The phrase “Do-Nothing Congress” dates back to the 1940s, but the 90th Congress that President Truman criticized was a model of activity compared with the Texas House. When lawmakers in Austin adjourned recently, they killed prospects for several immigration and border security bills aimed at eliminating the state’s illegal-migration crisis.

Despite Texas having the second-largest illegal alien population in the U.S., the 89th legislative session failed to pass meaningful enforcement measures or revoke opportunities incentivizing aliens to reside in Texas in violation of federal law.

Texans mandated bold legislative action to address the preventable threats posed by illegal immigration. Yet as the final gavel fell, the message delivered to Texans was one of commitment, not to U.S. citizens and lawful immigrants but to bureaucracy, inaction, and delay.

Several bills introduced this session would have made a tangible difference as they paralleled federal law, ensured public safety, and upheld fiscal responsibility. Here’s what Texas House leadership ignored this session.

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Current Texas statute requires only state agencies, institutions of higher education, and adult-entertainment businesses to validate employees’ work eligibility through the E-Verify system. Senate Bill 324 would have expanded that requirement to many other businesses. American jobs and wages serve as the No. 1 incentives for aliens to unlawfully enter or remain in the United States. Title 8 U.S. Code § 1324a expressly prohibits the employment of unauthorized aliens, making E-Verify a necessary instrument for states to comply with federal law.

Until recently, illegal aliens qualified for in-state tuition at Texas public universities, while non-Texan U.S. citizens were forced to pay out-of-state rates, in direct violation of 8 U.S.C. § 1623. Senate Bill 1798 ensured that resident rates would no longer be applied to illegal aliens, but the bill was never considered before the full body of either chamber.

Thankfully, a new lawsuit settlement permanently prohibits Texas from unconstitutionally issuing educational benefits for illegal aliens while U.S. citizens are ineligible for the same benefit, whether they are Texan or not. The legislature allowed S.B. 1798 to die without an existing case law precedent to eliminate the state’s unlawful practice.

The legislature also killed other good bills that would have required disclosure of citizenship status on real estate transfer documents (targeting illegal alien settlements such as Colony Ridge), prohibited land titles for illegal aliens or “designated countries,” and increased criminal penalties for unlawfully present aliens.

Defenders of the legislature argue that the state’s failure to give illegal aliens a Texas-sized goodbye is the result of a codified time restriction rather than willful stonewalling by leadership. Article III Section 5 of the Texas Constitution restricts both chambers from considering business not considered appropriations, gubernatorial recess appointments, or emergency items designated by the governor for the first 60 days of session.

It was not procedural matters that killed immigration bills this session. While both chambers are given the same 140 session days, only one gets to work quickly. The state senate assigned committee placements on the fourth day of session and passed its first bill favorably out of committee on the 15th day of session.

By comparison, the Texas House waited until the 31st day to hand out committee assignments, 27 days after the senate.

The only worthwhile immigration bill sent to the governor’s desk this session was S.B. 8. This bill requires some local law enforcement agencies to enter into memorandums of agreement with Immigration and Customs Enforcement under the 287(g) program outlined in the Immigration and Nationality Act.

The senate suspended regular order of business as necessary in order to send S.B. 8 to the house by April 2, but representatives did not vote on the bill before the full house until May 25, nearly two months later and only a few days before adjournment.

The reality is that most immigration legislation was dead on arrival in the house, as demonstrated by their lack of scheduled hearings, suspension of regular order of business, placement on calendars—or, really, any meaningful consideration.

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S.B. 4 served as a necessary protective measure for Texas when the Biden administration allowed a foreign invasion into the state, but Texas still has a lot of work to do. For starters, Texas does not target employers’ business licenses as consequence for hiring illegal aliens. Texas also neglects to enact vehicle laws that prevent solicitation for day labor; nor does it impose taxes on remittances sent abroad or require banks to verify immigration status.

Texas has failed to penalize nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) that smuggle illegal aliens around the state, despite data that the state had the highest density in the country of cellphones reasonably suspected to belong to illegal aliens detected at NGO facilities, according to a report by the Oversight Project.

President Trump issued an executive order terminating federal grants the Biden administration had awarded these private groups to transport illegal aliens, which created a lucrative business model that NGOs capitalized on in Texas. Unless the state legislature codifies a ban on licenses, contracts, and grants for NGOs involved in assisting illegal aliens, this system could be revived by future leftist administrations. The Heritage Foundation published a model statute on its website to ensure states are safe against organizations transporting illegal aliens.

Although Texans empowered the legislature with the direction to end illegal immigration, a key takeaway from the 89th regular session is that proposing immigration enforcement in Texas is a sure way to kill a bill.