Democratic state Representative Nicole Collier refused to come to the Texas state Capitol for two weeks. After returning on August 18 she refused to leave, and fellow Democrats joined her protest.

Collier was among dozens of Democrats who left the state for the Democratic havens of California, Illinois, Massachusetts, and New York to delay the Republican-controlled Legislature’s approval of redrawn congressional districts demanded by Donald Trump.

When they returned on August 18, Republicans insisted that Democrats have around-the-clock police surveillance and escorts to ensure they wouldn’t leave again and scuttle the August 20 House vote on a new political map.

But Collier wouldn’t sign what Democrats called the “permission slip” needed to leave the House chamber, a half-page form all

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