Happy birthday to conservative activist Jim Cardle and Jim Hurley of the Texas Youth Commission.
Austin weather from News 8 Austin’s Maureen McCann: Mainly sunny with temps slightly above average. High of 77.
(Send me an e-mail at jembry@statesman.com if you want a link to First Reading when I post it. Let me know if you want the Blackberry-friendly version. It doesn’t have the videos, but it pretty much has everything else.)
Wednesday highlights and the day ahead
Gov. Rick Perry had some pretty strong comments about the Obama administration on Wednesday in Midland, saying, “This is an administration hell-bent on taking America towards a socialist country.”Here’s the full video, and it’s pretty important, so I suggest you watch:
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The first part of Perry’s remarks focused on what’s called the Alien Transfer and Exit Program, something that he has been talking about for more than a week. Perry describes it as a plan where illegal immigrants who are captured in Arizona are sent to the small Texas town of Presidio and set free. It’s a sign that the Obama administration is trying to punish Texas, Perry said, adding that members of the state’s congressional delegation, as well as his office, weren’t given any warning of the administration’s plans for Presidio.
But there’s more to the program than Perry described.
According to a story by the CBS affiliate in Odessa, the illegal immigrants are returned to Mexico via secured buses. The station also reported, “last year 4,500 illegals were sent back through Presidio. Now 94 will be bused across this bridge 7 days a week.”
In addition, Brandi Grissom of the Texas Tribune reported last month that Bill Brooks, spokesman for the Border Patrol Marfa Sector, where Presidio is located, said the plan would not create any burden on the local community.
Grissom wrote, “The plan will bring two buses per day to Texas, each with 74 undocumented immigrants. The immigrants will be checked for health problems and will have signed voluntary deportation agreements. The program will not involve immigrants charged with criminal violations, Brooks said. Mexican officials are participating and will provide the immigrants with bus tickets to their hometowns, Brooks said.”
Advocates for the program say the point of transferring the immigrants from Arizona to Texas is to breaking the smuggling cycle that allowed them to enter in the first place, Robert Gilbert, the Tucson sector chief for the U.S. Border Patrol, wrote in a January op-ed. He wrote that in 2008 (during the Bush administration), more than 10,000 illegal immigrants were removed through the program (although it did not go through Texas then). Gilbert wrote, “The largest impact can only be made by breaking the smuggling cycle, by putting up barriers and checkpoints that make the business of smuggling humans and narcotics unprofitable and unattractive. Only as the smuggling cycle is disrupted do we see consistent decreases in arrests and increases in drug seizures.”
• The Statesman’s Gardner Selby has the story this morning of an official in the secretary of state’s office who was fired Wednesday after she made some controversial remarks to a meeting of Democratic and Republican county chairs about helping Spanish-speaking voters. When you click on Gardner’s story, you can hear full audio of those remarks, as well as the response from a member of the audience who didn’t like what she heard.
• Sam Bassett, the former head of the Texas Forensic Science Commission, took objection Wednesday to the panel’s new chairman saying the need to develop rules and procedures could delay the inquiry into the case of Cameron Todd Willingham and the controversial arson investigation that led to Willingham’s execution. “Mr. Bradley stated that he believes that the Commission needs ‘rules and procedures’ before it can move forward,” Bassett said. “I respectfully disagree. Though the Commission might benefit in the long term from development of written standards, I do not believe that this should result in paralysis of Commission activity. The Commission doesn’t need to evolve into a large, bureaucratic State agency to carry out its mission.”
Bradley objected to Bassett’s objection, saying, “Mr. Bassett is changing his story. He clearly told me that he was scared of the hearing getting out of control because the Commission had no plan or rules for the hearing.”
The Statesman’s Mike Ward has more on this over on the Postcards blog.
• Wayne Slater of the Dallas Morning News reported Wednesday that Kay Bailey Hutchison’s campaign has been checking out the availability of TV time over the next couple of months — a sign that the campaign may be thinking of going up with ads soon. Hutchison spokeswoman Jennifer Baker downplayed, saying the campaign has been making such inquiries since August, and that the Perry campaign is doing the same.
• Hutchison is supporting legislation to limit members of the U.S. Senate to two terms, Todd Gillman reports. She also wants to limit the Texas governor (not just the current one) to two terms. Of course, since we’re talking term limits, it’s important to remember that early in her Senate career, Hutchison said she’d only serve two terms, and she’s now on her third.
• Democratic gubernatorial candidate Hank Gilbert laid out his environmental agenda Wednesday on the shores of Lady Bird Lake. Among his proposals: A newly named agency, the Texas Environmental Commission, where all environmental regulations would be consolidated; an elected chairman of the Public Utility Commission; property-tax incentives for homeowners who install solar panels; higher energy efficiency standards for residential and business construction; and a requirement that more of the state’s energy supply comes from renewable sources.
• A second Republican has stepped forward to say he’ll challenge GOP Rep. Fred Brown. This time it’s Rick Davis, a former district judge, according to the Bryan-College Station Eagle. Brown still hasn’t announced whether he’ll run again.
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