Texas’ prison agency, the Texas Department of Criminal Justice (TDCJ), has asked the Legislature for $298 million over the next two years to add more than 15,700 air conditioned beds in state lockups. The request is more than double what the agency sought in the last legislative session — but advocates for incarcerated people say it falls dangerously short.
The total cost to air condition Texas prisons is estimated at $1.5 billion. The $298 million request covers roughly one-fifth of that. Nearly two-thirds of Texas’ 104 prisons are not fully air conditioned, leaving tens of thousands of incarcerated people in facilities where summer temperatures routinely reach life-threatening levels.
People have already died. At least 10 inmates died from heat-related causes between 2023 and 2025, according to a federal lawsuit — a figure TDCJ disputes, attributing deaths to other causes. Court documents show that at least 23 people died from heat-related causes in Texas prisons between 1998 and 2012.
Erica Grossman, an attorney representing the plaintiffs in that ongoing lawsuit, responded to the budget request directly: “This is more deliberate indifference. And it will lead to more completely preventable inmate deaths in the extreme heat every year.”
TDCJ says the request reflects a commitment to progress while balancing other demands — including a prison population projected to soon exceed 150,000 people. The agency also requested an additional $591.8 million to build new prison dorms with climate control already built in.
Texas summers are not going to get cooler. The people inside those facilities cannot leave when the heat becomes dangerous. Locking someone in a sweltering building and calling it justice is not justice — it is punishment without end. These are real people. Their families are watching. And the Legislature is being asked to decide how much their lives are worth.