2025 · Regular session · House bill
HB5238
HB5238 expressly extends Texas's offense of disrupting a lawful meeting, procession or gathering to in-person or virtual events and to electronic disturbances, including hacking of a virtual component.
Official caption: Relating to the criminal offense of disrupting a meeting or procession.
Official report lists House author(s): Lopez, Ray, Capriglione. This does not identify sponsors or amendment drafters.
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.
- HB5238 expressly extends Texas's offense of disrupting a lawful meeting, procession or gathering to in-person or virtual events and to electronic disturbances, including hacking of a virtual component.
- The bill leaves the offense classified as a Class B misdemeanor.
- Sources: final law; Penal Code 42.05, including unchanged classification; ordinary Class B punishment; history.
What does it do?
HB5238 expressly extends Texas’s offense of disrupting a lawful meeting, procession or gathering to in-person or virtual events and to electronic disturbances, including hacking of a virtual component. The person must intend to prevent or disrupt the event and obstruct or interfere with it. An accidental connection failure is not enough under that intent requirement.
The bill leaves the offense classified as a Class B misdemeanor. The ordinary punishment is a fine up to $2,000, up to 180 days in jail, or both; it is not automatically a felony because a computer is involved. The change took effect September 1, 2025.
Sources: final law; Penal Code 42.05, including unchanged classification; ordinary Class B punishment; history.
What changed along the way?
Previous law described obstruction or interference by physical action or verbal utterance. HB5238 retains those methods, expressly covers virtual gatherings, and adds electronic disturbance of a virtual component, with hacking as an example. It does not create a general ban on criticism during an online meeting; the offense’s intent and interference elements still have to be established.
The introduced, House committee, engrossed, Senate committee and enrolled operative text is the same. There was no committee substitute changing the policy and no floor amendment in the official index.
The governor signed the bill May 29, 2025. The new rule applies only to offenses on or after September 1. If any element occurred before that date, the former law continues to govern that offense.
Sources: all five versions; no-amendment index; introduced text; final act, including transition rule.
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?
Organizers and participants gain an explicit criminal-law provision addressing deliberate disruption of online and hybrid events. People who intentionally interfere electronically face the existing misdemeanor framework; police, prosecutors and courts must still establish the offense’s elements. This bill does not supply cybersecurity funding, guarantee prevention of attacks, or resolve every constitutional question about speech in a particular case.
The May 9, 2025 fiscal note anticipates no significant state fiscal implication and assumes no significant correctional-resource impact. It also assumes local enforcement, prosecution, supervision and confinement costs would not be significant. The April 15 introduced note reaches the same conclusion. These are projections, not a finding that enforcement costs or future cases will be zero.
Review boundary: the complete three-section act, history, all five text versions, no-amendment index and both fiscal notes were read. Historical Penal Code 42.05 and 12.22 confirm the unchanged misdemeanor level and ordinary punishment. Neighboring 42.04 was checked but its separate warning-before-arrest defense was not incorrectly imported into 42.05.
Source: latest fiscal note.
Official sources
- Bill history and latest recorded action
- Bill versions, analyses and fiscal notes
- Action history and votes
- Amendment index
Catalog report retrieved 2026-10-25. Check the official record for corrections or later changes.
