Texas Republicans, like those in other red states in recent years, have overhauled aspects of public higher education in ways that have raised concerns about the future of academic freedom for faculty and institutional autonomy for colleges and universities. They’ve banned diversity, equity and inclusion efforts; reduced the faculty’s role in university decision-making; and mandated curriculum reviews, among other changes.

But Senate Bill 37, which Gov. Greg Abbott signed into law in June, added something the other states’ laws lack: It created an ombudsman position tasked with ensuring institutions follow SB 37 and the earlier DEI ban, which took effect in 2024.

“The ombudsman shall serve as the director of compliance and monitoring,” the law says.

The governor gets to choose the ombudsman, and the state Senate can approve or deny the pick. After that, the governor can unilaterally decide to fire this new overseer if he’s not pleased. This means Abbott, a Republican who has criticized professors for pushing “woke agendas,” has ultimate authority over this new watchdog. Faculty and academic freedom groups say they’re concerned about politicization of this new position—which, under the law, can recommend that state lawmakers cut off a university’s ability to spend state funds until it complies.

Under SB 37, the ombudsman will receive and investigate complaints from students and employees who report violations of the law that banned race- and sex-based affirmative action in hiring as well as “trainings, programs or activities designed or implemented in reference to race, color, ethnicity, gender identity or sexual orientation.”

Further, students and employees can complain about violations of certain provisions of SB 37 itself. These provisions include, among others, the requirements that institutions regularly review their general ed curricula, that institutional presidents pick the presiding officers of faculty senates, that faculty elected to senates only serve two years in a row and then must take at least two years off, that only top university leaders or their designees can “be involved in decisionmaking” regarding faculty grievances and faculty discipline, and that faculty can’t have “final decisionmaking authority” on hiring other faculty or administrative leaders.

If the ombudsman concludes that an institution is violating such provisions, and the university doesn’t make changes that satisfy the official, the ombudsman can recommend that the Legislature bar the institution from spending state money “until the institution’s governing board certifies compliance and the state auditor confirms.”

The ombudsman has state subpoena power and can require universities to assist in investigations. It will report annually to the governor and lawmakers on complaints, investigations and results.

Abbott hasn’t announced his pick for the role. Andrew Mahaleris, the governor’s press secretary, sent an emailed statement in response to Inside Higher Ed’s requests for an interview about why the governor supported creating this position. His statement only specifically referenced SB 37’s restriction on the faculty’s hiring authority, which the ombudsman will enforce.

“Texas is on a pathway to becoming No. 1 in education,” Mahaleris wrote. “To reach that goal, our colleges and universities must prioritize quality education over political agendas. Governor Abbott was proud to sign SB 37 into law, ensuring partisan professors do not influence university hiring.”

Faculty and academic freedom groups have raised concerns about this new watchdog, including about a lack of details regarding how these investigations will be conducted and questions about what these probes may lead to when universities are under pressure to please politicians.

‘Thought Police’

Key concerns for critics of the ombudsman position are that politicians are in charge of appointing the official and that the post seems redundant.

Brian Evans, president of the Texas American Association of University Professors–American Federation of Teachers conference, said that institutions and the systems they’re part of already have compliance offices that accept complaints. The Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board also accepts student complaints about certain issues. Evans said allowing complaints to go to a politically appointed monitor who’s not part of shared governance or a particular campus adds “a very different direction” to higher ed oversight in the state.

“The governor now has a thought police he controls,” Evans added. He said the ombudsman has “the ability to compel anybody they want to be interrogated and investigated … This is really incredible power.”

Emily Berman, vice president of the Texas AAUP-AFT’s University of Houston chapter, expects the ombudsman to “dig and dig and dig and dig—whether or not there’s anything to find there.”

And the threat of the Legislature cutting off funding hangs like a “sword of Damocles” over institutions, she said, giving “universities really strong incentives to do whatever they have to do to make this political office happy.”

Moreover, she said, between governing boards and the statewide coordinating board, there are already “two layers of state-imposed oversight over universities.”

Joe Cohn, policy director for Heterodox Academy, which promotes viewpoint diversity in higher ed, wrote on Heterodox’s website that “university system ombudsmen are typically created to independently investigate complaints of failures of institutions to follow their legal obligations.”

But SB 37 makes clear that this ombudsman “serves at the pleasure of the governor,” Cohn wrote. He said, “This lack of independence is the theme of SB 37 and raises questions about whether the ombudsman will behave politically.”

Amy Reid, Freedom to Learn interim program director at the free expression advocacy group PEN America, said, “Senate Bill 37 has a set of interlocking measures that lead up to the ombudsman that, altogether, will likely chill speech on campuses and in classrooms.”

Reid compared the role to the third-party resolution monitor that Columbia University agreed to as part of its deal with the Trump administration last month to restore federal research funding. That monitor will police the agreement between the university and the federal government.

“In both cases, they’re establishing an outside monitor to look over your shoulder and make you toe the line,” Reid said.

Spokespeople for the Texas A&M University system and the University of Texas system, at least, aren’t criticizing this new overseer. The A&M system didn’t provide a comment and the UT system, in an emailed statement, called it “an opportunity for the legislature and the public to ask questions about higher education and its obligations to students, faculty, employees and the public.”

“The UT System welcomes any opportunity to show our positive impact,” it said.