Updated 10:35 a.m. Aug. 10: Added more Fortune 500 companies opposed to the bathroom bill.

AUSTIN — If the so-called bathroom bill gets flushed, big business will get the blame — or the credit.

With just a week left in the special legislative session, the legislation is likely to die, an expectation lawmakers attribute to the suddenly vocal opposition of Texas' largest corporate interests.

While this pleases industry groups and Republicans who oppose the legislation, it’s disappointing to bathroom bill backers such as Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick and Gov. Greg Abbott, who typically count on business to back their fiscally conservative agendas.

But it’ll take more than a little potty talk to permanently damage the Texas GOP’s relationship with the business community. In the game of politics, you win some and you lose some, and since business looks to win this fight, it's unlikely to have any hard feelings.

"I have a very strong point of view on the so-called bathroom bill," Harlan Crow, one of several Dallas-based CEOs to oppose the legislation, told The Dallas Morning News. "I hold it firmly. That doesn't make me think that Texas is not being served well by the leadership.

"It would be unreasonable to think that anyone, you or anyone else, would agree on everything."

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HRC and Halliburton

According to a comprehensive list compiled by The News, more than 3,000 individuals and entities have signed letters or come to a hearing at the Capitol this year to oppose some version of the bathroom bill, which would restrict restroom use based on biological sex or undo city ordinances that protect the right of transgender men, women and children to use intimate facilities that match their gender identity.

Rep. Byron Cook listened to hundreds of them. But the outcry from industry was the game changer, he said.

"What has changed is the business community has weighed in publicly," Cook, R-Corsicana, said. "That's a huge difference."

As chairman of the State Affairs Committee, Cook decides whether the bathroom bill lives or dies. On Tuesday, he told The News it's "unlikely" the legislation will get a hearing before the special session ends next week, all but guaranteeing its demise. KXAN first broke this news on Monday.

CEOs from 51 Fortune 500 companies have publicly condemned the bathroom bill as discriminatory and bad for the Texas economy. Three of those firms are in the top 10, and 20 are headquartered in Texas.

All together, more than 720 businesses and their leaders have publicly opposed the bill, The News found. Many voiced their concerns in the last month, giving House Republicans long uncomfortable with the restroom rhetoric a reason to dismiss it once and for all.

“In the end, we need to have common sense on how we approach these issues,” Cook said, adding he hadn’t heard any strong argument for the bill. “If we pass this legislation, it wouldn’t serve any purpose but would push this state off a cliff.”

Abbott, who resurrected the debate after a bathroom bill failed to pass during the regular session, disagreed with Cook’s likely decision.

“Governor Abbott believes that all the bills pertaining to his special session agenda deserve up-or-down votes,” spokesman John Wittman said in a prepared statement. “And this bill is no exception.”

Business groups say the legislation would damage the “pro-growth environment” lawmakers have created over decades. They warn it would threaten their ability to attract and retain skilled workers and could damage the state’s “open for business” reputation.

Add their voices to the dozens of other groups that oppose the legislation as state-sanctioned discrimination, and an unusual and surprisingly diverse political coalition takes shape.

LGBT rights organizations and the Episcopal Church both call the bill ugly and un-Christian. Police chiefs from across the state say it won’t make anyone safer, while state and national teacher groups warn it would put transgender kids in harm’s way.

The Texas Association Against Sexual Assault opposes it, and the NFL and NBA have warned lawmakers it could hurt the state’s chances of hosting major events, a fear echoed by the convention and visitors bureau of nearly every major city. Billie Jean King's Women's Sports Foundation says it "reflects an outdated view of gender equity in sports."

The issue even brought together oil services firm Halliburton and the gay advocacy organization the Human Rights Campaign, strange bedfellows, to say the least.

Bathroom bill supporters, on the other hand, are a strikingly monolithic group, the list shows.

The vast majority — around 80 percent of the roughly 950 people to publicly backed the bill — are pastors who signed up as part of an effort Patrick launched to garner Christian support for the legislation.

No Fortune 500 companies or law enforcement organizations have joined them. The Texas Homeschool Coalition is the only education group to favor the legislation, and Empower Texans, a far right conservative political action committee bankrolled by Midland oilman Tim Dunn, is their best-funded supporter.

The loudest proponent is Texas Values, a Christian advocacy group. It says the bathroom bill is about privacy, keeping “men out of women’s restrooms” and boys off of girls’ sports teams. And it has criticized the business opposition for giving in to “radical” elements on the left.

“Daughters over dollars” is the group's new slogan.

‘A new dynamic’

This debate has put Republicans at odds with business like never before. But several business leaders who spoke to The News said they didn't expect the rift to be long-lived.

“It’s a new dynamic,” said Bill Sproull, president and CEO of the Richardson Chamber of Commerce. “I’m not willing to say it’s a trend or that it’s here to stay, but it’s certainly something.”

Austin lobbyist Bill Miller said the business opposition to a Republican priority “sets the bar for a disagreement between the party and the business community,” but this too shall pass.

"It's a time of strain, but it's not like a permanent break."

Plus, businesses know their beef this time around is with one faction of the Texas GOP, not the entire party. While Senate Republicans backed the issue unanimously, the bathroom legislation enjoys far less support in the House, where Speaker Joe Straus has been an outspoken opponent.

Abbott, too, remained largely mum on the issue before it became clear he’d have to call lawmakers back for a special session. Even since then, he's supported the push but allowed Patrick to remain the issue’s standard-bearer.

Whether the bathroom bill remains a divisive issue within the Texas GOP depends on how prominent the issue plays into next year’s Republican primary elections, said Jim Henson, and whether social conservatives in the GOP challenge Republicans who opposed the legislation.

“It’s unlikely that some people are going to be severely punished for that unless they’re already vulnerable,” said Henson, director of the Texas Politics Project at the University of Texas at Austin.

After all, he added, even without the bathroom bill, every Republican can still point to the abortion and sanctuary cities laws passed this year as proof of their conservative bona fides.

Donor relations

Stalwarts on both side of the bathroom bill fight have poured money into GOP campaign coffers in recent years, so how might this public battle affect their bottom lines in the future?

Patrick has received far more from the relatively small group of supporters, including Empower Texans and Steve Hotze, the anti-LGBT head of Conservative Republicans of Texas, compared with Straus. Big business has benefited all of them, however, with "the big three" receiving a total of $1,145,532 in the last five years from the Dallas-based CEOs and companies that urged the governor to reject the bathroom bill in a July 17 letter.

But businesses seem unlikely to cut off funds to Republican leaders like Abbott and Patrick over this one disagreement, no matter how public, according to responses from North Texas Fortune 500 companies to questions about whether the bathroom bill fight would affect future campaign contributions.

A representative from AT&T declined to comment. Tenet Healthcare didn’t “want to speculate on the bill’s impact to relationships,” and American Airlines has a policy of not commenting on campaign contributions. Southwest Airlines said it had “enjoyed very good relationships” with elected officials and doesn’t “anticipate anything preventing that moving forward.”

Even the Texas Association of Business, which Patrick repeatedly maligned for issuing a problematic study about the bathroom bill’s potential costs, is optimistic about the future — especially now, since the legislation is expected to die.

“Obviously, businesses are speaking out more and more,” said TAB president Chris Wallace, who sat through a blistering verbal beating by state senators back in March. “We’re going to argue on a lot of issues, no doubt.

"But at the end of the day, we all want the same outcomes."