Passage of Campus Carry Bill Puts Texas Lawmakers at Odds With State’s Universities
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The controversial legislation would allow licensed gun owners to carry their weapons in campus buildings.
Concealed handgun license holders would be able to carry their weapons into buildings on Texas college campuses under a bill the state’s House preliminarily passed Tuesday night.
Licensees are currently allowed to have handguns in their locked vehicles in college and university parking areas, and in some outdoor public spaces, like streets and walkways, that aren’t technically considered part of a campus’ “premises." Senate Bill 11 would permit license-holders to carry firearms indoors, into locations such as classrooms and dormitories.
“There’s been a lot of miscommunication and misperception about what this bill does,” Rep. Allen Fletcher, a Republican backer of the legislation, said during remarks on the House floor. He stressed that the bill does not allow people to carry guns openly on campuses.
Referring to concealed handgun license-holders Fletcher said: “They’re sitting under trees studying their book before they go into class. The law now requires them to go back to their car and leave their gun before they go through double doors and sit down in a chair. These weapons are concealed. It’s not going to disturb any other student.”
“If we make them leave their gun and leave themselves unprotected, that’s not fair,” Fletcher, who represents a district north of Houston, added.
The bill was approved 101-47, with about a half hour remaining before a midnight House deadline to vote on Senate legislation. Opponents made apparent attempts to drag out the debate in an effort to hit the deadline and thereby torpedo the bill. But they ultimately failed.
There are remaining obstacles between the legislation and the governor’s desk. The bill now requires final House approval and will then be sent back to the Senate. It’s unclear how members of the upper chamber will respond to a number of amendments that passed last night, which left their version of the legislation notably altered.
One of those amendments would give colleges and universities a way to keep certain areas free of concealed handguns. Another would exclude campus medical facilities from the bill’s provisions. And a third would require private colleges and universities, as opposed to just public institutions, to also follow the guidelines in the legislation.
Rep. Trey Martinez Fischer, a San Antonio Democrat who opposes the bill, thinks the added language affecting private schools could be enough to sink the legislation going forward.
"Tomorrow morning there are going to be a number of powerful people—maybe alumni, donors, board members—who are going to say we better get sensible, practical and realistic about our gun policies in the state of Texas," he said, according to The Texas Tribune.
Rep. Terry Canales, a Democrat, introduced an amendment that would have left the University of Texas, Rio Grande Valley out of the legislation. The university has a campus in his district, which includes Edinburg, a city about 20 miles north of the Mexican border.
“My university seeks to be excluded,” Canales said on the House floor. “They have no desire for this, they have not asked for this. The student body hasn’t asked for this, the parents haven’t asked for this.
“In fact, it’s been the exact opposite,” he continued. “They don’t want to have their children carrying weapons on campus.”
The amendment was defeated in a 51-96 vote.
Fletcher, the Republican supporter of the bill, noted in his remarks that except for people in the military, concealed handgun license holders have to be at least 21-years-old. This, he said, ruled out the possibility that most undergraduates would be able to arm themselves.
“No frat parties, no 18, 19, 20-year-olds,” he said.
Among the high profile critics of the bill was William McRaven, the chancellor of the University of Texas system, which includes nine universities and six health institutions. He pointed out in a Jan. 29 letter sent to Texas Gov. Greg Abbott and Speaker of the House Joe Straus that suicide was the second-leading cause of death among college students.
“There is a great concern that the presence of handguns, even if limited to licensed individuals age 21 or older, will lead to an increase in both accidental shootings and self-inflicted wounds,” McRaven, a former Navy admiral who commanded the U.S. Special Operations Command, wrote in the letter. He added: “I feel the presence of concealed weapons will make a campus a less-safe environment.”
Canales, the lawmaker from the district that encompasses Edinburg, stated his opposition more bluntly.
“There’s nothing about this bill that, I think, makes anybody safer,” he said.
“I’m a gun advocate, I love guns, I love the Second Amendment, I own a boatload of guns,” Canales added. “This still doesn’t make any damn sense.”
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