The Blast - May 1, 2025

2 days until Election Day for local elections
14 days until the House bill deadline
32 days until sine die

IN TODAY’S BLAST

• House hardliners present their wishlist

• Abbott weighs in on bail

• Pending censures: Capriglione, Geren and McQueeney

HOUSE HARDLINERS PRESENT THEIR WISHLIST

The Texas House’s right flank today finally articulated some of the bills they want to see moving as the House approaches key deadlines in the session calendar.

Ten or so members joined Rep. Tony Tinderholt, R-Arlington, for an announcement in which they presented 79 bills they’d like to see passed. Members named at least 37 specific bills, with topics including immigration, vaccine policies, protecting children, elections and gun rights.

The members named several committee chairs whose committees haven’t advanced their bills yet. No one came up more than Ken King, R-Canadian, chair of the House State Affairs Committee. Conservatives said he’s blocking E-Verify legislation, both the House and the Senate’s bathroom bills and legislation addressing when children come out as transgender at school.

“He had initially told us, ‘It’s a great bill, love the bill.’ We have three joint authors from State Affairs, but Chairman King won’t give it a hearing” Rep. Steve Toth, R-The Woodlands, said. “Texans will not forgive our massive Republican majority if we fail to protect children from groomers.”

King declined to comment.

It’s the most specific the band of conservative hardliners have gotten since they took down the House’s local and consent calendar in an effort to force leadership to act.

There are 11 days left for House committees to report House bills and joint resolutions to the calendars committees. By 10 p.m. the next day, the Calendars Committee must announce the last daily House calendar with HBs and HJRs. The House must then preliminary pass most HBs and HJRs two days later and finally pass them the following day.

The problem for leadership is they need Democratic support to adopt proposed constitutional amendments, like Gov. Greg Abbott’s priority measure on bail.

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ABBOTT WEIGHS IN ON BAIL

Gov. Greg Abbott threw a wrench in the bail debate when he called for a constitutional amendment instructing judges to “automatically deny bail” for certain violent crimes, such as murder, rape and human trafficking.

Speaking at a press conference in Houston yesterday, Abbott outlined a plan in which defendants would have to prove that they are not a danger to public safety, and that they will appear in court, for judges to be able to set bail in those cases.

That would go further than state Sen. Joan Huffman’s bail legislation, Senate Joint Resolution 5, which would simply allow judges to deny bail in a wider array of cases than the state Constitution currently permits. SJR 5 does not make pretrial detention the default. The Senate approved the legislation in February.

Abbott said that Huffman was “in agreement” with his proposals and was “in favor of a modification of her JR.” The Houston Republican’s office has not responded to the Tribune’s request for comment.

That could be hard for Democrats — of which Republicans need at least 12 to approve a constitutional amendment — to stomach. Discussions are ongoing between Huffman and Rep. Joe Moody, D-El Paso, on how to get to 100 yeas.

— Kayla Guo

Abbott doesn’t always weigh in so publicly with a specific policy ask in the middle of session. The governor swooped in at the very end of the 2023 session in an attempt to mediate a property tax deal between the House and the Senate, for example. But rarely has he suggested an amendment to legislation.

“He’s certainly leaning in,” one conservative consultant told The Blast.

— Renzo Downey

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PENDING CENSURES: CAPRIGLIONE, GEREN AND MCQUEENEY

The Tarrant County GOP’s resolutions committee prepared censures against Reps. Giovanni Capriglione, Charlie Geren and John McQueeney last week, with the goal of removing the three from the primary ballot in 2026. Those resolutions became public this week, and the County Executive Committee will meet on May 8 and consider whether to adopt the censures.

Let’s take a look, because there are some surprising justifications buried in these documents.

Each member got docked for voting for Dustin Burrows for House speaker instead of the Republican caucus’ nominee, for voting to take long weekends and for supporting and stifling debate on the House rules. Those weren’t surprising.

Additionally, Capriglione, of Southlake, was censured for filing House Bill 10, the House’s DOGE bill. The Senate version, Senate Bill 14, became the first bill signed by Gov. Greg Abbott this session.

Geren, of Fort Worth, was reprimanded for circumventing the usual housekeeping resolution process by having his committee, the House Administration Committee, take up the content of the resolution to avoid debate. The resolution also criticizes him for filing House Joint Resolution 137, the casino gambling and sports betting resolution, and for — as House Administration chair — allowing the House Appropriations subcommittees to meet in formal meetings without video recordings.

McQueeney’s gets interesting. The Fort Worth freshman’s resolution docked him for voting against an amendment to the state budget that would’ve audited Operation Lone Star, voting for the overall budget and voting against an amendment to the voucher bill on disclosing sexual crimes against a child or student by a member of the governing body.

The committee also docked him for co-sponsoring the House’s original education savings account bill, House Bill 3, which was substantially similar to Senate Bill 2.

“This bill opposed the 9th Principle of the Republican platform, by enabling government interference and subsidies to Private Schools, and conflicts with the 4th Principle, which Limits government power to those items enumerated in the United States and Texas Constitutions,” according to the resolution.

All three resolutions call on the State Republican Executive Committee to enable the Tarrant GOP to remove the representatives from the GOP ballot in 2026. They want the SREC to take it up at its next meeting.

In recent years, Texas public schools have faced a growing teacher shortage, leaving students struggling to succeed and pushing school leaders to consider new strategies for attracting, preparing and retaining the best teachers.

How can Texas recruit more highly trained teachers — and keep the ones it already has? What can state leaders and lawmakers do to address high turnover and improve student outcomes?

Tribune education reporters Sneha Dey and Jaden Edison moderate back-to-back conversations with leaders, experts and policymakers on how to best support teachers, foster student success and build a stronger future for Texas schools.

Doors open at Raise Your Hand Texas in downtown Austin at 7:30 a.m. Tuesday, May 6, and the first of two back-to-back 45-minute conversations begins at 8 a.m. The Tribune will provide coffee.

The full speaker lineup will be announced here soon.

RSVP today

• The House preliminarily passed former Speaker Dade Phelan’s bill on mass text campaigns, House Bill 4960, with much less heartburn than on his altered campaign media bill. The vote was 132-11, with support from leadership critic Rep. Brent Money, R-Greenville, who commended Phelan for his amendment that addressed his concerns about grouping the text campaigns together when doling out penalties.

Committee highlights:

• The House on Friday is scheduled to take up House Bill 3717, a bill on developing trials to use ibogaine for treating opioid use disorders. Marcus Luttrell, the brother of U.S. Rep. Morgan Luttrell, R-Magnolia, testified in favor of the bill in committee. Former Gov. Rick Perry has also voiced support for the measure.

• The House Ways and Means Committee will take up the legislation to raise the homestead exemption for seniors to $200,000, Senate Bill 23 and Senate Joint Resolution 85, during a committee meeting at 9 a.m. on Monday.

• There are 11 days left for House committees to report House bills and joint resolutions to the calendars committees.

View the full list of upcoming committee notices here and here.

The House will convene at 9 a.m. tomorrow.
The Senate will convene at 11 a.m. on Monday.

View the House and Senate floor calendars here and here.

San Antonio mayor: Gina Ortiz Jones leads with 23% of the vote in the crowded race, according to a two-day poll completed yesterday by Blueprint Polling. Election Day is Saturday. Rolando Pablos polled in second with 15% and Beto Altamirano polled in third at 12%. Ortiz Jones also leads in runoff polling against both.

Southern District of Texas: Former Texas Court of Appeals Judge Michelle Slaughter is in the mix for a federal judgeship in the Southern District of Texas, according to Jacqueline Thomsen of Bloomberg Law. Now-Judge Lee Finley primaried Slaughter last year with the backing of Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton. Also in the running is Angela Colmenero, a deputy chief of staff to Gov. Greg Abbott who has been floated as a potential fill-in for Texas comptroller when Glenn Hegar leaves for Texas A&M.

More judgeships: Bloomberg Law’s Thomsen and Ryan Autullo report that new Texas Supreme Court Justice James Sullivan applied and interviewed to become a federal district court judge in Austin.

• Texas GOP Chair Abraham George, other party leadership and conservative advocates praised House Homeland Security, Public Safety and Veterans’ Affairs Committee Chair Cole Hefner, R-Mount Pleasant, for the committee substitute to the foreign land bill, Senate Bill 17. “Grassroots Texans pushed to make SB 17 stronger and today I’m proud to say that we have a bill that the Texas GOP is fully behind,” he said. The bill is now ready to be scheduled by the House Calendars Committee.

• President Donald Trump lathered on some praise for Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick while Patrick was at the White House to be named chair of Trump’s new commission on religious liberty. Trump called Patrick “one of the most highly respected men in politics.” “We worked on something having to do with your governor. We worked on something having to do with school choice. We knocked it over the fences — and that’s the ultimate school choice in Texas, and he’s been fighting for it for years, and we got it over the line pretty easily, as it turned out.

• U.S. Sen. John Cornyn introduced Joe Popolo, a Dallas-area businessman, at his Senate Foreign Relations Committee confirmation hearing for ambassador to the Netherlands.

“Texas House panel advances THC bill with stricter regulations — but no ban — for hemp industry” by Jasper Scherer of The Texas Tribune

“Renewable energy developers, oil lobby and manufacturers unite against bill” by Philip Jankowski of The Dallas Morning News

Op-ed: “Trump’s bold energy and AI push could be undermined by a Texas bill” by former Trump EPA spokesperson Jahan Wilcox in the Washington Reporter

“This election will decide if Elon Musk gets his own city in Texas. Most of the voters work for him.” by Lauren McGaughy of KUT

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