November 18, 2019      5:37 PM

Chairman Phil King: Speaker Bonnen is wrong to claim he cannot remove Chairman Nevárez in wake of cocaine charges

“Even if I'm wrong, and I'm not, he could just remove him and no one would complain,” King said; meantime others say Bonnen could simply have the committee meet and let the Vice Chair run the meetings

In a move that baffled some veteran Texas Capitol observers, retiring Speaker Dennis Bonnen on Friday told GOP Chairmen Phil King, Jeff Leach, and James White that the presiding officer does not have the authority to strip the chairmanship of Rep. Poncho Nevárez after he was charged with possession of cocaine.

The trio of Republican chairmen made the request after Nevárez, who leads the Homeland Security & Public Safety Committee and is Vice Chair of the Select Committee on Mass Violence Prevention & Community Safety, said there was no one to blame but himself for carrying cocaine at an Austin airport. He was charged with a felony on Thursday and turned himself in to authorities in South Texas.

Speaker Bonnen denied the request to remove Nevárez as a chairman and, curiously, said he did not have the authority to do so thanks in part to an amendment authored in 2009 by Chairman King of Weatherford:

By Scott Braddock

Copyright November 18, 2019, Harvey Kronberg, www.quorumreport.com, All rights are reserved