§ 27.011.Construction

Two construction rules, pulling in the same direction.

Subsection (a): the chapter does not abrogate or lessen any other defense, remedy, immunity, or privilege available under other constitutional, statutory, case, or common law or rule provisions.

So the motion is an addition, not a substitute. A defendant who loses a motion to dismiss still has every defence they had before — limitations, privilege, truth, the actual malice requirement, official immunity, summary judgment.

That matters because the motion is decided early, on a limited record, against an unusual standard. Treating a loss as a decision on the merits would make invoking the chapter dangerous, and the four categories named here — defence, remedy, immunity, privilege — cover the ground comprehensively.

Subsection (b): the chapter shall be construed liberally to effectuate its purpose and intent fully.

Read that with the purpose provision, which names two purposes. Liberal construction toward "its purpose" means toward the whole of it — protecting participation in government and preserving meritorious suits for demonstrable injury — not toward the movant alone.

That reading matters after the 2019 amendments, which narrowed the chapter’s definitions and widened its exemptions precisely because liberal construction had been operating on only one half of the stated purpose.

The two subsections work together. The chapter is read generously toward its aims, and it takes nothing away from the law that surrounds it.