2025 Texas sessionsRegular and both called sessions have ended. This index covers House and Senate bills, not resolutions. Statuses come from official reports.

2025 · Regular session · House bill

HB3073

HB3073, the Summer Willis Act, changes the intoxication-related circumstance in which sexual assault is treated as occurring without consent.

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Official caption: Relating to the prosecution of the offense of sexual assault.

Signed by governorSource-checked explanation published

Official report lists House author(s): Howard, Troxclair, Johnson, Cook, Collier. This does not identify sponsors or amendment drafters.

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Bill explanation published · Version and amendment review scope is stated below · Individual amendment records may not be separately annotated.

Bill highlights

Selected points from the published explanation. Follow each point to its source-linked context; conditions and limits may matter.

HB3073, the Summer Willis Act, changes the intoxication-related circumstance in which sexual assault is treated as occurring without consent.
This is not a rule that any alcohol or drug use automatically establishes the offense.
HB3073 changes conduct covered by the existing offense, not its punishment ranges.
The governor signed June 20, 2025.

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What does it do?

HB3073, the Summer Willis Act, changes the intoxication-related circumstance in which sexual assault is treated as occurring without consent. The revised provision applies when the actor knows the other person is intoxicated or impaired by any substance to the extent that the person is incapable of consenting. It replaces the earlier provision focused on an actor intentionally impairing someone by administering a substance without that person’s knowledge. The new wording does not require the accused person to have supplied or secretly administered the substance. Final law.

This is not a rule that any alcohol or drug use automatically establishes the offense. The final text requires incapacity to consent and the actor’s knowledge of it, alongside the other elements of the sexual-assault offense. The act also expressly uses the Penal Code’s definition of consent: “assent in fact, whether express or apparent.” The law’s other listed circumstances of nonconsent remain. Consent definition; sexual-assault statute.

HB3073 changes conduct covered by the existing offense, not its punishment ranges. The statute’s general classification is a second-degree felony; its ordinary range is 2–20 years in prison and a possible fine up to $10,000, with other statutory classifications and enhancements depending on the circumstances. This is not a prediction of an individual sentence. Penalty range.

The governor signed June 20, 2025. The change applies to offenses committed on or after September 1, 2025. If any element occurred before that date, the act directs that the former law govern the offense. Official history.

What changed along the way?

The filed bill and House substitute proposed broader changes involving incapacity, awareness and withdrawal of consent. The substitute preserved the existing mental-disease-or-defect provision, placed the substance-impairment change in subsection (b)(6), and dropped a related medical-board cross-reference change that accompanied the filed version’s renumbering.

Johnson’s adopted House amendment added the Summer Willis Act name. The Senate substitute narrowed the operative changes: it restored the existing unconsciousness/physical-inability and unawareness provisions, removed the proposed separate withdrawal-of-consent clause, and replaced “knows or reasonably should know” with “knows” in the substance-impairment provision. The House concurred and that text became law. Removing proposed wording does not itself mean the conduct is lawful under other applicable provisions.

The amendment index lists the naming amendment; the major substantive narrowing appears in the Senate committee substitute. All text versions.

For the full amendment record, open the official amendment index.

Official bill versions

Compare the published text versions in the official text index. A change is not attributed to a specific amendment here without a verified record.

Who could benefit—and who could bear the costs?

The change can provide a clearer prosecution route for assaults on people incapacitated by substances even when the accused did not administer the substance. Survivors may benefit from that coverage. Investigators and prosecutors still must establish the required facts; defendants face the existing felony process and penalties where the elements are proven. This briefing does not determine guilt or whether a particular person’s consent was valid.

The final May 29 fiscal note anticipates no significant state fiscal impact and assumes local enforcement, prosecution, supervision and confinement effects will not be significant. The May 26 criminal-justice impact statement recognizes that expanded criminal liability could increase correctional demands but assumes no significant effect. Those are estimates, not a promise of no additional cases or costs. The act makes no appropriation.

Official sources

Catalog report retrieved 2026-10-25. Check the official record for corrections or later changes.