Texas House Speaker Shuts Down Bathroom Bill Amendment

Texas House Speaker Joe Strauss has blocked an effort to tack "bathroom bill" restrictions onto an unrelated measure regulating the agency overseeing oil and gas.

Tyler Republican Matt Schaefer tried to ban transgender Texans from using public restrooms of their choice as part of a sweeping Railroad Commission bill.

“Who decided that amendment was not germain?” asked Schaefer.

“The chair made that determination,” Strauss answered.

“Was there a point of order called on that amendment?” Schaefer continued.

“Mr. Schaefer, since 1913 it has been the practice of the chair to not lay out non-germain amendments,” said Strauss.

The Texas Senate already approved SB 6, requiring transgender people to use public bathrooms based on their birth-certificate gender.  It was introduced in response to the Obama administration's guidelines for public schools.

But it remains a hot topic on talk radio even after President Donald Trump rescinded the order.

“Everybody always says what about the pervert who goes into the girls' bathroom?  But what about the 15 or 16-year-old boy who thinks he's a girl and does not want to shower after gym class in the boys bathroom, but wants to go into the shower room with girls?” asked a talk radio listener in Houston.

Syndicated radio host Michael Berry is among those who sides with the Texas House Speaker.

“The biggest problem facing our public schools is not boys going in the girls bathroom and being allowed to do it and girls being subjected to it, its not,” Berry told listeners Tuesday.  “That's a fear and its got a lot of people wound up.”

SB 6 may never pass given the uproar and costly boycotts that followed North Carolina approving a similar law last year.

“You don't need laws for parenting,” Berry added.  “If there's a creepy looking woman going in there, who is perfectly legally entitled to go in there, you're going to grab your daughter and think there's something about her that's a little off-kilter, your my child, let's go sweetheart, c'mon.”


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