Chaos and Confusion in Texas Senate After Questionable Vote

By Cynthia Herbert :: 2:49 AM

Earlier this morning, the Texas state legislature voted to pass a bill that would severely limit the abortion options for women in the state. The bill bans abortions after the 20th week of pregnancy and establishes new requirements for facilities that perform them that abortion rights advocates claim would cause nearly all abortion clinics in the state to close.

The vote was not carried on most cable news networks, but a non-profit organization, the Texas Tribune, provided a live video stream via YouTube that captured the attention of over 175,000 viewers after a contentious vote was passed just after midnight, Texas time.

Democrats are crying foul over the passage of the bill, claiming that voting began at 12:02 AM, two minutes later than Senate rules allowed for. The Republican majority claims that votes began being tallied prior to the cutoff, and that the “yes” vote stands.

Womens rights supporters flooded the rotunda of the Texas state capitol building, and defied authorities requests for them to leave. Chanting “hell no, we won’t go,” many protesters were arrested by police and dragged out of the building.

At the heart of the argument was the day-long filibuster attempt by Democratic Senator Wendy Davis. Davis had been battling against the bill’s passage since 11:00 AM on Tuesday morning, and was stopped only after Senate leadership called some of her tactics into question, and was examining them for rules violations.

News is now emerging that the official records of the Texas Senate have been altered from when the vote was originally tallied. The date stamp on the initial vote showed “6/26/2013”, a violation of the rules since the vote would have occurred after midnight. New screenshots obtained by the press show the initial votes now backdated to “6/25/2013”.

This issue is far from being over, and could, perhaps, even require a lawsuit to be filed for the issue to be solved.