Speaker Sexton skirting the rules to ram through Gov Lee's school choice bill.

In K-12 Subcommittee, HB1183 (the Governor's school choice bill) passed with a roll call vote of 6-2, but it's not that simple.

There was an extra member of the committee, Speaker Pro Tempore Pat Marsh. The chairman of the committee allowed Rep. Marsh to sit and vote in the committee hearing as the Speaker's designee. The problem is that the House Permanent Rules only allow the Speaker or Speaker Pro Tempore to vote in a Standing (or Full) Committee and not a subcommittee. Further, this is not addressed by Mason's Manual of Legislative Procedure which governs this process in the absence of a rule.

Why is the House allowing Speaker Cameron Sexton to unconstitutionally make up his own rules of order to pack the vote in a subcommittee because they feared the bill might fail?