• Investing in our Schools

Wendy Davis was the leading voice against $5.4 billion in budget cuts to public schools in 2011; specifically, she was the only Senator to filibuster those massive cuts. She has continued to fight tirelessly to restore that funding to education.

Wendy Davis will invest more in our schools so our children are prepared for the future. She will cut bureaucratic waste and administrative red tape to put more money into classrooms and continue to fight the $5.4 billion in budget cuts to public schools that led to overcrowded classrooms, teacher layoffs and closed schools.

• Reducing Standardized Testing

Wendy Davis helped pass a comprehensive law that reduced the number of standardized tests Texas high school students take from 15 to 5.

• Expanding Pre-Kindergarten Programs

Wendy Davis will ensure that school districts across the state are offering students high-quality, full-day Pre-K.

• Attracting, Recruiting, and Retaining High-Quality Teachers

Wendy Davis will build a well-trained workforce of teachers by engineering guaranteed pathways to careers in education and ensure ongoing support by raising teacher pay to be in line with the rest of the country.

• Increasing Access to Higher Education

Wendy Davis will strengthen and expand Texas’ existing early college opportunities to make obtaining college credit while in high school a reality for more students.

• Encouraging Parental and Community Engagement

Wendy Davis will make sure that no child is forced to attend a low-performing school, and that parents and communities all across Texas have the most effective tools to provide students with the resources they need to excel in the classroom.

• Making College Affordable

Wendy Davis will work with the legislature to rein in the skyrocketing costs of college and fully fund grants that help hardworking Texans get to college and prepare for careers.

She will also expand college credit access for high school students that will put college within reach for a new generation of Texans.

• Creating Opportunity for All Texans

Wendy Davis coauthored legislation that established a new university in South Texas within the University of Texas System, which will result in a single institution that serves the entire Rio Grande Valley. This expansion of the university system represents a step toward bringing higher education resources outside of the main Central Texas corridors and improving access to higher education for students.

In addition, Wendy Davis coauthored legislation to help Texas universities reach Tier One status to ensure all Texans have access to quality and affordable higher education opportunities.

Wendy Davis will fight to make more Texas schools Tier One schools, thereby expanding access to top education opportunities and bringing world-class research programs and economic growth to communities across the state.

• Honoring Our Heroes

Wendy Davis also worked to strengthen the Hazlewood Act, which offers veterans expanded opportunity and financial encouragement to pursue higher education.

Wendy Davis supports the College Credit for Heroes program, which allows colleges and universities to award course credit for experience, education and training obtained during military service. This program helps veterans save time and money as they pursue degrees and transition into the civilian workforce.

• Education

Investing in our schools to ensure all Texas children have access to quality educational opportunities and good-paying jobs is key to Texas’ economic success. As Governor, Wendy Davis will:

• Implement quality, full-day Pre-K for every child.

• Ensure we test less and teach more.

• Cut administrative costs and bureaucratic waste to put more money in our classrooms.

• Make college more accessible and affordable through college-credit hours available to high school students and by doubling the number of early college high schools.

• Invest in the TEXAS Grant program, Texas’ need-based funding program for higher education students.

• Support the advancement of Texas universities to Tier one status.

• Infrastructure

A strong infrastructure is essential for Texas to create good paying jobs and stay competitive in the 21st Century economy. As Governor, Wendy Davis will:

• Fight for smart, sufficient, and sustainable investment for Texas’ transportation infrastructure.

• Ensure the voter-approved State Water Plan is implemented transparently and effectively, so Texas families and business have the water supply they need.

• Honest Pay for Honest Work

Hardworking Texas families are the key to our economic success, and a full day’s work is worth a full day’s pay. As Governor, Wendy Davis will:

• Fight to increase the minimum wage, ensuring 2.8 million hardworking Texans have better paying jobs — including 1.5 million women, 917,000 parents, and 368,000 people over the age of 55.

• Sign the Texas Equal Pay Act to help close the pay gap and ensure that women and all Texans are paid equally for doing the same work.

• Energy

Our energy industry builds our schools, boosts our infrastructure and creates hundreds of thousands of jobs. As Governor, Wendy Davis will:

• Help our energy industry remain a leader in innovation and technological advancement.

• Use the combined advantage of our oil and gas, wind and solar abundance to lower families’ energy bills and grow Texas’ economic prosperity.

• Protect private property rights and quality of life for Texas residents as the energy industry continues to grow and thrive.

• Work with the industry to ensure that Texas takes full advantage of its leadership in clean energy like natural gas production and wind energy to become an even bigger energy exporter to other states.

• Economic Development Funds & Tax Exemptions

When responsibly invested, economic development funds can help bring new businesses and jobs into the state, promote innovation, and encourage technological advancements. But under the wrong leadership and without accountability, too often they become giveaways to special interests and insiders that drain valuable resources from essential investments like our schools and increase taxes on working Texas families. As Governor, Wendy Davis will:

• Promote transparency, accountability, and responsible investment of economic development funds to ensure they actually create jobs, as well as encourage innovation and development that benefits all Texans.

• Establish strong, independent oversight of our incentive funds.

• Ensure transparency and accountability of tax exemptions.

• Medicaid Expansion

Wendy Davis believes we cannot let $100 billion of Texas tax dollars leave the state and pay for healthcare in other states like California, New York and Florida. We need to keep those dollars here at home to relieve the burden on local governments and create 300,000 new jobs.

Wendy Davis believes our fellow Texans in uniform deserve respect and support when they come home. Our veterans should have access to education, get credit for the training that they received while in the service, and be welcomed back into the workforce in Texas.

Wendy has worked to make sure that veterans, service members, and their families are provided every opportunity for a quality education. This includes college tuition exemptions, more college counselors available to help veterans, and strong support for Hazlewood benefits.

Our military offers some of the best job training in the world. In the Senate, Wendy helped change a law to require state agencies to provide credit towards occupational licenses for job-relevant training our veterans received in the military.

Wendy Davis has pushed for and supported policies that would create jobs for our service men and women upon their re-entry into civilian life. In the 83rd Legislature, Senator Davis supported the establishment of the Veteran Entrepreneur Program, and wrote and co-sponsored laws to make it easier for service members to get their trucking, plumbing, and electrician licenses.

As Governor, Wendy will continue to fight for those who fought for us. Whether it’s job training, mental health counseling, or funding for existing services, Wendy will continue to support programs for our veterans.

• Fighting Against Closure of Women’s Health Centers

Wendy Davis stood for nearly 13 hours to fight against Austin insiders trying to close 60 health centers across Texas that once provided hundreds of thousands of women with care they can’t get elsewhere.

• Empowering Rape Survivors, Cracking Down on Rapists

Wendy Davis authored the second law in U.S. history to focus on eradicating the state’s backlog of thousands of untested rape kits to ensure sexual predators are brought to justice.

• Ending Sexual Violence

Wendy Davis has also passed laws to make certain that survivors of sexual assault can be treated and have their evidence collected at almost any hospital with an ER and be kept up to date on the status of their case.

• Fighting for Equal Pay

Wendy Davis passed a bipartisan equal pay for equal work bill in 2013, which would have conformed Texas law with federal law and allowed victims of wage discrimination to pursue their case in state court. Governor Perry vetoed the bill. Texas is one of only four states that does not have equal pay for equal work protections.

In Texas, the median pay for a woman working full time, year-round is $33,689 per year, while the median yearly pay for a man is $42,044. When broken down, full-time, year-round Texas women are paid about 82 cents for every dollar paid to men, amounting to a yearly gap of $7,859 between men and women.

• Cracking Down on Rapists

Wendy Davis authored the second law in U.S. history to focus on eradicating the backlog of thousands of untested rape kits to ensure sexual predators are brought to justice.

• Empowering Rape Survivors

Wendy Davis has also passed laws to make certain that survivors of sexual assault can be treated and have their evidence collected at almost any hospital ER and be kept up to date on the status of their case.

• Fighting Domestic Violence

Wendy Davis supported laws to improve how the state addresses domestic violence. She broadened the emergency resources available to survivors fleeing their abusers, worked to ensure survivors maintain custody and property rights, and extended protective orders to shield a victim’s animal companion from being harmed or abused.

• Stopping Human Trafficking

Wendy Davis has been a leader in the fight against human trafficking throughout her time in the Senate, including making improvements to Texas Crime Stoppers, creating the Human Trafficking Prevention Taskforce, and increasing penalties and offenses under the criminal code.

• Protecting Children

Wendy Davis sponsored the law that requires computer technicians to report child pornography to law enforcement.

• Cracking Down on DWIs

In 2009, then two year-old Abdallah Khader and his family were rear-ended by a drunk driver, who had seven prior drunk driving convictions and a blood-alcohol level that was more than three times the legal limit. The crash caused severe brain damage to little Abdallah – leaving him permanently disabled for the rest of his life. Inspired by his story, Wendy sponsored and passed “Abdallah’s Act,” a law that enhanced the penalty for a drunk driving accident if the victim is left in a persistent vegetative state. The law also increased the penalty if a driver is found to have a blood-alcohol level almost double the legal limit or higher.

• Protecting Texans’ Right To Know

While Attorney General Greg Abbott ruled to keep the locations of explosive chemicals secret, Wendy Davis will work to keep Texans safe by calling on the legislature to clarify that Texans are entitled to basic chemical information under the Texas Community Right-to-Know Act.

• Securing the Border

Wendy Davis is fighting to secure our border by ensuring the resources are available for the public safety officials responsible for keeping it safe. Wendy Davis will focus public safety resources specifically to combat organized criminal activity from every level, including resources for district attorneys and targeted investigations.

• Comprehensive Immigration Reform

Wendy Davis is pushing Congress to implement comprehensive immigration reform that facilitates the employment of essential workers by U.S. companies and allows hard-working, tax-paying workers to eventually earn legal status and continue contributing to our economy.

• DREAM Act

Wendy Davis supports the Texas DREAM Act, which was signed into law in 2001 by Governor Perry with the strong backing of both Republicans and Democrats in the Legislature. The Texas DREAM Act says that children brought to this country by their parents through no fault of their own, who grew up in this state, stayed out of trouble and got good grades should have the opportunity to get an education and contribute to our economy.