Watch as Texas House committee debates anti-"sanctuary" bill

The Texas House State Affairs Committee is set to debate a bill that would gut funding from local and state entities that don’t enforce immigration laws.

 As of Tuesday afternoon, Texas House Republicans were still tweaking the lower chamber's version of Senate Bill 4, a controversial immigration-enforcement bill that seeks to outlaw "sanctuary cities" in Texas. The term is commonly applied to local and state entities that don't enforce immigration laws and Gov. Abbott has made passing the legislation a priority.

State Rep. Charlie Geren, R-Fort Worth, said on the House floor Tuesday that committee staff was scheduled to meet with the state's attorney general's office to go over the bill, though he declined to elaborate on how the House version would differ from the Senate's version that chamber passed out last month.

The legislation was listed last month as one of Gov. Greg Abbott’s emergency items, which allows lawmakers to vote on the issue before the traditional 60-day waiting period to hear bills on the floor of either chamber. Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick also deemed the bill a legislative priority.

Before it passed the Senate, the bill was the subject of an emotional 16-hour committee hearing in Senate State Affairs. Watch the livestream above as House State Affairs takes up its version of the bill.