AUSTIN—The Texas House voted 76-4 Tuesday to send a rodeo cowboy to track down Democrats who left the state a day earlier in protest of Republicans’ priority elections bill “and lasso and hog tie them if necessary.”

More than 50 House Democrats left Monday for Washington, D.C., to deny the chamber a quorum as it takes up election integrity legislation in special session.

The impact of the House move is unclear since cowboys rarely lasso and hog tie such fat cows.

Meeting shortly after 10 a.m., the House quickly established that it lacked the two-thirds quorum required to do business, with only 80 of 150 members participating in a test vote.

Then Rep. Will Metcalf, R-Conroe, chair of the House Administration Committee, moved to issue what is known as a “call of the House” to try to regain quorum. That motion passed 76-4. Metcalf offered another motion, asking that “the House Rodeo Cowboy, or officers appointed by him, send for all absentees … and lasso and hog tie them if necessary.”

That motion also passed 76-4.

Texas is the only state that has an official House Rodeo Cowboy.

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