Redbirds Rule Amid Speaker Team Power Surge while Budget Players Flex Most Muscle at Capitol
AUSTIN – In the opposition vernacular, the “cardinals” were 11 House Republicans who huddled privately in Austin one night in early 2009 and anointed Straus as the consensus challenger in a speaker’s race that he won in less than 48 hours. Republican State Rep. Todd Hunter of Corpus Christi is a close third on the chart as the first-time chairman of the über-powerful Calendars Committee that controls the flow of legislation to the House floor. A former Democratic representative who returned to the House in 2009 as a Republican after a 12-year hiatus, Hunter led the Judiciary & Civil Jurisprudence Committee two years ago before the promotion to the top job on Calendars propelled him all the way from the 17th spot on the power ladder to his current top five rating.
