Texas Democrats are joining a colleague who can't leave the state Capitol because she won't agree to having law enforcement officers shadow her.

SMU political science professor Matthew Wilson explains the rarely enforced rules being applied during this second special session of the legislature.

Texas state Rep. Nicole Collier was told she was not free to leave the building after refusing to sign a permission slip requiring a 24-hour police escort.

Democratic lawmakers in Texas returned to the state on Monday, ending a two-week walkout that broke quorum and temporarily blocked Republican efforts to redraw congressional maps at the behest of U.S.

Democratic lawmakers who fled their state to stymie Republican plans to redraw political maps at the behest of President Donald Trump announced on Monday they were "returning to Texas on our terms," as the battle lines harden 15 months before the U.

"It's imperative at this moment to use every tool that we have to fight back," Isaiah Martin, a candidate running in Texas's 18th congressional district.

Texas Republicans forced Democrats to sign a slip authorizing a police officer to surveil them until Wednesday, when the House is scheduled to reconvene.

A trio of Texas Democrats slept overnight Monday in the statehouse instead of traveling home with a mandated law enforcement escort ordered by the Republican leadership.