2025 Texas Legislative Session Recap
Category: News
July 8, 2025
At Any Baby Can, we always put children and families first. The 89th Texas Legislative Session was no different. Our main goal coming into this year’s session was to tackle system-level policy and funding issues, increase education and advocacy, and strengthen partnerships to support kids and families. We pushed for key priorities, teamed up with key partners, and ensured that the voices of those we serve were heard. You can read about our top priorities here.
Stronger Together: Our Partners
This session, we were lucky to work with many advocacy and coalition partners. Their combined knowledge helped us reach our shared goals. Some of our key partners included:
Texans Care for Children: Our main partner for Early Childhood Intervention (ECI) advocacy.
TexProtects: A key partner in supporting policies that keep children safe and make families stronger.
Texas PN-3 Collaborative: This group focuses on prenatal-to-three efforts. Children at Risk, Texans Care for Children, and TexProtects lead this group.
Changent (formerly National Service Office for our Nurse-Family Partnership program) and Parents as Teachers: Important partners who promote and support proven home-visiting programs.
Texas Nonprofit Strong: This group, led by United Ways of Texas and OneStar, works to ensure nonprofits get the support they need.
Children at Risk: Another key partner committed to improving the quality of life for children with many policy goals they supported during the 89th session.
Our Approach to Advocacy
We used many strategies during the session that helped us to focus on being non-partisan, flexible informative, and collaborative:
Staying Involved: We actively took part in education and advocacy events and shared our involvement across our communication channels.
Talking to Lawmakers Directly: We made it a priority to attend advocacy days, meet with staff from various offices (in-person and online), and share our powerful client stories. These stories showed the real impact of our goals.
Using Data: We used important facts and figures on ECI, Medicaid access and payments, mental health, and family well-being to inform others. For example, we highlighted that it could take over seven months for parents to find a mental health provider who takes Medicaid, and that nearly 1 in 11 children face medical hardship.
Tracking Bills: We carefully watched House and Senate bills using tools like LegiScan and Texas Legislature Online. We shared updates in blogs, newsletters, and on social media.
Getting Our Team Involved: We kept our senior leaders, staff, board and program participants informed. We also held advocacy training to help them talk with lawmakers.
State Advocacy
There were important House and Senate Bills that relate to prevention, early intervention, and maternal and mental health. Here's a brief look at some of the House and Senate bills we monitored.
Let’s celebrate some of the meaningful wins for Texas children and families:
- Senate Bill 1- Allocates an additional $100 million to the state's childcare scholarship program, aiming to reduce the childcare waitlist of nearly 95,000 children.
- House Bill 136- Improves support for breastfeeding by covering lactation services under Medicaid health insurance.
- House Bill 3940- Improves health coverage for newborn babies by providing additional information to parents and providers.
There were some additional key wins for childcare and charitable giving:
- Senate Bill 462- This will help childcare educators secure care for their own children — a meaningful step in addressing workforce shortages.
- Senate Bill 2018- The creation of a Strong Families Credit will offer tax incentives to businesses that contribute to approved nonprofit and community-based organizations. The goal is to increase private support for programs that strengthen Texas families by improving access to vital resources and
We partnered with United Way of Texas and Texas Nonprofit Strong to defend the nonprofit sector against some legislation that did not pass, which is also a win:
- Senate Bill 2623 – This bill would have restricted nonprofits from serving people experiencing homelessness near schools, parks, or colleges, and created a state-appointed task force with enforcement powers and authority to recommend new regulations, including licensing and penalties.
- Senate Bill 504/House Bill 4188 – This bill would have imposed invasive financial reporting requirements on nonprofits contracting with the government.
- House Bill 4852 / Senate Bill 2340 – This bill would have expanded the Attorney General’s investigative powers over nonprofits and created a new criminal offense.
Unfortunately, some of the bills we did support did not pass:
- House Bill 1955- Relating to the establishment of an early childhood mental health home visiting grant program.
- House Bill 38- Relating to improvements to the Texas Information and Referral Network for 2-1-1.
Federal Advocacy
Our advocacy also reaches the federal level because national policies greatly affect Texas families.
- S.317 Charitable Act: This bill, supported by both parties, would allow taxpayers who don't itemize to deduct up to $5,000 in charitable donations. This is vital support for both donors and non-profits like ours. We actively promoted this bill. This bill is currently in the early stages of the legislative process.
- Child Tax Credit (CTC): We closely watched and advocated for improvements to the Child Tax Credit, especially the proposed temporary increase to $2,500 per child. Specific legislation for expansion has not yet been passed.
- Medicaid: We strongly communicated our concerns with proposed cuts and limits to Medicaid. We know these changes would hurt vulnerable families. We actively took part in national calls and shared information to get other advocates involved. The Senate recently passed a bill containing significant Medicaid cuts.
Although the 89th Legislative Session has ended (aside from a few bills in Special Session), Any Baby Can remains committed to advocating for policies and funding that make families stronger and give every child a chance. We’re thankful for our partners and community's support. This empowers us to continue our vital work. We’ll keep an eye on the results of any pending bills and will keep our community informed of their impact.
"Our mission doesn’t stop when the session ends. We’ll keep pushing for policies and funding that give every child a fair shot, strengthen families, and make Texas a place where all children can thrive."
— Veronda L. Durden, President and CEO, Any Baby Can
Want to get involved with Any Baby Can? Make sure you receive our monthly newsletter, and join us at an upcoming event or volunteer opportunity.
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It's a critical moment for Texas children. Our five key priorities guide us in the 89th Legislative session.
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