'This is moving things in the wrong direction': Kamin criticizes Abbott for vetoing a bill proposing dating violence prevention classes for schools

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott recently vetoed a bill that would have had schools teach dating violence prevention lessons.

Senate Bill 1109, dubbed the Christine Blubaugh Act, had bipartisan support in both chambers and would have required Texas public schools to teach students about domestic violence and dating abuse, how to recognize the signs of abuse and how to report abuse, according to Texas Politics.

Houston City Councilwoman Abbie Kamin took to Twitter to voice her disappointment with the governor's choice to veto the bill.

"With domestic violence related murders continuing to rise, this is moving things in the wrong direction," Kamin wrote in a June 22 Twitter post.

Abbot said that he vetoed the bill because it “fails to recognize the right of parents to opt their children out of the instruction,” Texas Politics reported. “I have vetoed similar legislation before on this ground, because we must safeguard parental rights regarding this type of instruction." 

He added that he would consider legislation that took a more narrow approach.

The bill would have required that schools teach approximately four to eight hours of education on the subject of abuse that could be spread out over several years, according to Houston Chronicle. 

Authored by Texas State Sen. Royce West (D-Dallas), the bill was named for a north Texas teenager Christine Blubaugh, who was killed in 2000 by an abusive ex-boyfriend, according to Texas Politics. Christine's mother, Debra Blubaugh, reportedly didn't even know that her daughter was in an abusive relationship.

“As a parent, you think recognizing the signs of abuse would be easy, especially in your own daughter,” Debra told Texas Politics. “She didn’t share much about this part of her life, maybe with a few of her closest friends. But these children were young too, they had never really been around it, they didn’t know what to do, they didn’t know what the signs were. I believe had she had this information in high school, it could’ve started this conversation.”

The CDC's Youth Risk Behavior Survey and the National Intimate Partner and Sexual Violence Survey shows that mostly females are the victims of teen dating violence, with one in 11 female high school students having reported experiencing physical dating violence within the last year.

SB 1109 was among 21 bills that Abbott vetoed.