Rep. Jasmine Crockett is urging Texas leaders to review school police use of force after posting that students are being hogtied, handcuffed, and tased in the state’s public schools. The Texas Democrat’s Oct. 6 message on X, tied to a letter seeking answers from Gov. Greg Abbott, Attorney General Ken Paxton, and Education Commissioner Mike Morath, quickly drew replies questioning her wording. Online users argued the force is meant to protect other students, with the most-liked reply telling her she has “ZERO kids” and to “chill with the loaded language.”
The images show the letter, not a recorded exchange. On the page, Crockett writes that Texas has given school officers “extraordinary authority” without “sufficient oversight,” and that students, “including children as young as six years old, have reportedly been handcuffed, hogtied, pepper-sprayed, shocked with Tasers, arrested, and subjected to other uses of force.”
The letter also says that, according to data The New York Times obtained, there were “more than 2,600 use-of-force incidents from January 2022 through December 2025.” A later page names 17-year-old Tayshawn Chadwick and says officers “pressed a Taser against his skin, and shocked him repeatedly.”
The caption says, “Our kids are being hogtied, handcuffed, and tased in our schools,” and asks Texas leaders for “immediate oversight.” The images do not show the incidents themselves. Crockett’s office said the letter is based on a review of the Times and the Houston Chronicle.
In that reporting, Cy-Fair ISD later banned hogties after an officer used the restraint on a 10-year-old with disabilities, and a district lawyer said, “We’re not perfect.” Tayshawn told reporters, “It felt like a lightning bolt.”
New Texas Education Agency rules, taking effect this month, say restraint is for emergencies, not ordinary discipline.
Responses to Crockett’s Texas School Force Letter
On X, the sharpest pushback was aimed at Crockett herself. The highest-liked reply said, “You have ZERO kids. Chill with the loaded language and word games.” Another wrote that people, “including students, shouldn’t commit crimes and expect not to be handcuffed.”
A second group treated the restraints as protection for everyone else in the building. One commenter asked, “Yes, let’s protect the violent students in our schools. Do you hear yourself?”
Another said students were being hogtied, handcuffed, and tased “to protect the other kids,” and a third called those actions “the very definition of safety.” A separate reply said the students “should try to behave.”
Others focused on the students on the receiving end. One X user wrote that children “should also never be subjected to handcuffs, tied, or physically roughed up.” In her own release, Crockett said, “Our kiddos should not be treated like criminals.”
In a separate case, a district said an officer used “necessary force to gain control of the situation.”
It is not clear whether Abbott, Paxton, or Morath will answer the questions in the letter. The post remains part of a wider argument over how Texas school officers use force, and over where discipline ends and a police response begins.
