The platform was voted on in Houston at the state party convention, which ended Saturday. Resolutions for Mr. Biden and Mr. Cornyn were approved by a majority vote of the delegates, according to James Wessolek, communications director for the Republican Party of Texas. Statements about homosexuality – as well as additional abortion posts calling on students to “learn about the Humanity of the Newborn Child” – were among more than 270 boards approved by a platform committee and voted on by its largest group. Assembly of Representatives using paper ballots. The results of those votes were still pending on Sunday, but Mr Wesolek said it was rare for a full congress to vote against it after it was approved by the committee. The resolutions that adopted the false allegations that former President Donald J. Trump fell victim to a stolen 2020 election, and the other statements were the latest examples of Texas Republicans moving further to the right in recent months. Republicans control both chambers of the legislature, the governor’s mansion and every state-wide office, and have used their dominance to push through tough anti-abortion legislation, creating supply chain problems by temporarily adding additional state inspections. border and redefine the Trump-backed state attorney general of a member of the Bush family in a qualifying round in May. Mr Wesolek challenged the idea that the declarations were linked to the right-wing inclination of the ruling party. “That was the will of the body,” Wesolek said Sunday. “We are proud to be a party from the ground up.” Assemblies of state parties in Texas were at times venues for public display of internal rifts. In 2012, Gov. Rick Perry was outraged at the state Republican convention when he said he backed the powerful lieutenant general over Ted Cruz in a controversial Senate qualifier. On Friday, Mr. Cornyn – a key negotiator in arms talks with Democrats – was rebuked by those present at the conference during a speech in which he tried to reassure Republicans that the new legislation would not violate gun owners’ rights. The state party resolution defending the baseless allegations about the stolen 2020 elections said that “significant electoral fraud in key metropolitan areas significantly affected the results in five key states in favor” of Mr. Biden. The state party, the resolution continued, rejected “the certified results of the 2020 presidential election and we believe that incumbent President Joseph Robinett Biden Jr. was not legally elected by the people of the United States.” The resolution encouraged Republicans to “show up to vote” in November and “bring in your friends and family, volunteer for local Republicans, and tackle any possible fraud.” State spokesman Steve Toth, a Republican representing part of Montgomery County, a suburb of Houston, said he left the convention before voting on the resolutions, but voiced support for them. He said he hoped the Biden resolution would “encourage Republicans and Democrats to meet and ask for a forensic examination” of the 2020 election. Jason Vaughn, 38, a Republican from Houston, praised the inclusion of the “vote for vote” language in the Biden resolution. “My fear is that if we continue to tell people that the election was stolen, they will not go to the polls,” Vaughn said. Mary Lowe, a Fort Worth suburban spokeswoman who focused on education at the conference, said she was surprised the 2020 election results were in the spotlight for her Republican colleagues. But, he added, “I do not know too many people who thought Biden won.” Ms Lowe, head of the Tarrant County chapter of a group known as Moms for Liberty, said she was among those who openly criticized Mr Cornyn. But he added that he was ashamed of the curl and did not participate in it. “I do not think booking is polite,” said Lowe. “I feel that the elected officials should be treated with due decency.” Jamie Haynes, a 47-year-old Republican who lives in Texas Panhandle with her husband and says they have “a lot of guns” together, said the disapproval of Mr Cornyn showed that there was a “resounding strong opinion”. “The Republicans do not want to shave their gun rights – not just to be stripped – but even to shave in any form.” The resolution reprimanding Mr Cornyn, passed in the assembly, went against the red flag laws, which allow the seizure of weapons by people considered dangerous. These laws, according to the resolution, “violate the right of the individual to a fair trial and constitute a pre-criminal punishment of persons who are not found guilty.” The homosexuality board passed the platform committee by a vote of 17 to 14, according to Mr Vaughn, an openly gay member of the committee who voted against it. “It is doing nothing to move us forward as a party and win voters,” he said in a video from the commission meeting. In an interview, Mr Vaughn said the change at the conference was the result of a small number of people “making the process miserable because they want to do all these extreme, far-right things”. Mr Toth disagreed, saying that for abortions, gay rights and the 2020 election, the Republican Party was consistent in upholding its conservative principles. “Defense of marriage? Abortion? Second amendment? “Where did we move to the right?” asked. “Republicans have always been strong advocates of constitutional family values.” A Texas lawmaker, Colin Allred, described the Republican Party’s actions as “backward.” “The Texas Republican Party is trying to take us back to a time when women could not make decisions about their bodies and when Americans lived in fear of being punished for being themselves,” Mr Olred told a statement.
