New State Representative in District 146 Lauren Ashley Simmons has pledged to fight against abortion bans, censoring the teaching of Black history in schools, banning books in school libraries, discriminating against LGBTQ+ families, suppressing voting rights and millions of Texans being kicked off health insurance.
“When my community is under attack, I’m under attack,” she told the Defender. “I’m very defensive about not protecting just myself but others who aren’t able to…it’s time for us to be bold, to be brave, and not cower because that’s what they want. They want to erase us and remove us from public life.”
Simmons represents parts of south and southwest Houston, including neighborhoods such as Westbury, the Willowbend area, Brays Oaks and Sunnyside. She defeated incumbent State Rep. Shawn Thierry in the 2024 March primary, receiving 64.6% of the votes. In the Nov. 5, 2024, elections, Simmons (77.7%) defeated Republican Lance York (22.3%).
Looking back
Simmons, a graduate of Jack Yates High School and the University of Texas, became a mother in her freshman year at 19 without her parents’ support and battled poverty. She said she did not understand “how expensive it is to be poor.”
“I truly was able to connect the dots between what it means to be working class in this society, and just how much our lives are dictated by the jobs that we have access to, by the education we have access to,” Simmons said. “And I just wanted to help people fight for their rights.”
After joining the labor movement and finding a purpose in life, Simmons says that she now advocates for policies and working groups in the 89th legislative session.
On public education
Simmons, the mother of a high school senior and a 10-year-old, said her “deep passion” for public education stemmed from having family as educators, who instilled a “deep love and understanding of just how critical public education was, especially in a Black community.”
Today, she believes that education, or what she calls the “great equalizer,” is “under attack” after the Texas Education Agency takeover of the Houston Independent School District. The protest against the takeover is far from the start of Simmons’ advocacy. She was a part of the community of parents and educators who held HISD accountable for years. She also worked for the American Federation of Teachers when HISD Superintendent Mike Miles was in charge of the Dallas ISD.
Simmons said the TEA takeover is a political move.
“I hate to sound conspiratorial, but you can’t tell me there’s not some type of connection between our governor who spent the whole almost last legislative session, and then four special sessions trying to push a voucher plan through, and then the takeover of the largest school district in the state,” she said. “If funding is based on enrollment, then of course schools in our predominantly Black neighborhoods…are gonna be even more under-resourced than campuses that are attracting more students.”
On voting rights in Texas
Simmons believes Harris County is “often the target of anti-voter legislation because Harris County is a bluer county.”
“I think Republicans kind of realize very early on that their base is only gonna expand so much because their policies really don’t center around working people,” she said. “Instead of figuring out how to attract a broader base and be a bigger tent, what they wanna do is make it as difficult as possible to vote and shrink the electorate.”
On health
Simmons wants to make health care more accessible to the people of her district, addressing high rates of insured people in Texas.
“I want everybody who wants to reside in the city of Houston to be able to afford to live here, to have access to a good job, a safe neighborhood, good public schools and what we call the American dream,” she said. “Pushing to expand Medicaid is another piece of legislation I filed to make sure that people in this state have access to healthcare.”
On MAGA policies and the Texas legislature
Simmons expressed her frustrations about the dismantling of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) policies, inaction on book bans, gender-affirming care and attacks on critical race theory, which can lead to funding issues at universities, particularly HBCUs.
“Especially now when we’re talking about banning books that contain history and anti-DEI measures…but there is a reason why those things were in place,” Simmons said. “It was because, for a really long time, our stories were not told. Our stories did not matter, and our voices did not matter. I really, now more than ever, am so adamant about not just me but all of us getting back to our history, getting back to our roots and pushing our legacies forward that our ancestors left for us.”
