In the closing weeks of the 2025 legislative session, leaders with TMO and its sister Texas IAF organizations mobilized once again to stop a corporate tax giveaway that would have slashed wages and cost Texas schools hundreds of millions in lost revenue.

House Bill 105, filed quietly in the final days for bill filing, would have gutted key wage and job creation standards in the JETI (Jobs, Energy, Technology and Innovation) program. JETI replaced the failed Chapter 313 program in 2023, effectively cutting it in half.

If passed, HB 105 would have created a new class of “Priority Projects” for companies investing $750 million or more, allowing them to:

• Avoid proving their tax breaks were a “compelling factor” in choosing Texas,
• Sidestep any requirement to create new jobs,
• Lower wage standards from 110% of the average industry wage for that type of manufacturing facility to 110% of the average county manufacturing wage, which includes many low wage manufacturing jobs, often tens of thousands of dollars less.

In short, it would have allowed some of the largest companies in the world to drive down the wages in their industry by locating new plants in Texas counties with low average manufacturing wages.

Texas IAF leaders were the only ones to testify against HB 105 in committee, sounding the alarm that the bill would allow multi-billion dollar corporations to pay substandard wages while receiving massive  school property tax breaks.

On the other side were dozens of the largest Chambers of Commerce with Oil & Gas and Chemical industry lobbyists. 

In a single example, under HB 105,  ExxonMobil's proposed $8.6 billion plant in Calhoun County would have qualified for $242 million in tax breaks — while paying wages $30,000 below what the current JETI standard requires.  Another project in Brazos County would have reduced wages from $71,000 under JETI  to just $54,000 while still receiving over half a billion dollars in school property tax breaks.

Working with unlikely allies from across the political spectrum, Texas IAF leaders distributed a detailed briefing to legislators, flagging the cost to schools and making clear just how workers would be left behind if the bill passed.

By the time the bill reached the House floor, enough questions had been raised to force multiple delays. Support from pro-business legislators from both parties began to unravel. Conservative fiscal hawks and progressive leaders alike began to follow Texas IAF’s opposition. Ultimately, the clock ran out. HB 105 died. 

“We pushed for wage standards because Texans shouldn’t subsidize poverty jobs,” said one leader. “This was about our children’s schools and our neighbors’ paychecks.”

Texas IAF will remain vigilant as the next legislative session approaches in two years.