Democratic state Representative Nicole Collier hunkered down for a second night in the Texas Capitol building rather than accept a mandatory police escort in a redistricting battle as U.S. President Donald Trump seeks to keep Republican control of Congress.
Tonight, she expects to have a bit more company.
Collier was one of more than 50 Democrats from the Texas House of Representatives who left the state in a two-week walkout to deny Republicans the legislative quorum they needed to approve new congressional district maps drawn at Trump’s behest.
After the Democrats returned on Monday, they faced new rules by the Republican leadership, requiring each to stay put in the Capitol, unless they agreed to be placed in custody of a state police officer to monitor their movements.
Republicans said the signed permission slips were designed to ensure Democrats would be present when Republican leaders gavel in a second special session on Wednesday to pursue the unfinished business of redistricting.
Democrats called the crackdown unjustified.
Collier refused to agree to police monitor
Collier, who is currently in her seventh two-year term representing Fort Worth, refused to agree to the police monitor, remaining in the Capitol building in protest.
“What matters to me is making sure that I resist and fight back against and push back,” Collier told Reuters from the Capitol in an interview on Monday.
CBS News reported that Collier’s lawyers filed a court petition against the Republicans’ crackdown, saying the threat of civil arrest for leaving the Capitol amounted to “illegal confinement.”
Collier posted a picture of herself on social media on Tuesday sleeping on a chair with a blanket and the caption, “This was my night, bonnet and all, in the #txlege.”
CNN said Texas State Representatives Gene Wu and Vince Perez, also Democrats, joined her in solidarity overnight, bringing snacks of dried fruit, ramen and popcorn.
On Tuesday, Collier said several more of her Democratic colleagues had torn up their permission slips and would join her for a second overnight protest in the Capitol.
About two dozen supporters staged a boisterous but peaceful protest in the Capitol, chanting and carrying signs outside the House chamber where Collier remained sequestered.
Walkout allowed counter-measure, Dems say
The proposed redrawing of Texas congressional districts aims to help Republicans pick up five seats from Democrats in the U.S. House of Representatives in the November 2026 midterm elections.
Republicans now hold a slim 219-212 majority in the U.S. House, with the balance between the two parties expected to be closely fought.
The Texas Democrats said their walkout, while merely delaying the action they sought to thwart, gave their party time to organize a counter-measure, led by California Gov. Gavin Newsom, to advance its own redistricting plan.
Newsom has called California’s effort, designed to pick up five new Democratic seats in the U.S. House, the “Election Rigging Response Act.”
Speaker of the Texas House Dustin Burrows, a Republican, accused Collier and other Democrats of shirking their duty as lawmakers, delaying other important business besides redistricting.
After Monday’s session, Collier stood alone in the centre of the chamber in Austin, the state capital, making telephone calls and doing interviews in a sea of empty seats.
Wu, the Democratic leader of the Texas House, has said that the current congressional districts in Texas already dilute the voting power of racial minorities in the state, and the new redistricting plan represented “turbocharged racism.”
In an appearance on Fox News, Abbott called Wu’s accusation “bogus,” saying redistricting would create more Hispanic-majority districts. He argued that it was also necessary to give Trump voters in Democrat-majority districts the ability to elect Republicans.
Collier, a former chair of the Texas Legislative Black Caucus, said in a statement on Monday, “My community is majority-minority, and they expect me to stand up for their representation.”
