Good morning,

The language used to define issues often determines how they will be solved. I end the week reflecting on the importance of shaping the debate.

This is the Texas Minute for Friday, September 26, 2025.

– Michael Quinn Sullivan 

November’s Constitutional Amendments

• On the upcoming November General Election ballot, 17 constitutional amendments will be placed before voters for their consideration. Addie Hovland reviews the recommendation for each proposition being offered by Texans for Fiscal Responsibility, the True Texas Project, and Texas Policy Research. 
    
• According to the Texas Secretary of State, early voting will begin on Monday, October 20, 2025. Election Day is Tuesday, November 4, 2025.

UNT Program Promotes Demonology and LGBT Ideology

• At the University of North Texas, courses such as An American Demonology and Introduction to LGBTQ Studies, are part of the Women’s and Gender Studies program this fall. Robert Montoya has the details.
      
• The demonology course examines "witchcraft, vodou, shamanism, and conjure" in American culture. Among the course readings is a paper that decribes Eve (from Genesis) as "the first witch." The author asserts women should embrace "queering the witch" as part of their identity.
         
• Other courses deal with transgender experiences, including drag performers and cross-dressers, as a way to show that "gender is not natural or fixed."
       
• For the course Feminist Foundations, the syllabus claims that every woman's "voice matters and we need to hear it." This might be a surprise to women on campus like Mary-Catherine Hallmark, who has been targeted in recent weeks for harassment by campus leftists for advancing conservative values. Hallmark has said UNT officials have refused to address her concerns or threats to her safety.
      
• Not to rub it in, but your taxpayer dollars are subsidizing coursework on the study of demons. Congratulations.

Public Libraries' Ability to Remove Sexually Explicit Books Being Challenged in Federal Court

• Travis Morgan reports that cases moving through the federal courts in Texas and Colorado could impact how public libraries deal with explicit materials. 
    
• The Texas case involves the Llano County Public Library, in which the U.S. Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals decided in favor of plaintiffs who have argued that sexually explicit books should not be made available to children. The majority opinion noted that the First Amendment does not require the government to subsidize speech, meaning there was no obligation for any particular book to be on the shelf.
      
• The case in Colorado involves a local school district, where officials removed titles they found inappropriate for children. It is expected that the Tenth Circuit will rule against the effort, creating a split between the two appellate jurisdictions.
     
• Such a divergence usually draws intervention from the U.S. Supreme Court.

Texas Supreme Court To Decide Controversial Property Tax Fight

• Over 40 years ago, a tax designed to support the handicapped was repurposed for a school district—without voter approval. Paige Feild reports the fight is now before the Supreme Court of Texas. 
    
• Taxpayers from Willacy County and the Lyford Consolidated Independent School District have sued to stop a decades-old property tax from being collected. Plaintiffs assert they are paying taxes to two separate school districts.
      
• South Texas ISD boasts that it is the “only all-magnet school district in the state.” It spans 3,643 miles, making it the second-largest school district in Texas by land area. It’s also flush with cash. But the property tax that funds South Texas ISD wasn’t originally supposed to finance a school district.
     
• Voters in Willacy County ratified a tax in 1974 to fund maintenance and operations for the Rio Grande Rehabilitation District for Handicapped Persons. Almost a decade later, without voter approval, the rehabilitation district repurposed and renamed itself as the South Texas ISD. In 2023, the district levied a new property tax rate, and taxpayers sued.
      
• A local judge ruled in favor of the taxpayers, but the 13th Court of Appeals reversed the decision. The Supreme Court of Texas is set to hear the case on November 5.

Harris County Commissioners Pass Budget Featuring Hiring Freeze, Cuts ... and Tax Hike

• Harris County Commissioners Court finally approved the 2026 budget this week after months of infighting between Democrat commissioners. Michael Wilson reports the budget comes in at $2.7 billion.
      
• The new budget includes a 72 percent reduction for the Sheriff’s Office medical division and a 48 percent reduction for the Office of County Administration. Other areas saw spending authorization go up, including for elections and court-appointed defense.
       
• The budget also comes with a tax rate increase of two cents per $100 in property valuation, which does not require voter approval.

This Sunday on REAL TEXANS

Friday Reflection

Words Matter

The key to winning a fight isn’t found in the fight itself, but in defining what the fight is even about. The great military philosopher Sun Tzu understood this, warning his students not to let their enemies pick the times and locations of battles. He wrote, “The clever combatant imposes his will on the enemy, but does not allow the enemy's will to be imposed on him.”

When you fight on your enemies’ terms, it rarely works out well.

You’d think this would be self-evident, but time and again, American conservatives have allowed liberals to define the fights. It is no wonder the war for our culture and republic has been in such shambles!

Words matter; they shape how we approach the world and its problems. In culture and government, language also determines how we will solve them. And all too often, conservatives have allowed themselves to be backed into rhetorical corners, letting the left define the debate by dictating the very words used.

Conservative politicians will say they are adopting the language employed by the cultural and political left as a reasonable concession to civic dialogue. In many cases, though, they are instead revealing their own insecurity or laziness … Or, maybe, they are just revealing their true beliefs.

Take the barbaric practice of surgically and chemically mutilating the sex organs of children to achieve the appearance of the opposite gender. The left wants to call this “gender modification,” leaning into a worldview that devalues human life to little more than a knock-off Lego set.

Nothing is being modified on those children, but rather mutilated. Only by calling the practice of gender mutilation what it is can we hope to see it stopped.

That culture has been at war with marriage for a long time is not news. From “no-fault divorce” to “gay marriage,” holy matrimony has devolved into little more than a casual legal arrangement. The latest verbal assault is on the way spouses are referred to culturally. Gone are “husbands” and “wives.” Now they are “partners,” putting your husband on the same rhetorical footing as the fellow who services your office’s copy machine.

The examples go on and on. Consider the invasion at the southern border … or the problem of “undocumented migrants.”

“Undocumented migrants” is addressed in a vastly different manner than “illegal aliens.” One presumes a paperwork problem created by a bureaucracy; the other defines an existential threat to our national survival.

How we describe any problem goes a long way in dictating how we will solve it.

If conservatives want to be competitive in the war for culture and government, they must stop letting leftists define the terms used to describe the world. Conservatives must discipline themselves and not allow the manipulated language of the left to cross their tongues. 

Conservatives must impose on the national conversation honest language to describe the issues of the day if we are to save the republic.

Quote-Unquote

"A careful definition of words would destroy half the agenda of the political left and scrutinizing evidence would destroy the other half."

– Thomas Sowell

Directory of Officials

📧 If someone forwarded the Texas Minute to you, and you like what you see, it is easy to get on the list yourself!