Determined to get his way on property tax relief, Greg Abbott has a tantrum and vetoes 76 unrelated bills

Rep. Jessica Gonzalez, a Democrat from Dallas and founding member of the Texas LGBTQ Caucus, authored a bill in the Texas Legislature’s 2023 regular session to broaden the scope of current human trafficking laws to include protections for disabled individuals.

Nothing controversial about that. She even had Republican co-authors on the bill, and the bill passed both houses with wide margins. Because no one supports human trafficking, right?

Well, no. Someone apparently does: Gov. Greg Abbott vetoed the bill.

Vetoed? Was he looking for even stronger language?

No. He was having a tantrum because his version of property tax relief didn’t pass the Texas Senate.

Abbott vetoed 76 bills because “other issues aren’t as important” as deciding how property tax relief would be delivered.

You know what wasn’t vetoed? Transgender discrimination bills. Why? Well apparently something is more important than granting Texans property tax relief, and that is discriminating against trans folks.

Oh, and making sure drag queens are brought under control.

And eliminating non-discrimination ordinances in most of Texas’ large cities.

And replacing trained and certified school counselors with religious quacks — I mean unqualified, uncertified, uneducated chaplains.

No one is disagreeing with Abbott that property tax relief is a good idea, considering the state’s huge budget surplus. But granting that tax relief has gone into overtime, because so much of the session that ended on May 30 was taken up passing anti-trans discrimination.

Had property tax relief been made a priority at the beginning of the session, it would have passed by now.

As the regular session ended, Abbott called a special session and said he wanted both houses to focus on delivering property tax relief by sending money directly to school districts to cut local ISD taxes. The House passed the proposal and adjourned. The Senate concentrated on a plan that would increase the homestead exemption and refused to consider the plan Abbott proposed and the House passed.

To make his point, Abbott began vetoing bills.

Those bills include establishing a sickle cell disease registry, which would have kept “accurate, complete records of cases of sickle cell disease to aid in the cure and treatment of sickle cell disease.”

Again, nothing controversial. Bipartisan. Helps research. Could save lives. Property tax is more important?

Not to people suffering from the effects of sickle cell disease.

Another bill that hit the cutting room floor would have established a Gulf Coast Protection Account. I guess it doesn’t matter to the governor whether the land washes away — as long as the owners of that land, or former land, are paying lower taxes on it.

Many of the bills vetoed affect relatively few people. One them would have created an exemption to allow nonprofit wildlife conservation groups to sell raffle tickets online.

OK, so maybe Abbott is right in this case. Property tax relief may be more important than raffle ticket relief.

But here’s where he’s wrong, petty and vindictive on all the vetoes: The next “priority” is going to be put off when bills like this one have to be reconsidered, taking up committee time, staff time and floor time to pass again.

Another bill would have addressed the transfer of property between the Texas Military Department and the Palo Pinto County Livestock Association.

I know. You’re thinking how deeply anything that happens in Palo Pinto County affects you. But the bill affects better use of land, and delaying consideration of it until a later session wastes some of that money Abbott so desperately wants to return to the pockets of Republican voters.

I mean all voters.

I mean all taxpayers.

Except in Palo Pinto County where their money will be wasted by not addressing the transfer of property from one group that doesn’t need it to another group that does.

But Abbott is determined to get his way on how property tax relief will be delivered. The average homeowner will save about $1,400 under the Senate plan but will save about $1,400 in the House plan. How that $1,400 is saved, not whether $1,400 is saved, is the issue.

The House didn’t care which way it worked and voted in favor of the governor’s plan to send money directly to school districts. The lieutenant governor is determined to get his way and is insisting on passing his own plan based on increasing the homestead exemption.

So while the stalemate continues, we’ll just have to wait another year or more before the second Saturday in October is designated as Hospice and Palliative Care Day, a bill written by Dallas Sen. Nathan Johnson, passed by both houses and vetoed by Abbott — but sure to come up again and take up the Legislature’s time.