Late last week Rep. Ralph Hall, a veteran Congressman from Texas, announced that he was switching from the Democratic to the Republican party. (Hall claimed that he made the switch because Republicans had “zeroed out” his district’s appropriations in the budget, although more cynical people note that Republican redistricting in Texas would have made it much harder for him to be reelected as a Democrat.) Hall had been the ranking minority member—top Democrat—on the House Science Committee, and often worked closely with Republican chairman Sherwood Boehlert on a number of space policy issues, including an effort to delay the Orbital Space Plane.
Hall will be replaced as ranking minority member by Bart Gordon, a Tennessee Democrat who had been the ranking Democrat on the space subcommittee. Who will take over that position, or if Gordon will hold that job as well as Hall’s old position, hasn’t been announced. There has been some speculation that Hall could become chairman of the space subcommittee, since Rohrabacher stayed on the job post-Columbia, after internal House term limits should have forced him out, because of a lack of other members interested in the post. This should all sort itself out shortly after Congress reconvenes after MLK Jr. Day.
