Burrows relied on Democratic support to win the gavel last year, then green-lit a wave of conservative priorities.

Nearly 800 elected officials, party activists and local Democratic leaders signed onto a letter supporting Scudder after three dozen called on him to forgo reelection.

In an open letter, former staffers and other insiders said the state party has fallen short on strategy and failed to act with urgency under Scudder’s leadership.

Democrats highlighted the issue on the March 3 primary ballot, and Republicans have created a state taskforce. Now survivors and advocates want to see actions taken to prevent these deaths.

The effort is a partnership between the state party, two of its largest political organizations and the House Democrats’ campaign arm.

Party insiders said the way the move was handled undercuts Chair Kendall Scudder’s rhetoric about winning back working class voters, who lurched to the right in 2024.

In 2024, President Donald Trump won all four counties in the Rio Grande Valley, once considered a reliable Democratic stronghold.

Scudder takes over after a difficult 2024 election for the party.

The State Democratic Executive Committee will meet on Saturday to elect the successor to party Chair Gilberto Hinojosa.

Sign up for The Brief, our daily newsletter that keeps readers up to speed on the most essential Texas news. The head of the Texas Democratic Party has appointed a committee to take a "deep dive" on what went wrong in the November election after a group of executive committee members wrote to him demanding answers, reforms and a shakeup in senior staff. Texas Democrats severely underperformed expectations in the November election after looking to it as their best shot in decades at making inroads. The letter was organized by two SDEC members, Kendall Scudder and Jen Ramos. As for the party’s headquarters, Hinojosa wrote in his letter that he “strongly believes” the party should maintain a “storefront” office as it has in Austin.