Fellow East Texans,

I hope your Spring is off to a great start and that you survived the stormy weather over the weekend!

You know it’s officially April in Texas when the bluebonnets take over the Tyler Rose Garden on the Capitol grounds.

First Floor Votes

This past week, the Texas House took up its first batch of votes on the floor. These included:

✅ HJR 1 and HB 9 to raise the personal property tax exemption from $2,500 to $250,000.

✅ HJR 4 to prohibit the legislature from implementing taxes related to security exchanges and securities transactions.

✅ HB 908 to require law enforcement to report missing children to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children in addition to other databases to aid in finding them.

While this was the first time that we’ve voted on legislation as a whole chamber, rest assured that we’ve been busy working hard behind the scenes.

Over 5,500 bills have been filed by the House alone. With 150 members in the chamber, getting good legislation passed (and weeding out the bad legislation) requires a lot of conversations among lawmakers and fine-tuning bills to make them stronger.

Committees have held hearings over the past month on over 600 of those bills, and the Committee on the Delivery of Government Efficiency (DOGE) that I sit on has also held several investigative hearings with public invited testimony to shed light on government fraud, waste, and abuse.

In the coming weeks as committees continue to consider bills, the House will vote on more bills on the floor at an increasing rate—including on the budget and school choice.

On Our Way to Banning a Carbon Tax

Out of 31 freshmen, I have the distinction of being the first to have a constitutional amendment considered and approved by a committee.

HJR 138 would prohibit the legislature from implementing a carbon tax. It was heard in the House Committee on Ways and Means and was approved by the committee in an 8-3 vote, with all Republicans and one Democrat in support. The resolution is now in the Calendars Committee where we are working to have it placed on the calendar soon for a vote on the House floor.

While there’s currently no carbon tax in place and there’s no sign of Texas seriously considering one any time soon, the time is ripe to raise the barrier for any future tax. Should the political winds in Texas change and decades from now there’s an appetite for a carbon tax, placing this ban in the Texas Constitution would require a two-thirds majority support of the legislature and approval from Texas voters to implement.

Office Visits

Toward the end of March, I had the pleasure to recognize Texas REALTORS on the House Floor with HR 545. I loved getting to see all of my colleagues clad in purple as they met with lawmakers for their legislative priorities.

Last week I was honored to be presented with the School Choice Trailblazer award from Americans for Prosperity Texas. I know that the school choice program the legislature is working on will be a boon to students in need across the state like those who visited me from East Texas.

Coming Up…

We have just under two more months to get our bills across the finish line and into law.

One of the top priorities for me to accomplish in that time is passing HB 3225. This bill would require municipal public libraries to remove or relocate books to an adult section if they depict sexually explicit conduct – thereby protecting our kids from inappropriate material.

This shouldn’t even be a bill that we need to pass, but unfortunately this kind of explicit material is available for minors in public libraries today – even here in Smith County. Thankfully, I am proud to have over 50 co-authors on this bill already, so I’m optimistic that we will get this legislation passed into law.

Another priority bill is HB 1527, which would expand the tuition exemption at public universities for peace officers in Texas to include broader subject areas related to law enforcement. This is an easy way to support our first responders without adding more costs to the state, and would create opportunities more on par with those that firefighters can receive.

As always, thank you for the opportunity to serve.