Gov. Abbott wants ‘criminal’ investigation related to porn in Texas schools amid book controversies

Gov. Greg Abbott is directing Texas education officials to investigate whether pornography is available in public schools and to notify law enforcement if such material is accessible.

His directive comes amid a political backlash against books related to race, gender and sexuality. Some parents have railed against books that include scenes of sexual abuse and LGBTQ relationships.

Earlier this week, Abbott called on the Texas Education Agency, State Board of Education and Texas’ library and archives commission to develop standards to prevent the presence of “pornography and other obscene content” in schools — though he didn’t specify what kind of standards. The state agencies said they would comply with his request.

The Republican governor intensified his push with a letter Wednesday to Education Commissioner Mike Morath noting that while standards are being developed, “more immediate action is needed to protect Texas students.”

“The presence of pornography in schools is not only inappropriate, but it is also against the law,” Abbott wrote.

Abbott did not say in his letter what books he considers to be pornography. In previous correspondence, the governor pointed to two books recently removed from the libraries of Keller and Leander schools as examples.

Keller removed Gender Queer: a Memoir by Maia Kobabe after complaints of the book’s drawings and Leander removed In the Dream House by Carmen Maria Machado, which describes sexual acts.

Young adult authors and education advocates have pushed back against the crackdown on books in school libraries. They say students need access to literature that reflects their identities and experiences. They worry investigations will have a chilling effect.

Abbott’s latest letter will likely intensify those fears.

“During this investigation, I ask the agency to refer any instance of pornography being provided to minors under the age of 18 for prosecution to the fullest extent of the law,” Abbott wrote.

Texas Education Agency officials are reviewing the letter.

But Abbott appears to be trying to generate a moral panic under the guise of an investigation, said Jonathan Friedman, director of free expression and education at PEN America.

The governor’s letter cites a section of Texas Penal Code that deals with the sale or distribution of “harmful material” to minors, which has a very specific legal definition, Friedman noted.

“It has to be utterly without redeeming social value,” he said. “I think it would be difficult, if not impossible, to suggest that the books he has singled out in previous letters — or the other books that librarians have put in libraries that are works of literature — would possibly ever rise to these kinds of standards.

“From a legal perspective, this is just kind of hyperbole in the wind.”

Conservative politicians are increasingly focusing in on what children are reading in schools alongside efforts to combat critical race theory in classrooms. Pundits have distorted the academic framework and conflated it with a wide host of school districts’ diversity and inclusion efforts, turning it into a major red-meat issue.

”No one of sound mind and moral character thinks Texas students should have access to pornography in public schools,” Shannon Holmes, director of the Association of Texas Professional Educators, said in a statement. “The primary people who think there is a ‘porn problem’ in public schools are running for public office.”

Abbott is gearing up for another election season. Last week, another gubernatorial candidate also capitalized on the the strife. Don Huffines, a former state senator who represented the Dallas area, accused the Department of Family and Protective Services of training employees in critical race theory and said Abbott must do more to weed it out.

Just before Abbott’s request, another Republican lawmaker launched a probe into school library books. Rep. Matt Krause, R-Fort Worth, sent an unnamed number of superintendents a letter with a list of roughly 850 books attached. Among the most contemporary titles, the vast majority were written by women, people of color and LGBTQ authors.

Krause, who is running for Texas attorney general, asked the superintendents to identify where the books — dealing largely with the topics of race, gender identity and sexuality — were located and how much money was spent on them. He also asked district leaders to identify any other books that address human sexuality, sexually transmitted diseases, or any material that “might make students feel discomfort, guilt, anguish, or any other form of psychological distress” because of their race or sex.

Hours after Abbott publicized his letter, South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster sent a similar directive to his state’s superintendent, requesting an investigation into obscene and pornographic materials in schools.

Some enraged parents have read excerpts of books, including In the Dream House, at school board meetings. One mother gained attention after she attended a meeting and told trustees that the explicit sexual language in that book “probably constitutes child abuse.”

Machado, the author, responded to the backlash via a recent New York Times column. She wrote that, while the books under scrutiny might make some people uncomfortable, literature is essential to “expanding minds, affirming experiences, creating appreciation for the arts and building empathy.”

“Those who seek to ban my book and others like it are trying to exploit fear — fear about the realities that books like mine expose, fear about desire and sex and love — and distort it into something ugly, in an attempt to wish away queer experiences,” she wrote.

Preventing teenagers from reading her book — which delves into the emotional reverberations of the author’s abusive relationship with another woman — won’t protect them, Machado said.

“On the contrary, it may rob them of ways to understand the world they’ll encounter, or even the lives they’re already living,” she wrote. “You can’t recognize what you’ve never been taught to see.”

The DMN Education Lab deepens the coverage and conversation about urgent education issues critical to the future of North Texas.

The DMN Education Lab is a community-funded journalism initiative, with support from The Beck Group, Bobby and Lottye Lyle, Communities Foundation of Texas, The Dallas Foundation, Dallas Regional Chamber, Deedie Rose, The Meadows Foundation, Solutions Journalism Network, Southern Methodist University and Todd A. Williams Family Foundation. The Dallas Morning News retains full editorial control of the Education Lab’s journalism.