Texas House Speaker Joe Straus Says He Won't Seek Re-Election

AUSTIN, TX — In a surprise announcement Wednesday, Texas House Speaker Joe Straus announced he will not run for re-election in 2018.

"I believe that in a representative democracy, those who serve in public office should do so for a time, not for a lifetime," Straus said in a campaign email. "And so I want you to know that my family and I have decided that I will not run for re-election next year."

The bombshell announcement will potentially upend the political power balance in Texas where Straus — although a Republican in a state where the Legislature is controlled by the GOP — served as a moderate voice. On issues seen as divisive that nonetheless had enthusiastic support of his conservative brethren, Straus often acted as legislative conscience in promoting calmness, as he did when the state's most prominent GOP members pursued a so-called "bathroom bill" that would've banned transgender people from using bathrooms labeled with their genders of self-identity.

Straus issued a lengthy statement on his Facebook page after making his announcement:

But with his decision not to seek re-election, there will be a new speaker when the Texas Legislature next convenes in 2019. His announcement already has others jockeying to take his place mere hours after Straus made his announcement. The Texas Tribune reported one of his top lieutenants, Rep. John Zerwas, a Republican from Richmond, announced he had already filed to run for the speaker's post. State Rep. Phil King, a Weatherford, Texas, Republican, had previously announced his candidacy, and others are expected to jump in, the Tribune added.

A Republican from San Antonio, Straus had grown accustomed to clashing with party hard-liners since his 2009 ascension to the speaker's post given his moderate stance on many issues. Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick — who promoted the "bathroom bill" as something of a cause to protect women and children from interacting with transgender people — publicly blamed Straus for the bill's defeat.

Straus also earned the antipathy of intractable Tea Party members and other more unbending political operatives unwilling to coalesce with other points of view as Straus historically has demonstrated. "It's morning in Texas again!" Rep. Matt Schaefer — a Republican from Tyler, Texas, who labels himself as a "liberty loving conservative" — jubilantly tweeted upon receiving news of Straus's decision.

In his statement, Straus himself acknowledged the unexpected nature of his decision.

“It’s been decades since someone has left the Speaker’s office on his own terms," he said. "But we have accomplished what I hoped the House would accomplish when I first entered this office, and I am increasingly eager to contribute to our state in new and different ways.”

While he didn't specify future plans beyond 2018, Straus said he will seek to unify in his post-Speaker life that will yield a "...greater opportunity to express my own views and priorities." He said he would "...continue to work for a Republican Party that tries to bring Texans together instead of pulling us apart.”

In the wake of Straus's announcement, some sought to conflate it as part of a trend involving other moderate politically conservative voices — chiefly Rep. Jeff Flake of Arizona and U.S. Sen. Bob Corker of Tennessee — making similar announcements in deciding not to seek re-election. Flake and Corker have been exceptionally critical of the performance of Donald Trump as they position themselves to retire from political life.

No less a figure than U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson weighed in to advance the idea that Straus's decision wasn't made in a chamber, but is part of a new Trumpian landscape: "The LEFT thinks Corker, Flake, & Texas House Speaker Joe Straus are being forced out," Tillerson wrote on Twitter. "They're not. It was a campaign promise," he posited, ending with the hashtag #DrainTheSwamp.

Others, such as conservative author and history professor Larry Schweikart, trotted out the pejorative acronym RINO (Republican In Name Only) used as cudgel against the bona fides of less rigid conservatives not adhering to an intractably partisan stance like them. "TX Speaker of the House RINO Joe Straus will NOT run for reelection," Schweikart tweeted. "Major swamp draining continues."

Others — including member of other political parties — were more kind. "In a world longing for true statesmanship, @SpeakerStraus proved himself to be a model for Texas and our country," San Antonio Mayor Ron Nirenberg, a Democrat, wrote on Twitter. "God bless Joe Straus."

Even Lt. Gov. Patrick — who often rhetorically clashed with Straus — was nicer than many, taking a conciliatory tone in reacting to Straus's announcement while blaming "the media" for any perceived tension between their ideologies and the impact the different worldviews may have had on state lawmaking.

"Any man who enters the arena deserves respect," Patrick wrote. "The media often tried to portray our differences as personal when they were actually just a markedly different approach to governance and political ideology."

Media bashing notwithstanding, Patrick was a vocal critic of his party's House speaker — with no prompting by members of the Fourth Estate — as he dramatically illustrated recently after several of the lieutenant governor's pet bills died on the vine in the last legislative session due to lack of support. In his subsequent rant, Patrick put the blame for that outcome squarely on Straus.

“School choice for disabled children — my God, you’re going to kill that?” Patrick said to reporters. “The speaker wanted to give a child who’s a transgender child, or any child, a choice of any bathroom in the school, and the speaker wanted to (let) any child, a boy, play on a girl’s team and take away a scholarship. He was for choice, but he wasn’t for giving the parents of a child in a wheelchair the choice to go to a better school if their current school couldn’t support them.”

Patrick wasn't done, invoking the sacrosanct specter of the Alamo to further lambaste the speaker. After the legislative session yielded mixed results for him, the lieutenant governor mused about the fate of Alamo defender William B. Travis had Straus been part of the fort's defense.

"Thank goodness Travis didn’t have the speaker at the Alamo," Patrick told reporters. "He might have been the first one over the wall.”

>>> Top image via Twitter, official photo of Joe Straus via Texas House of Representatives