Last summer, during the Republican Party of Texas (RPT) State
Convention, delegates voted for eight legislative priorities that
fall roughly into one of two categories: protection of children
and protection of conservative values and God-given inalienable
rights. This 88th regular session succeeded on the first and
yielded mixed results on the second.

Regarding the protection of children, banning Child Gender
Mutilation has been a top priority for two sessions in a row.
This session, thanks to Senator Donna Campbell and Representative
Tom Oliverson, SB 14 was passed prohibiting medical providers
from practices that attempt to change a child's physical
characteristics to approximate the opposite sex. Medical
providers will lose their licenses if they violate this law.

There were five bills passed that met the priority of Stopping
the Sexualization of Texas Kids.

They include HB 900 by Rep. Patterson, prohibiting sexually
explicit materials in Texas public schools; HB 1181 by Rep.
Shaheen, which requires strict age verification for online porn;
SB 12 by Sen. Hughes, prohibiting sexually oriented performances
in the presence of minors, including drag shows; SB 1527 by
Senators Hancock and Huffman, which provides a criminal penalty
for sexually grooming children; and HB 4520 about educator
employment and retirement consequences for selling, distributing,
or displaying harmful materials to children.

These are all outstanding bills, and we are very appreciative for
the hard work of those legislators who championed them and got
them to the Governor's desk. Ultimately, culture must change to
protect children. But we believe these bills will encourage that
change and provide needed safeguards until it does.

Our other priorities include protecting our elections, securing
the border, protecting the unborn, our second amendment rights,
and parental rights.

Protect Our Elections: HB 1234 (Rep. Hefner) passed, which
returns the penalty for voter fraud to a felony, as did HB 5180
by Rep. Wilson, which provides for public inspection of ballots
after 60 days of an election. A major miss was addressing the
issue of the Attorney General's lack of authority to prosecute
election crimes. There were some good bills passed outside of the
priority purview, such as SB 1070, which puts safeguards in place
to protect individual personal information and specifies the
duties that shall be executed for the Interstate Voter
Registration Crosscheck Program. We were also very disappointed
that SB 990, calling for precinct-only voting on election day,
failed.

Secure the Border and Protect Texans: We passed two good bills.
SB 1403 by Sen Parker creates an interstate compact for border
security, including building a border wall and sharing state
intelligence and resources. SB 1900 by Sen. Birdwell designates
the cartels as foreign terrorist organizations. Speaker Phelan
killed HB 20 by Rep. Schaefer, which would have created the Texas
Border Task Force and allowed Texas to turn illegal aliens back
across the border when Democrats killed it on a point of order.

Abolish Abortion in Texas: No bills passed to address illegal
abortions or enforcement.

Defend Our Gun Rights: HB 3 (Rep. Burrows) provides for an armed
security guard on school campuses. This is a good step toward
eliminating gun-free zones and is major headway in protecting our
students. HB 3137 by Rep. Isaac also passed, which prevents
counties from restricting gun rights.

Parental Rights and Educational Freedom: SB 29 by Sen. Birdwell
passed, which prohibits public schools and other government
entities from enforcing a vaccine or mask mandate to prevent the
spread of Covid-19. The House blocked all school choice
legislation where the money follows the student.

The final legislative priority, Ban Democrat Chairs, could not be
achieved by legislation but rather Speaker Phelan's initiative or
a members' vote on the House rules. As predicted, Democrat House
chairs did kill RPT priority bills. But, to be fair, Republican
House chairs also killed priority bills.

Now it is up to Texas Republican voters to look at the results of
the 88th Legislative session, look at the votes of your own
Representative and Senator, and decide for yourself if you want
to hire them for the next session. We encourage you to do the
hard work of educating yourself and your neighbors about this
legislative session. Don't rely on what your Representative or
Senator will tell you in the coming months as they come back to
their districts to begin campaign season.

One conservative club in Denton County has built a website that
assesses their Representatives' performance in supporting the
Republican Party of Texas Legislative Priorities. Take a look and
consider if this is something you wish to do in your county or
district: www.staterepscorecard.com. If we keep doing the same
things, we will get the same results. You must decide if you are
satisfied with the current results.

CONTRIBUTE
secure.winred.com/republican-party-of-texas/legislative-priorities-contribute?utm_source=prmt&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=

For God and Texas,

Jill Glover
SREC, SD 12
Chair, SREC Legislative Priorities Committee

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