Smith turned the bill writing over to Strom, who authored it in isolation and then made revisions during conference committee meetings, while the House and Senate versions of the bill were being reconciled. Democrats didn’t see the changes Strom made until four days before the final vote. One immigrants’ rights advocate told The Texas Observer, “We would start to lobby on it, and when we went to offices, some of them would say, ‘we didn’t even know this provision was in there.’ ”
