In part I we covered the statewide races. Today we’ll go over the nearby congressional and Harris County races. In part III later this week, we’ll go over the contested judicial races and the ballot propositions. Have I mentioned that we have the longest ballot in the nation? Feel free to scroll down to races you’re interested in.
Congressional
Races
Congressional
District 38
I’ve spent the most time on this race—the newly created
district here in northwest Harris County. I’ve written about it here, here, and
here.
It’s a tree-shaped district; the top branches cover Jersey Village, Cypress areas, and Tomball, reaching almost to Montgomery County. I’m in the stem, or trunk, area, which is a pretty narrow connector to the southern section, the tree roots, which includes the Energy Corridor along I-10 and parts of Memorial. There is no incumbent, since it’s brand new.
There are 10 candidates. What you need to know is that this
is a David and Goliath-type contest. The Washington, DC, establishment has put
their money and push behind their candidate, and they’re assuming the money
will buy them what they want. Their candidate is Wesley Hunt. He ran two years
ago in CD 7, losing against Democrat Lizzie Fletcher. This was not my district,
but looking at that race, here’s what I wrote about this DC candidate at that
time:
Wesley Hunt looks good on paper. He’s an African-American
military veteran, the kind of person you want to be pleased about voting for.
However, his voting record shows never having voted in a Republican primary.
Maybe we have to forgive him for 2008 (although I’d rather not), but all other
primaries? It’s hard to convince me of your dedication to the Constitution
without even that minimal record.
Since then he has voted in
the Republican Primary—the one in which he was on the ballot.
I was willing to give him an
honest chance, but he failed to show up at two candidate forums in December,
and then failed to show up as scheduled at the Cypress Texas Tea Party, despite
confirming the night before. The only forums I know of where he has shown up
have been fundraising dinners, usually with other Washington, DC, picks, Dan
Crenshaw (CD 2) and Morgan Luttrell (CD 8). I get emails from Hunt, but rather
than talking about issues, it’s all about fundraising.
There was this one that caught my eye a week ago (Wednesday, February 9, 2:12 PM). The subject line said, “every $5 = 1 new voter”:
What exactly is his Voter
Registration Fund? Is it separate from his campaign fund? Because, I’m a deputy
voter registrar. There are rules. You can’t distinguish between parties you’re
willing to register. You can go to events where there are a lot of people of
one party, but you can’t do anything partisan while registering voters—that
includes campaigning for a candidate. And, like I said, he’s not going to
events where there are Republicans. Also—I don’t get paid for that; it’s
volunteer work. So what is this money he’s collecting going to? And why is he
equating contributions to this fund to a certain number of new voters? He
thinks he can buy votes? If somebody wants to pursue this with election law
people, feel free. I’m putting my energy elsewhere, but this seems both
offensive and pretty fishy.
So, enough about him. What
about the other nine candidates? Most—all but one—lack experience. I’m behind
the experienced candidate, Mark Ramsey.
There’s another candidate (Lopez)
who has been trying to paint Ramsey’s long years of grassroots volunteer
service as “being part of the establishment” “part of the problem.” Really? So,
I’m asking, personally, when does a grassroots volunteer suddenly cross over
into the establishment? I made this comment on such a post:
Being involved in politics for me has
meant being a convention delegate, a citizen lobbyist to my representatives in
Austin and their local offices, making calls and emails to my representatives,
being a poll watcher, a poll worker, eventually stepping up as precinct chair
when mine was moving, volunteering to help on the platform committee. At what
point of volunteering my time as a citizen do I step over some line and become
"100% part of the problem"? If you're talking about Mark Ramsey,
you're saying his experience and success as a volunteer citizen makes him some
part of the establishment that he's been fighting for decades. Exactly where
does a person cross the line from good citizenship to problem—and would you
think of such citizens as problems from Washington?
When you look at voting
records—publicly available information—only Mark Ramsey has consistently voted
in Republican primaries. Hunt failed to vote even in a general election between
2008 and 2018. His military service was 2004 to 2012, so it wasn’t all the
inconvenience of deployment.
Mark Ramsey has these endorsements:
·
Texas Right to Life
·
Texas Home School Coalition
·
Texas Values Action
·
Grassroots America, We the People
·
Americans for Parental Equality
·
Kingwood Tea Party
·
The Conservative Republicans of Texas
·
Texas Conservative Review
·
The Link Letter
·
Conservative Coalition of Harris County
Those are the groups. These
include the three "slates,” which people sometimes call pay-to-play. But Mark tells
us that was not his experience. They interviewed him, gave the endorsement,
before any talk of buying ads. No ads were required for the endorsement. He was
told the more ads they sell, the greater their reach. But there was no
pressure. I don’t know if that is always the case, but that was his experience.
Then there are the
individuals, a long list, including:
·
Sid Miller, Texas Agricultural Commissioner
·
Wayne Christian, Chairman, Texas Railroad
Commissioner
·
Mayes Middleton, Representative Texas House
District 11, Chair of Texas Freedom Caucus
·
Steve Toth, Representative Texas House District
15, Texas Freedom Caucus
·
Briscoe Cain, Representative Texas House
District 128 Texas Freedom Caucus
·
Kyle Biederman, Representative Texas House
District 73 Texas Freedom Caucus
·
Rick Miller, Former Representative Texas House
District 26, Navy Aviator
·
Derek Townsend, Tomball City Councilmember
·
Gail Lowe, Former Chair Texas State Board of
Education
·
Ken Mercer, Former Texas State Board of
Education
·
David Bradley, Former Texas State Board of
Education
·
Charlie Garza, Decorated Navy Submariner, Former
School Board of Education Member, SREC
Add in a lot of members of
the SREC members (representatives from each state senatorial district who work
on state Republican committees), precinct chairs (76% of those who have committed), grassroots activists, and
regular citizens. And me.
He’s strong on all things constitutional—and knows what he’s talking about. And he’s especially
strong on energy, being an oil & gas engineer, having run his own
consulting business for the last couple of decades.
He has been a mentor to me.
I’ve worked with him several times on the district resolutions (platform)
committee, and he pulled me along to edit the state platform when he chaired
that committee. Here’s a detail you might not see elsewhere: we pray at every
campaign meeting, and even at meet and greet events. We have a sense that we
need to take back our country—and that God will support such efforts. I guess I
just can’t say enough good about him as a candidate. I’m so glad we can choose
him, instead of the one Washington thinks they are choosing for us. Here’s the
campaign website: RamseyForTexas.com.
Candidate Forums:
The video of the December 1st HCRP CD 38
Candidate Forum is available on YouTube.
The video of the December 15th forum is available here. Below are links to
the videos of the candidates who spoke at our Tea Party in December and
November:
Congressional District 8
I’ll have less to say about
these other districts, since they aren’t mine. But I’ve heard from some of the
candidates. After redistricting, many of my friends and neighbors got moved
into CD 8, which is west and south of much of CD 38. It should be a
strong Republican district, so, again, the decision is essentially being made
in the Primary.
There are quite a few
candidates. The main three are Christian Collins, Jonathan Hullihan, and Morgan
Luttrell. Collins and Hullihan both spoke at our Tea Party. Morgan Luttrell has
been campaigning alongside Crenshaw and Hunt. He’s also a former Seal, as is
Crenshaw—and his rather famous brother Marcus Luttrell, who wrote Lone
Survivor. Morgan Luttrell is colorful. The first I’d heard from him was a
forum this past week—linked below—with just these three candidates. On many
issues he seems conservative. But there were some points where he just didn’t
know enough to be convincing. Both of the other two know conservatism
thoroughly.
Hullihan also has a military
background, having served as a JAG lawyer. In that position he has actually
written legislation. Collins is young, and I expect he’ll have a future. He’s
the Christian conservative and pro-life choice of many, although I believe
Hullihan could fit that description as well.
People in this district can
do what you like, but if I were voting in this race, I’d be leaning toward Hullihan.
Candidate Forums:
These three candidates
participated in this candidate forum. These two spoke at our Tea Party in November:
Congressional District 2
CD 2 is no longer my
district, although I guess Dan Crenshaw is still nominally my representative
the rest of this year, because we won’t swear in a representative for CD 38
until next January. Crenshaw has some challengers. I know next to nothing about
any of them. I’m aware there is some displeasure with Crenshaw over some votes (related
to climate and red flag issues) and some statements that made it sound like he
disdains anyone who believes there was significant election fraud. (That would
include me.) There have also been some attacks on his faith, and I think that’s
out of line. I’ve read his book. I know what he’s been through. God helped him
through that. And I pray for him. Heritage Foundation still gives him a 98%
rating on votes. If I were in that district, being me, I’d have a hard time
pushing him out. But those in that district can make their own decisions on
that.
Congressional District 7
CD 7 is held by
Democrat Lizzie Fletcher, who by all reports, from friends who have needed her
help, has been utterly useless. Redistricting changed CD 7 from a close
district (that Hunt should have been able to win in 2020, if he’d been such a
great candidate) to a D+24 district—which means the Democrat (even
non-incumbent random Democrat) is expected to win by 24 percentage points.
There are nonetheless a number of candidates willing to go up against the odds.
I don’t know much about any of them, unfortunately. So you’re on your own. The
candidates are Tim
Stroud (campaign info here; article here), Rudy A. Atencio (campaign
info here),
Tina Blum Cohen (campaign info here), Benson Gitau (campaign
info here),
Laique Rehman (campaign info here), and Lance Stewart
(campaign info here).
Harris County Judge
Possibly the most
important race in Harris County is to unseat Democrat Lina Hidalgo as Harris County
Judge. This is an administrative position, working with the county
commissioners to handle logistics and infrastructure. Hidalgo has managed to
use it—under the direction of a commissioner who controls her—to take elections
away from the County Clerk and put it in the hands of an unelected election
bureaucrat that she appoints. She has managed to turn Houston into the crime
capital of the nation—wresting that dubious title from Chicago—by insisting on
releasing violent criminals without bail. She is far more concerned about
implementing woke rules than solutions to flooding after Harvey. If there is
something that obviously needs to be done to solve problems in the county, she
is likely to do exactly opposite.
So I’ll take anyone who can beat her. But I’d really prefer someone who can do the job as well as recognize the importance of conservative principles—which work every time they’re tried. I think Alexandra del Moral Mealer, Martina Lemond Dixon, or Vidal Martinez could do the job. Mealer seems to be the actual true conservative.
In the forum at our Tea
Party, Vidal Martinez spoke first. His resume looks like he’s especially made
for the job. He has the right experience and track record. Then, during the
Q&A someone asked him about donations he’d made to Lina Hidalgo—after her
first year. Really? He says he was trying to be hopeful and supportive, hoping
she would improve in the job. I think it’s more likely that, as a corporate
lawyer, you use donations like that—sizable to us regular folks—just to smooth
the road, so to speak. But I’ve been trying to decide since then if it was a
deal breaker.
Martina Lemond Dixon is a
black female, relatively new to conservatism. She has handled some challenging
school board issues and looks like she might be effective. But her voting
record concerns me a lot. She was also asked about Democrat donations. She
admitted them (there are nine such donations) but claims they were made by her
husband using her credit card. Hmm.
Alexandra del Moral
Mealer is former military, where she has leadership experience that
actually translates into County Judge duties. She led a bomb squad, and handled
logistics, managing personnel in high-stress circumstances. She’s a bit
unpolished, but she has improved as the campaign has gone along. She’s
getting my vote.
Here is campaign info for
all the candidates in this race: Martina
Lemond Dixon (campaign info here), Vidal Martinez (campaign
info here), Alex Mealer (campaign info here), Randy Kubosh (campaign info
here), Oscar Gonzales (campaign
info here), Robert Dorris (campaign
info here), H. Q. Bolanos, George
Harry Zoes (campaign Facebook page here) and Warren Howell (campaign
info here).
Candidate Forums:
The Cy-Fair Republican Women are hosting a candidate forum for County Judge candidates on February 26, 1:00-3:00 PM, at Steve Radack Community Center.
There was a candidate forum for Harris County Judge on Sunday, February 6, for two of the candidates: Martina Lemond Dixon and Alexandra del Moral Mealer. Video here or here.
Five candidates spoke at our December Tea Party meeting:
County Treasurer
The only other contested county
race this year is for County Treasurer. The two candidates are Kyle Scott (campaign info here) and Eric Dick (campaign
email ericbdick@gmail.com).
Kyle Scott was our Lonestar
College Trustee from 2013 until term-limited out. He made some good
conservative inroads—mainly by standing his ground on budget issues—during that
time. We met him at the Tea Party even back then. I’m glad to see him back in
the battle. He wrote a recent article on why the county treasurer position is
important, here.
His opponent, Eric Dick,
filed later in the process. We never heard from him at the Tea Party. I got one mailer, not particularly informative. He has no campaign website, only a Facebook page.
The only endorsement I’ve seen for him is the Houston Chronicle, which
he seems proud of (the Chronicle, of course, leans Democrat, even when they offer their choices in the Republican Primary). He is a Harris County Department of Education trustee; we’re
trying to get rid of that money funnel. I don’t know what his position is even
about that. He works as an insurance lawyer.
So it’s a clear choice. I’m voting for Kyle Scott. You might enjoy his talk at our November Tea Party meeting, here.
House Districts
Most House district in this
area (north and west Harris County) are uncontested, so I won’t mention them.
The contested ones are 132, 138, and 150. Mine is 138, so that’s where I have
the most to say. Then I’ll cover the others just briefly.
HD 138
This has been a painful year
of disappointment in elected officials: Governor Abbott, Lt. Governor Patrick,
to some extent my US Rep. Dan Crenshaw. Add to that my State Rep. Lacey Hull.
This was her first term in the legislature; two years ago I was trying to
decide whether she had my vote. I decided late in the Primary process, but I
did vote for her. I like her personally. She’s sweet and appears to be the kind
of person I’d like to go to lunch with. We could talk homeschooling, and
conservative politics, and, I thought, Christianity. But, some months ahead of
the 2021 legislative session, I was in a meeting where I said I thought she was
going to be good. And someone blurted out that she was now divorced—her fault.
Pretty ugly. I didn’t know if it was true; I didn’t want it to be. It was later
corroborated by enough sources that I believe it. No need to share sordid
details here. I have been praying for her. I believe in repentance; I also
believe that takes time.
During the legislative
session, her notable accomplishment had to do with connecting with a national
database to find John Does, the unidentified dead, to give their families closure.
It was a nice piece of legislation. Very non-partisan. She supported school
choice—but did not sign on as a co-author. There are things she supported that
related to maintaining a lack of transparency—or what looks that way to us out
here. The question is, did she fall into the swamp in Austin and get caught up
there? I don’t know.
While I’ve gotten campaign literature from the Hull campaign, I’ve also gotten anti-Hull literature. Abolish Abortion Texas points to her broken signed pledge to support and co-author legislation to abolish abortion. I don’t know what her votes were on the heartbeat bill, which passed; but she did not get the endorsement of Texas Right to Life either. A group called Defend Texas Liberty PAC pointed out that she voted to allow Democrats to have some committee chairmanships. That’s a tactical thing. The very conservative Rep. Oliverson told me and a friend, near the beginning of the session, that it’s to keep them from putting all their energy into obstructing Republicans. Personally, I don’t think that strategy is working, but Hull may have taken advice from someone who thought it would be the right thing to do.
She has two challengers. Both
are people of remarkable integrity and ability. Christine Kalmbach worked on
the district platform committee two years ago, which is where we became
acquainted. Josh Flynn ran for this seat two years ago but just didn’t make it
on my radar. But then he worked with the RPT during the convention two summers
ago—that messy online one. There would have been no way to finish our online caucuses
without his technical help and innovation. He’s now serving as secretary in the
Harris County Republican Party.
We heard from both of them
at our January Tea Party; Lacey Hull was invited but didn’t come. Don’t hold
that against her; our reminder to get a final commitment came late and she was
committed elsewhere. Here are the two videos:
Josh was less comfortable
speaking than I expected. Still, he’s very capable. Christine, I thought, got better
as she talked more. She was fully conversant on issues of the legislature, and
had done her homework on important House votes. I’ve talked with her a couple
of times (I initiated the conversations with her) to talk about why she was
running. What, legislatively, was bad enough to challenge a Republican
incumbent? I took serious notes. She knew what she was talking about. They were
things I hadn’t been aware of, as much as I try to pay attention during the
legislative session. The transparency issues—she had specific legislation,
specific votes even on amendments.
Still, I’ve hesitated. I
think it’s an uphill battle to go against an incumbent, so, regardless of what
I do, chances are I’m likely going to be in the position of supporting Hull
against a Democrat in a district that has been very close the past couple of
elections (I’m not sure, after redistricting, how that has changed, only that
my slightly R precinct is still there). I don’t want to burn bridges. But I
finally decided, a few days ago, to support Christine Kalmbach in the Primary. I’m
hoping they’ll be bringing a yard sign by any day. This is another race that could
be decided in a runoff.
HD 132
Rep. Mike Schofield is one
of our Tea Party favorites. He comes often. All you have to do is ask a
question and let him talk for an hour. He knows the ins and outs of the legislature
better than most. And he’s been an effective conservative there. He’s
challenged by Erik Le, whom I do not know, and who doesn’t have a campaign
website, only an email. The Primary should be a slam dunk for Mike Schofield.
HD 150
I’m not sure what’s going on
in this race. Rep. Valoree Swanson is a member of the Freedom Caucus,
and is congratulated this past session for successfully getting a bill passed
to require high school sports to be according to biological sex. She has the
endorsement of Texas Right to Life and Texas Home School Coalition. She was our
SD 7 SREC committeewoman before running for the House. She kept in touch with
me well during those years.
She’s being challenged by Valerie
McGilvery (campaign into here), Bryan Le,
and Debbie Riddle (campaign email debbie@rafirm.com). The only one
I’m familiar with is Debbie Riddle, who held the seat for a number of years
prior to losing it to Swanson. I’ve always liked Riddle, but she supported a
House Speaker who was intolerably non-conservative. That struck too many people
as going establishment. I’m not sure why all the challengers this year. Maybe
it’s a personality thing. Maybe it’s some level of politics that I just don’t follow. I’ll let you figure it out, if that’s your district.
State Board of Education
District 6
Our incumbent SBOE is Will
Hickman. I like him. I voted for him. The SBOE voted in November on
health sciences curriculum. Those who are keeping watch to guard against woke
agendas looked at the proposals seriously and recommended voting against all
four. Hickman voted against three of them, and only the one passed. There seemed to be some need for a
compromise just to have a curriculum to use. I didn’t follow the details
closely enough to know if that fourth one should be a deal breaker. For me it
isn’t. His challenger, Mike Wolfe, does not seem as capable. So Hickman will
get my vote again.
District 7
This area is further south,
but in case anyone is reading, I’ll just say I support Julie Pickren.
She has the right experience, having worked and accomplished what’s needed on a
school board. She helped us out up here last spring when we were beginning our
fight to oust the pro-CRT board members on our school board. She showed up
at a neighborhood event on September 11, where I talked with her—and she pulled
me aside and prayed with me; it was a memory moment I treasure. I wish her
well. She got a 100% endorsement from the Conservative Coalition of Harris
County, and the endorsement of Texas Right to Life.
Bonus: For those of
you who have actually read this far, here are some of the resources I’ve used.
Voter’s Guides,
Endorsements, and Recommendations
·
TTP’s statewide and Harris County recommendations they’ve made so far for
the Primary are here.
·
Texas Right to Life pro-life voter guide here.
·
Texas Home School Coalition voter guide here.
·
Conservative Coalition of Harris County voter guide here. Click on federal, state, or county for questionnaire answers from
candidates.
·
iVoterGuide here. Click on “more” for each candidate to get
questionnaire answers and other details.
·
Conservative Republicans of Texas PAC (Hotze/Woodfill)
endorsements here.
·
Texas Conservative Review (Gary Polland) voter guide here.
·
LINKLetter (Terry Lowry) voter guide here.
· Take Texas Back has a list of 85 candidates who have signed the Texas First Pledge. See that list here.
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