Big Jolly Politics

politics in Harris County and Texas

Local Law Firms Are Using “Paycheck Protection” Funds to Bankroll Democratic Campaign Efforts

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mark mccaig
Mark McCaig

Over the last several election cycles, the “First Tuesday” PAC has been one of the best funded vehicles to support Democratic campaign activities in Harris County. Backed largely by the local Plaintiffs’ bar, First Tuesday spent approximately $1.5 million during the 2018 general election cycle to support the Democratic ticket. First Tuesday’s fundraising efforts for the 2020 general election are well underway to undertake a similar, if not larger, effort to support Democrats this November.

The most recent campaign finance report for First Tuesday, filed with the Texas Ethics Commission last week, reflects that the PAC raised $595,000 during the first half of 2020. More than half of this money came from local law firms that have recently received forgivable loans from the federal government under the Paycheck Protection Program. Four of these firms made contributions to First Tuesday PAC after receiving taxpayer funds.

On April 8, 2020, the Ammons Law Firm received a forgivable “Paycheck Protection” loan in an amount between $350,000 and $1 million. On May 22, 2020, the Ammons Law Firm contributed $100,000 to First Tuesday.

On April 14, 2020, Raizner Slania, LLP received a forgivable “Paycheck Protection” loan in an amount between $150,000 and $350,000. On June 19, 2020, Raizner Slania, LLP contributed $25,000 to First Tuesday.

On April 7, 2020, Perdue & Kidd received a forgivable “Paycheck Protection” loan in an amount between $150,000 and $350,000. On June 23, 2020, Perdue & Kidd contributed $50,000 to First Tuesday.

On April 29, 2020, Laminack, Pirtle & Martines received a forgivable “Paycheck Protection” loan in an amount between $150,000 and $350,000. On June 26, 2020, Laminack, Pirtle & Martines contributed $50,000 to First Tuesday.

Entities that applied for “Paycheck Protection” loans were required, as part of the application, to certify that “current economic uncertainty makes this loan request necessary to support the ongoing operations of the Applicant.” The fact that these law firms had ample financial resources on hand to make generous political contributions just weeks after receiving “Paycheck Protection” loans warrants investigation by the Small Business Administration into whether these law firms made truthful certifications about the necessity of the loans to support their operations.

In addition to the law firms that made significant political contributions to First Tuesday after receiving their “Paycheck Protection” loans, two other law firms were in a healthy enough financial position to make major donations to First Tuesday shortly before applying for their own “Paycheck Protection” loans for millions of dollars.

On February 7, 2020, Arnold & Itkin contributed $100,000 to First Tuesday. This firm obtained a forgivable “Paycheck Protection loan” in an amount between $1 million and $2 million on April 10, 2020.

On February 10, 2020, Abraham, Watkins, Nichols, Sorrels, Agosto & Aziz contributed $50,000 to First Tuesday. This firm obtained a forgivable “Paycheck Protection loan” in an amount between $1 million and $2 million on April 9, 2020.

As these law firms were financially healthy enough to make large political contributions before receiving their “Paycheck Protection” funds, their certifications that they applied for the loans out of necessity due to economic uncertainty are highly questionable. This warrants investigation by the Small Business Administration as well.

I will continue to monitor campaign finance reports for further evidence that “Paycheck Protection” funds are being used to fund Democratic campaign activity and will provide updates on this blog as more information becomes available.

Mark McCaig is an attorney and Republican Precinct Chairman in Harris County.

Texas GOP just keeps getting stupider and stupider

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How self-important do you have to be to insist upon meeting in a large gathering in the middle of a pandemic in a city that is blowing up with cases of coronavirus? Texas GOP executive committee and delegate self-important. But state Republican elected officials have figured this one out. From Cassandra Pollock at the Texas Tribune:

The Republican Party of Texas is moving forward with its controversial in-person convention during the coronavirus pandemic — but elected officials including Gov. Greg Abbott and Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick will be giving their scheduled speeches virtually.

“All the elected officials are switching from a live, in-person speech to videos,” Kyle Whatley, the party’s executive director, said during a town hall livestreamed Tuesday night. “They’re doing that for us in order to focus all the attention on the business of the meeting and to get everybody in and out of here as quickly and as safely as possible.”

(click here to read the entire article on TexasTribune.org)

LOL, sure, to focus on business and the safety of others. Wait. You are still going to have the speeches. How does that help anything? Dumbasses. The elected officials just aren’t as stupid, although certainly as self-important.

Where to start? I keep hearing from delegates that the upcoming election is too important to not have an in-person convention. Huh? Exactly how is the convention going to help in the upcoming election? By adding more idiotic planks to the already bloated party platform? You know, the platform that elected officials ignore.

The thing is, if you’ve been around Republican politics for any length of time, you know the reason for insisting upon an in-person convention. The SREC members and many delegates have come to the conclusion that it is more important for them to control the party than it is to win elections. Gay folk want a booth? No way, get the hell out of here, we have important cocktails to drink while we scheme against other Republicans.

The RPT continues to talk about all of the safety measures that they will have in place. First off, many wild-eyed delegates aren’t going to follow any safety measures. Because, “it’s muh right”, dontcha know? Second, what about the service workers at the hotels and restaurants? How many restaurants have reported cases of staff Covid again? So let’s get infected and take it back to podunk Texas and have our own outbreak dammit!

I’ve also heard the tired rhetoric of the Black Lives Matter protests being “allowed” and what about that? Well, what about that? It turns out that the data refute that notion.

In the immediate aftermath of Floyd’s death, health officials expressed great concern that protesters, potentially yelling and shouting in very close proximity, would quickly spread the virus, which might lead to devastating outbreaks.

However, researchers found “no evidence that urban protests reignited Covid-19 case growth during the more than three weeks following protest onset.”

In fact, they determined that, based on cellphone data, “cities which had protests saw an increase in social distancing behavior for the overall population relative to cities that did not,” leading to “modest evidence of a small longer-run case growth decline.”

The study’s lead author, Dhaval Dave of Bentley University, said, “In many cities, the protests actually seemed to lead to a net increase in social distancing, as more people who did not protest decided to stay off the streets.”

(click here to read the article on Forbes.com or here to read the study by the National Bureau of Economic Research)

It was fairly easy to guess that this was the case, given the fact that cities other than Houston had massive protests with no increase in coronavirus cases and the whole indoors/outdoors thing but hey, who cares about data when you are a populist Republican and mad/scared about black folk protesting?

Hopefully someone, somewhere will put a stop to this nonsense and tell the self-important Republicans to stay away and let Harris County recover somehow. Trust me when I say this, your platform isn’t important to the electoral process.

For those of us that do live here, stay away from people outside of your family, wash your hands, and wear a damn mask.

(see here for more)

The County Party is on the Verge of Becoming Irrelevant

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I’ve often written about the need to take the high road, focus on winning the person rather than the argument, adhere to the big tent philosophy, or other in general play nice types of articles. See here, here, here, here, here and here.  These posts and ones recognizing good done by others regardless of political affiliation such as Edward Pollard’s food distribution are done for times such as this – to establish the proposition that we are stronger when we work together.  All the chatter of real conservatives, RINO, real republicans, etc is to our detriment.

Right now the party is in the midst of outright disintegration as a cohesive entity, and it any major outside shock would lead us to virtual collapse since we have no leader who can address any major shock involving the party apparatus itself. We are our own worst enemy.  The Democratic Party doesn’t need to push on any big issues locally since they can simply sit back and let us destroy ourselves.  Why subject their candidates to scrutiny on positions when they can sit back and let us dig our own grave?

Chris Bell and Rodney Ellis likely don’t like each other, but you don’t see the dirty laundry aired in public.  That’s reminiscent of when we were winning at the county wide level.  All of our dirty laundry was kept behind closed doors. We, as a party, have to stop this very public fighting if we want to try and salvage any potential of taking back Commissioner’s Court next cycle.

Ramsey winning the seat for Commissioner’s Court is the biggest local race we face this cycle.  If he loses it doesn’t matter if we can find a candidate to unseat Judge Hidalgo next cycle – the democrats will have three of the four Commissioner Court precincts and have control for the foreseeable future.  This needs to be priority number one for the local party, otherwise all is lost countywide.

We have too many factions within HCRP to try and list.  With no effective leader it’s going to take the factions themselves regulating their members to try and bring some sense of cohesion to the party.  We have forgotten we agree on more than we disagree.  Covid and masks will not last forever, but the damage to the local party might.  That’s a touch hyperbolic, but the public warfare will lead to long lasting damage.  There’s the very real possibility that the damage occurring now is going to impact Ramsey’s race.  It also may create enough damage that we can’t come together in 2022 when vulnerable judges are up for reelection.

We have to stop the infighting, and stop now, lest we become an afterthought countywide.  If you think the county is poorly governed on the whole now, just wait until there’s no threat to democratic control on the Commissioner’s Court.  If Ramsey loses the fear of Commissioner’s Court possibly flipping next cycle is lost, and there’s no restraint to the flights of fancy they can push through.

It’s time to call a truce and come together for our own good. If we don’t we are regulated to an afterthought for the foreseeable future.

Mask Silliness in the Midst of a Crisis

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We are in the midst of a Covid crisis in Harris County.  There’s no  other way to describe the situation that has followed the Floyd riots and funeral.  Rather than put politics aside a furor over masks has erupted.  We look silly.  Here’s a glimpse of how silly we look:

Data is data, and if we are going to be responsible we have to go where the data leads us.  As a general proposition, that means being willing to look at the data for information, and when patterns emerge be willing to act in the way the data leads us.  Right now we are in Covid crisis, and all the bickering over masks is wasted energy and not addressing the overall solution we need.  All life matters, and that’s a balancing act between sparing the hospitals and preventing indirect deaths.  Sometimes that’s open it up, but right now the data says three things:  Shut. It. Down. 

We were doing okay until the Floyd Riots and Funeral

TMC ICU Covid Occupancy

The Texas Medical Center has been posting daily data about ICU occupancy.  The diamonds show when we had reopening phases.  Phase 1 was okay.  Phase 2 was concerning, but the rise in occupancy initially, but then it stabilized.  Then the Floyd riots and funeral occurred and now we are in a significant increase.  The data is actually more sinister than it appears.  The Southeast Texas Regional Advisory Counsel  is also releasing data that can be reduced by County.  That shows much more interesting results, and shows that the Floyd riots have pushed us into a crisis and we have to shut down to blunt the crisis and then we can return to our previous balancing act.

Covid bed occupancy with 7 day moving average.

Here’s the data for Harris County from Phase II reopening with the 7 day moving average.  The deviation above the moving average is far greater than the moving average showing that we are in a dire and escalating situation in Harris County.  However, looking deeper than the curve shows even more interesting data.  If we look at the incubation period and then plot the hospitalization and ICU utilization it shows a far scarier picture.

 

Harris County ICU occupancy 10 days after events
Harris County general bed occupancy 10 days after events

Plotting general bed and ICU bed occupancy starting 10 days after Phase II, the Floyd Riots, and Floyd Funeral shows a troubling pattern.  The prior event had stabilized and then 11-13 days after the event occurs the occupancy rate increases sharply.  It’s mildly apparent for Phase II reopening.  However, with the Floyd events the pattern is obvious.  Look at the small tail on the left of the Floyd lines followed by an increasing rate of utilization.  Worse, each event shows the slope increases showing that the effect is amplifying.  Now, we are in a situation where the hospitals have reached capacity more or less, and many more asymptomatic people milling about in society.  Which brings us to the silly fighting about masks.

Masks are not worth the fighting

Academic research suggests that masks slow the spread.  This may even have some truth to it.  But if it is ineffective why are we fighting over these silly masks?    The data for Harris County suggests that social distancing is more important than masks.  In fact, not only does the data show social distancing is controlling it may be so controlling that we can’t test for mask effectiveness in the real work.

However, the do they work or not work argument is also harmful.  This is an issue where people have drawn a line in the sand and many are refusing to comply.  In a situation where a significant amount of the population refuses to comply two options are available – persuasion or brute force.  The options available are either we engage in political persuasion for the ones who don’t want to wear the masks, or there’s a China like crackdown on violators.  I keep saying we need to keep the high road.  Why?  Taking the high road builds goodwill, and the goodwill is what allows for civil debate.

Now, we’re too far down that road to have persuasion be effective.  By going low road the goodwill necessary to persuade those who don’t want to wear masks is absent.  At this point we not only don’t know, but can’t know if masks will work because of lack of willingness to cooperate.  The only method we have left to pursue in this crisis is to shut the economy down until the hospitals are in better position to address the situation.

Abbott and Hidalgo need to act like Adults

The two elected leaders are more concerned about political positions and not the good of their governed.  Each disease bubble needs to be addressed individually, and the Governor needs to stand up and say Harris County has to be shut down.  Hidalgo needs to exercise her power to make staying at home easier.  She appears to be unwilling to restrain homeowner associations that are enforcing no work from home provisions in their governing documents.

The panhandlers are still out in force.  The contact tracers could never trace infections back to the panhandlers.   The ranks of curbside pickup or Favor/Doordash/type of services are not keeping up with demand.  Rather than simply saying here’s free money for rent the recipients should be hired to bring the orders to homes so people don’t have to venture out for food.  Thinking outside the box and making it easy to stay at home will keep people more likely to be home.

We have to shut down, and shut down now.  It’s too close to the brink, and may already be too late.  We also know that Phase I and Phase II are okay – even the phase two increase leveled out. When the immediate crisis is over open back up.  Stop arguing about masks.  Even my cow head above meets the mask requirements.  Let’s get away from the mask war and try to get back to thinking how we can improve going forward.

Harris County issues COVID-19 Threat Level System

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Harris County Judge Lina Hidalgo and team have devised a new threat level system to combat the rising  hospitalizations of COVID-19 in Harris County.

Leading Harris County: Public Guidelines for a Healthy Community

Message from Harris County Judge Lina Hidalgo

During this uncertain time, we must do everything we can to put ourselves in the best position to succeed in our fight against COVID-19: manage the spread of the virus, keep the number of cases and deaths low, and keep our hospitals from becoming overwhelmed. Safety measures such as social distancing, wearing face coverings, and staying home from work, school, and social activities are difficult. But, if followed closely, these orders and policies can save thousands of lives. They can give us our best shot at reopening sustainably, rather than driving our community toward the breaking point time and time again, hurting our economy even more profoundly over the long term.

We cannot, at least not now, go back to the way our lives were before COVID-19 emerged in Harris County. We must assess the risk for everything we do. Harris County Public Health has developed the recommendations published here to help us safely navigate our everyday lives and better manage the ebbs and flows in severity of the threat of COVID-19. We must remember that a resurgence of the virus that can knock us down and put us right back where we started, or worse, is right around the corner as long as a vaccine or treatment are not readily available.

We all want to get back to work, see our friends, hug our family, go out to eat, and resume our livelihoods without limitations, but we still have a long road ahead of us to end this epidemic. Here in Harris County, we remain committed to taking whatever actions are necessary to save lives — not just the lives of people with the virus, but the lives of anyone requiring a hospital bed.  We will continue this fight to keep you and your family healthy as long as we have to. Here in Harris County, we are in this together.

Message from Dr. Umair Shah, Director, Harris County Public Health

COVID-19 has had a devastating impact globally, nationally and locally here in Harris County. Currently there is no treatment or vaccine to prevent COVID-19, so prevention is the best way to reduce your chances of getting COVID-19. This includes tried and true actions such as maintaining social distancing from others (6ft or 2m), wearing facial coverings, proper handwashing, and staying home and away from others if you are sick. Extensive social distancing and these other types of interventions have shown to be successful in other countries to prevent or delay a rapid increase in the number of cases and deaths. However, these measures do not eliminate the threat COVID-19 poses within our community.

Social distancing has allowed Harris County to slow down rapid accelerations in the number of positive cases as well as hospitalizations, which has given our public health and healthcare systems more time to prepare for a potential surge of cases. To continue reducing spread and deaths from COVID-19, social distancing and other preventive measures must be sustained, and testing must be widely available until vaccine options are developed.

Harris County Public Health (HCPH) is continually working to keep the community healthy and safe by conducting its epidemiology (disease detective) work including disease surveillance and investigations; building data and technology infrastructure; coordinating and providing testing, both in the community and at nursing homes and other group facilities; monitoring levels of important supplies and equipment in the healthcare system; and continuing to reach out to educate the community.

HCPH has developed these local public health recommendations as a guide for residents to understand better state and local COVID-19 orders and guidance. It will take everyone in the community working as a team to continue to slow the spread of COVID-19 and ultimately stop this pandemic.

We thank all our community, including businesses, faith-leaders, and other partners for continuing to do their part in reducing the spread of COVID-19 in Harris County. We must all come together to combat COVID-19 today and into the future.

Click to download the entire document: Harris County Public Health Public Guidelines for a Healthy Community
Here are slides from the document:


For those of you who insist that our political leaders are fearmongering this virus in order to get Trump reelected, how about looking at the facts? And the fact is, hospitalizations in Texas and Harris County continue to increase daily. Besides which, Harris County doesn’t need any fearmongering for people to vote against Donald Trump, he does just fine with that on his own.

Harris County’s political leaders continue to lead the way in addressing this virus. Just the fact, Jack.

Harris County Commissioners vote to study police procedures

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From the InBox:

GARCIA LEADS ON LONG-OVERDUE LAW ENFORCEMENT REFORM

COMING TO HARRIS COUNTY

In the wake of the murder of George Floyd, Commissioner Adrian Garcia supported several proposed new law enforcement procedures to help end police misconduct

adrian garcia
Adrian Garcia

Harris County, TX — Following his attendance at the funeral for George Floyd Tuesday, and after a marathon session of Harris County Commissioners Court, Precinct 2 Commissioner Adrian Garcia was on the forefront of several criminal justice reform measures that were ultimately passed by court. The aim of these measures is to create meaningful change to immediately reduce and eventually eliminate misconduct by county law enforcement officials.

Due to the items’ approval, Harris County will soon begin evaluating the following (for expected additional future court action): investigating a standardization of use-of-force tactics, increasing public reporting when law enforcement officials are accused of misconduct, additional sharing of body-cam footage from officer-involved deaths and injuries of suspects, considering a shift in who responds to mental health distress calls, as well as several other groundbreaking moves.

“Though it occured in Minnesota, here in Harris County, however, the tragic death of George Floyd will not have happened in vain. Real reform of how officers deal with the public is coming, so that going forward, what happened to George will hopefully never be repeated in the county where he grew up. I thank my colleagues on Commissioners Court for their assistance in getting these items approved,” said Commissioner Garcia.

SUMMARY OF ITEMS APPROVED BY COURT:

  • Resolution honoring the life of George Floyd, acknowledging and decrying racist law enforcement procedures that led to his death (passed 4-1)
  • Evaluation and eventual recommendations to propose standardization of use-of-force tactics (3 motions – all passed, 5-0, 4-1, & 4-1)
  • Engaging the community to discuss best practices for county law enforcement budgets (passed unanimously)
  • Study to evaluate who best should respond to potential mental health crises (passed unanimously)
  • Consideration of a Community Oversight Board (passed unanimously)
  • Analysis of racial disparities in incarceration rates (passed unanimously)

Note: Some of these measures approved by Commissioners Court were proposed by other members. Commissioner Garcia voted in favor of all of them.

Those are fairly modest proposals and included some Republican support. But in today’s Harris County Republican Party, this is scary stuff. From the Harris County Republican Party Executive Committee (non-official) Facebook page:

adrian garcia

 

 

Good grief. Defunding the police? Sending UN peacekeepers into US cities? Planning to keep the riots going? All to keep DJT from being re-elected!

Of course. This folks, is your modern Harris County Republican Party. Damn shame it’s gotten to this.

The idea that Adrian Garcia, former HPD officer and former Harris County Sheriff would propose defunding police is ludicrous.

Anyone that doesn’t see a need to change and demilitarize our community police forces is simply refusing to face the current reality. To whine and moan about these innocuous measures by the Harris County Commissioners Court is just plain nuts.

Good job by the Commissioners.

Art Acevedo And Jesse Jackson

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A police chief is supposed to have the backs of his officers.  When they do wrong he is supposed to punish them.  And he is right in condemning the wrongful actions of an officer from another department like the deadly kneeing of George Floyd by a Minneapolis cop.

Houston Police Chief Art Acevedo was about to be fired from a scandal-ridden Austin Police Department when he was rescued by Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner.  Not the smartest move Old Sly ever made.

Like civil rights activist Jesse Jackson, Acevedo has never passed up a photo-op ever since he became Houston’s top cop.  He made a compete fool of himself when he appeared before the TV cameras to address the botched Harding Street raid.

Lately Acevedo has been photographed marching arm in arm with the George Floyd protesters, kneeling with them and hugging them.  He is too stupid to realize the protests are not just about Floyd’s death, but that the protesters are also demonstrating against what Black Lives Matter claims is systemic police brutality against blacks and institutional police racism.  By demonstrating with the protesters, Acevedo appears to agree with the false accusations by Black Lives Matter.

Acevedo’s participation in the protests even got him an interview on NBC’s Today show. Now that was a photo-op he’ll really relish the rest of his life.  And it probably made Old Sly proud too.

 

As a former law enforcement officer and criminal justice professor, I worked with many law enforcement agencies, including the Los Angeles and Houston police departments.  Yes, there are racist cops, but I can assure you that there is no systemic police brutality or institutional police racism.  Some have accused me of being unwilling to recognize racism when I see it, but believe me, I do recognize bigotry and discrimination where and when it occurs.

Civil rights activist Jesse Jackson and race-baiter Al Sharpton who coined the phrase “No Justice – No Peace” can be expected to march in lockstep with the protesters, but in his role as Chief of the Police, Acevedo is not a civil rights activist.

In Houston, the police have shot dead six men in six weeks, five of them black or Latino.  The cops did not shoot them because they were black or Latino, but because at the time they were perceived to be an imminent threat to the lives of the officers.  The families of the deceased claim the shootings were not necessary.

What did Acevedo do in his latest photo-op?  He hugged some of the family members of the six men killed by his officers.

Acevedo is too ignorant to realize that by hugging the family members he appears to be agreeing with them that his officers should not have killed the six men.  How do you think that makes Houston’s cops feel?

The poor excuse for a police chief should have been canned after the Harding Street fiasco, but it looks like as long as Sly Turner is mayor, we will be stuck with dickhead Acevedo.

UPDATED – Should the Harris County Republican Party Chair-elect decline to take control?

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(note: this post has been updated below to reflect Keith’s decision to step aside as Chair-elect of the HCRP)

Keith Nielsen, chair-elect of the Harris County Republican Party, is facing calls for resignation for what many Texas leaders are calling a racist post on Facebook. His defenders are calling it nothing more than a gaffe for which he has apologized and he need not step aside. For those unaware of the controversy, here you go:

keith nielsen banana

Again for those unaware, that quote is from Martin Luther King Jr.’s Letter from a Birmingham Jail. The banana is, of course, a long time symbol of racism towards blacks by comparing them to monkeys.

Keith apologized, then deleted the apology. In this Houston Chronicle article by Jasper Scherer, Nielsen is quoted as reposting the image with the banana because in his childhood home, they used the word “bananas” instead of curse words and he was trying to differentiate between protesters and rioters.

Tone deaf much, yes but should he decline to accept the position for which he was duly elected? Many Texas Republicans certainly think so.

Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick:

“I have called on the chair of Bexar County and the chair-elect of Harris County to step down because of their recent outrageous and racist statements on social media. The Texas Republican Party represents the majority of Texans — conservatives who are united by principles of freedom, faith and equality for every Texan. There is no room for racism or hatred, in our party — let alone in a leadership position.

“Going forward, we know that some Democrats and their allies in the media will continue to throw out charges of “racism” anytime they disagree with us on any issue. Without taking that bait, we should continue to unequivocally condemn racism where we see it in our party and in their party.

“As have said before, in times of crisis all Texans come together. During this past week Texas has seen primarily peaceful protests including a march of over 60,000 people in Houston. During Hurricane Harvey we were one Texas — nobody cared who was on the roof or who was in the boat. Our state has one of the most diverse populations in the world. We know there is more work to be done in bringing us all together and ensuring that every Texan is respected, treated equally and prospers.

“But we cannot do this alone.  Scripture commands us to love one another as we love ourselves. We can’t do that unless we love God and put him first in all that we do. He is the answer to healing our nation.”

Rep. Dan Crenshaw:

Keith Nielsen has no place in our party. Not now. Not ever. It is a sad reminder that such blatant ignorance and bigotry still exists. When we see it, it’s our duty to unequivocally condemn it and make sure that people like him have no place in our politics.

Rep. Michael McCaul:

The Facebook post made by the Harris County GOP Chair-elect was racist and unacceptable. Keith Nielsen should tender his resignation immediately. Racism has no place in the Republican Party, the state of Texas or the United States of America.

Ed Hubbard:

I have known Keith Neilsen of several years, and my wife and I have worked with him and his wife in Republican organizations. I like them both, have hoped that Keith would succeed as the new HCRP Chair, and have been prepared to help him in any way I could to succeed. Moreover, I have no doubt that about his the sincerity of his beliefs and motives, or his desire to improve relations between our party and those African-American neighbors who currently support the Democrats but who agree with us on so many issues.

Based on all of this, I was shocked to see the post Keith uploaded to social media quoting MLK with the picture of a banana.

Regardless of his intent, the message seen and perceived of putting these two images together does nothing but reinforce the distrust of our party among many of our neighbors. Although I like Keith and wish him well, this is not the message or perception the party of Lincoln should be making at any time—let alone in the midst of the ordeal we now face as a country. Although Keith removed the post and has apologized, this is a bell that cannot be un-rung in this age of social media, and it will impede our efforts to try to re-build trust with our neighbors. Frankly, it will haunt us and our candidates this fall.

It is for these reasons, that I join so many leaders of our party, including Senator Cruz, Commissioner Bush, and Congressmen Crenshaw, Hurd and Roy, in condemning the gross lack of judgment behind this post, and the perception it reinforced among our neighbors; and I sadly join them in asking Keith to resign his position as HCRP Chair-elect to allow the HCRP Executive Committee to elect a new chair this summer.

You get the gist of their complaints.

And I get it. The job of the HCRP Chair is to bring people to the party, not keep them away. Does this racist post/gaffe help in that regard? No. Does it hurt? Not really.

What? Not really, I say? Yep. Not a single person is going to stay away from voting Republican because of this Facebook post. Not one. The fact is that yes, Democrats will use it to tell votes that Republicans are racist. Guess what? If Keith declines to take the role, they will STILL use it against Republicans. So really, what is to be gained by Keith stepping aside?

Nothing.

Now, I’m not saying he should or shouldn’t step aside. I’ll leave that up to Keith. I’m simply saying that it isn’t going to help or hurt the HCRP regardless of his decision. He probably should stay and fight if he wants to reclaim the good name he has had in the party for many years but again, I’ll leave that up to him.

From a purely political perspective, I think he should stay. Harris County Republicans are going to be crushed in November. It would be nice to have a sacrificial lamb as the head of the party and then choose someone to lead the party back to some success in 2022 when we don’t have the stigma of Donald Trump at the head of the ballot. Besides, if he declines to accept the post, the HCRP Executive Committee will choose the new chair – talk about a disaster. This group is now led by the most radical of radicals in the party. On second thought, maybe it would be fun to see whom they would choose.

I reached out to Dr. Steven Hotze for his thoughts on Keith. After all, if it weren’t for Dr. Hotze’s support, Keith would never have been elected in the first place. This is what he had to say:

I cannot imagine that Keith intended to disrespect blacks with his post.

If I were him, then I would just ignore the cries to resign.

UPDATE: Keith Nielsen has decided to step aside and will not be Chair of the HCRP. Via his Facebook post:

I have spent my entire adult life supporting conservative candidates and causes and I am grateful for the thousands of supporters who have reached out to me over the last several days. I regret that I must step aside as Chairman-elect of the Harris County Republican Party and will not be taking office on Aug. 3rd. I will continue to stand up for the values that have made our country great…“Faith, family and freedom.” Dr. King’s quote is as relevant today as when it was delivered. “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.”

Concerning Keith’s statement, Senator Paul Bettencourt said, “The true measure of a person is what they do in the face of adversity. I respect Keith for his decision and thank him for his years of service to the HCRP.”

Are Covid Emergency Orders and Riot Curfews the same?

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With much of the nation engulfed in race rioting curfews are in place in numerous locations.  One theme the keeps reappearing is that conservatives are inconsistent with their values in that they oppose the Covid emergency orders, but support the curfews in response to the rioting.  While the argument is superficially appealing a closer examination shows there are some distinct differences between the governmental actions.  At the outset, I’ll acknowledge this is comparing somewhat different legal frameworks. To answer the argument I am using riot related criteria: a time, place, and manner limitation, and is the governmental action narrowly tailored to achieve the governmental interest. To narrow the focus I am using Houston as the example since the local officials did a relatively good job controlling the riots.

Rioting

There’s no doubt the government has some authority to restrict assembly. But the rules for restriction are clear. With the riots doubtless some people who are attempting to peaceably assemble had their rights to assemble restricted. Given the sheer scale of the rioting it’s not possible to separate the honest protest individuals from rioters. We have a recent history, too, of BLM suddenly turning from peaceable to not. During the last significant protest they blocked 288, and when someone tried to get through to have an asthma attack treated they were assaulted.  In the current rioting Ashton Woods threw the first punch in a street right. There’s videos of mob activity damaging random vehicles.

While people like to talk in terms of clear and present danger the test is actually imminent lawlessness. Given the recent history of blocking the streets, the current attempts to block the streets, Ashton Woods initiating a street fight, and the ongoing damage coupled with the inability to tell who is peaceable and who is not the imminent lawlessness test would seem to be met and restrictions are appropriate.

With the test met how does the government narrowly tailor the restrictions to meet their concerns? If a riot/peaceable meter were over everyone’s head it would be easy. Set the objective level and restrict. No such meter exists though; so rules of general applicability issue. Although the governmental action was not wholly successful to be fair the failures have not been widespread. This largely successful riot control doesn’t help the poor victims who have had their property damaged, especially since insurance coverage does not cover riots, but from an absolute instance standpoint the amount of lawlessness has been relatively contained. It’s also easy to adjust greater or lesser restrictions so the current restrictions are pretty much on point.  While some degree of lawlessness and damage was tolerated; by and large the situation was contained by a limited governmental response.  This narrow tailoring to the threat posed by the rioters seems justified.

Covid

Now compare that with the Covid restrictions. Is there a governmental interest? To a point. We don’t want the hospitals to be overrun, but we also don’twant to prevent all virus transmission. The stated government purpose was flatten the curve. That’s a misnomer; the goal is to keep the hospitals from being overrun.  In light of the horrors in New York City some form of restrictions are appropriate. The whole it’s my right to go out criticisms fail because, despite complaints to the contrary, there is a governmental interest at stake.

Once a governmental interest is established – and one has been – the question is are the restrictions narrowly tailored to meet the government’s interest. Here’s where the legitimate criticism arises. The hospital capacity is not threatened, and the county spent millions to create unneeded extra capacity. The medical center has been publishing hospital utilization information for the Covid crisis. Three charts tell the tale of the threat posed to the local community.

Texas Medical Center ICU Capacity June 3, 2020

Hospital ICU capacity is not threatened.  On June 3, 2020 ICU occupancy stood at 219 Covid cases and 964 other cases, with 279 remaining unoccupied beds at base levels of capacity.  On top of base capacity the hospitals have a plan for another 1,187 beds if necessary.  We don’t want to see those additional beds become necessary, but at the same time the number of Covid related ICU occupancy could double and the baseline capacity would be able to handle the case load.  With baseline ICU capacity not threatened it’s difficult to justify strict stay at home orders and mandatory masks.

June 3, 2020 is a single snapshot.  What do the historical numbers tell us?  The medical center has been publishing that information also.  The data there is both comforting and concerning at the same time.

Texas Medical Center Covid Hospitalizations June 3, 2020

This graph shows daily hospitalizations with a 7 day moving average.  The graph also notes the Phase I and Phase II openings.  Unfortunately, the graph does  not show data from the initial executive order implementing the stay at home restrictions.  The graph starts with the order extending the stay at home order.  With that order there was a generally quick rising daily hospital admission count at first that was quickly followed by a steadily falling admission count.  Presumably, this is what lead to the phased reopening plan, and is the point where Governor Abbott and Judge Hidalgo’s paths separated.

Hospital admissions are not the only consideration.  ICU utilization is a more important marker to look at since it is where the threat of death occurs.  The medical center has published information regarding this matter.  As you can see in the chart below, the ICU utilization data closely follows hospitalization data allowing for the same conclusions as with hospitalizations.

Texas Medical Center Covid ICU Occupancy June 3, 2020

It’s noteworthy that the current ICU utilization is at similar levels as the high point following the March 31 order Governor Abbott issued.  With the baseline capacity never threatened, and staggering economic harm arising from the restrictions it’s difficult to say the restrictions were narrowly tailored to meet the government’s interest. This is especially highlighted by the fact that the phased relaxing of restrictions has not caused a hospital capacity crisis. The local digging in on we can’t open up yet only magnifies the belief that the degree of restrictions are too broad.

Governor Abbott Should Not Have Implemented Phase III

Just because the data shows that Phase I did not have a detrimental impact on the hospitals it doesn’t mean we can simply say that the need for restrictions are over.  The hospitalization and ICU utilization data both show a slow, but steady, increase in cases since phase II was implemented.  We can’t extrapolate since the utilization is near or at the high point of when the initial stay at home order started dropping. Although the ICU utilization isn’t stressed we also do not see a Phase II rise end.   Prudence says stay the course rather than loosen up.

Sadly, will not be able to have meaningful data for the effect of the Phase III implementation.  Many tens of thousands of people were out in close quarters in the streets over the past week, doubtless including Covid carriers.  A rise in hospitalization and ICU utilization cannot be attributed to either Phase III or the protesting.  The time period and sheer number of individuals in close proximity prevents contact tracing.  We simply can’t know what the etiology of the soon to appear increases.

Conclusion

So, to answer the argument.  Are conservatives being inconsistent in saying Covid restrictions are a violation of rights, but supporting curfews in response to rioting? Yes, superficially, in the sense that some degree of governmental restriction appeared to be needed to respond to a governmental interest. However, that’s a straw man argument those critical of conservatives are raising.  If we raise the steel man version of the argument that the implemented Covid governmental response is not narrowly tailored to meet the governmental interest someone can easily support the curfew and not support the local Covid restrictions that Judge Hidalgo is calling for.

Edward Pollard’s Food Distribution was a Great Success

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The Covid crisis has brought out the best and worst in our elected officials.  Just as the bad deserves criticism the good deserves recognition.  To that end we need to recognize the District J food distribution organized by Councilman Edward Pollard’s office.

When asked about the undertaking Pollard said:

The reason for the free food distribution is because I know that the pandemic has severely impacted low income communities the most. People are in need of resources and I wanted to do all I could to lift a little of the burden off these families during these challenging times.  We were able to serve over 2,000 families with enough food for a family of 4 for at least a week. We provided boxes of meat, canned goods, fruits, vegetables, and drinks, all for free. There was no registration required and went on a first come first serve basis. We had walk up and drive thru opportunities.

This was a mammoth undertaking, and it was a rousing success with Pollard noting:

The food was provided by the Houston Food Bank, the food was purchased by the Ardenwood Group and the Southwest Management District. We had over 150 volunteers and it was held at the PlazAmericas Mall located at 7500 Bellaire Blvd in the heart of District J.

Mayor Turner showed up at the distribution.  To his credit, the mayor didn’t simply just show up, take a photo and leave.  He happened to select the station I was manning to assist, and he jumped right in and joined the line where we were distributing milk. He simply participated rather than trying to engage in political activities.

Hunger knows no ideology.  It is great to see everyone come together to address a common area of concern.

Thank you Councilman Pollard and Mayor Turner.