- yesterday
Republican lawmakers in Texas are in the midst of leading an aggressive redistricting effort by trying to pass a redrawn Congressional map that would help them potentially flip 5 seats in the House. Democrats in the state’s House have since fled the Lone Star state to avoid a quorum needed to pass the redistricting bill. Kendall Scudder, State Chair for the Texas Democratic Party, joined "Forbes Newsroom" to discuss.
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00:00Hi, everybody. I'm Brittany Lewis, a breaking news reporter here at Forbes. Joining me now
00:06is Kendall Scudder, state chair of the Texas Democratic Party. Kendall, thank you so much
00:10for joining me. Hey, thanks for having me on, Brittany. I appreciate it. I want to talk about
00:15what exactly is happening in Texas right now because it is a national story. Republican
00:20lawmakers in the Texas House right now are having a pretty aggressive redistricting effort. They're
00:26trying to pass these redrawn maps in the Texas House that would potentially flip five seats in
00:31the House from Democrat to Republican. Democrats in the state House, though, aren't having it.
00:37They fled the state on Sunday. They're still not in the state to avoid a quorum needed to pass these
00:43maps, to have a vote on these maps. So to start off the conversation, it is Wednesday morning.
00:48Where exactly are we right now in this story? Well, let me actually take a couple steps back
00:54right quick. We are in the middle of a special session where they are redrawing redistricting
00:59maps. But that was not the intention of this special session. And I think that context is
01:04really important. This special session was called because there was a monumental flood in our state
01:09where 137 Texans are dead. And there was an intention to call this special session to respond to that,
01:15to do flood mitigation and disaster response. They chose to put political map redrawing on this docket
01:24while we are all wanting to focus on flood relief. There have been eight hearings on redistricting
01:30and political districts and one on flood relief. So I think that context is important because
01:36Democrats are refusing to participate in the sham of a special session. If they want to help flood
01:41victims, we would love to be a part of that process. We have been pushing for that to be the case.
01:47Instead, they are choosing to play political games so that Donald Trump can avoid accountability
01:52for his supreme mismanagement, where they have told you they would not cut Medicare and Medicaid
01:57and did it anyways. Shut down rural hospitals, made energy costs more expensive, pushed the largest tax
02:04increases on working class families in my lifetime with these tariffs. And now they're openly talking
02:08about privatizing Social Security. We are not going to allow them to avoid accountability by driving a
02:14dagger through the heart of minority representation in this country. This is about you as a voter,
02:20having the right to representation in your government and not letting a group of politicians
02:24pick their voters so that they can obfuscate accountability. That's what this fight is about.
02:30And that's why we are throwing down as hard as we are to make sure that they don't steal this
02:34government away from you and rig the 2026 election right in front of your eyes.
02:39I think that context is extremely important. And I would love to get a little bit more perspective
02:44on that. Do Democrats in Texas feel a little hoodwinked then if this special session was for
02:50that horrible flood, for the flood relief? We all remember that flood earlier in the summer.
02:55Do they feel that, hey, they're trying to jam this redrawn map vote in as well? And now Governor
03:01Abbott had a comment where he said in a statement that Democrats are essentially running away from flood
03:08relief vote or something to that effect. I don't have it right in front of my face, but he said something
03:12to that effect. Do Democrats feel like, hey, you're trying to get this in for a political reason? I
03:18mean, what does that really look like? Right. I mean, no one was running away. We were literally
03:23engaged in the entire first half of this special session where they did nothing. They did nothing
03:28on flood relief while we were sitting around trying to get it done. They control the calendars.
03:32They control how all of this is done. So instead of focusing on what we need to do,
03:38they're playing these games. Now look, we're Democrats from Texas. Okay. We're used to not
03:42always getting our way and we're used to getting steamrolled from time to time. That doesn't mean
03:48that we don't break quorum on every single vote that happens. Okay. These maps were drawn by
03:54Republicans and they just testified in federal court in June that these maps as currently drawn
04:01were in complete accordance with federal laws and regulations and guidelines. And then one month
04:08later, they leave that federal court and come to us saying, wow, these are so out of line, so
04:14incredibly terrible. We have to draw it so that we're drawing every single black member of Congress,
04:20either out of their district or into a Republican seat. Okay. This is ridiculous for them to act like
04:28it's anything other than them using, frankly, a bunch of dead kids in a disaster as human shields
04:38for them to play political games. It's disgusting. And anyone that thinks that we should play along
04:43with that, I think is lacking a moral compass. That is not who we are. We want relief for these
04:49families. We want it now. And we want you to stop doing the work of Donald Trump and start doing the
04:54work of the people who actually live in this state. That's what we're angry about. That's what we're
04:58fighting for. And we're not going to participate in a system that serves Donald Trump, bends over
05:03backwards for some New York City huckster instead of working for the people of Texas.
05:09I hear how angry you are. And you said earlier in this conversation that Democrats are throwing
05:14down. And I mean, this fight is serious. I mean, Democrats who fled the state are potentially going
05:20to get charged $500 a day as a fine every time that they're not there every day. They're not there
05:25for the special session. Governor Greg Abbott threatened to take the seats away of the
05:28Democrats who fled. The Texas House Democratic caucus chair, Gene Wu, said, come and take
05:34them. Attorney General of Texas Ken Paxton said this yesterday. Starting Friday, any rogue lawmakers
05:41refusing to return to the House will be held accountable for vacating their office. The people
05:46of Texas elected lawmakers not jet-setting runaways looking for headlines. If you don't show up
05:50to work, you get fired. Are Texas Democrats, are they concerned about their seats right now? I mean,
05:56what does that really look like? Is that threat serious that their seats are going to be gone?
06:01Okay. Number one, the characterization that they aren't showing up to work is ridiculous.
06:06Quorum breaking is literally outlined in the Texas Constitution. It is a constitutionally protected
06:13procedural mechanism. Okay. So this is not them not showing up to work. This is them exercising what
06:19is outlined in the Texas Constitution for their right to do. Number one. Number two, Brittany,
06:24if you did not show up to work, who would fire you from your job? Your boss. Your boss would fire you.
06:32Do you know who our boss is? The people of Texas. And the people in our districts are telling us to
06:38stand up and fight back on this. The weird guy in legal who tries to bang all the interns is not the
06:45guy who gets to fire you from your job. Your boss is the one who gets to do it. Ken Paxton is a crook
06:51who doesn't even have the moral integrity to treat his wife with respect, let alone the people of
06:58Texas. And we are not going to allow him to circumvent the Constitution and think that he has
07:04any right to remove these people from their positions. He does not.
07:07And it doesn't sound like, but correct me if I'm wrong, that Texas Democrats are going to come
07:13back anytime soon. A, is that correct? And B, what is the long-term goal there? Are they staying
07:18out this whole special session? Is there a deal to say, hey, if you take the redrawn maps out of this
07:24special session, we want to vote for flood relief to help these families of Texas. We'll come back.
07:29Are there even conversations happening right now? Well, let's context. Special sessions in Texas
07:36last for 30 days. And so after 30 days, it's over. He can call another special session. Everything has
07:43to start over from scratch. So any bills that were filed are gone. You get to start back over. So if
07:47this special session ends, very easy. Just call another special session. Don't put redistricting
07:53on it. Let's go. But instead, they aren't going to do that because it's not about providing flood
08:00relief to people. If it were, number one, that's what they could do. But number two,
08:05he has emergency powers as the governor. He doesn't even need us to do flood relief and flood mitigation.
08:12So why has it taken you more than a month to help these people if your intention was not to work with
08:18us in the first place? Okay. The third argument that I'm going to make, whether you agree with
08:23the Democrats or not on what they're doing, okay, we can have disagreements about policy and what we're
08:28trying to accomplish. But understand that how we feel about it is that this is our moral obligation
08:34as patriotic Americans to make sure that you have right to representation in your government.
08:39My granddaddy fought in jungles of Vietnam. We have people in our family who have fought and
08:45stormed beaches in Normandy. All Americans have folks that fought to defend this country.
08:51We view this as an affront to democracy. And if we don't have to do all of those things,
08:57all we're being asked to do is go hang out in Chicago to be able to preserve people's rights to
09:02the representation in government. That's a low price to pay, even though this is a great sacrifice
09:08for them to be making personally. And so from our perspective, we'll hang out in Chicago if that's what
09:14we have to do to make sure that you still get a voice in your government. And so you don't have
09:18to agree with this, but I hope you see the ideological purity in it and that we think that
09:22we're going to do everything that we can to protect your right to a ballot box and your right to
09:26representation. There has been some criticism, and I'm sure you have heard it, about the location of
09:33where a lot of Texas Democrats are going, Chicago, as you said, because Illinois, it received an F,
09:38their redrawn map from the Princeton gerrymandering project. I spoke with Texas State Representative
09:45Brian Harrison. He's a Republican. He said this, quote, they're running up to Illinois,
09:49hiding behind Governor Pritzker, and the irony of that is quite literally impossible to overstate.
09:54Illinois might be the most gerrymandered state in this country. Republicans aren't the only people
09:59in this country, aren't the only party in this country to redistrict. Gerrymandering isn't uniquely
10:03Republican in the context of the history of this country. I mean, what do you think of that
10:08criticism? Speaking of people who are more interested in being performative than they are
10:13in delivering results, Brian Harrison, let's have a conversation about that. In 2021, Democrats
10:21proposed a bill in the United States Congress to eliminate all partisan gerrymandering, including in
10:28blue states, okay? Sacrificing our ability to do that to make sure we had federal,
10:33nonpartisan, redistricting committees. Every Democrat voted for it. Every Republican voted
10:39against it, okay? Our goal here is to get nonpartisan redistricting committees for the country,
10:45but we can't be expected to play by a different set of rules than they are, okay? There are states like
10:52California where we have. We've set ourselves up to fail by making sure that you had good districts
10:58there with redistricting committees. But in order to make sure that we get federal nonpartisan
11:05redistricting committees, what we're going to have to do is go into blue states and play hardball
11:10and start carving those districts up to make sure that we send Republicans to D.C. whining and
11:16complaining about partisan gerrymandering so that they'll finally vote for our bills to get
11:21nonpartisan redistricting committees. So go ahead and laugh about us being in Chicago. That's neither here
11:26nor there. If you want nonpartisan redistricting committees, then do it. No one on the Democratic
11:32side is stopping you from doing it. We are encouraging. Yes, please do. Nonpartisan
11:37redistricting committees right now. You file that bill in Congress, every Democrat will vote for it.
11:42And so speaking of blue states, state governors and Democrat states like Governor Gavin Newsom,
11:50like Kathy Hochul, like J.B. Pritzker of Illinois, have said that they are at least looking into
11:55redistricting. Do you think that's a good idea? And do you think that will be the fire to get these
12:01state Republicans? I'm thinking of Kevin Kiley of California, Mike Lawler in New York. Do you think
12:06that would be enough to get them to the table and say, hey, we need to vote for this? This we need
12:11this needs to end here. There needs to be a detente. I mean, is that not even thinking? I mean,
12:16what do you think? I mean, you would think it would because it's in the best interest of the
12:20community they represent. But unfortunately, what we're seeing in government is these Republicans
12:24aren't representing their districts. They're doing what Donald Trump wants them to do. And if Donald
12:29Trump tells them they can, he's their sugar daddy and he's going to they're going to do whatever he
12:33tells them to do. And so, yeah, sure. I hope that they would do it. I'm going to make a criticism of
12:38those blue state governors. My criticism is what are you waiting on? Are you said if Texas does it,
12:45you're going to do it? My whole delegation is away from their jobs, away from their families on the
12:50first day of school. They have mortgages to pay. They're getting fined $500 a day to try to protect
12:56representation in government. What are you waiting on? It's already happened. So so are you going to
13:01sit around and wait for the Republicans to clock us a couple more times and give us more black eyes?
13:08Are you just going to do it? And I just think they need to move on it so that we can get this show
13:12on the road. The dream scenario is that Texans are able to start working on flood relief and that
13:18the United States Congress passes nonpartisan redistricting committees and that we're able to
13:23get fair districts across the country. Stop gerrymandering in every state. That's what the
13:27Democrats are looking for. Stop gerrymandering and provide flood relief to the victims. I don't think
13:33that's radical. And I think that this is a conversation. I mean, this whole Texas story is a
13:38conversation that's, I mean, pretty gnarly, to be honest with you. Governor Greg Abbott is threatening
13:43to remove these jobs, threatening to fine people $500 a day, threatening to arrest them to bring
13:50them back to Texas. Texas Democrats are fighting back and saying, come and take us, come and get us.
13:55I mean, there are conversations happening in the media, it seems. Are there conversations happening
14:00behind closed doors between Texas Democrats and Republicans to try to find a solution?
14:04Our phones are open. You know, no one, I think we would love to have an opportunity to do that,
14:12but they're not going to pull this off the junket for us to do it, you know, and there's, it's just a
14:16non-starter without that discussion. We can't go back into the state because they're not good faith
14:20actors, you know, and so I'll let the legislators kind of work through what a lot of that looks like.
14:26Um, it's a, it's a real shame to me, uh, but let's, let's take one more 50,000 foot view from
14:33our perspective. What's happening right now is tension is ratcheting up in a way that we really
14:38haven't seen an American discourse in a while. Literally governors talking about removing elected
14:43officials. It's very intense. The reason it's gotten that tense is because Democrats have always
14:48been the voice where they've been the adults in the room, taking the hits, moderating themselves to
14:54the middle to make sure that we're keeping everybody happy and stopping tensions. And
14:59what Democrats are saying right now is we're sick and tired of being the only ones playing by this
15:03set of rules while Republicans are playing by that set of rules. We're going to play by that set of
15:07rules. If that's the set that y'all want to play with, we're going to be there. And that's what's
15:11making this tension ratchet up. So maybe Republicans for once should come to the table and make some
15:17sacrifices because we're sick and tired of being the only ones doing it. Do you think that's going to
15:22happen? I mean, what do you think? And I know you don't have a crystal ball here. I know it's hard
15:26to tell. I know that this special session is over in 30 days and he'll have to call a new one,
15:31but what do you think is next here? What do you think the outcome is? Because that sounds like a
15:36nice outcome. Do you think it's going to happen? I mean, if I, I'm not a pundit, but if I were,
15:43here's what my projection would be. I think that the Democrats are going to stay in Chicago until this
15:48special session's over. At that point, the balls in the governor's court. If he wants to call another
15:54special session, happy to participate in it. But if he's going to put denying representation to
15:59government on the, on the docket, you can expect us to hang out somewhere else. We're, we're not going
16:06to participate in a system where they're not working for you. They're working for Donald Trump.
16:12He is not a Texan. He is an East coast grifter with a trust fund. And he has a bunch of trust
16:19fund babies and class traders doing everything that they can to grovel towards him and do his
16:24bidding. When they're ready to work for the people of Texas, let's go. But until then, we're doing our
16:30work from Chicago. Uh, the, they are working their butts off. I've been there with them and I've seen
16:37how hard they're working. No one's left any seats. Um, no one is sitting on vacation. They're working
16:43hard. They're still doing constituent services in their districts. And, and we're going to continue
16:49to, to operate that way and refuse to participate in some sham of a special session that doesn't serve
16:54the people of Texas. Well, I think one thing for certain is this is not a story that's going away
16:59anytime soon. And Kendall Scudder, I appreciate you being here today. And I hope as we see developments
17:04continue that you can come back on and join me. Thank you so much for the conversation.
17:08You're welcome back anytime. Thank you, Brittany. I so much appreciate you having me on.