Texas Republicans sue Houston, mayor for canceling convention

The Texas Republican Party is suing Houston and its mayor a day after the state GOP in-person convention was canceled because officials said the spread of the coronavirus made it impossible to hold the event as scheduled.

“This morning, the Republican Party of Texas filed a lawsuit against Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner, Houston First Corporation, and the City of Houston for breach of contract and applied for a writ of mandamus requiring the city to honor its contract,” State Republican chair James Dickey said on Thursday in a statement about the lawsuit. “The Republican Party of Texas is seeking an injunction requiring the George R. Brown Convention Center to comply with the binding contract and is requesting a temporary restraining order (TRO) preventing the city from restricting the convention’s events or using the virus as a pretext to cancel the convention.”

Mayor Sylvester Turner said the city’s lawyers exercised provisions in the contract that the Texas GOP signed to rent the downtown convention center for a three-day event to have started July 16, with committee meetings earlier in the week. Turner, a Democrat, previously resisted calls to cancel the convention and insisted Wednesday that his decision wasn’t driven by politics.

“The public health concerns outweighed anything else,” Turner said.

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Dickey, in his statement about the lawsuit, begged to differ.

“Mayor Turner canceled the convention because he wanted to, not due to any ‘act of God’ – only due to his desire to do so and to hold the Republican Party of Texas to a different standard than other entities. Further, Mayor Turner’s mandate far exceeded the requirements in the Governor’s Executive Order. Our objective is that the courts will hear and rule in our favor in time to open up the George R. Brown Convention Center Monday morning so that we may safely begin our vital work in the electoral process.”

Speaking Wednesday afternoon, the mayor said he waited to act because he had hoped state Republicans would cancel the event on their own.

He added that he thought of his late mother, who worked as a hotel maid, and whether others in her position would face a heightened risk of infection if the convention went forward.

On Thursday, Dickey, in his statement about the lawsuit, accused the liberal city head of playing politics.

He said: “Mayor Turner publicly stated his intention to interrupt the convention process and disenfranchise Republicans around the state, and yesterday he put his scheme into action. Mayor Turner was explicit in his objective to dig through our contract and try to find a way – any way – to shut us down. Mayor Turner changed Health Department guidelines to impose additional requirements on the Republican Party that he did not impose on other organizations.”

On Tuesday, Texas reported more than 10,000 new coronavirus cases, obliterating its previous record for single-day increases. The day's 10,028 confirmed cases eclipse Texas' previous record of 8,258, which the Lonestar State set on Saturday.

Hospitalizations are also reaching record highs, with the state surpassing 8,000 hospitalizations for the first time over the weekend. According to the nonprofit COVID Tracking Project, Texas has more than 9,200 hospitalized patients as of Tuesday.

At least two counties announced that their hospitals had already reached full capacity, NPR reported Wednesday.

According to The Texas Tribune, nearly 14 percent of new U.S. COVID-19 cases are recorded in Texas.

The conference reportedly could draw approximately 7,000 people to the city, the Texas epicenter for the coronavirus crisis.

Dickey said on Wednesday that organizers had planned to institute daily temperature scans, provide masks, and install hand sanitizer stations.

Echoing the criticism among some conservatives to the government’s coronavirus response, Dickey argued attendees at any convention would have more protection than the tens of thousands of protesters who gathered in downtown Houston following the death of George Floyd, a Black man who died after a white police officer pressed his knew into Floyd’s neck for almost 10 minutes.

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The fight over whether thousands of Republican supporters will converge on downtown Houston as the city’s hospitals are overwhelmed is a snapshot of the broader political tensions that have underscored Texas’ handling of the pandemic.

Gov. Greg Abbott, the state’s top Republican, had publicly deferred to state party leaders who last week voted by a 2-to-1 margin to go forward with an in-person event, though he had not committed to attending the convention.

Abbott has faced pressure from both sides while managing a coronavirus crisis that has surged in recent weeks. In May, he lifted restrictions on gatherings and began to reopen business over the objections of Democratic leaders in several Texas cities. The numbers of confirmed virus cases and deaths began to spiral in June and reached new daily highs this week.

Last week, Republican Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick said he was through listening to the nation’s top infectious disease expert, saying Dr. Anthony Fauci “doesn’t know what he’s talking about” over comments that some states reopened too fast.

But even Patrick, who is chairman of Trump’s reelection campaign in Texas, expressed misgivings about his party pressing forward with the convention.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.