Transgender advocacy group asks judge to OK depositions in hunt for source of pre-Election Day mailers

A Texas transgender advocacy group has launched a legal effort to determine who was behind a mass mailing campaign that the group says impersonated it.

Earlier this month, Texas families across the state reported receiving unsolicited text messages and later physical mailers that promoted resources from the Transgender Education Network of Texas (TENT). The materials linked to the TENT website, which features guidance on advocating for trans-identified students regarding access to opposite-sex bathrooms, using wrong gender pronouns, launching allied student clubs and how to seek legal emancipation from one's parents. 

TENT has strongly denied any involvement, calling the distribution a political attack timed to coincide with the start of early voting. 

On Oct. 22, TENT filed a pre-suit discovery petition in Travis County District Court seeking limited, expedited depositions and information from a Wyoming limited liability company and a Croatian communications firm.

According to a CP review of the filing, the petition, assigned to the 345th District Court and brought by attorney Mimi Murray Digby Marziani on behalf of TENT, alleges that a Wyoming-based company called Texas Transgender Student Union LLC and Infobip coordinated a campaign of texts and mailers that violated Texas laws against online impersonation. The Wyoming company’s name appears on the mailers.

TENT contends the materials falsely linked the organization to the communications, which included its website address, photos from its events, images of its merchandise and its logo.

“On the eve of the hotly contested 2026 midterm election, in which transgender people have been repeatedly scapegoated by large political donors seeking partisan gain, someone impersonating TENT sent thousands of unsolicited text messages and a professionally-printed mailer to Texans around the state, including to Travis County residents, apparently spending millions of dollars to do so,” the petition states.

The mailers, titled a “Texas Trans & [LGBT]+ Student Resource Guide,” were “targeted to maximize reputational damage,” according to the filing. TENT argues the materials were engineered so the public and state officials would conclude that the organization was contacting other people’s children about topics such as hormonal treatments, out-of-state medical care and legal emancipation. The petition asserts that none of the written content originated with TENT and denies any involvement with the outreach.

TENT says the fallout from the mass mailing “has been immediate and severe, threatening the safety of TENT’s leadership and the very existence of its organization,” the petition states. The group reports an onslaught of hate and violent threats through its social media and email channels that intensified after the texts and as the mailers began arriving in voters’ homes.

Infobip, the Croatian IT and communications company named in the petition, allegedly transmitted the text messages on behalf of a client. In a response attached to the filing, Infobip said it takes TENT’s concerns seriously, does not condone use of its network to transmit messages that misrepresent the sender’s identity, and cannot disclose a customer’s identity outside an ongoing legal process. 

The company said it has notified its customer, suspended the relevant category of messaging traffic pending review, and directed the customer to cooperate and provide information about the messages.

A spokesman for Infobip told CP on Wednesday that while the company could not disclose details about the case “due to confidentiality obligations,” Infobip “did not author or originate the content of the messages in question.”

“Upon becoming aware of the issue, we took immediate action. We have suspended the traffic in question and are actively monitoring the situation to prevent further occurrences,” said Infobip spokesman Marcelo Nihime. “Furthermore, we are in active contact and cooperating with TENT’s lawyer on this matter.”

A hearing on TENT’s petition was scheduled for Tuesday in Austin. Separately, a West Texas district attorney has opened a forgery investigation into the mailers.

TENT has not responded to multiple requests for comment from CP.

Earlier this month, state Rep. Jeff Leach, R-Allen, urged Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton to investigate TENT for allegedly helping Texans evade a parental rights law.

In an Oct. 13 letter, Leach also asked Paxton to examine how the organization obtained Texans’ names, email addresses, telephone numbers and other personal information, and whether it violated privacy, consumer-protection or data-security laws. Leach said he and many of his constituents received an unsolicited text linking to the toolkit over the weekend, and that he understood texts and emails promoting the guide had reached thousands of Texans.

The TENT website includes a section on Senate Bill 12, the 2025 law that prohibits public school districts from establishing any diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) practices, policies or activities that “reference race, color, ethnicity, gender identity, or sexual orientation.”

The bill also bans student clubs based on sexual orientation or gender identity, such as Gay-Straight Alliance, as well as any “instruction, guidance, activities, or programming regarding sexual orientation or gender identity” to students through 12th grade.