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The following editorial reflects the views of Don J. Dodd, Publisher/CEO of The Examiner Corporation.
Jeff Yass, a multi-billionaire and the wealthiest man in Pennsylvania has made substantial political donations – much of his money ending up right here in Southeast Texas. Boundaries of Yass’ vast fortune are untold, but his 15% stake in TikTok, according to Forbes Magazine, is alone worth $21 billion. Selling the secret lives of our children to China really brings home the bacon.
Many of his recent contributions, totaling millions, have been directed toward the “Club for Growth Action,” a Political Action Committee (PAC) with no Texas-based staff that can be seen, which is sticking their Pinocchio nose into Southeast Texas politics.
This PAC recently sent out a mailer featuring an image of Pinocchio to voters in Jefferson and Orange counties, accusing Speaker of the Texas House Dade Phelan of “Lying” and advocating for us to vote for Phelan’s opponent, David Covey, on May 28.
Who is David Covey? These mailers, that somehow manage to get delivered to our homes when we can’t seem to get regular mail or packages delivered by the post office in a reasonable time, don’t say a word about the candidate they want us to blindly elect. No one seems to know what Covey’s plans are to serve Southeast Texas; all we know is he had billionaires from West Texas, and now from Pennsylvania, paying millions of dollars for TV commercials, Deep Fakes on social media, unsolicited emails and text messages.
As a newspaper, many have asked us about Covey and, while we fully endorse Dade Phelan because of his integrity and honesty while still securing state funding for Southeast Texas, we really know nothing of Covey – mostly because he won’t tell us.
Numerous calls and emails have gone unanswered. Not interested in an interview? Ok. We sent a list of questions seeking his stance on important policy initiative; again, no answer. So, we searched the internet; Covey is listed on campaign filings as an Oil and Gas Consultant and Lawyer with work experience, yet he is not eligible to be a practicing lawyer with his mail-order, online degree.
What Covey fails to mention in campaign literature is his 2013 and 2014 stint as Constituent Liaison for U.S. Congressman Steve Stockman, who, in November 2018, was sentenced to serve 120 months in prison and ordered to pay over $1 million in restitution for orchestrating a four-year scheme from 2010 to 2014 to defraud charitable donors of hundreds of thousands of dollars and secretly funnel the proceeds to pay for personal expenses and to finance his campaigns for public office illegally. Maybe that reference wouldn’t play well with voters.
The Golden Triangle Republican Women reached out to Covey and Phelan’s campaigns to host a debate, presumably to allow Covey and Phelan to lay out their plans as our representative in the legislature; Phelan agreed, Covey said no.
Why is it that Covey and his puppet masters only want to put out their nasty, divisive political rhetoric? Is it because Covey really doesn’t have any solutions? Is it because his billionaire masters are not really interested in who represents Southeast Texas? They just want Phelan gone so they can dictate who gets the speakership because, if Covey were to win, he absolutely would not be the Speaker of the House; he would only be a freshman with no clout, no influence, and absolutely would not have a seat at the table.
Yes, Phelan did appoint eight Democrats to chair a meager portion of the Texas House’s total 34 committees; there were 86 Republicans and 64 Democrats serving the Texas House in 150 seats in the last session. A tradition of Texas House Speakers appointing committee chairs from both parties has been going on for decades and is not exclusive to any party or Speaker; it is simply a tradition that many believe allows for tempered compromise and prevents the kind of gridlock we see in Washington. Republican supporters of Phelan say this tradition did not stop conservatives from achieving long-sought policy wins last year, including a near-total abortion ban and permitless open carry of handguns, not to mention the largest property tax decrease in Texas history.
In Texas, we have the ninth-largest economy in the world and a $32.7 billion budget surplus while, in Washington, the federal government is running nearly a trillion (that’s with 12 zeros) dollar deficit this year alone and threatening a shutdown of the government every other week because they can’t pass a budget.
With Phelan in leadership at the Texas House, he was able to not only secure historic levels of funding for skills training to our universities; he has seen that the tens of millions of dollars needed for mental health and our ports was secured; and, he did it all while working with Texas’ elected leaders to create a budget surplus allowing for property tax decreases statewide.
In an editorial during the regular election, we asked why West Texas billionaires were spending so much on this campaign. We answered it clearly: They want control of the Texas House, and Phelan won’t give it to them. Now, we ask what in the world the richest man in Pennsylvania wants with this House seat from Southeast Texas? What does he want with control of the Texas budget, our surplus funds and natural resources?
Please don’t be influenced by slick mailers from outside influencers from Pennsylvania; check the facts. And, though the runoff election for District 21 holds more serious repercussions than selecting the wrong hot sauce, as Pace Picante showed the world of Texans in the ’90s, you don’t want your salsa from New York City. Now, it’s time to let the world know you don’t want your Texas state representatives to be owned by someone from Pennsylvania, either.