Judge Blocks Texas’ Drag Show Ban — Cites Dolly Parton

U.S. District Judge David Hittner struck down Texas Senate Bill 12 on Tuesday, blocking the state from enforcing its 2023 restrictions on “sexually oriented” performances in front of minors.

Hittner, a Reagan appointee on the Southern District of Texas bench, ruled the law violated the First Amendment and used definitions so broad they could have swept in mainstream entertainers.

The statute barred a “sexually oriented performance to be presented on the premises in the presence of an individual younger than 18 years of age” at a Texas business.

Dolly Parton once surprised Austin drag queen Brigitte Bandit with a rhinestoned guitar. Here's why. https://t.co/jVV003V4xT pic.twitter.com/42m6aaAHME

— KUT Austin (@KUT) August 25, 2026

LGBTQ advocacy groups and drag performers sued after the bill passed. Hittner first enjoined it in 2023. The Fifth Circuit later lifted that injunction in late 2025 and let Attorney General Ken Paxton resume enforcement, while telling the judge how to reassess the statute.

Hittner has now blocked enforcement again and denied Paxton’s motion for a new trial.

Business owners faced fines up to $10,000 per event. Performers faced a misdemeanor carrying up to a year in jail.

Hittner found the law “overly broad” and “an unconstitutional form of both content and viewpoint discrimination.” He focused on the terms “visual performances,” “nude,” and “prurient interest in sex.”

He wrote that critics once targeted Elvis’s hip movements, “chastised Dolly Parton as a voluptuous sex symbol because of her big hair, flamboyant clothes, and breast exposure,” and shamed Miley Cyrus for twerking at the 2013 VMAs. Those “erotic” elements in popular performances, he said, could have drawn civil and criminal penalties under S.B. 12.

One plaintiff, drag performer Brigitte Bandit, impersonates Parton. Parton reportedly gave Bandit a rhinestone guitar in 2023 after Bandit testified against anti-drag bills.

Hittner also wrote that cheerleading, dancing, live theater, and other common events could have been treated as crimes.

To people offended by the performances at issue, he offered this: “The solution is relatively simple… just don’t go.”

Paxton said he would appeal immediately. “This is a profoundly flawed decision that endangers our children and is an affront to Texas values,” he wrote, adding he would “continue to fight to protect our kids.”