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Texas Matters: Ending Countywide Voting and Stifling Renewable Jobs in Texas

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David Martin Davies
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TPR

Voting in Texas is going to much more difficult if bills pushed by Republican lawmakers become law. There are proposals to end voting on college campuses, end countywide voting, make voting mistakes a felony and give the Texas secretary of state the power to overturn election results.

To explain what is happening with these Republican backed bills and how they could impact democracy in Texas I’m joined by Katya Ehresman Voting Rights Program Manager Common Cause Texas.

TCEQ Sunset

The Texas Commission on Environmental Quality has been called the Texas version of the Environmental Protection Agency— but that comparison is very generous.

While the TCEQ is the environmental agency for the state of Texas, it is known for its refusal to withhold permits for controversial projects, failure to perform air monitoring after hurricane Harvey, and being lax on chronic polluters.

Last year a coalition of 13 organizations requested a federal review of the TCEQ , alleging the agency violates civil rights and environmental laws by failing to evaluate how minority and low-income neighborhoods are affected by air pollution from industrial sites.

But supporters of the TCEQ may have found a way to silence its critics by cracking down on repeat complainers about polluters in Texas.

All this, while the TCEQ is undergoing a required Sunset review – which happens every ten years.

Martha Pskowski is covering these developments for Inside Climate News.

Texas Stifled on Green Jobs

On Thursday Sen. Edward Markey (D-Mass.) and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) reintroduced the Green New Deal.

This is a sweeping and controversial proposal that seeks to address the problem of climate change by weaning the nation off fossil fuels while creating millions of well-paying jobs in the clean energy industry.

Texas is certain to benefit from a switch to renewable energy. There is more wind and solar potential in the state than anywhere else in the nation.

And these provide good paying jobs in rural parts of the state that now are being depopulated due to the lack of opportunity.

But Texas Republican elected leaders and lawmakers are slowing down the switch to renewable power. They are passing laws to limit the growth of solar and wind power, misleading the public about their reliability and spending billions in state funds to build more natural gas power plants that critics say will not fix the grid.

Kristoffer Tigue writes about this paradox in his article “Clean Energy Is Thriving in Texas. So Why Are State Republicans Trying to Stifle It?”

Tigue is a reporter for Inside Climate News.

David Martin Davies can be reached at dmdavies@tpr.org and on Twitter at @DavidMartinDavi