(Texas Scorecard) – Citizens testified to Texas senators this week that despite the legislature’s passage of a law prohibiting sexually explicit books in public school libraries, these materials are still present.
“HB 900 is not being implemented,” anti-smut advocate Bonnie Wallace told members of the Senate Education Committee during a hearing Wednesday in Austin.
House Bill 900, also known as the READER Act, prohibits sexually explicit material in public school libraries and requires book vendors to issue appropriate ratings on books before selling them to public schools.
While the requirement for vendors to rate books is currently on hold in the courts, the prohibition on sexually explicit materials is fully enforceable.
The lawsuit against the READER Act’s rating system was brought by BookPeople, which alleges the law violates the First Amendment rights of booksellers by requiring them to rate books. The case is now in a trial court.
Ryan Kercher, deputy chief of the special litigation division at the attorney general’s office, told the committee a summary judgment briefing will happen sometime in October and will likely decide the case instead of a trial.
Kercher highlighted that during the case, some vendors admitted to selling sexually explicit materials to school libraries.
“We took the deposition of one of the independent bookstores who claimed to have a First Amendment interest in not having to label the works that she sells to our ISDs,” Kercher said. “One of the things that we learned is that she admitted to selling two pieces of sexually explicit material—two sexually explicit books—to Memorial Middle School. This just underscores how important it is to ensure there are limitations on what we put in front of our children.”
State Sen. Angela Paxton (R-McKinney) asked whether she heard Kercher correctly, and he confirmed the two books were explicit.
“They’re both by the author Colleen Hoover, who writes in the erotic adult space,” said Kercher.
This brought senators to one issue regularly heard during the hearing: that school districts are refusing to comply with the READER Act requirement for school libraries to remove sexually explicit content.
State Sen. Phil King (R-Weatherford) suggested the legislature consider exacting financial penalties for school districts that fail to comply with the law.
Wallace agreed, “We need consequences, we need responsibility, and we need accountability.”
Currently, while parents and citizens have brought challenges to sexually explicit books before their school boards and district officials, many are facing resistance from their districts regarding the removal of such materials.
On X, State Republican Executive Committeewoman Christin Bentley recently posted a legal update on one such case. In a grievance filed against Lovejoy ISD by district mom Laura Giles, the school district refused to temporarily remove obscene books reported by parents.
“In the case of Giles vs. Lovejoy ISD, Administrative Law Judge Christopher Maska has allowed the case to proceed on the merits and has ordered a briefing and oral arguments,” Bentley wrote. “This is the first known case related to the possession of prohibited library materials in front of an ALJ after The READER Act was passed and went into effect in September 2023.”
According to Bentley, Maska has also determined that the Texas Education Agency has jurisdiction, meaning that TEA could enforce the READER Act, especially if directed by lawmakers next legislative session.