Proposal advances to widen bail role of judges
The Texas Senate has approved a proposal to let voters decide whether to allow judges to deny bail outright in a wider variety of cases, a change aimed at locking up more defendants accused of violent crimes as they await trial.
Under the proposed constitutional amendment, judges could deny bail for those accused of murder and a handful of “aggravated” charges: kidnapping, robbery, sexual assault and assault with a deadly weapon. It would also apply to defendants charged with repeated human trafficking offenses.
For now, the Texas Constitution generally guarantees defendants a right to pretrial release unless they are charged with capital murder or meet certain criteria for repeat violent offenses.
The measure, known as Senate Joint Resolution 44, passed on a 30-1 vote. It now heads to the House, where it will need the support of two-thirds of the chamber to be placed on the statewide November ballot.
State Sen. Joan Huffman, the Houston Republican who authored the resolution, said it would serve as a “tool for judges to use in extreme situations.” Under the proposal, judges could only deny bail if they found by “clear and convincing” evidence that doing so was needed to “reasonably ensure” a defendant’s appearance in court or the safety of the community.
Republicans have made their version of bail reform a priority in recent campaigns and legislative sessions, arguing stricter laws are needed to curtail a rise in the number of defendants charged with new crimes while out on bond. State GOP leaders have pinned most of the blame on local Democratic judges,
who they accuse of setting overly lenient bail conditions.
Prior versions of Huffman’s constitutional amendment failed to clear the two-thirds threshold in the House two years ago, when the Legislature last met. The lower chamber gave initial approval to an earlier version in the spring of 2021, but it died on the final day of the session when Democrats fled the Capitol to thwart a Republican-backed voting bill.
Like in previous sessions, Huffman’s latest proposal earned widespread bipartisan support in the Senate, with all but one of the chamber’s 12 Democrats voting for it Monday.
House Democrats have been more reluctant to embrace the idea, arguing earlier versions applied to an overly broad set of crimes. Republicans will need to get roughly a dozen Democrats on board in the House to send the measure to voters.
State Sen. Borris Miles, D-houston, said he agrees judges should be allowed to deny bail to “defendants that pose dangerous threats to our communities” but worried the changes would “fall heavily on Black and brown communities.”
“I’m just concerned, Madam Chair, that we’re turning the hands of the clock backwards,” Miles, whose district is made up of 77 percent Black and Hispanic residents, said to Huffman on the Senate floor.
Huffman argued the measure would “affect a wealthy person exactly like it would affect a person of low income,” because a judge “can hold any person at no bond” who meets the criteria laid out in the amendment. The measure goes further than a Huffman-authored bail overhaul passed in 2021, Senate Bill 6, which sets limits only on no-cost and low-cost bonds — meaning those who can afford to post bail can still do so, while only those without enough cash are forced to stay behind bars.
State Sen. Juan “Chuy” Hinojosa, a Mcallen Democrat who jointly authored the constitutional amendment, also noted it requires judges and magistrates to “impose the least restrictive conditions, if any, that are necessary.”
Still, opponents of the amendment argue it would cause more defendants to plead guilty to avoid the risk of lengthy pretrial detention.
Lauren Rosales, operations manager at The Bail Project, a group that advocates for ending cash bail, said the measure would allow judges to deny bail “simply if they believe a person may miss a court date.”
“Missed court appearances may be inconvenient, but they are hardly reason enough to keep a person in jail, away from their families, jobs and communities,” Rosales said, adding that most missed court appearances are “unintentional” and stem from “sudden illness,” “inescapable work obligations” and other factors.
Huffman said her proposed amendment wouldn’t allow judges to deny bail under those circumstances.
“I just can’t imagine a judge making a written order, stating, ‘I find by clear and convincing evidence that the defendant must be held without bond because he missed the bus one time,’ ” Huffman said. “I mean, that’s subject to appeal, and that’s not a rational analysis of the bill.”