House Democrat Revives Transgender Ban
in Show of School Loyalty and Retribution

Capitol Inside
May 8, 2021

The Texas House degenerated into a romper room for petty grudges and grievances on Saturday when Democrats turned against one of their own for resurrecting a bill that would ban transgender athletes from high school sports for no apparent reason beyond personal revenge.

State Rep. Harold Dutton of Houston ignited the warring with fellow Democrats on Friday after raising the transgender discrimination proposal in Senate Bill 29 from the grave in a fit of revenge after having a separate measure that he's sponsoring picked off the night with parliamentary maneuvering.

SB 29 - the marquee measure in the GOP's biennial attack on LGBTQ rights this year - appeared to be dead earlier this week after Dutton refused to support it in his role as the Public Education Committee chairman.

Dutton had set the measure up to fail in his committee by bringing it up when one of seven Republicans on the panel had been absent. That made it possible for Dutton to abstain from the initial vote on SB 29 - a curious move as a lawmaker who hadn't been viewed as homophobic during three dozen years in the lower chamber as its second-longest serving Democrat.

But Dutton sought to teach the Democrats for knocking off House Bill 3270 late Thursday night on a technical point of order that Democratic State Rep. Alma Allen of Houston has raised and GOP Speaker Dade Phelan sustained in a move that sent the measure back to committee without sufficient time to be corrected and passed on the floor.

HB 3270 would have given the state a substantial boost in power over the operation of public schools that are run by elected officials at the local level. The measure would have made it easier for the Texas education commissioner who's appointed by the governor to take over local boards when schools in their jurisdictions had been deemed to be failing over a period of years.

Dutton's payback play with the transgender school sports bill drew the immediate wrath of Democrats who've been united against the plan that he has back on track in SB 29.

The Senate bill “is a terrible bill and I’m severely disappointed that it came out of committee,” Grand Prairie State Rep. Chris Turner said as the Democratic Caucus chairman the lower chamber. “The bill should move no further in the process, and the Texas House should be allowed to focus on common-sense policies that benefit Texans, not discriminatory legislation that attacks our children.”

Dutton made it clear that HB 3270 was personal for him as a graduate of Phillis Wheatley High School that teenagers from the Fifth Ward attended in an area near downtown Houston that had the highest concentration of Black residents in the city.

Wheatley - one of the state's oldest high schools in its 94th year - received failing grades from the state for seven consecutive years. Wheatley had been the only Houston school district to score an F in 2019 on the state accountability scale that was disabled last year as a result of the coronavirus pandemic.

Dutton graduated from Wheatley in 1961 - seven years before the University Interscholastic League lifted a ban on schools with populations that had been exclusively Black from competing in sports with those that white students attended. Wheatley won four state basketball championships from during a six-year span beginning in 1968 - the first year it was allowed to compete against teams with white players in UIL sports after being relegated to a league reserved for Black high schools that hadn't been integrated in Texas.

Wheatley capped off a 36-0 with its first title with an overtime win against all-white team from Thomas Jefferson High School in Dallas. Houston Wheatley defeated San Antonio Wheatley in a historic semi-finals playoff game before beating Spring Branch Memorial in the 1969 championship game and claiming a third the following year with a 108-80 demolishing of Carrollton Turner as the third straight foe with no Black players.

But Wheatley would become plagued by dropouts, drugs and violence on campus during the next few decades. Dutton appeared to be offended that Democrats opposed his apparent attempt to save it in a move they saw as the latest in a long line of attacks on local control.

Democrats were clearly taken aback by the longtime lawmaker's resuscitation of the transgender spots prohibition as an unabashed and unapologetic act of vengeance that was uncharacteristic for Dutton as a representative who entered the lower chamber in 1985.

The bad blood that Democrats sparked with the ambush on HB 3270 showed signs of boiling over on the floor today when Democratic State Rep. Erin Zwiener of Driftwood and Dutton threatened to kill each other's bills on the local calendar with caustic rhetoric that turned out to be bluffs.

While Dutton has been relatively independent - breaking ranks at times with fellow Democrats - he's always been viewed as serious legislator who's been a voice of reason and conscience when needed. Dutton has chaired House committees in nine of the last 10 regular sessions - leading the Juvenile Justice & Family Issues Committee under three separate speakers for the GOP.

Dutton is in the midst of his 12th consecutive regular session as a member of the Public Education Committee that he's chairing now in his A-team assignment on the House leadership team since taking office more than 36 years ago.