Bay Area Houston

When you stop at Buc-ee’s to take a dump or stuff your face with beaver nuts, just remember some of your money is going in the toilet. 

I’ve written about the donations to Greg Abbott and others by the owner of Bucee’s, Arch Aplin. From When you stop at Bucee’s for beaver nuts

Aplin’s biggest donations went to Greg Abbott for $575,000 and Dan Patrick for $250,000.

In 2021 alone, just the first 6 months, Arch Aplin (Beaver Aplin, Arch Aplin III) has donated $485,000 to republicans in Texas including another $250,000 to Greg Abbott, the guy who brought you permit less carry and restricting women’s rights. So the next time you are taking a dump at Bucee’s just remember where your money is being donated to if you buy beaver nuts.

Photo by Texas Monthly

Well, if there was any doubt who Greg Abbott serves….

In 2021 alone Greg Abbott raised nearly $21 Million from 16967 donations. 95% of this amount came from just 269 donors who donated $5000 or more for a total of $19,846,290. Only $1,026150 came from 16,698 donors with donations of less than $3500 amounting to just 5% or his total. 75% of all donations, $15,731,764 came from just 65 donors of $100,000 or more.

$4 Million came from just 4 donors.

Eric Dick, who chairs the Harris County Department of Education, is whining about “deceptive media content”. This is laughable. Truly laughable.

Dick has a preliminary hearing scheduled at the end of this month in front of the Texas Ethic Commission for his deceptive media content. As you might remember Dick paid for a mailer to the African American community during the 2019 City Council runoff. This mailer did not have the required “Political ad paid for by…” statement. It also looked like prominent Black elected officials such as former President Barack Obama, Congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee, and others were endorsing his run for Houston City Council. 

Not only did they not endorse Dick or any candidates on the mailer, some of the candidates specifically asked NOT be be included in the mailer. It was deceiving, dishonest, and illegal. So for Dick to be whining about a number of articles from the Southeast Texas Record, a publication focusing on the legal community, is just rich. According to Dick:

But what about the second form of deceptive media content: erroneous and biased reporting? This solution could come from ordinary people like you and me. News agencies like Southeast Texas Record and David Yates that publish false, dishonest, and biased stories can be called out. Furthermore, we may assess our involvement in spreading misleading information on social media and take serious steps to prevent it.

That really is rich coming from Dick who will be facing the Ethics Commission next month.

It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out who is behind the republican butt kissers for Texas Attorney General.

Bush raised $2,264,137 from 1114 donations. 73%, $1,650,000, came from 78 donations of $10,000 or more. 99% came from 299 donations of $1000 or more leaving only 1% of all his donations coming from donations of $500 or less. $300,000 came from 3 different donors, Trevor Rees-Jones, Arnulfo Eduardo Trevino Garza, and HH Tripp Wommack III.

Paxton raised $1,819,468 from 503 donations. 86%, $1,572,000, came from 46 donations of $10,000 or more. 99% came from 125 donations of $1000 or more leaving only 1%, $23,536 of all his donations coming from donations of $1000 or more. $500,000 can from 2 donors, $250,000 from Douglas Scharbauer, and $250,000 from the Republican Attorney General Association. Darwin Reason and Kenny Troult each donated $100,000.

Eva Guzman raised $1,051,723 from 234 donations. 85%, $892,500, came from 24 donors of $10,000 or more. 98%, $1,027,700, came from 75 donors of $1000 or more. Texans for Lawsuit Reform donated $200,000.

This shouldn’t be much of a surprise. The Party of Q led by right wing extremist Allen West, received $5,452,396 in donations in 2020. The breakdown is pretty interesting.

Of the $5,452,396 total:

$97,504 (1.7%) came from 798 donors contributing less than $1000, averaging $221 each.

$5,355,891 (98.3%) came from 249 donors contributing more than $1000, averaging $21,509 each.

$4.994,300 (91.5%) came from 119 donors contributing more than $10,000, averaging $41,968 each.

The biggest donors include Chief Justice Nathan Hecht for $750,000, Brett Busby for Supreme Court $800,000, Justice Jane Bland for $400,000 and Richard Weekley for $125,000. Here is a list of the top donors:

Lacey Hull won a close raise in Texas House District 138. According to Living Blue in Texas her husband filed for divorce the same day she won alleging “Respondent has committed adultery.” According to her campaign finance reports Hull is carrying on other affairs with special interest groups.

Prior to her 30 day out report, Hull had only raised $122,000, a very poor fundraising total for a competitive race. Within a month she had raised over $1.6 Million, most from in-kind donations. $1,027,448 came from special interest groups. These affairs includes Texas for Lawsuit Reform for $645,000, Republican State Leadership for $292,000, Association Republicans of Texas for $191,000. Greg Abbott threw in $17,000 ask $25,000 came from Republican Texas Leadership. Various PACs including home schoolers contributed over $37,000.

Hull won in a very tight race so she really needed the $1.6 Million to pull this off. If her husband had filed for divorce, alleging an affair, prior to the election she would have easily won. Republicans in Texas count adultery as a plus in their world. 

Watch for a primary candidate in 2022.