(Texas Scorecard) – In a big win for protecting Texas children from sexual predators in public schools, state senators unanimously approved a House measure to eliminate school districts’ “sovereign immunity” from civil liability in sex abuse cases.
House Bill 4623 by freshman State Rep. Mitch Little (R–Lewisville) increases accountability in Texas public schools by allowing civil liability when a school is grossly negligent or reckless, or when it enables intentional misconduct in hiring, supervising, or employing individuals who commit sexual misconduct or fail to report suspected abuse.
“We have a sexual abuse crisis in our public schools in Texas. It’s indisputable, and we can’t look away,” Little said earlier this month as he laid out the bill—his first—on the House floor.
House members approved HB 4623 on May 14 in a 109-19 vote.
The Texas Senate took up the bill on Tuesday night.
State Sen. Angela Paxton (R–McKinney), who sponsored HB 4623 in the Senate, noted that “child sexual predators hunt children in their natural habitat. They embed themselves in the very institutions to which we entrust our children: our churches, summer camps, youth organizations, day cares, and yes, our schools.”
“I know that not a single person in this room has any tolerance for a child sex abuser who would don the trusted mantle of a teacher or a coach or a bus driver in order to create unfettered access to innocent children,” Paxton, a former teacher herself, told senators. “Perhaps the only thing we might find more reprehensible would be school district personnel turning a blind eye to this evil, or worse yet, enabling such an atrocity.”
Paxton explained that HB 4623 applies to all public schools, including open-enrollment charter schools, and covers a broad definition of professional school employees including administrators, teachers, bus drivers, and board members.
Private schools are not included because they do not enjoy governmental immunity from liability.
HB 4623 creates a new cause of action that waives governmental immunity for public schools and abolishes official immunity protections for employees who sexually abuse students, ensuring that survivors can bring claims in court. The bill as currently written caps damages at $500,000 per claimant and guarantees the recovery of court costs and attorneys’ fees.
Paxton said the bill ties liability “directly to institutional failures and individual accountability.”
“House Bill 4623 sends a message to the whole state of Texas, to all of our schools … In Texas, school safety is non-negotiable, the innocence of a child is non-negotiable, and schools will face serious consequences if they fail to protect our children,” she added.
Before the Senate’s unanimous vote on final passage, Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick also gave a warning to Texas public school district officials: “No more excuses.”
“For all of those in the schools—our thousand or more superintendents, thousands of principals—understand we’re going to be watching, and your careers will be destroyed. You could end up in jail,” said Patrick. “We’re not going to tolerate this one more day.”
Patrick also said he was going to ask Education Commissioner Mike Morath to “move personnel to focus on this issue” and to send a “special delivery envelope” to every Texas school superintendent and principal advising them of the new laws.
“I can’t think of another time that our hearts have really been hit by a bill,” said Patrick. “I don’t want to hear they don’t have enough people … I don’t want any excuses that they didn’t know, they didn’t see, they didn’t understand.”
While the final version of HB 4623 is not as strong as Little’s original proposal, advocates like Christin Bentley, who heads the Texas GOP’s advocacy efforts on legislative priority “Stop Sexualizing Texas Kids,” acknowledge it as “a significant step forward in holding public school districts accountable for sexual misconduct and abuse, ensuring justice for countless Texas families.”
“For every survivor who was silenced, ignored, or told ‘nothing could be done’ — this is for you. For the families who begged for justice and met only closed doors — this is for you,” Tami Brown Rodriguez, director of policy for anti-trafficking organization Jaco Booyens Ministries, posted on X. “Texas stood up for victims of educator sexual misconduct. No more hiding. No more immunity. No more cover-ups.”
Many of the survivors, parents, and advocates who hailed lawmakers’ “landmark action” in passing the “historic bill” had shared emotional testimony with lawmakers in the House Judiciary and Civil Jurisprudence Committee last month and again in the Senate Education K-12 Committee last week.
Survivor Callie McDonald told senators last week that since she first testified about being sexually groomed and abused by a Texas public school coach and district officials blaming her and shielding the predator, dozens of girls have reached out saying they had exactly the same experiences.
Aileen Blachowski, president of Texas Education 911, presented both committees with shocking statistics from “State-Sponsored Child Abuse,” the advocacy group’s analysis of educator misconduct reporting data gathered by the Texas Education Agency. Blachowski also identified specific school employees who had documented histories of being passed from district to district despite complaints.
On Tuesday night, Paxton shared testimony given by Rockwall mother Corey Booth, whose then-four-year-old son reported being sexually abused by his female pre-K teacher while at school.
Similar stories have been shared by parents across Texas.
“Some of you are thinking that surely this is exaggerated. Surely such things could not happen,” said Paxton, adding that “the dark and devastating truth” is that “the unthinkable has and is happening to children in our schools.”
“Not just cold and calculated sexual abuse of little children, but school districts literally covering up these heinous crimes,” she said. “And members, you need to know the level of evil that we’re talking about here because it is literally beyond what you would ever imagine.”
“No one should be able to hide behind sovereign immunity for doing something like that,” said Paxton.
Can you imagine a family who has nowhere to go? They know that a school has been complicit in harming their child, and they have nowhere to go with it. That won’t be true anymore. And accountability is good for all of us. Transparency is good for all of us. But the biggest winners are going to be our kids.
The Senate-approved version of HB 4623 has now returned to the House, which can concur with the changes or request a conference committee to agree on a compromise.
The measure will then go to Gov. Greg Abbott. He’ll have 20 days after the legislature’s final adjournment on June 2 to sign or veto the bill, or take no action and allow HB 4623 to become Texas law on September 1.