the current term.
Waivers are rare. Only one was granted last session, to Rep. Virginia Foxx, R-North Carolina, who stayed an extra term chairing the House Education and Workforce Committee. Before Foxx, the last waiver was granted in 2012, to former Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wisconsin.
McCaul's fight comes as Texan influence in the House is on the decline. The state delegation, which includes more Republicans than any other state, will see the retirements of Rep. Kay Granger, R-Fort Worth, who stepped down from her powerful perch as Appropriations chair, and Rep. Michael Burgess, R-Denton, who will give up the Rules Committee gavel less than a year after gaining it.
Rep. Jodey Arrington, R-Lubbock, will remain the top Republican on the Budget Committee. And Rep. Brian Babin, R-Woodville, is currently the only Republican running for the top spot on the Science, Space and Technology Committee.
Committee assignments are determined by the Republican Steering Committee, made up of party leadership and regional representatives, and then approved by the full conference. The 36-member Steering Committee, which always includes at least two Texans, has been stingy with waivers in the past, even when considering chairs like McCaul who have spent most of their time in the minority.
The decision could depend in part on how McCaul's committee feels about his leadership. Foxx had the support of every Republican on her committee in seeking a waiver, including from the next-highest ranking Republican who would have replaced her.
None of McCaul's 26 Republican colleagues on Foreign Affairs have made endorsements yet, but at least three members — Ann Wagner of Missouri, the committee's vice chair, Darrell Issa of California and Joe Wilson of South Carolina — have already confirmed they are running against McCaul for the top spot. The committee includes three fellow Texans: Reps. Nathaniel Moran of Tyler, Keith Self of McKinney and Ronny Jackson of Amarillo, none of whom responded to requests for comment.
It's not immediately clear whether any of McCaul's announced rivals would diverge greatly from his policy positions, and all three supported foreign aid packages for Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan earlier this year.
Matthew Choi contributed to this report.
Just in: Former U.S. Rep. Liz Cheney, R-Wyoming; U.S. Sen. John Fetterman, D-Pennsylvania; and Oklahoma Gov. Kevin Stitt will take the stage at The Texas Tribune Festival, Sept. 5–7 in downtown Austin. Buy tickets today!
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