At Tuesday’s regularly scheduled San Marcos City Council meeting, the council voted five to two against “a possible resolution calling for the immediate and permanent ceasefire in occupied Palestine.” At the previous meeting on April 15, the council discussed and decided to move forward with voting on the item at the next scheduled meeting. The decision prompted Governor Greg Abbott to send a letter to San Marcos Mayor Jane Hughson urging that the council vote against the resolution or “the Office of the Governor will not enter into any future grant agreements with the City and will act swiftly to terminate active grants.”
San Marcos Council Member Amanda Rodriguez amended the resolution by adding language that said the council “unequivocally condemns the killing of civilians.”
“With the attacks from state leadership, I wanted to make it clear, as you do with public policy, to explicitly define your intent,” Rodriguez said. “Whereas this resolution does not require, request or encourage the city of San Marcos to violate any applicable state statutes including — and I went ahead and did the governor a favor and copied and pasted the statutes he cited himself — and furthermore the resolution attempts to express the city council’s position on human rights [and] international affairs as an exercise of free speech, while fully respecting and complying with all legal obligations under Texas law.”
Rodriguez said that due to the concerns in public comment related to the council not condemning all violent wars, she added that “we condemn all wars, acts of violence and human rights violations around the world.”
The amendment passed five to two, with San Marcos City Council Members Matthew Mendoza and Lorenzo Gonzalez voting against it.
San Marcos Mayor Jane Hughson said she still felt the same as she did the last meeting in which she made it clear that she didn’t believe a resolution by the San Marcos City Council would impact the war in Gaza and was not in support of the resolution. She reread the quote by Austin Mayor Kirk Watson, which said the resolution had the power to divide the city but not end the war.
“I don’t believe this is the business of the San Marcos Government. I’m not going to say it's not of interest to people in San Marcos,” Hughson said. “Whatever people want to do that they feel in their hearts that they need to do, I would encourage you to do that. I just don’t believe it is the business of the city government of San Marcos.”
Rodriguez said the resolution has taught her that “our democracy is dying, if not dead already.”
“We’ve witnessed in real time the methods of collective punishment the state is willing to use to force the city to bend the knee not because of violence, not because of lawlessness but because of speech they disagree with,” Rodriguez said. “Set aside the contents of this resolution for just a moment. Your governor and the political machinery behind him threatened to defund you, your neighborhoods, your city. … The real question, the only question, is whether you can walk out of the chambers tonight and carry on with your life knowing that the right to dissent only belongs to those in power, … that our ability to speak truth has become conditional.”
Rodriguez looked into the camera as she added a message to Governor Abbott, “How dare you.”
San Marcos City Council Member Saul Gonzales said, after speaking with constituents, he planned to vote no and “stay in my lane.”
Mendoza said he would vote no because his “priority is the citizens of San Marcos.”
“For us to actively go out there and try to yank funding from our very poor community makes no sense to me. That’s where our obligations should stand, within our city limits,” Mendoza said, adding that his lack of support for the resolution did not mean he supported what is happening in the war. “I in no way want genocide to exist. I’m a human being. I don't want children dying. I don't want any of that stuff happening."
Mendoza encouraged activists to speak to state representatives such as Erin Zwiener.
“She’s one of the most amazing representatives that we have, and she’s willing to fight,” Mendoza said. “But no one is knocking on her door. You need to talk to her. She has the power. Go run down [Texas Representative] Carrie Isaac. Go talk to [US Representative] Greg Casar. These are all people we voted for to make those choices for us.”
San Marcos City Council Member Alyssa Garza asked if the council would allow themselves to be silenced with threats of the removal of grant funding.
“Dozens of legal experts right here in Texas and beyond have confirmed what we already know,” Garza said. “These threats hold no legal merit. This is political theater meant to scare us into submission, and here we are.”
She said this is a clear example of government overreach, and felt that folding to the threats would set the precedent for the future.
The resolution failed with only two council members voting in favor of the resolution — Rodriguez and Garza.
