Nearly a month after his contentious election as the new Speaker of the Texas House, Dustin Burrows finally announced committee assignments for the 89th legislative session on Thursday. Burrows installed Republican members as chairs of every standing committee, a historic move that ended the chamber’s longstanding bipartisan tradition of appointing members of the minority party to helm some committees.
The appointments formalize a remodeling of the House power structure that was instituted through new rules that members passed last month requiring that members of the majority party lead all of the now-30 standing committees while members of the minority serve as vice chairs. As part of the rules package, Burrows also eliminated six committees and created two new ones—Intergovernmental Affairs and the Delivery of Government Efficiency—and created 12 new subcommittees.
In Burrow’s new House, Republicans, who hold an 88-seat majority, now constitute a majority of every one of those committees and subcommittees.
