Senate State Affairs to Examine Prediction Markets, Debanking and Judicial Training Seminars

The Texas Senate Committee on State Affairs will gavel in at 9 a.m. Sept. 15 in Capitol Extension room E1.012 for a second consecutive day of interim hearings, this time on four charges that share a common shape: an industry doing something Texas law did not anticipate. Prediction markets taking bets on elections and sports. Banks closing accounts over politics. Advocacy groups teaching judges. Retailers bottling their own liquor. Public testimony will be limited to two minutes per witness, and anyone filing written testimony must bring 20 copies for the committee clerk, according to the hearing notice. The Senate does not accept online comments on this agenda.

Sen. Bryan Hughes, R–Mineola, chairs the nine-member panel — eight Republicans and one Democrat, Sen. Judith Zaffirini of Laredo — with Sen. Angela Paxton, R–McKinney, as vice chair, according to the committee’s page. State Affairs carries 11 interim charges this cycle; the panel took up three of them the day before, on online gaming, family courts and the lottery handover.

The closing gambling loopholes charge is the one with the most movement behind it. It directs members to study what Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick’s charge calls the sudden inundation of prediction market gambling and the use of federal law to route around Texas gambling prohibitions, and to examine how federally regulated derivatives markets relate to conduct Chapter 47 of the Penal Code treats as illegal. The platforms at issue list event contracts on elections and sporting outcomes under Commodity Futures Trading Commission oversight, and other states have moved first: Nevada, Connecticut and Arizona regulators and prosecutors have all taken action against Kalshi, while Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton has stayed out of the multistate fight, Legal Sports Report noted. The Dispatch reported in August that the Texas Medical Association has proposed a minimum age of 21 for prediction market platforms, an indication that the fight will not stay confined to gambling law.

The fair banking charge revisits a bill the chairman lost. Senate Bill 946, by Hughes, would have barred lenders from denying credit to organizations based on social credit or value-based standards. State Affairs reported it 9-1 and the full Senate passed it, but it died in House State Affairs on May 15, 2025, after failing to receive an affirmative vote in committee. The federal ground has shifted since: President Donald Trump signed an executive order in August 2025 directing financial regulators to address politicized debanking, and the interim charge borrows its language. Members are asked to study banks and insurers closing, restricting or denying service to people, lawful businesses and whole industries for non-financial reasons.

The judicial integrity charge is the least defined and the most pointed. It directs members to study what the notice calls attempts by public advocacy groups to improperly influence the judiciary through biased informational seminars, and to identify the entities running them. The national version of that dispute centers on the Environmental Law Institute’s Climate Judiciary Project, which develops climate science curriculum for judicial education programs and which 23 Republican attorneys general asked the Environmental Protection Agency to defund in 2025. The notice names no organization, so the invited witness list is where the charge’s actual target will become clear.

The alcohol sales charge returns to the three-tier system that Texas has separated producers, wholesalers and retailers under since Prohibition ended. Members are asked to study retailers selling alcohol distilled under their own private labels, a practice that raises tied-house questions when a retailer’s control over production goes beyond quality assurance, and to recommend changes that keep consumer protections intact. The Texas Alcoholic Beverage Commission’s marketing practices guidance already restricts what retailers may take from the tiers above them.

Because this is an interim hearing, the committee will take no votes and no legislation is before it. What members hear will shape the panel’s interim report and the bills filed for the 90th Legislature, which convenes in January 2027.

Meeting at a glance

Committee members

• Sen. Bryan Hughes, R–Mineola (SD-1) — Chair
• Sen. Angela Paxton, R–McKinney (SD-8) — Vice Chair
• Sen. Paul Bettencourt, R–Houston (SD-7)
• Sen. Bob Hall, R–Edgewood (SD-2)
• Sen. Adam Hinojosa, R–Corpus Christi (SD-27)
• Sen. Tan Parker, R–Flower Mound (SD-12)
• Sen. Charles Perry, R–Lubbock (SD-28)
• Sen. Charles Schwertner, R–Georgetown (SD-5)
• Sen. Judith Zaffirini, D–Laredo (SD-21)