Sen. Kel Seliger
State Sen. Kel Seliger has been stripped of his post as chairman of the Senate Agriculture Committee, in an escalation of a feud with Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, who presides over the upper chamber.
Announced Tuesday afternoon, the demotion caps a weekend spat between Seliger, an Amarillo Republican first elected to the Senate in 2004, and Patrick. The two have found themselves at odds with one another after Seliger voted against two of the lieutenant governor’s priorities in 2017.
Patrick said the demotion came after Seliger failed to apologize for a “lewd comment … that has shocked everyone” — a remark made on a West Texas radio program suggesting that a senior Patrick aide kiss his “back end.”
The tiff started Friday, when Patrick released committee assignments for the legislative session, stripping Seliger of his longtime post as chairman of the Senate Higher Education Committee and taking him off the committee entirely. Instead, Seliger was appointed chair of a newly created agriculture committee, which split off from a larger committee. Patrick said only that committee assignments were “based on a number of factors.” Seliger called the snub “a very clear warning” that Republicans better toe the line, teeing up the battle.
In response, Sherry Sylvester, senior advisor to Patrick, said, “If Sen. Seliger believes serving as chair of the Agriculture Committee — a critical committee for West Texas and all of rural Texas — is beneath him, he should let us know and the lieutenant governor will appoint someone else.”
In an interview over the weekend on the radio show the “Other Side of Texas,” Seliger shot back one more time.
“It was extremely snide and really unbecoming for a member of the staff, the lieutenant governor’s or my staff,” Seliger told host Jay Leeson. “I didn’t say anything of the sort, and that assertion is disingenuous and I have a recommendation for Miss Sylvester and her lips and my back end.”
Patrick announced Tuesday that he removed Seliger from his leadership position after the veteran lawmaker declined to apologize for that remark.
Seliger later said that he should have directed his remark at Patrick, which seems fair. But honestly, the idea that Dan “Please let us pay for your wall, Mr. Trump” Patrick could possibly be offended by anyone’s language is ridiculous on its face. The best part of this is that Seliger is now free to vote against bringing any bill he doesn’t like to the floor, and with the 12 Dems they can effectively block it. Let the pettiness reign! Ross Ramsey and Texas Monthly have more.
Good for Selinger. I hope he uses his swing vote position to hold Lyin Dan’s feet to the fire when it comes to school funding and doing right by teachers which is doing right by the students of Texas