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The Texas legislature only meets once every other year for five months. The session is our best opportunity to actually effect legislative change. In the last legislative session in 2023, a few key pieces of landmark legislation were passed and signed into law. Other pieces of legislation either died in the Texas House or were struck down in Federal Court after they were signed into law. Texas Family Project recently released its legislative agenda detailing all of the issues we expect our legislators to address in this session. Some of these bills have already been filed, while others are still in the works.
Last Session
In the last legislative session, there were a couple of key victories for the family unit. Senate Bill 14 banned the chemical castration of minors and banned “gender affirming care.” This law is currently in effect. In fact, Attorney General Ken Paxton is enforcing the law by suing doctors who performed these illegal surgeries. Senate Bill 15 ensured boys play in boys sports leagues and girls play in girls sports leagues all the way up to the collegiate level. House Bill 1181 required age verification for the use of any website when at least one-third of its content is graphic. This law has made a major impact on Texas families! The largest pornography company in America ceased all operations in Texas due to its unwillingness to follow this law.
There were also two pieces of key legislation which are not current law. Senate Bill 12 aimed to criminalize drag shows in front of minors. This issue has been massive around the state, but an activist federal judge claimed the wording of this bill was too broad and violated the First Amendment. The founding fathers did not intend the First Amendment to allow grown men to dance sexually in front of children! The second piece of legislation to be revisited is House Bill 900, the READER Act. This bill forced book vendors to submit books to a grading system that would rate how sexual they would be, kind of like a rating system for movies. This would have eliminated hyper-sexual books and materials from Texas schools. After a lot of pushback from the book vendors, courts ruled this law would be too burdensome on the vendors. They left the law in place but stripped out the enforcement mechanism.
This Session
This legislative session, we have four main priorities:
End The Sexualization Of Texas Kids: It is past time to have a FULL ban on sexual drag shows in the presence of minors! We also are working on updating the enforcement mechanism on the READER Act so dirty books will actually be removed from schools. We also are beefing up the enforcement methods on the law to ban child genital mutilation.
Ensure Schools Educate, Not Indoctrinate: Families in Texas deserve universal school choice! This bill has to have protections for homeschool and private school families. We also are working with the Lieutenant Governor to have the 10 Commandments displayed in every Texas classroom. This is one of his priorities and one of ours.
Promote Pro-Family Policies: Parents in Texas need a parental bill of rights to protect their families from government and bureaucratic overreach in the state of Texas. We also are working on the establishment of an adoption assistance program to help families with the cost and challenges of adoption. This is a HUGE step in ensuring Texas is a fully Pro-Life state.
Keep Casino Gambling Out Of Texas: Out of state casino lobbyists are working hard to turn Texas into a pro-casino state. An overwhelming majority of Texans do not want casinos in the Lone Star State. We are committed to keeping them out!
What We Will Do
We have already met with many legislators across the state and shared our legislative agenda with them. Many of them have contacted us with ideas about new legislation and creative enforcement ideas. While this is great news, we know politicians respond to public pressure! We will continue to send out action alerts, hold legislators accountable, and shine a light on the often confusing legislative process. We will continue with our Friday Family Update to keep you informed on what is happening in Austin regarding these and other important family issues.
What You Can Do
In order to be effective, we have to stay active. Follow us on social media and read our emails. Call legislators when we ask you to and ask your friends to do the same! Just a few phone calls from concerned citizens can change the trajectory of a bill. (If you don’t believe us, let us know and we’ll send you some examples where public pressure saved or killed a bill!)
We look forward to seeing what the 89th Texas Legislative Session has in store. There are many battles to take place and many victories to be won. Dozens of new faces are in Austin this session, and we look forward to encouraging them to use their new position for good. If you have any questions about what is happening in Austin, please feel free to email us at info@texasfamilyproject.com.