Texas gives final OK to unlicensed handgun carrying, El Paso lawmakers react: ‘Our deaths don’t matter’

AUSTIN, Texas — Texas lawmakers have given final approval to allowing people carry handguns without a license, and the background check and training that go with it.

The Republican-dominated Legislature approved the measure Monday, sending it to Gov. Greg Abbott. The governor has said he will sign it despite the objections from law enforcement groups who worry it would endanger police and the public.

Gun control groups and Democratic lawmakers opposing it also point to the state’s recent history of major mass shootings, including the El Paso Walmart massacre, though those were primarily carried out with assault-style rifles.

El Paso lawmakers specifically denounced the bill, noting this is the first legislative session since the deadly Walmart mass shooting in 2019.

“All [El Paso community members] wanted was something better. All they wanted was some accountability. Yet here we are,” state Rep. Joe Moody, an El Paso Democrat, told colleagues on the floor Monday. “When the doors were closed, I heard lots of promises. I haven’t heard them since.” (You can watch Moody's entire remarks in the video player atop this article.)

State Sen. Cesar Blanco, another El Paso Democrat, applauded Moody's floor speech, tweeting: "I wholeheartedly opposed this bill. We need solutions to address gun violence... (this) is not a solution."

But perhaps the most powerful words of opposition came from El Paso Congresswoman Veronica Escobar, who weighed in on the state decision from her view at the federal level.

"After the deadliest Latino-targeted massacre in modern American history, fueled by hatred against immigrants & Mexicans in El Paso,Texas on August 3, 2019, the Texas legislature decided to EXPAND easy access to permitless, unconcealed guns. Truth is, our deaths don’t matter," she tweeted.

The bill’s supporters claim the measure would allow Texans to better defend themselves in public, while abolishing unnecessary impediments to the constitutional right to bear arms.

However, a solid majority of Texas voters don't think permitless carry should be allowed, according to the latest University of Texas/Texas Tribune Poll.

Texas already has some of the loosest gun laws in the country and has more than 1.6 million handgun license holders. Once the new measure is signed into law, Texas will join nearly two dozen other states that allow some form of unregulated carry of a handgun, and by far the most populous.

Texas already allows rifles to be carried in public without a license. The measure sent to Abbott would allow anyone age 21 or older to carry a handgun as long as they don’t have violent crime convictions or some other legal prohibition in their background. But there would be no way to weed them out without the state background check currently in the licensing process.

The bill would not prevent businesses from banning guns on their property, and federal background checks for some gun purchases would remain in place. Texas has no state restrictions on private gun sales.

Texas has allowed people to carry handguns since 1995, and has been reducing the cost and training requirements for getting a license for the last decade.