CliffsNotes: George Santos Ethics Committee Report

November 16, 2023

I took another for the team and read the 55 page report. You can read the entire thing here. It’s detailed. It’s boring. Here are the findings:

  • The committee gave Santos ample opportunity to address the issues, provide documentation, and testify to the committee. He refused all while claiming he was fully cooperating with the committee.
  • His staff wrote a 141 page Vulnerability report and encouraged him to drop out of the race. His staff members quit.
  • His staff encouraged him to seek medical attention for his constant lying.
  • His staff member responsible for the FEC filings admitted to conspiring with Representative Santos to submit false reports to the FEC.
  • Santos listed multiple personal loans, over $80,000, and $500,000 to his campaign that were never actually made.
  • Representative Santos was also improperly repaid for loans that were not made ($31,000)
  • These fictions loans falsely raised his Cash on Hand and could not pay outstanding debts. One staffer was not paid for 8 months.
  • Ms. Marks pled guilty and testified under oath to conspiring with Representative Santos to falsely report loans
  • He made $6,000 worth of purchases at Ferragamo stores, withdraw $800 in cash from an ATM at a casino, withdraw $1,000 in cash from an ATM near Representative Santos’ apartment, and to pay Representative Santos’ rent.
  • filed a list of false donors with the FEC on the year-end 2021 report knowing it was not true, and the donors, who are the real people, didn’t give [her] permission to use their names.
  • This was done to obtain money for his campaign by artificially inflating his funds to meet thresholds set by a national political committee
  • He spent thousands of dollars on personal expenses such as $2,281.52 spent at resorts in Atlantic City, $1,400 at Virtual Skin Spa, $225 at CityMD, and $3,332.81 Airbnb expenditure, $5000 for personal credit cards
  • He used his campaign money, over $4000, for Botox treatments
  • The ISC determined that the systemic errors and omissions in Representative Santos’ campaign reporting were more than mere carelessness by his treasurer; rather, they were part of an overall scheme to avoid transparency about his campaign’s finances
  • $50,000 of contributors money was used to, among other things: pay down personal credit card bills and other debt; make a $4,127.80 purchase at Hermes; and for smaller purchases at OnlyFans; Sephora; and for meals and for parking.
  • He convinced donors to contribute large amounts to an advertising company claiming the donations would go towards his campaign. He used the donations for personal use.
  • Santos claimed that he hired a professional tax preparer to file his Financial Disclosure statements. The tax preparer said she didn’t file the reports and was not hired by Santos.
  • He lied on his FD claiming he made $400,000/year when he made only $55,000
  • Santos reported four assets: (i) an apartment valued between $500,001 and $1,000,000; (ii) a checking account with between $100,001 and $250,000; (iii) a savings account with between $1,000,001 and $5,000,000; and (iv) 100% ownership of Devolder Organization, valued between $1,000,001 and $5,000,000. Each of these disclosures was false.

I’m tired. He is a liar like trump but just more stupid.


CliffsNotes: 2022 Election Fraud Judgement

November 13, 2023

Bottom line? You lost. Get over it.

I took one for the team again and read the Final Judgement Denying Election Contest. This was concerning the lawsuit filed by 21 losers candidates for Harris County judicial positions in 2022. You can read the entire judgement here if interested. My notes are below.

  • Lawsuits were filed in 21 races
  • This was a “test” case between Tamika Craft and Erin Lunceford and resulted in dismissing the others
  • Lunceford lost by 2743 votes
  • The Judge concluded “For the reasons stated below, the court has found many mistakes and violations of the Election Code by the Harris County Elections Administration Office (“EAO”) and other election officials. But the court holds that not enough votes were put in doubt to justify voiding the election for the 189th District Court and ordering new one.”
  • After investigating mail in ballots, Statements of Residence, shortage of ballots, etc, the Judge determined 2779 were affected but did not result in overturning any election.
  • The Harris County Elections Administration Office (EAO) did not provide enough ballots for some voting locations. The Judge was highly critical of this error and said the estimation process was in violation of the law.
  • HE DID NOT ADDRESS the republican judges at the voting locations waiting till the last hour (literally) to ask for more ballots. The entire issue would have been averted if the EAO had estimated better and the judges had done their damn job.
  • Because of the lack of ballots the Judge found that 2600 voters left the polling location due to a shortage of ballots. The judge estimates that between 250-850 voters who left the polling location had failed to vote.
  • One election worked claims that a voter spit on her when the voter learned of the shortage. (I’m calling bullshit)
  • 966 Statement of Residence were illegal votes and should not have been counted
  • 36 Mail in ballots lacked a required signature and 9 were mailed in too late. (How did the Board who screen these ballots with a republican and democrat team miss this?)
  • 380 out of 532 challenged Reasonable Impediment Declaration (RID), meaning they had no valid photo ID, should not have been counted. (Again WTF? The election judges should have caught these)
  • 7 Ballot By Mail (BBM) should not have been counted due to signature problems
  • Evidence that 2000 votes by voters whose registration was cancelled was submitted but 1995 of these were cancelled AFTER the election. 5 votes should not have been counted.

In conclusion. You lost. Get over it.


Mattress Mac’s frivolous election fraud lawsuits dismissed!

November 10, 2023

Womp. Womp.

The multiple frivolous lawsuits filed by Harris County Republicans and MAGAt Mattress Mac claiming election fraud that led to Democratic wins have been dismissed. Here is what the Houston Chronicle said this morning:

However, after an eight-day trial in which Lunceford’s legal team did not provide testimony from any disenfranchised voters, Judge David Peeples, a visiting judge from Bexar County, ruled the results of the race were legitimate. 

In a 36-page ruling, Peeples said he found Harris County had made “many mistakes and violations of the Election Code.” “But the court holds that not enough votes were put in doubt to justify voiding the election for the 189th District Court and ordering a new one,” Peeples concluded.

The lawsuits included Alexandra Mealer against Lina Hidalgo who dropped her suit a few weeks ago as did republican judicial candidates Dan Spjut, and Sartaj Bal. Only 1 of the multiple lawsuits are still pending that being the race between Republican Tami Pierce and Democrat DaSean Jones. That race was very close. DaSean is a self proclaimed “democratic socialist”. It might be better for him to lose and be back on the ballot in 2024.

But….the suits are over. The election deniers will appeal. They will continue being election deniers. They will still file frivolous lawsuits. Hopefully the plaintiffs will demand lawyer fees. All the judges who were sued had to pay their own legal fees. Lawyers were banned from providing free legal aid to the defendants. The Harris County Attorney was not allowed to represent them. So they had to raise money or pay for their fees from their own pockets. It was a brilliant and frivolous lawsuit by the Republican Party and they should be sanctioned.

You lost. Get over it.


More on “When right wing bloggers attack”

November 9, 2023

This is interesting…..and very disturbing.

From Harris County District Court

As reported by the Houston Chronicle, republican political blogger, Aubrey Taylor, was indicted for Injury to Elderly by a Harris County Grand Jury. After the indictment Taylor filed a civil suit against the victim, Gerald Womack claiming Womack actually attacked him. You can read the civil suit here. It is quite an interesting set of possible alternative facts. But there is more to this….

Jared Woodfill
In the civil suit he is represented by Jared Woodfill. According to the Houston Chronicle, in 2018 the FBI raided Woodfill’s office. I haven’t found any updates on that issue. Woodfill is also representing Steven Hotze charged with multiple felonies concerning a voter fraud conspiracy. He is representing multiple republican candidates claiming voter fraud in the 2020 elections. Both of them are closely associated with the Harris County Republican Party. Woodfill was the chair of the party from 2002-2014. Jared is also involved in an indictment of former State Judge Paul Pressler for sexual assault of a minor, his former bible study student. (You can read all the horrible details from The Texas Tribune here) and here is just a tidbit:

In recent sworn testimony, Woodfill said he’d known since 2004 of an allegation that Pressler had sexually abused a child. Woodfill learned of those claims, he said, during mediation of an assault lawsuit filed against Pressler that he helped quietly settle for nearly a half-million dollars at the time. Despite his knowledge of the accusation, Woodfill continued to work with Pressler for nearly a decade — leaning on Pressler’s name and reputation to bolster their firm, Woodfill & Pressler LLP.
Rather than pay him a salary, Woodfill testified, the firm provided Pressler a string of employees to serve as personal assistants, most of them young men who typically worked out of his River Oaks mansion. Two have accused Pressler of sexual assault or misconduct.

Texas Tribune

Oliver Brown
According to the Chronicle Oliver Brown is defending Taylor in the assault case. Brown, according to Laws in Texas, was indicted by a grand jury after being accused of trying to strangle his girlfriend. That case was eventually dismissed. LIT has more.

Aubrey Roshon Taylor
I don’t get it. He went to Womack’s place of work and an assault happened. Taylor claims in his civil suit that he was the victim even though charges were only filed against him not Womack. If I had been assaulted by a 66 year old I wouldn’t have left the scene. I would have dialed 911, waited for the police to show up, and cooperated. His civil suit just doesn’t make sense. He is asking for $100,000 in his suit.

According to the Harris County District Court this isn’t the first run in with the law for Taylor. (Link here) The last indictment was in 2005. He had a couple of other indictments in 1990 resulting in probation and jail time. I’m glad that up until this latest indictment Mr. Taylor has served his sentence and has become successful. Good for him.


Who is hosting Trump’s fundraiser in Houston?

November 1, 2023

Trendsetter Engineering 10430 Rodgers Rd, Houston, TX 77070.

Mario Lugo is the CEO of Trendsetter Engineering in Houston. Trendsetter is an offshore engineering company with about 80 employees. He will be hosting the twice impeached, 4 time indicted, presidential candidate for a fundraiser on Thursday. You have to wonder if all the employees will be required to listen to Trump whining for 2 hours about losing the election. Maybe they will have a day off.

Who else can we expect to be at the fundraiser? Tony Buzbee, Fred Flickinger, MAGAt Mattress Mac? I wonder if any elected officials will show. Tickets can be found on line on trump’s campaign site. You can find that link your fuckin self.

It says a lot about someone hosting such a rotten human being.


Defend Texas Liberty recruiting more donors

November 1, 2023

The president of Defend Texas Liberty met with Nick Fuentes a known white supremacist. Go ahead. Google Nick Fuentes.

Fuentes often praises Adolf Hitler and has publicly fantasized about marrying a 16-year-old. Last week, he visited the office of a Texas operative who runs a deep-pocketed political group.

That deep-pocketed political group was Defend Texas Liberty the same guys who meddled in our CCISD elections. Over the last year Defend Texas Liberty has raised over $4.6 Million. $2.8 Million came from Texas billionaire Timothy Dunn and/or Hexagon Partners (Dunn is the registered agent) $1.5 Million came from another billionaire Timothy Dunn. New comers to the PAC include Alex Fairly the registered agent for DealOn LLC out of Amarillo. He donated over $222,000. New comer Carol Adams of Princeton Texas donated $50,000. Wind Grimes and her husband has donated over $500,000 since 2022. In 2023 she donated $25,000.

Here are the top donors that made up 99.4% of the total donations.

Dunn ,Timothy1,500,000.00
Wilks ,Farris & Jo Ann1,500,000.00
Dunn ,Timothy316,000.00
Hexagon Partners250,000.00
Dunn ,Timothy200,000.00
Hexagon Partners200,000.00
Dunn ,Timothy175,000.00
Fairly ,Alex145,850.00
Dunn ,Timothy140,000.00
Adams ,Carol50,000.00
Grimes ,Windi25,000.00
Dealon LLC20,000.00
DEALON LLC19,500.00
Dealon LLC15,000.00
Fairly ,Alex12,000.00
Morrison ,Peter10,000.00
DEALON LLC10,000.00

Raising Campaign Cash 8 days out Houston City Council Races

October 30, 2023

Notes: Gilbert Garcia, running for Mayor, is self financing his campaign as is Fred Flickinger running for City Council District E. Lee Kaplan’s majority of his donations are from a personal loan. Other notables that are funding their campaigns with their own money include Melanie Miles, Julian Ramirez, Obioha “Obes” Nwabara, Ericka McCrutcheon, Roy Morales, Shannan Nobles, and Orlando Sanchez.

CandidateRaisedExpendituresIn-KindCOHLoans
Gilbert Garcia*$348,640$1,930,037$458$72,588$0
Sheila Jackson Lee$333,226$1,128,102$0$208,285$0
Lee Kaplan$57,551$948,870$0$124,034$400,000
John Whitmire$520,040$3,328,772$39,653$4,266,473$0
Robert Gallegos$1,000$14,544$0$131,833$0
At Large 1
CandidateRaisedExpendituresIn-KindCOHLoans
Melanie Miles$9,490$87,756$0$66,377$50,000
Conchita Shelly Reyes$13,254$20,147$0$8,509$0
Leah Wolfthal$17,626$22,564$81$9,221$0
Julian Ramirez$13,091$27,888$2,091$8,383$20,000
At Large 2
CandidateRaisedExpendituresIn-KindCOHLoans
Nick Hellyar$9,736$107,544$0$40,886$0
Danielle Bess$9,675$25,387$0$50,283$0
Holly Flynn Vilaseca$23,138$62,689$0$0
Marina Coryat$10,019$13,656$0$5,863$0
Willie Davis$4,850$5,620$0$1,986$0
Obioha “Obes” Nwabara$5,825$10,494$5,000$11,636$20,000
At Large 3
CandidateRaisedExpendituresIn-KindCOHLoans
Twila Carter$3,515$147,659$56,402$4,000
Richard Cantu$5,794$12,961$0$30,081$0
Casey Curry$3,938$2,704$0$1,957$0
James Joseph*$99,700$62,206$58,200$37,493$0
Donnell Cooper$4,899$15,238$0$7,954$0
Ericka McCrutcheon$3,000$17,647$0$7,352$25,000
At Large 4
CandidateRaisedExpendituresIn-KindCOHLoans
Letitia Plummer$31,087$63,822$0$49,798$0
John Branch$1,400$232$0$1,167$0
Roy Morales$6,400$37,820$0$5,839$21,979
At Large 5
CandidateRaisedExpendituresIn-KindCOHLoans
Sallie Alcorn$62,571$292,472$1,728$191,153$0
District E
CandidateRaisedExpendituresIn-KindCOHLoans
Martina Lemond Dixon$14,350$53,704$0$0
Fred Flickinger$5,490$38,137$0$26,141$103,000
Controller
CandidateRaisedExpendituresIn-KindCOHLoans
Chris Hollins$180,704$249,936$0$135,571$0
Shannan Nobles$15,375$29,852$0$37,016$112,000
Dave Martin$16,650$215,871$0$64,785$0
Orlando Sanchez$82,690$42,717$0$89,968$198,128

FFS! It gets worse for CCISD Trustee

October 26, 2023

“It’s like a nightmare, isn’t it? It just keeps getting worse and worse.” –The Color of Money

FFS! Just when you think it can’t get any worse, it does. Yesterday I posted about the relationship between CCISD Trustee Scott Bowen, Defend Texas Liberty, Chris Russo and Cary Cheshire. I said:

Russo, Cheshire, and Bowen graduated from Texas A&M. All three were on the Student Senate together. Russo was the President of the Senate the year right after Bowen. Cheshire co-authored a bill concerning the Gay Community at Texas A&M on religious freedom grounds. Russo and Cheshire are directors for Texans for Strong Borders, an anti-immigrant PAC primarily funded by Defend Texas Liberty. Russo is listed as the Treasurer with an address in El Lago.

And it gets worse.
The Texas Tribune has dug deeper into Chris Russo and the known white supremacist, Nick Fuentes. It’s not pretty. From The Texas Tribune:
Since at least 2019, Texans For Strong Borders founder and president Chris Russo has operated in Fuentes’ racist movement on various social media platforms under the username “Optics Respecter.” Without sharing his real identity, Russo used the accounts to rail against immigration, feminists, the LGBTQ+ community and Black people, as well as share posts by other Fuentes followers that contain racial and homophobic slurs.

Bowen needs to publicly distance himself from these individuals and Defend Texas Liberty. He needs to return their donations. He needs to come clean with the community.


Yet more troubling details about Defend Texas Liberty PAC and CCISD

October 25, 2023

This is truly troubling. Seriously screwed up and it implicates one of our own CCISD Trustees. Bear with me.

Quick Background.
I’ve written about the extreme right wing PAC, Defend Texas Liberty (DTL) meddling in CCISD’s local election before. (they failed) DTL is funded by 2 billionaires featured by CNN. They financed the campaign for a CCISD candidate for Trustee. They donated $2000 to Scott Bowen in his re-election bid. They donated $5000 to a CCISD candidate who refused the donation. They made donations to only 1 out of over 1000 school districts for Trustee races, that being CCISD and Scott is responsible for that.

It gets worse.
The Texas Tribune had a breakthrough investigation concerning the leader of DTL, former State Representative Jonathan Stickland, meeting with a known white supremacist, Nick Fuentes……for 7 hours. Fuentes is documented by the ADL including “On a livestream episode, Fuentes “jokingly” denied the Holocaust and compared Jews burnt in concentration camps to cookies in an oven.” Texas Speaker of the House Dade Phelan has since called on republicans to return their donations from DTL and Johnathon Stickland has been removed as the leader of DTL.

But…it gets even worser. 🙂
The Tribune has documented a long, troubling list of white supremacists affiliations with DTL including some local individuals. According to The Texas Tribune the following individuals has interfaced with DTL:

  • Chris Russo. (More on Chris below) Director of Texans for Strong Borders. Was seen chauffeuring Fuentes to and from the meeting at Pale Horse Strategies this month. Multiple people, who asked not to be named to avoid drawing the attention of white nationalists, told the Tribune that Russo has ties to Fuentes’ so-called “groyper” movement. 
  • Cary Cheshire. (More on Cary below) The executive director of Texans For Strong Borders and a longtime employee of Defend Texas Liberty-linked groups, was also at the Pale Horse offices while Fuentes was on-site.
  • Kyle Rittenhouse. The kid that crossed state lines and shot and killed two protestors. Was on site during the meeting with Fuentes.
  • Julie McCarty. Founder of True Texas Project an organization identified by the Southern Poverty Law Center as an anti-government “extremist” group. The local chapter was banned from holding meetings at the Webster Presbyterian Church after the elders learned of their background.
  • There are many more individuals with ties to Fuentes as documented by the Tribune. Visit the story and view the graphic identifying these individuals and their associations with Qanon, white supremacists, white genocide, antisemitism, European American Community, and more.

Back to Chris Russo, Cary Cheshire, and CCISD Trustee Scott Bowen
This is truly strange coincidence. Russo, Cheshire, and Bowen graduated from Texas A&M. All three were on the Student Senate together. Russo was the President of the Senate the year right after Bowen. Cheshire co-authored a bill concerning the Gay Community at Texas A&M on religious freedom grounds. Russo and Cheshire are directors for Texans for Strong Borders, an anti-immigrant PAC primarily funded by Defend Texas Liberty. Russo is listed as the Treasurer with an address in El Lago.

This is the company Scott Bowen is keeping. It’s clear Defend Texas Liberty was invited by Bowen to meddle in our local elections. And now it is clear exactly who they are. If you have read this far, take a few minutes to read The Texas Tribune article.

From The Texas Tribune

League City Ethics Committee clears Captain Snowflake

October 25, 2023

OMG. It’s on video.

I don’t like Captain Snowflake, League City Council Member Justin Hicks for many reasons. I know veterans who had bullets shot at them who don’t walk around with a military chip on their soldier. They don’t consider themselves special even though they are. Hicks is an extremist MAGAt Republican. Like most MAGAts he probably can’t even spell Constitution much less truly understand it. He championed the unnecessary book ban in League City targeting the Gay community. He has been involved in racial controversies concerning the Police Chief and threats to city employees. He invited an anti-gay writer to read to children at the Public Library. He butted into the CCISD lawsuit brought about by a losing candidate. He ran for City Council as a “Conservative” but he isn’t conservative. He is a republican. In today’s day you can’t be both.

Well last night Captain Snowflake was on video whining about an ethics complaint filed against him. You can watch the entire meeting here. It’s only 15 minutes long. Start at 1:18 to watch Hicks whine to the committee followed by Council Member Tom Crews to address the same issue. The Committee then discussed the ethics complaint and votes to dismiss it. Committee Member Rachel McAdams at 15:09 ends the meeting with a comment. She addresses the issue eloquently.

Hicks stated he takes criticism “like a champ” yet attempts to interrupt McAdams comments from the audience. A champ doesn’t do that. I’m not quite sure what the complaint was about but there were comments made by Hicks about someone digging up his personal information. He might have been talking about the website JustinHicksTx.com which was reporting on Hicks’ time on Council. That website has since been taken down. I reviewed that site and thought it was just full of public information including his house being up for sale by Zillow. Not sure why the owners would take the site down but I would bet Hicks had something to do with it.

On Facebook Hicks says he will be announcing a life changing personal victory. Maybe his house has finally sold, he has accepted a job in New Jersey, and will be resigning from City Council. It would be a win-win for everyone.

I wish him luck. League City voters, do better next time.