Our long countywide nightmare is over.
Harris County Commissioner Tom Ramsey’s call for Judge Lina Hidalgo’s resignation failed to pass Tuesday after commissioners voted 2-1 to strip a reference to her March 10 expulsion from the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo from a resolution.
The vote effectively scuttled Ramsey’s push to address Hidalgo’s behavior after she was kicked out of the rodeo for attempting to access a premium seating area for which she and her guests did not have tickets. Democratic Commissioners Lesley Briones and Rodney Ellis both voted to approve a modified version of the resolution that simply honored the rodeo without referencing the county judge or the incident.
Hidalgo and Commissioner Adrian Garcia did not attend Tuesday’s meeting.
Hidalgo alleged she was “manhandled” by rodeo security and suggested she was treated differently because she is a woman — a charge rodeo leadership rejected. Ramsey asked commissioners to consider a modified resolution stating commissioners’ opposition to Hidalgo’s characterization of the incident, but that, too, was rejected.
“I think the tens of thousands of volunteers at the rodeo would disagree with this approach,” Ramsey said. “To not acknowledge, to not deal with a very clear problem that, frankly, we’ve experienced in this Commissioners Court … we need to set the record straight.”
Briones said she did not support the call for Hidalgo’s resignation because it was not commissioners’ place to push for the removal of an official twice elected by Harris County voters. Ellis cited racist and sexist remarks made by President Donald Trump, and suggested commissioners should first address the president’s behavior before holding Hidalgo to a higher standard.
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The resolution was first introduced at a March 19 meeting, but a procedural rule change led commissioners to table the item until Tuesday’s “business court” meeting. Such gatherings require only three commissioners to form a quorum and typically address only procedural items requiring little public discussion.
I know it’s my thing to follow local politics closely, but sometimes I just don’t have it in me to obsess over all of the miscellania. This was one of those times. I have no problem with the course of action taken by Commissioner Ramsey. It’s fair to consider this the county’s business, and I’d do the same in a similar situation. I basically agree with Commissioner Briones about their response. All of this has a known and imminent endpoint. We can now move on.