Bay Area Houston

Different name. Same game.

CCISD Trustee had the ear of the PAC Defend Texas Liberty. They were funded by two billionaires in Dallas, Timothy Dunn and Farris Wilks and featured in an investigative report by CNN. That PAC eventually folded after their leadership was caught meeting with a known white supremacist Nick Fuentes. Bowen’s association with this group and others was so disturbing I spoke at a board meeting detailing his involvement. You can read the details here.

But Defend Texas Liberty is back. Again. This time as Texans United for a Conservative Majority PAC. Same people. Different name. Over the last year TUCM (Tuck-em) raised $9,606,725 with $7,065,000 coming from Dunn, and $1,290,000 from Wilks.

These individuals tried, unsuccessfully, to influence the last CCISD election financing Peter Lauzon’s campaign. He lost. They also donated $5000 to another candidate. She returned the money. Bowen himself received $2000 from them.

You might want to read the information on Scott Bowen’s relationship with these guys and other organizations. Here are the entire list of donors and donations:

You have to wonder how much they pumped into these races.

The 1776 Project PAC, based in New York, endorsed 12 candidates in 7 school districts across Texas. They won 7 with 1 going to a runoff. Local Trustee Jeff Larson was one of the candidates and defeated Albert Wittliff. They endorsed two candidates in Katy ISD. Both lost.

I’ve written about Katy before. Parents organized and created KEEP Katy Educational Excellence Partners. KEEP “is dedicated to organizing community support to elect school board trustees who are committed to provide excellent public education for all and to maintain Katy ISD’s reputation as an educational leader.” It is unfortunate that parents, teachers, and students have to organize to keep extremists off of their school board but that is where we are today. Maybe CCISD needs to create NOPE! NO Politics in Education! Lucky for us our school board is composed of excellent individuals who leave their political preferences at home. (except for Scott Bowen and Jeff Larson)

So how much did they spend to win these seats? That is a tough question to answer. These PACs have a way to hide their expenditures. For instance this PAC is registered with the Federal Elections Commission and has spent over $3 Million over the last year. Unfortunately we will not see how much they spent in support of Larson until July and the expenditures might be just generic categories like “texting services”.

So the New York PAC won in CCISD. Let’s welcome Trustee Larson back to the CCISD School Board.

Nothing good has come of it.

The Houston Chronicle, once again, has written about the heated race for two Katy ISD candidates due to political PACs funding and campaigning for them. According to the article two candidates have accepted endorsement from the Harris County Republican Party, The Project 1176 PAC and others. The Party has flooded the district with mailers, of course, claiming their opponents are flaming liberals.

Mailers are not cheap. From the article multiple mailers have been sent out. In a local race where a candidate is depending on support from parents and voters in the district it is very difficult, if not impossible, to compete against. In Keller ISD Patriot Mobile PAC invested $150,000 in three candidates. They all won. School Board races usually requires a couple thousand dollars, a hand full of signs, and lots of hand shaking. Trying to compete against $50,000 is impossible.

In CCISD the partisan political PACs meddling in CCISD began with Scott Bowen’s election. In the last election Bowen recruited his friend, Pete Lauzon, to run and found $5000 from Defend Texas Liberty PAC for his campaign. DTL also donated $5000 to Glendora Rogers. She returned the donation. Bowen received $2000 from DTL for texting in his re-election. DTL, a PAC funded solely by two Dallas billionaires, is no longer active after their leadership was caught meeting with a known white supremacist.

In this years election, Trustee Jeff Larson, applied for an endorsement from The Project 1776 PAC, an extreme right wing organization out of New York. I’ve seen the texts they have sent out in support of Larson and heard about phone calls to voters. Both are not cheap. Larson has raised $2858 with $2549 coming from two donors, Scott Bowen and someone in Houston.

Partisan politics does not belong in our school districts. Candidates should be representatives of the community, parents, teachers, and students, not to out of state PACs or political parties.

This should really piss off CCISD voters. BTW I have asked Larson about this situation. He has refused to respond.

Partisan politics was introduced into CCISD and many school districts across the state a few years ago. CCISD Trustee Scott Bowen led the charge here with Trustee Jeff Larson following his right wing partisan politics. It led to division in the community, attacks on the gay community, attacks on our teachers, attacks on curriculum, and attacks on our librarians. It brought in the ban on the fictional studies called CRT which was never taught in schools in the first place. This white wing, extremist agenda also brought money from out of district PACs funded by billionaires out of Dallas. Nothing good has come from partisan politics in non partisan elections for the school board.

So what does Trustee Larson do? He applied for the endorsement of The Project 1776 PAC, a far right, extremist organization. They are now sending out texts in support of his campaign. How much they are spending is unknown at this time. I will spare you a copy of the multiple texts that have been sent. What is very disturbing about this is that he actually had to apply for the endorsement and some of the questions are more of the same crap we saw over the last few years that caused so much division. Here they are. I can bet I know exactly how he answered them.

Over the last few elections voters in CCISD have turned down the extreme candidates, Parizo, Dawson, Lauzon, and current Trustee who recruited these extremists, Scott Bowen, failed to received 50% of the vote in his last election.

Our Board, besides Larson and Bowen, are composed of great individuals who have put their personal partisan preference to the side. They have served the community very well. CCISD residents are lucky. Other districts such as Keller and Katy are struggling after candidates were elected by billionaire donations. In Keller three candidates won after a PAC spent $50,000 on each!

Larson should be ashamed of himself. Anyone who brings their sorry ass partisan politics into our Board should consider doing something else.

Like resigning.