This article is Part 4 of a four-part series demonstrating how the money in a lobby sector can impact state politics and legislation. Read the first three articles here, here, and here.

Last week we reported that lawmakers had lumped this session’s most prominent pieces of legislation — property tax reform, school finance reform, and a sales tax — into one codependent heap. Yesterday, the Senate took steps to remove and kill the sales tax portion of the heap.

There’s a lot of talk about Texas’ Big Three — Governor Greg Abbott, Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick, and new Speaker of the House Dennis Bonnen. Considered the three most powerful politicians in Austin, and all conservative Republicans, they made headlines when they declared in January that they would be working as a team to reform property taxes and the school finance system.