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Texas senators are trying to get to the bottom of whether Republicans successfully pushed through a vote on Senate Bill 5, the omnibus abortion restriction bill, ahead of their midnight deadline.

Sen. John Whitmire, D-Houston, says the bill passed at 12:02 a.m.; if that's true, the vote may not withstand legal scrutiny.

"It's pretty conclusive that it didn't pass," said Whitmire.

But the Senate still has not officially adjourned sine die. When Senators resume floor proceedings, Whitmire said Democrats will call a point of order on the motion to vote on a bill after the midnight deadline.

Original story:

Texas Democrats, far outnumbered by Republicans in both the House and the Senate, are nonetheless on the verge of killing one of the most restrictive abortion proposals in the nation — at least for now.

Using delaying tactics and parliamentary rules, the minority party argued into the wee hours in the state House on Monday morning and then stuck together to keep the GOP from jamming Senate Bill 5 through the Senate in the afternoon and evening. Republicans vowed to try to muster enough support to push the bill through Monday night, but that effort failed. And Democrats are prepared for a final talk-a-thon Tuesday that could spell death — for now — for the bill.

SB 5, by state Sen. Glenn Hegar, R-Katy, would make abortion illegal after 20 weeks and would establish stringent new requirements for facilities that perform abortions. Supporters of the bill say it would make the procedures safer for women and protect unborn babies. Abortion rights proponents say the legislation would shut down most of the abortion facilities in Texas.

With barely more than a day left in the 30-day special session called by Gov. Rick Perry at the end of May, that means Democrats have moved much closer to putting the controversial measure within the range of a filibuster.

“I think we are now in a position to try to do what’s right for the women of this state,” said Sen. Kirk Watson, D-Austin, chairman of the Senate Democratic Caucus. “We need to be protecting women’s health in this state, and we need to be protecting a woman’s right to make choices about her body.”

Sen. Wendy Davis, a Fort Worth Democrat and rising star in the party, has vowed to launch a filibuster. Unless Republicans can change some votes, the abortion measure can’t be brought up for debate until Tuesday morning at about 11 a.m. Since the session ends at midnight Tuesday, that means she could kill the legislation by talking nonstop for about 13 hours.

The Democrats won a test vote at about 4 p.m., turning away a GOP attempt to fast track the abortion legislation by suspending a 24-hour layout rule. It takes a supermajority — two-thirds of those present — to suspend that rule. The Democrats voted as a bloc and stopped debate on the measure.

The Senate took a short break and reconvened at 7 p.m., but the result did not change. Once again, in a vote that broke along party lines, the GOP effort to begin debating the abortion legislation Monday night failed. Democrats began preparing for the final kill with a filibuster to run the clock out before a midnight deadline Tuesday that marks the end of the special session.

Sen. Dan Patrick, a Houston Republican who is eyeing a race for lieutenant governor, criticized the Senate's Republican leadership for allowing the abortion measure to fall prey to Democratic attacks in the waning hours of the session.

“If you don’t have a plan, sometimes you don’t achieve what you’d like to achieve,” Patrick said, a thinly veiled attack on his potential rival in the GOP primary, Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst. “We appear to be flying a little bit by the seat of our pants. These are important bills. You don’t fly by the seat of your pants when you’re trying to pass important bills.”

Dewhurst bristled at the suggestion that he didn’t have a plan. He blamed Democrats for sabotaging the legislation and also said the Texas House failed to get the bills over to the Senate in a timely fashion.

“We had a clear plan all during the session to try to get a group of these pro-life bills passed, but unfortunately the Democrats chose not to negotiate in good faith,” Dewhurst said.

Perry added abortion restrictions to the agenda of the special session on June 11. If the legislation fails, he could choose to call the Legislature back for another 30-day special session at any time.

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