House Democrats' Own Floor Handout Shows How Texans Could Vote on Independence

A one-page document that Democrats circulated on the floor of the Texas House during the 2025 fight over school vouchers lays out how the Legislature can put a question directly to Texas voters by passing an ordinary bill. The Texas Nationalist Movement obtained a photograph of the page from a lawmaker who was on the floor.

The page opens with a passage it attributes to the Texas Legislative Reference Library: "Texas does not provide for citizen-led referendums at the state level, but the legislature may pass legislation mandating a referendum on a particular topic. This type of referendum is authorized by bill, and is distinct from propositions to amend the Texas Constitution." It continues: "The Constitution neither permits or prohibits this procedure."

"Texas has held multiple statewide referenda for several controversial topics in its history," the document says. "In each of these referenda, the vote was authorized by the Legislature."

The principle is right. Several of the page's facts are not.

It gives two examples. The first holds up: Senate Bill 15, passed in 1986, sent pari-mutuel wagering on horse racing to the voters on Nov. 3, 1987, and they approved it, according to the Legislative Reference Library. The second is misdated. Senate Bill 86, by Democratic Sen. Carl Parker, asked voters whether to keep an appointed State Board of Education, and they rejected it. The document labels that vote 1989. It took place on Nov. 3, 1987, the same day as the racing vote. January 1989 is when the appointed board's term ran out.

The page's other precedents fail outright. House Bill 1776, by Rep. Ron Wilson in 1993, called for a nonbinding vote on licensing Texans to carry handguns, but Gov. Ann Richards vetoed it, so the vote it called for never took place. House Bill 3, Rep. Jim Keffer's 2005 school finance bill, contains no statewide referendum in any version TNM reviewed, and it did not become law that year.

Democrats made that argument in the open as the voucher bill moved through the House. On April 16, 2025, Representative James Talarico offered an amendment to send the voucher bill to a statewide referendum. The House tabled it 86 to 62 on Record Vote 244. The House Journal lists Gina Hinojosa and Vikki Goodwin among the 62 who voted against tabling it. Two months earlier, Hinojosa had answered a school-choice advocate on X by citing the same 1987 school board vote: "It was NOT a constitutional amendment. Let Texans Vote." A week after that, she asked Governor Greg Abbott's press office, "What are you afraid of?"

On Tuesday, Hinojosa won the governor's race and Goodwin the lieutenant governor's race in the unofficial count. On Thursday morning, TNM published an open letter asking both of them to sign the Texas First Pledge or to say publicly whether Texans should get a vote on independence. TNM's referendum bill takes the route the floor document describes: a statewide vote set by ordinary statute. Earlier versions were filed in 2021 and 2023 as HB 1359 and HB 3596. Each went to the House State Affairs Committee, and neither received a hearing.

The letter asks the two incoming officials to back a public hearing for the next one. The 90th Legislature convenes Jan. 12, 2027, and prefiling opens Monday. TNM President Daniel Miller put the question to Hinojosa directly in comments to Newsweek on Thursday. "The new governor demanded a vote of the people on vouchers and asked Abbott's office, 'What are you afraid of?'" he said. "On a vote for independence, I'm asking her the same question."

Neither campaign has answered the letter. TNM said it will publish any answer in full.

In 2025, Democrats carried a page onto the House floor arguing that the Legislature can send a question to Texas voters by ordinary bill. In January, two of the members who voted on that argument will hold offices that decide whether it reaches independence.