“Enormous embarrassment!” Texas Republicans suffer legal nightmare

Added: 2026-05-18

[00:00:00]This is Democracy Watch. Mark, we have some major unexpected news from the highest court in Texas. Can you explain what just went on there?

[00:00:07]>> Yeah, this is great news and it is an enormous embarrassment for Ken Paxton uh and Greg Abbott. Uh I mean really just an absolute humiliating uh defeat at the hands of an all Republican state supreme court. You know, you may remember that uh Democratic uh legislators walked out of uh the chamber in order to try to deny Republicans a quorum. uh when they were redistricting. Uh well, you'll probably also remember that uh Greg Abbott went to the state supreme court to try to uh forcibly remove uh Representative Gene Woo, the House Democratic leader, from office, alleging he had violated the state constitution by fleeing the capital. And then, not to be outdone, uh Ken Paxton uh uh then asked the Supreme Court to remove 13 Democratic state lawmakers from office.

[00:00:57]is this was like a competition between bad and worse uh in uh uh in state government. And they thought they had a layup, right? They figured, all right, this is going to go to the the state supreme court of Texas. It's all Republicans. How could we, you know, not win? Well, guess what? They lost. They lost both cases. Uh and like I said, this is a huge embarrassment uh to them.

[00:01:19]Uh I mean I just have to imagine they are humiliated at the hands of Republican uh uh state supreme court justices. Uh but it's further proof that you know the Republicans are as anti-democratic as they come. Uh but even they sometimes push it too far uh with even sympathetic judges.

[00:01:39]>> Was there anything in their ruling given the fact that this was such a major rebuke? Was there anything that they'd written in their ruling that was especially striking for you?

[00:01:47]>> Yeah. What was interesting uh is that what the court basically said was that uh and I'll quote the chief justice, whatever wrong may have been committed by the absent house members, the Texas Constitution's internal political remedies, none of which involve the judicial branch were sufficient to the task of restoring the House's ability to do business. And I think that this is like basically the Supreme Court saying look children >> meaning the governor and the the attorney general like this is politics like you know this is politics and you guys you know are the governor and the attorney general and politics is politics you know it's not beanag as they say and it works it it works its way out with these things involving quorum and the like and so what are you doing what are you doing with us we don't we don't need to be involved this all this all worked itself uh worked itself out. But like I said, it's it's a it's a humiliating defeat for the governor and the attorney general. It's hard for me to articulate this to people who are not, you know, necessarily lawyers or followed this that closely. I mean, the the Texas Supreme Court is a very Republican, very partisan state Supreme Court. I mean, losing there, it's not like they lost one vote. I mean, the words I just read were from the Chief Justice of the of the Texas Supreme Court. To that end, Mark, I think it's important to note that you litigated in this state over the exact issue of of redrawing these maps, which is another part of this right-wing power grab at the hands of of these Republicans. Can you give a lay of the land as to where that litigation settled on right now in the state of Texas?

[00:03:21]>> Yeah, so this is an untold story that really everyone needs to be paying attention to. So, we litigated the maps before a three judge panel, federal court panel in Texas, and we won. And then it went to the US Supreme Court.

[00:03:35]And in December of last year, the Supreme Court said, "I'm sorry, we can't change the maps because it's too close to the election." Okay, this was December of last year. It was already in their view too close to the primary election which took place in March. And the reason why I I point this out is because of everything else we're watching, right? Every place else where Republicans right now are trying to redraw maps. Literally when voting started taking place already in in Louisiana and you know less than 10 days from voting starting in Alabama there the Supreme Court was like yeah go ahead you know change all the rules throw out the ballots to Louisiana you know Louis Alabama you can use your new map no problems with PCEL at all but in Texas we were told that because it was campaigning had already begun. I mean I mean Brian if the standard is going to be that campaigning has already begun then we might as well never litigate anywhere because when is campaigning not begun? I mean like campaigning begins the day after the next election. I mean there are people who are campaigning for president of the United States in 2028.

[00:04:45]Now does that mean we can't file any lawsuits now because people are already campaigning? I mean the double standard that we have seen at the US Supreme Court is really just breathtaking. And I thought about this when I saw the ruling from the Texas Supreme Court come out that even the Texas Supreme Court occasionally calls one against the you know the Republican governor and the Republican attorney general and they are partisan. It's a partisan elected Supreme Court right? is not when I say they're Republicans, they are Republicans. But yet what we have in the US Supreme Court where they are appointed on a nonpartisan basis and you know and they're supposed to operate on a nonpartisan basis. You know, it's it's just it's just amazing.

[00:05:28]>> To that end, you know, a a we talk about the fact that you are litigating in that state as well as a raft of other states across the country. Uh for folks who are looking to support that kind of work and and this this fighter mentality that I think is otherwise so absent on the left, a small step everybody watching right now can take to support Mark's work is to subscribe to Democracy Docket. That's the news outlet he founded to focus on everything voting in elections. It is my first stop every single day, especially as these redistricting wars continue to ramp up.

[00:05:57]So I'm going to put the link to Democracy Docket right here on the screen and also in the post description of this video. if you focus on one news outlet moving forward, it should absolutely be that. Um, Mark, as far as, you know, we just spoke about Texas. Can you give a quick lay of the land in terms of other ongoing litigation um for voting rights given the fact that we are now heading uh closer and closer to midterms? And I know for a lot of states, there's not going to be enough time to do anything. But what is what are still the question marks as we head toward November?

[00:06:28]>> All right, Brian. Right now, the biggest question marks is what's going to happen in the deep south. Right? We know that Alabama and Louisiana are both trying to redraw their maps to do away with one of two uh black influence districts in both states. There's still litigation going on in both both of those instances. Uh and that's what's going on there.

[00:06:47]Tennessee uh has redistricted uh Memphis into oblivion to do away with uh a black opportunity district and also uh like I said split up uh Memphis that's still in court but looks further along. Uh South Carolina Republicans still really have not indicated what their plan is. I don't know they know what their plan is whether they're going to leave the Clyburn seat or not. They're still debating that uh in the legislature. I think if there was a sleeper right now that people are not paying attention to, it's actually Florida. Now, this is a state that Ronda Santis controls and he has appointed uh all or nearly all of the justice and state supreme court. So, this is not an easy case, but I I I mention this because of what we just saw in Texas. You know, that state's constitution prohibits partisan gerrymandering. Explicitly prohibits partisan gerrymandering. And what Florida just did was explicitly partisan gerrymander. So, my law firm, we sued on behalf of our clients an hour after he signed that map. And uh we just concluded a a hearing before a judge, a trial judge on the question of whether or not to block this new map, which Republicans think will gain them four seats. And I'm not here to predict what the outcome will be at the trial court or at the state supreme court. But if there was going to be a surprise, if you woke up one day and said, "Wow, that really surprised me that a conservative court um uh you know was not biting on what they were selling." After Texas, I would say now look at Florida. So, everyone should be paying attention to Florida. Um and the best way to do that other than to subscribe to Democracy Nugget is as Brian said, is actually to subscribe to this channel because when we have news in Florida, Brian and I will do a video on it. We will lay out exactly what happened in Florida and it's going to be critical because we're talking about a four seat swing here.

[00:08:36]It's the really the biggest numerical number of seats left in any one state.

[00:08:41]So go ahead and subscribe to the channel by clicking on the link uh on the screen right now or in the description below.

[00:08:49]>> And and finally last last uh last question here Mark. A as we look toward the Florida of the world, obviously, you know, the big question is that there is a a prohibition in the state's constitution preventing that state from from uh engaging in partisan gerrymandering. They've already done it in the map that was in existence from 2022. Uh they did it again by signing into law this gerrymander on top of the existing gerrymander uh that Ronda Santis just signed uh this this month.

[00:09:17]And of course, that's going to be challenged in court. But but if the Supreme Court opts not to defy Ronda Santis, then how can there be any um any confidence in in the judicial system if you have a Supreme Court that would rather that's more differential to their political party than to the law.

[00:09:40]>> Right? Look, this is the great crisis of the American judiciary right now. I mean, the crisis that we face with the courts is twofold. The first is one that we have talked a lot about and which you all watching this have no doubt a agonized over and considered and you've heard a lot about and that is the defiance of the judiciary by Donald Trump. Right? So like one dimension of this is how can we have a functioning judiciary if it is they are unwilling to enforce their orders against the president who is intent on disregarding them. Right? So that's crisis one. But the one that has really emerged that you touch on, Brian, is is in some ways even worse and more problematic, which is that the courts, if they're only going to call balls when Republicans are up at bat, and they will call everything a strike when a Democrat is up at bat, like you just don't have a functioning judiciary. I mean, if fundamentally at the end of the day, the rule is that in some states the Republican always wins, the Democrat always loses. If the rule is at the Supreme Court that white voters always win and black voters always lose, like you don't have a functioning judiciary regardless of whether or not Donald Trump is president or not president, right? Because like that that that's an independent threat.

[00:10:58]And I don't think that that has gotten enough attention. I think the legacy media is invested in the status quo and in both sides that they they they they can report from time to time about the Trump administration not following court orders, but they really don't have a frame by which they can say, you know, the the ruling from the US Supreme Court where a decision in December is too late for a March primary for Texas, but a decision in May for a May primary in Alabama is not too late, right? And that's that's functionally what we're talking about here. That's that has happened. They are unable to call that out on any term. So as a result, their coverage is is incomplete to the point of nonsensical. Like it doesn't hold together because they're not identifying and explaining the thing that is clearly behind this. And so that's one of the reasons why I started democracy. one of the reasons why you and I have been doing this series now for more than 500 episodes going back several years because we have identified this as a problem and we've been on top of it and again I cannot strongly enough say that Brian and I use this series on this channel as the way to keep you informed about the breaking news around these things you know day in day out you get videos posted here on weekends at nights in the mornings I mean all all all time of day all time of the week So, go ahead and subscribe and hit the bell because then you'll get alerts when there are those new videos.

[00:12:27]>> Well, I I I want to take this opportunity as we see a lot of these fights continue to play themselves out um to highlight the work that you and your team are doing. Um, you know, obviously it's no secret, I think, uh, either among myself or my audience, that there is a der in in fighters that we have on the left. And we wouldn't be anywhere close to where we are right now in terms of winning the sheer number of fights that we have won if it wasn't for for for you. And so, um, again, just want to note that for folks who are watching to support Mark's work, it's a very small lift. Uh, everybody should subscribe to Democracy Docket. I'm going to put that link again uh right here and also in the post description of this video. Please make sure to subscribe.

[00:13:08]Please make sure to support uh the work that Mark is doing right now and to elevate his voice in this ecosystem so that more people uh can follow his lead and become fighters in exactly the way that he has. I'm Brian Taylor Cohen.

[00:13:19]>> I'm Mark Elias.

[00:13:20]>> This is Democracy Watch.