(The Center Square) – On the same day that parents of daughters killed at Camp Mystic sued state officials for failing to enforce state law, Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick called on the state agency to pull the camp’s license.
On Tuesday, the parents of nine daughters who died at Camp Mystic during the July 4, 2025, flash flood in Hunt, Texas, sued six Texas Department of State Health Services officials alleging they violated their daughters’ constitutional rights to life and bodily integrity.
DSHS officials “responsible for licensing youth camps deliberately looked the other way,” their attorney, Paul Yetter, said. “While Camp Mystic bears responsibility and is also being sued, state officials knew the camp’s emergency plan lacked a required evacuation component and still licensed it as safe.”
On the same day, Patrick wrote a letter to one of the defendants, DSHS Commissioner Jennifer Shuford, urging her to not issue a license to the camp. The agency is statutorily required to enforce camp safety laws.
“It has come to my attention that Camp Mystic is soliciting and accepting applications for the summer of 2026 camp season,” Patrick wrote Shuford. “Twenty-eight lives were taken, and until these deaths are investigated and any necessary corrective actions are taken to ensure this never happens again, a camp license should not be issued to Camp Mystic.”
The state legislature held hearings last year and passed legislation to improve emergency response and oversight of flood warning systems, technology and preparedness, and camp safety requirements, among other measures, The Center Square reported. Gov. Greg Abbott signed the flood relief and camp safety reform bills into law, which are now in effect.
An investigation is ongoing led by bipartisan state Senate and House general investigating committees. Patrick and House Speaker Dustin Burrows launched them last October. Their first joint meeting is scheduled this spring to discuss findings and next steps.
“I expect, after those facts are determined, there may be necessary corrective actions for Camp Mystic to take to make sure future campers and counselors are safe and do not lose their lives,” Patrick said. Despite the loss of life, the camp’s website home page “does not acknowledge the 28 deaths that occurred at the camp, nor does it acknowledge that the search for one little camper who lost her life is still ongoing,” he said, referring to Cile Steward, whose remains were never found. “Surprisingly, Dick Eastland, [the camp’s former owner who died on July 4] is still named on the website as still being in charge, all as if 2025 never happened,” Patrick said.
“I would not feel comfortable sending my grandchildren to a camp where 27 young girls lost their lives less than a year ago, particularly while key questions remain unanswered,” he said, adding that Texas taxpayers who funded recovery efforts and ongoing legislative oversight and response deserve transparency.
He requested Shuford to not renew the camp’s license “until all legislative investigations are complete and any necessary corrective actions are taken.”
In response, Camp Mystic issued a statement saying its Cypress Lake location, which it has planned to reopen this summer, “is in compliance with all aspects of the state’s new camp safety laws. There is, consequently, no regulatory basis to deny Camp Mystic Cypress Lake its license. Camp Mystic Cypress Lake is a separate property that is not adjacent to the Guadalupe River and sustained no significant damage from the historic flood on July 4.”
Multiple lawsuits have been filed against Camp Mystic and its owners and affiliated entities alleging wrongful death and gross negligence. The lawsuits point to federal records showing the camp owners petitioned FEMA multiple times to have flood plain designations removed, alleging they did so to cut insurance expenses while also marketing the property as “safe,” The Center Square reported. They argue their daughters’ deaths were entirely preventable and had they known they were staying in cabins in a floodplain they never would have allowed them to stay there. They also argue the camp’s policy of instructing the girls to remain in their cabins caused their deaths and “corporate fictions” were used “as a means of evading an existing legal obligation, namely, civil liability for negligence and gross negligence” that killed their daughters.
The camp’s attorney has said the allegations in the lawsuits are “misinformation” and the camp denies culpability.
A camp spokesperson told The Center Square in an email the camp also invited Patrick and members of the investigative committee to visit the camp last October. The invitation remains open, with the owners saying they “will always be available as a resource for the Committee as we believe having each member of the Committee physically tour the Camp location is the best and only way to learn exactly what happened.” They say Patrick never responded.
