David Bellow - SREC Texas State Republican Executive Committee Senate District 3

Should TX GOP go Winner Take All? Is RNC Changing Stupid Presidential Primary Rules?

2012-02-25T22:51:00.001-08:00

Should the Republican Party of Texas go back to winner take all?

The State Republican Executive Committee (SREC) will vote on Feb 29th, 2012 to change the rules and approve a Temporary Convention/Delegate Selection Plan. Should the SREC vote to also change the RPT Presidential Delegate Selection Rule 38 from proportional back to winner take all? Also, should the RPT change the rules to allow the presidential delegates to be uncommitted after the first committed vote at the National Convention? In other words, if no presidential Candidate has a majority of the votes to win the nomination, the Texas Delegation would be able to be a player in a brokered convention by having the ability to team up with other delegates from other states and select the next Republican Presidential Nominee? Proportional might sound good vs winner take all because under proportional the candidates get a proportion of Texas delegates based on the percentage of the votes they get in the state Primary Election. The problem is that proportional weakens states rights. With proportional we might as well just have a big nation-wide popular vote. With winner take all, the State of Texas (as well as all states with winner take all) has a much bigger impact on the Presidential race because the candidate who wins Texas really does win Texas and gets all of the delegate votes from the State. Same thing with the Electoral College. The President does not win by a national popular vote. The President wins by the electoral college and he wins by winning the most states, not the most people. It is all about states rights and not about a national popular vote. With Texas having such a late election, we need all the power we can to have an impact on the Presidential race!
Let me know what you think!

RNC Considering Changing their Stupid Presidential Primary National Rules

What was the Republican National Committee thinking when they decided to let 4 states go ahead of everyone else without a penalty? What were they thinking when they FORCED the Republican Party of Texas to have a diluted voice in the Presidential Primary by making Texas change from winner take all to proportional?
State Parties do not even control their Primary Election date, the State Legislatures do. The RNC was just not thinking when they created these new rules! Texas, which now has a late primary because of the redistricting battle, will have an even weaker voice because it is no longer winner take all. With the National Republican Presidential race dragging on because of 4 candidates splitting delegates, Texas still might have a huge impact even with a late primary. That huge impact is minimized because we are no longer winner take all.

I have advocated that the Republican Party of Texas should stand up to the RNC and change the rules to go back to winner take all.

Some states, like Florida, just told the RNC to go take a hike and did not follow the timeline rules put forth by the RNC. Texas should do that too if the RNC does not allow us to go back to winner take all. Another issue of course is the DOJ. The DOJ likes to extend the unconstitutional voting rights act on the RPT, a Private Political Organization. A change back to winner take all would have to be cleared by the DOJ. We could just sue the DOJ though for unconstitutionally applying the voting rights act onto the RPT, which is what I have advocated also!

FINALLY, the RNC is realizing that their stupid plan is not working.

The following is an article on the subject from The Hill:

Long, damaging primary has GOP considering changes to its rules

By Cameron Joseph - 02/24/12 01:35 PM ET

Republicans are weighing a change to the party’s presidential primary rules amid fears this year’s prolonged nomination process is hurting the GOP’s chances of retaking the White House.

The problems with the current system were discussed at length at both the most recent Republican National Committee meeting and at the Southern Republican Leadership Conference last month. Top RNC committeemen plan to reconsider the rules at the next RNC meeting, slotted for late spring in Phoenix.

Many acknowledge privately that they worry a long primary is forcing all of the GOP candidates to spend more than they want and that the candidates' negative attacks against each other are hurting the eventual nominee's chances against President Obama.

“I think it comes up at almost every major Republican meeting across the country,” said one senior Republican, who requested anonymity to speak candidly. “Everyone’s talking about how we can do this better, how can we fix it. I think it’s going to be a big discussion.”

The RNC adopted a new rules system in 2011 in order to try to control the mad scramble for early primary dates that had occurred in years past, partly because of the view that John McCain locked up the nomination too quickly and that a longer process would have helped the GOP find a stronger candidate.

The new system created a rigid calendar and strong penalties for states that moved their contest's date up, including the loss of half a state’s delegates and a proportional rather than winner-take-all system for states that voted before April.

The two goals were to keep the primary season out of the holidays and to prolong the system so lesser known candidates would have more of a chance.

Florida’s decision to break the new rules and vote early anyway set off a calendar scramble that pushed Iowa’s caucuses to Jan. 3. Many Republicans are now worried that the second goal has worked too well, and that the long primary is hurting the candidates.

One prominent critic of the current system is New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie (R). “These RNC rules that turned to proportional awarding of delegates, this was the dumbest idea anybody ever had,” he said on Fox News on Thursday. “You're running against an incumbent president who will not have a primary, so your idea is make ours longer so we can beat each other up longer?”

Some Republicans worry the extended primary is draining their candidates’ coffers, leaving them at a financial disadvantage against Obama.

“People do have concerns this has gone on longer than they would like and cost more money than they would like and created more thunder and lightning than they would like. That is a result of people going before the time allotted in the rules," said John Ryder, an RNC committeeman from Tennessee who came up with the idea to assign delegates proportionally. "And had the states complied with the rules the calendar would have been more compressed, orderly and less costly."

Ryder blamed Florida for jumping the gun. He argued that that the eventual nominee will be much more battle-tested and ready to take on Obama, but he worried that the level of negativity the campaigns had engaged in could hurt the eventual nominee.

“A lot of [the ad money] is going to exposing the flaws in the other guy’s policies,” he said. “It’s a trade-off. They have to raise and spend more money than they would have in a shorter primary but they get the privilege of being in the public eye.”

Ryder predicted that the RNC would seek to strengthen the current rules.

“I think the key change is going to be to try to find a way to encourage states not to jump line the way Florida did this time," he said. "I don’t know whether that’ll be an increase in penalties or some other device that can affect their decision process."

RNC spokesperson Sean Spicer said it was too early to say whether this year's primary process would have any effect on the general election.

“I’m sure there were a lot of New York Giants fans that were concerned when they started the season two and three, but not many were concerned after they won the Super Bowl,” he said. “We’re very early in the process and have a ways to go.”

Most observers still predict that the primary will be all but over by late April and say that would give the nominee plenty of time to raise money and prepare for the general election.

But they all said that if the primary dragged into the summer, it could hurt the eventual nominee and that a brokered convention would be a disaster for the party. Thus far, none of the Republican candidates are even close to hitting the 1,144 delegates needed to lock in the nomination. At the current rate of distribution, the earliest a candidate could have the necessary delegates is late April.

Adding to the pressure are threats from Ron Paul and Newt Gingrich to stay in the race until the GOP convention in Tampa.

“It’d be horrible to go into a brokered convention heading into Labor Day weekend,” said Saul Anuzis, an RNC committeeman from Michigan who backs Mitt Romney.

Anuzis was the only one of the 15-member board to vote against proportionality.

“When you’re challenging the incumbent, you wanted to get the nomination process done as quickly as possible so they can begin pulling the party together and raise money,” he said.

Anuzis said he didn’t fight hard against the rule when it passed a year ago but said he thought the system would be scrapped for next election.

“What we’ve seen is unless the rules are extremely draconian you’re going to have a hard time imposing national rules,” he said. “There are some people that believe we should eliminate all the timing rules and just let the nominating process work its way out. It’s very hard to try to control the states from the national perspective, we cause more grief than good sometimes. I’d be all for a laissez faire system.”

Should Texas GOP Sue DOJ over Voting Rights Act Preclearance Constitutionality?

2012-02-21T02:44:00.000-08:00

Disclaimer: the following article is the opinion of David Bellow, an individual who is on the SREC, and does not express the "official opinion" of the Republican Party of Texas

The State of Texas is under assault by the Department of Justice and the Voting Rights Act. All this Texas redistricting mess (and the pushing back of the Primary Election date) is due to section 5 of the Voting Rights Act which requires a few states to have any voting changes approved by the Department of Justice first (because somehow it is better to have one unelected, biased person, the Attorney General Eric Holder, decide how a state runs elections instead of the elected officials of the state determining it for themselves)

The Republican Party of Texas, not just the State of Texas, is also facing the same, unconstitutional oppression. The Texas GOP is faced with possibly having no precinct conventions, or limited precinct conventions, that are only optional with approval of counties/senatorial districts. Why is this happening? It is happening because the RPT has to come up with a way to have our convention/delegate selection process BEFORE the Primary Election this year due to the Primary Election getting pushed back possible past the date of the State Convention. Somewhere along the line, the DOJ extended its hand into the Republican Party of Texas, a private organization, not a public or government organization. This new RPT convention/delegate selection process must first be cleared by the DOJ. We do not know when or if the new process will be cleared, and it could take weeks. Because of this uncertainty in the timeline, the Republican Party of Texas is strongly leaning towards makingprecinct conventions optional (to be decided by the county or senatorial district executive committees). Also, because we just do not know when the plan will be cleared by the DOJ, if precinct conventions do happen, they would be on the morning of the county/senatorial convention date (April 21^st or April 14^th in some cases).

Does DOJ Voting Rights Act Oversight Apply to Private Political Parties/entities like the Texas GOP?

It is clear that the (unconstitutional) section 5 of the Voting Rights Act applies to election changes made in the State of Texas, but does it apply to the convention process changes of a private political party in Texas?

I say NO. The Republican Party of Texas is a PRIVATE political entity. Our process, by nature, is restricted to, and is guided is by, the values/rules of only the members of our private Republican Party organization. Our process is not subject to the regulations for public elections/voting. Our party conventions DO NOT elect public officials or determine public policy/laws for the general public in Texas. Our convention process is used to develop our party rules/values and also to elect leaders of our PRIVATE POLITICAL ORGANIZATION. Any changes that the Republican Party of Texas makes to our convention process have NO EFFECT on the election process of public elections and voting. Public elections (electing public officials and voting on state and local regulations) are run by the governmental bodies in Texas, not the political parties in Texas. Changes to RPT rules do not effect general, public elections (or access to them) and certainly do not prevent anyone from voting for whomever or whatever they choose to in ANY public elections.

It is wrong that the RPT even has to get DOJ approval for our RPT Convention/Delegate Selection Process

Is Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act even Constitutional?

Should Texas Join Other States like Alabama and South Carolina in Openly Challenging the Voting Rights Act in the Courts?

11) Section 5 requires some states to have their plans approved by the DOJ while other states do not have to have anything approved. It is inequitable to have one standard for some states and a different standard from some states. That is like having one school for blacks and one school for whites. The different standards also creates a situation where you have some states, like Illinois, getting to pass voter ID laws but Texas cannot pass them because the DOJ will not let us. How is it constitutional that one state can have a regulation but then Texas cannot have the same regulation because the DOJ does not like it?

22) Another reason why section 5 of the voting rights act is unconstitutional is that there is no difference today between southern states and northern states in the sense that there is no institutionalized racism anymore and there is certainly NO states trying to keep minorities from voting. When the voting rights act was initially passed it was a good thing. DEMOCRAT controlled southern states had laws discriminating against minorities and preventing them from voting. Those days are long gone. Anyone can vote no matter what color you are. Anyone of any color can be elected to public office in any state. Heck, the President is half black! My friend and conservative Texas State Rep, James White who is black, was elected here in East Texas based on his values, not the color of his skin. That right there shows you that the issue of minorities being restricted from voting, or even restricted from running for office, is long gone.

33) Some parts of the Voting Rights Act are being used to CREATE INSTITUTIONAZED RACISM. That’s right, it was passed to stop discrimination but now it is creating discrimination. It is nothing short of racist and discriminatory to say that voting districts have to be drawn based on race and that some races must have their own voting districts while other races cannot have their own voting districts. It is just silly. I don’t think ANY voting district should have the district drawn based on race, whether white black or Hispanic. We, as Americans, have to stop using race as a factor in everything we do. We need to look at each other as all fellow Americans and stop looking at race. It is keeping us apart instead of allowing us to come together. It is keeping people together in groups based on the color of their skin instead of allowing people to group together based on their values and regardless of the color of their skin. Will we never have a nation where people are judged based on the content of their character instead of the color of their skin as Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. dreamed?

44) The Voting Rights Act is being used to preserve DEMOCRAT districts and not minority districts. It is crazy but true. There are some districts in Texas that Democrats are trying to preserve using the courts. These districts are not majority minority districts. In other words, a majority of the voters in the district are not minority voters. The majority of the district is white. This makes them not protected by the Voting Rights Act as a majority minority district. The only reason the Democrats are trying to protect these Districts is because they are DEMOCRAT Districts. The Democrats argue that the minorities in the district team up to vote with part of the white people in the district and therefore it should be protected as a majority minority district. This is what the Voting Rights Act has become? A way for Democrats to keep districts without regard to protecting minorities?

Texas Should Have Acted Sooner by having a Split Primary and Challenging the Voting Rights Act

I knew that the Democrats and liberal judges would drag this out and push back the election, which is why, from the beginning, I advocated for a split election so that we could go ahead and have the some parts of the Texas Primary Elections now (Presidential, County-wide, State-wide) and we could also have the Party Conventions/Delegate Selection. This would have allowed us to get the conventions and presidential primary election out of the way while the State and the Courts battled over redistricting/primary election date for US Congress, State Senate and State Representative.

I also advocated that Texas challenge Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act from the beginning of this whole mess. That would certainly have fast tracked the issue to the Supreme Court where they will hopefully strike down parts of the Voting Rights Act as unconstitutional. I am sure Texas will eventually join other states in challenging the Voting Rights Act in the near future, but because we did not challenge it from the beginning, we are stuck with it until this mess is all sorted out in the Courts.

Neither of the above ideas happened of course and that is why we are in the big mess we are in with the Primary Elections getting pushed back to May 29^th, 2012 at the earliest.

This also means that we have to do our conventions and delegate process before we even have the primary elections. This causes MANY problems like who gets to go to the conventions since we cannot verity if they are Democrat or Republican? Who will run the conventions if we have not elected new county party leaders? Who will pay for the precinct conventions and locations since the conventions will no longer just be at the already established primary election polling places? Is there even time for counties to be able to organize their Precinct Conventions?

The fact of the matter is that this is a BIG MESS and there will be NO perfect plan. There will be many problems and many people will be upset. We just have to do what we can with a bad situation.

What should the RPT do about the DOJ and our Convention Process?

Here are three plans that I think are options:

Plan 1) The Republican Party of Texas can just say no to the DOJ and go ahead with our precinct conventions now instead of waiting for approval of our plan (we would still have the problems associated with having the conventions before the Primary Election). This decision to ignore the DOJ would probably be challenged and an injunction placed against the RPT and our entire convention process could be put on hold and would be in jeopardy until we battle up to the Supreme Court and get a ruling from them as to whether or not we were justified in ignoring the DOJ.

Plan 2) The RPT can go ahead and come up with plans to submit to the DOJ. The DOJ would likely approve the plans but we would have to wait a couple of weeks for them to do it. This would allow Texas to have our conventions/delegate selection process without any legal problems from the DOJ or Judges. This would also mean that we would probably not have Precinct Conventions, or they would be optional, due to the limited time we will have to organize everything since we have to wait for DOJ approval. (This is currently the plan that the RPT is leaning towards)

Plan 3) The RPT sues the DOJ over the Voting Rights Act. We could sue the DOJ now before we have our conventions, which might cause a convention holdup, or we can go ahead and follow the DOJ approval process for now so that way we can have the conventions and get those out of the way before we take on the task of suing the DOJ. No matter what we do, I think we should still end up suing the DOJ. This of course would cost money. The RPT does not have any extra month for an expensive lawsuit so the Republicans in Texas would have to stand up and donate money to help the RPT sue over the Voting Rights Act.

A 2009 US Supreme Court Ruling sets up the Supreme Court to Strike Down Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act

There are multiple lawsuits challenging the Constitutionality of parts o the Voting Rights Act. At least one of them, out of Shelby County in Alabama, is on a fast track to be heard in the US Supreme Court this year.

Following renewal of the Voting Rights act in 2006, a Texas utility district challenged the constitutionality of the preclearance provision, claiming that it went beyond Congress’s power because Congress could no longer show that the law was necessary to prevent racially discriminatory voting.

In that 2009 case, the court came very close to striking down the law. Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. questioned whether there was evidence that these states, and only these states, would go back to racial discrimination in voting if the Voting Rights Act disappeared. He compared the government’s argument that preclearance was still necessary to an “elephant whistle”: “Well there are no elephants, so it must work.”

Chief Justice Roberts wrote a disingenuous opinion for eight members of the court resolving the question on statutory grounds — holding that the utility district could apply to “bail out” from coverage under the act — and temporarily avoiding the constitutional issue and political fallout. The opinion gave a clear warning that Congress needed to fix the problems in the act. Congress has done nothing about it and now there will be another showdown in the Supreme Court.

Texas Precinct Conventions will be OPTIONAL under New 2012 Republican Delegate Selection Process

2012-02-18T22:54:00.000-08:00

Update: The New Draft Plan has come out and all counties and senatorial districts will be able to have precinct conventions (if they want) and they can be whenever and wherever the county or senatorial district wants. There is no big conspiracy to keep people from getting involved. Read more here
clarification: to all the Ron Paul Supporters emailing me. I can promise you that whatever plan the RPT comes up with, it WILL NOT be an attempt to keep Ron Paul supporters from being involved. In fact, if the RPT decided on only optional precinct conventions, there will be more of a chance for grassroots individuals to be involved because they will be able to go directly to being involved at the county convention instead of having to be chosen as a delegate at the precinct convention before they can go to the county convention.

The Texas GOP is entering into unknown and uncharted territory. We are now faced with having to do our Republican Conventions/Delegate Selection Process BEFORE we even have a primary election! This process has always been tied to the Primary election but this year it will not because of the belated Primary Election (see below for the normal process from previous years). The 62 members of the State Republican Executive Committee will be developing an entire new Convention/Delegate Selection Plan. We have already had a conference call in which we discussed the many different ideas and we agreed on the basic plan. This plan is VERY intricate and has many different moving parts, not to mention our hands are tied in many ways. Over the next 2 weeks, the RPT will pound out all the details of the plan. We will then have an emergency SREC meeting in Austin on Wednesday, February 29^th, 2012 and at this meeting we will vote to approve the plan. We cannot have the meeting any sooner because we have to have a 12 day notice before the meeting. The plan then has to be presented to the three Judge Federal Panel in San Antonio and then sent to the Department of Justice for approval (We can thank the unconstitutional Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act for having to do this). DOJ approval will then take at least a couple of weeks (usually takes 2 months but they will try to do it faster).

We are still developing the full plan and it is very complex. Therefore, right now I do not have the complete details of the plan to send out to everyone, but I will send out more information as soon as the RPT releases the details of this plan.

I know that everyone will have MANY questions about the new plan after reading this article. I ask that everyone please wait until we have all the details worked out and emailed out to everyone. We should have a draft with more details to email out in the next few days. After we release the complete plan, feel free to ask questions or share concerns.

I WANT YOUR OPINIONS BEFORE WE VOTE! I would just like you to wait until we send out a DRAFT plan so that way you can ask questions AFTER you have read the plan. There will be time before we vote for you to send us your concerns!

Precinct Conventions will be Optional and will be the Morning of the County/Senatorial District Conventions.

The most important thing right now that I want to let everyone know, and this detail will not change, is that Republican Party of Texas Precinct Conventions will be optional. Each County Executive Committee will vote on whether or not to have them, and if they decide to have them, they will be on the morning of the County/Senatorial District Conventions which are currently approved by the Federal Panel to be on April 21^st (or April 14^th for some counties). This date for the County/Senatorial Cenventions could change if needed but that is what we are planning for and we would not want to push it back much more so that we will have time to get ready for the State Convention June 7^th – 9^th, 2012 in Fort Worth, TX. We cannot change the date and location of the Texas Republican State Convention 2012.

This is a Glimpse How the Convention/Delegate Selection Process Will Work THIS YEAR:

Rumors had gone around that the Republican Party of Texas would not have precinct Conventions at all and instead we would jump straight into the County/Senatorial District Conventions and then the State Convention June 7^th – 9^th, 2012 in Fort Worth, TX.

In response, there have been many emails going around stating that the Republican Party of Texas has to have Precinct Conventions because we have to keep the grassroots involved and so we must not do away with the Precinct Conventions. I was one of those people insisting that the RPT does not eliminate the Precinct Conventions. There were many great ideas and plans submitted to the SREC showing us how we can still have Precinct Conventions. I was 100% in favor of using some of these ideas or coming up with a way to have precinct conventions.

The SREC had a conference call to discuss a new Convention/Delegate Process and we got a little eye opening session.

We looked at the timeline and realized that we have NO IDEA when our new delegate selection plan will even be approved by the DOJ. This makes it impossible to create a timeline that includes a separate precinct convention date before a County/Senatorial Convention because we do not even know when we will get approval or even if that approval will be in time to be able to have a Precinct Convention. On top of that, there is an ENORMOUS amount of work that would have to be done by the County Parties in a very limited amount of time. There are over 5500 precincts in Texas what would need precinct conventions/locations/organization and Precinct Convention Chairmen. Even if we get approval in time for a precinct convention, and each county had the precinct conventions all combined in one location and used old precinct chairmen, the counties would simply not have enough time to organize 5500 precinct conventions and then have to turn around and quickly plan the county convention and process all the paperwork from the precinct conventions.

It is just not possible. There are MANY reasons why it is not possible and the reasons above are just a couple of the many reasons. Ya’ll know me and ya’ll know I fight for things. I was ready to fight for Precinct Conventions but we just simply do not have a choice.

We listen to the grassroots Republicans and we have come up with a solution so that we can still have Precinct Conventions.

You CAN still have Precinct Conventions if your County Wants to…

It would not have been fair for the State Party to FORCE all counties into scrambling to organize Precinct Conventions with limited time and resources. At the same time, we are listening to the grassroots and we WANT any County to be able to have precinct conventions if the Republicans of that county would like to and are able to. For this reason, we are allowing the Executive Committee of every county in Texas the option of voting to have Precinct Conventions in their county. We do not have a timeline set because of the DOJ approval holdup, so if a County approves having Precinct Conventions, the Precinct Conventions would be on the morning of the County/Senatorial District Conventions and at the same location. It does not seem possible to plan for Precinct Conventions in 5500 different locations and on a different date before the County/Senatorial conventions so the next best thing would be to have Precinct Conventions on the same day and same location as the County/Senatorial Conventions.

Having No Precinct Conventions and Only a County/Senatorial District Convention Actually Allows for MORE Grassroots Republicans to be Involved

One of the reasons why I and others were insisting on having Precinct Conventions was so that all of the grassroots Republicans would still be able to be involved in the process. What I found out was that MORE people will have to opportunity to be involved if there are no Precinct Conventions. You see, when there is a Precinct Convention, each precinct selects delegates to go to the County/Senatorial District Convention. That means not everyone at the Precinct Convention gets a chance to be involved in the County/Senatorial Conventions. On the other hand, if there are no Precinct Conventions, EVERYONE gets to go to the County/Senatorial District Conventions. Everyone gets to be involved in that next step. Not having a Precinct Convention actually allows MORE Republicans to be involved in the process. It will also cut down on confusion and workload by having one date and location to be able to announce to all Republicans in the County. Not having a Precinct Convention will of course mean the County/Senatorial Conventions will be much bigger than normal and it might take a little longer to decide on rules/platform changes.

The 155 National Delegates elected at the Texas Republican State Convention will NOT be assigned a Presidential Candidate to Vote for, initially.

Due to the Election being right before the June Convention (maybe even after), the National Delegates chosen at the State Convention will NOT KNOW who they will be casting their ballot for in the Presidential Nomination at the National Convention. Once Texas certifies the Presidential Primary Election Results, the national delegates who were elected at the State Convention will then be told who they will be voting for at the National Convention. It will still be proportional as already planned. Proportional means that if someone, let’s say Santorum, gets 60 percent of the votes in the Texas Republican Primary Election then Santorum will get 60% of the 155 national delegate votes that Texas has. The delegates just will not know who they will be pledged to initially because they will have to wait until the Primary Election Results are in and certified.

Texas Might Actually Have an Impact in the Republican Presidential Race – Brokered Convention Possible.

I would have never believed this, but it looks like Texas might actually still have a voice in the Presidential Race. It looks like we might have all 4 current Presidential Candidates stick in the race until the end. So far, no one has jumped ahead very much in the Delegate Count because the vote keeps getting split and different candidates are winning different states. This means that there STILL might not be a clear Republican Nominee by the time Texas Votes on May 29th or in June. Texas will have 155 delegates and could swing the election for a candidate. Or, if one candidate is already in the lead, let’s say Mitt Romney, and Texas gives most of our Delegates to Santorum or Gingrich, then that might be enough to deny Mitt Romney a chance to get a majority of delegates and we will end up having a brokered convention. At a Brokered Convention, Texas will have a full 155 Delegates and therefore would have a huge say in the negotiations at a brokered convention.

For Those of You Who Are New to This Convention/Delegate Selection Process, Below is a little History Lesson on How the Convention/ Delegate Selection Process Has NORMALLY Worked IN THE PAST in Texas:

Each Precinct in Texas has a voting location on Election Day. In the past, voters would go to their polling place on the night of the Texas Republican Primary Election Day and there would be a Precinct Convention. Republicans at the Precinct Convention would submit changes/additions to Republican Party rules and Platform values. They would also pick delegates to go represent their precinct at the County/Senatorial Convention. Next would be the County/Senatorial District Conventions. The delegates at the County/Senatorial conventions would vote on the changes/additions to the rules/platform that were passed up to them from the Precinct Conventions. The delegates at the County/Senatorial District Conventions would also select delegates to represent the County/Senatorial District at the State Convention. Then there is the Texas Republican Party State Convention. All the delegates to the State Convention will vote to create the new Party Rules and the New Biennial Texas Republican Party Platform. The delegates of the State Convention will also vote on things like to elect a State Republican Party Chairman, new SREC Members, Delegates to the National Republican Convention to vote in the Republican Presidential Nomination, and two National Committee members to serve on the Republican National Committee (RNC). There is then a National Republican Convention and the National Delegates from every State will vote to pick the Republican Presidential Nominee. That is how the process would normally look if we were not in this big mess.

Sincerely,
David Bellow
State Republican Executive Committee

IMPORTANT TX Redistricting Update: NO April Election. One May 29th Primary or Split April/May Elections

2012-02-18T22:52:00.001-08:00

The San Antonio Federal Court had a Texas Redistricting hearing yesterday, 2/14/12. We had hoped for more clarity of when we will get to vote. After the hearing, things did not look so good…. Instead of clarity, we got chaos. A Unified April Election is OUT (won’t happen) and we still do not know when we will vote! We might even be forced to have our Precinct, County and State Conventions BEFORE we even have the primary election!

Remember last week the Court said they wanted a unified April Primary? I am not so gullible to believe every word that this liberal leaning court says and so for the past couple of months I have been adamant that the courts and the Democrats will keep pushing things back and we will either have a unified May primary or a split primary. Guess what, the court changed their mind yesterday about wanting to have a Unified April Primary (is anyone surprised?) and now there will be NO Unified April Primary! There is just no time.

Now it looks like we will have one unified Primary Election on May 29th or June 26th, OR we will have a split Primary (two elections) with the Presidential and Statewide elections in late April and all the other elections in May/June (or whenever the redistricting battle is settled).

Both the Democrats and the Republicans are OK with a split election now that there is no time for a unified April Primary, if there was a way for it to be funded. A split election would cost more money than one election, so unless the state comes up with the money, Texas will not have a split primary and instead we will have one unified Primary Election on May 29^th or even as late as June 26^th.

After the conclusion of the hearing today 2/15/12 (or whenever the court feels like it because we are apparently their puppets right now), the court will tell us whether or not we will have a split election or one unified election pushed back to May/June.

We are going to have some major problems if we do not have a split election and instead have one unified election in May/June. We have to have Precinct, County and a State Convention. This is required and we CANNOT move the date of our June 7^th Republican State Convention. The Precinct Conventions, by Law, are on the Primary Election Day. If the court dictates that Texas will have one unified Primary election in May or June, then it will be impossible to have our conventions on Primary election day. We will have to beg the court/judges/dictators/kings for Judicial Relief to allow us to have our Precinct and County Conventions BEFORE the Primary Election Day and NOT tied to the Primary Election in any way.

So that is basically what is going on. WHAT A MESS! How much longer will we just sit here on the sidelines waiting on the court instead of being more proactive and pulling everything out of our sleeves in order to fight the unconstitutional actions that are being taken against us?

Sincerely,

David Bellow

State Republican Executive Committee

Official Statement from the Republican Party of Texas

The Republican Party of Texas issued a statement about all the new developments after yesterday’s Redistricting Hearing in San Antonio. This statement is as follows:

Redistricting Update IX: Valentine's Day Hearing Update

Today in San Antonio, the three-judge panel began a full day of hearing final arguments in the Texas redistricting case, which affects the scheduling of the state primary and state convention. We can report that the Court appears to be backing off of its stated intention to have a unified April Primary Election. This comes after assorted county election officials stepped forward to testify that it would be impossible to hold a unified April Primary Election - even if they had maps today.

Although the Republican Party of Texas had Harris County Clerk Stan Stanart appear before the panel to testify that an April 24th primary election is still doable, our sense is the Court now believes that April is no longer viable for a single unified primary. From the Court's questioning, it seemed that at least one judge and possibly two would prefer to go ahead with a Presidential primary and statewide races in April and the other races at a date to be determined in the future. How the extra primary election would be funded appears problematic at this time. We won't know until the Court rules whether these conclusions are correct. Our best estimate right now is that there will be a single unified primary on May 29th, absent the state coming up with funds for a split primary.

Because the Texas Democratic Party's lawyers backed up Chairman Munisteri's testimony at the hearing that it is practically not possible to move the State Conventions at this late date, one thing we know for sure (and the Court is aware of this fact), is that you can't schedule the primary after the State Conventions unless (as the Democratic lawyer stated) the State Parties can find a field somewhere to hold their conventions and if we could guarantee good weather.

Chairman Munisteri testified to the Court that it would be impossible to select delegates in accordance with the process prescribed in the Election Code, if the primary was not held until May 29th and the state convention began on June 7th. However, the Court signaled that it would be open to judicial relief to allow the State Parties to select their delegates in a way that didn't require precinct conventions to be tied to the primary. The Texas Democratic Party lawyer went a step further and argued that even though the Election Code prescribes the process, that it is their position that the Election Code is unenforceable because the political parties are private organizations and thus they could change their rules without a court order. The RPT believes it would be risky to do so and prefers the route of obtaining judicial permission prior to such action. In the event the Court schedules a May primary, Chairman Munisteri plans to schedule an emergency teleconference with all SREC members and Republican County Chairs to discuss alternative processes for picking State Convention delegates, in the hopes of coming to a consensus as to what to suggest to the court for relief.

The court also heard presentations from several plaintiffs and the State of Texas as to their position relative to how maps should be drawn. Last month, the U.S. Supreme Court directed the three-judge panel to issue new maps that were neither the legislative-drawn lines, nor the subsequent lines issued by the San Antonio three-judge panel in November. In issuing that directive, the Supreme Court set forth the criteria by which lines could be altered. Specifically, the Supreme Court said that if the San Antonio panel found there was a "not insubstantial" chance of violation of Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act, that lines could be altered to comply with Section 5. A Washington, D.C. three-judge federal panel has had a trial on Section 5 so as to make a final determination as to violations, but the Supreme Court indicated that the San Antonio three-judge federal panel should issue interim maps which correct any deficiencies in districts in which the "not insubstantial" standard was met. Moreover, the San Antonio three-judge panel has jurisdiction over Section 2 violations of the Voting Rights Act and the Supreme Court indicated that if there were violations of this provision, that lines could be altered as well.

In recent orders, the San Antonio three-judge panel had directed the plaintiffs and the State of Texas (representing the legislative maps) to see if they could agree which districts fell under these criteria and suggest fixes. Last week, the Attorney General put forth a proposed set of maps which addressed potentially problematic districts while at the same time, tried to stay as close to the original legislative maps as possible. Some of the plaintiffs' groups agreed to some of the proposed lines. The hearing today flushed out the differences, with each party stating their differences and arguments thereof. The Attorney General's proposals put forth what it believes are 50 Texas State House districts which have an opportunity for minorities to elect their candidates of choice - a number which meets the benchmark (2010) plan's number of 50 such districts. Some of the plaintiffs' groups however, want 51 or more of these districts, and a much larger number of "coalition" districts, which would likely elect Democrats, but would not have a majority of their citizen voting age population be comprised of a single minority group. Another group of plaintiffs which opposes the suggested lines put forth by the Attorney General, was arguing for 67 majority-minority districts in the State House. In effect, their proposed maps would substantially reduce the number of Republican legislators.

The Latino Redistricting Task Force, which represents a number of the Latino groups, has indicated that they would not object to much of the proposed map, but they disagree over House District 144 (currently represented by Representative Ken Legler). The Attorney General's map draws that district with 48% registered voters with Spanish surnames. The Latino Redistricting Task Force would not accept any lines for HD 144 that do not have at least 50% of registration of Spanish surnames. That particular plaintiffs' group was also willing to accept the proposed Congressional maps which would split the four new Congressional districts into lines which would result in two new Republican districts - an improvement over the three-judge panel's maps but which is down one from the maps originally drawn by the Legislature. Many of the other plaintiffs' groups opposed the proposed Congressional map and wanted at least one more Democratic Congressional district in addition to the two new Democratic districts contained in the Attorney General's map. Congressman Joe Barton has intervened, and is arguing for one more Republican district.

The State Senate map has really only one district in dispute - that being Senate District 10, the district held by State Senator Wendy Davis. Apparently the Attorney General and the plaintiff Democrats are not that far apart in respect to their proposals. Under virtually every anticipated scenario, at the very least that senate district would be winnable by a Republican candidate. The final battle over the lines will determine whether it is a toss-up district, or one where the Republicans will have a slight advantage.

To complicate things further, the Department of Justice sent a lawyer who argued that there were five Texas House districts on the previously-drawn legislative map, which the Department of Justice is insisting be changed because of violations to the Voting Rights Act. The DOJ lawyer also stated emphatically that the federal court panel has limited authority to alter deadlines that were controlled by federal statute.

At this time, it seems more likely than not, that all the parties will not come to an agreement on the Congressional and Texas House maps. Therefore, we are assuming that once the hearing is concluded tomorrow (Wednesday, Feb. 15) that the final map lines will be decided by the three-judge panel as opposed to the parties in the lawsuit. To add another wrinkle, one of the judges suggested that if the primary will have to be delayed until May anyway - that the San Antonio three-judge panel may delay their decision for at least a while to see if they get a ruling out of the Washington D.C. three-judge panel regarding potential Section 5 violations so that they can incorporate the decision into their deliberations.

After attending in full and testifying at the hearing, Chairman Munisteri issued the following statement - "It is the Republican Party of Texas' position that a single unified primary is still possible for April. If the Court delays the primary further, it will be a great disappointment to Republicans who wish to have early participation in the Presidential primary process. I would like to applaud the work of General Abbott's Deputy Attorney General for Defense Litigation, David Mattax, who I thought did an excellent job refuting the Democrats' contention that Republicans intentionally discriminated against minorities, as well as providing excellent rebuttal district by district to the plaintiffs' attorneys contention that more districts needed to have their lines altered with the intent of creating additional Democratic districts."

The hearing will continue tomorrow, but is expected to conclude by 2:30pm. We should know tomorrow for certain, whether we have a split primary or a unified primary. We should also know whether April is definitely out. We hopefully will have some guidance as to what flexibility the parties will have in altering the delegate selection process. We will provide a further report after tomorrow's hearing.

Advisory to all Republican county chairmen, precinct chairmen, and party activists - In the event that the primary is pushed back further, the RPT will still seek court relief to allow district conventions to go forward on the dates you already have scheduled but with the different delegate selection process. Consequently, at this time - we urge you not to cancel your district conventions as they still may occur on the same day. We anticipate having a conference call with the SREC in the next week to discuss the situation and examine options together. Thank you for your understanding and patience in this difficult situation.

View Texas Senate District 3 Map - List of Counties in Senate District 3

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After the 2011 Redistricting battle is over, the Senate District 3 boundary lines will be different. Until then, below is the current map.

Senate District 3 is currently contains all or part of 16 counties. It is about to expand to 19 counties after redistricting. The current counties in Texas Senate District 3 are:

Anderson County, Angelina County, Cherokee County, Hardin County, Henderson County, Jasper County, Nacogdoches County, Newton County, Polk County, San Augustine County, San Jacinto County, Shelby County, Tyler County, Smith County, and Montgomery County.

View Senate District 3 Map - Click Here

Christian Conservative Republican Links, Maps, Issues, Websites, News, Blog, Commentary, Opinion

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Texas GOP (official website of the Republican Party of Texas) - Click Here

Texas GOP Vote (Texas and National Republican News, blog, commentary, opinions, press releases) - Click Here
Conservative Organization Links - Click Here

Christian Voter Guide - Click Here

Texas County Chairman's Association (county chairmen can get all the help and Advice they need to run their county) - Click Here

Texas Alliance for Life (protecting babies from murder) - Click Here

Senate District 3 Republican Party of Texas Officers and other Elected Officials

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Your Republican Contacts:

This page is dedicated to providing you with the contact info for all of your Republican Leaders. From the Governor all the way down to your county Chairman. This includes they county website info and regular meeting info

State Republican Executive Committee Members for Senate District 3:

David Bellow:

Website: www.DavidBellow.com Phone: 409 656 5128 Email: mdbellow@gmail.com
PO Box 8253 Lumberton, TX 77657

Dianne Caron:

Phone: 903 561 5120 Email: tdcaron@hotmail.com

National - Legislative

    * United States Senate
    * United States House of Representatives

Texas Officials

    * Statewide Officials
    * Texas Supreme Court
    * Court of Criminal Appeals
    * Texas Senate
    * Texas House of Representatives
    * Texas State Board of Education
    * Local Officials by County
    * Court of Appeals, District Attorneys, and Justices

Party Officials

    * Party Officers
    * National Committee Members
    * State Republican Executive Committee
    * County Chairmen
    * County Party Web Sites
    * Texas Republican Caucus
    * Auxiliary Organizations

Your County Republican Chairmen Contact info and Websites

Anderson County

Chairman: Michael Mart

Email: m-mart@flash.net

515 North Church Street

Palestine, TX 75801

Office: 903-729-3289 Fax: 903-723-9102 Cell: 903-391-6999

Website:

Regular Meetings:

Angelina County

Chairman: Robert Flournoy

Email: bob@rlflournoylaw.com

2821 FM 819

Diboll, TX 75941

Office: 936-639-4466 Home: 936-632-5413 Cell: 936-676-4402

Website:

Regular Meetings:

Cherokee County

Chairman: Steve Looney

Email: Stephen.Looney@dfps.state.tx.us

14854 Hwy.79 N.

Jacksonville, TX 75766

Office: 903-589-2270 Cell: 903-721-2653

Website:

Regular Meetings:

Hardin County

Chairman: Kent Batman

Email: kbatman@hardinfuels.com

2427 Clear Lake

Kountze, TX 77625

Fax: 409-755-0773 Cell: 409-782-5918

Website:

Regular Meetings:

Henderson County

Chairwoman: Betty Holland

Email: bsholland1@aol.com

123 Goodknight Ranch Rd.

Trinidad, TX 75163

Home: 903-778-2586 Cell: 214-535-4284

Website:

Regular Meetings:

Jasper County

Chairman: Gene Acree

Email: gacree@netzero.net

RR 1 Box 619065

Kirbyville, TX 75956-9723

Home 409-423-3260 Cell: 409-423-9917

Website:

Regular Meetings:

Nacogdoches County

Chairman: Jackie Yates

Email: chairman@nac-gop.com

16911 S. FM 225

Douglass, TX 75943

Office: 936-569-9685 Home: 936-569-1070 Fax: 936-569-8975 Cell: 936-462-3175

Website:

Regular Meetings:

Newton County

Chairman: Cal Ebner

Email: ceebner@hotmail.com

P.O. Box 378

Deweyville, TX 77614-0378

Home: 409-746-2335 Fax: 409-746-9408 Cell:409-670-3432

Website:

Regular Meetings:

Polk County

Chairman: Benny Fogleman

Email: benny.fogleman@gmail.com

2410 Hwy 190 W STE C

Livingston, TX 77351

Office: 936-328-5757 Home: 936-327-4985 Fax: 936-967-2011 Cell: 936-328-0773

Website:

Regular Meetings:

Sabine County

Chairman: Les Kercheval

Email: lesrayz@valornet.com

9105 Hwy 875

Hemphill, TX 75948

Office: 409-787-4272 Home: 409-579-3237

Website:

Regular Meetings:

San Augustine County

Chairman: Woody Harrison

Email: thewoodstr@aol.com

905 FM 353

San Augustine, TX 75972

Home: 936-288-3026 Fax: 936-288-3526 Cell: 936-596-7411

Website:

Regular Meetings:

San Jacinto County

Chairman: Todd Pegoda

Email: todd.pegoda@gmail.com

360 S. Moody Lane

Cleveland, TX 77328

Office: 281-553-9501 Home: 281-592-8769 Cell: 281-435-3598

Website:

Regular Meetings:

Shelby County

Chairwoman: Leigh Porterfield

Email: shelbygop@att.net

1112 Spring Branch

Center, TX 75935

Office: 936-591-9120 Home: 936-598-5451 Fax: 936-591-9140 Cell: 936-591-1749

Website:

Regular Meetings:

Tyler County

Chairman: Mike Paddie

Email: mike.paddie@warrenisd.net

P. O. Box 801

Village Mills, TX 77663

Office: 409-547-3328 x 116 Fax: 409-547-2686 Cell: 409-781-8558

Website:

Regular Meetings:

Smith County

Chairman: Ashton Oravetz, III

Email: ret-jora@tjc.edu

705 Becky Dr.

Tyler, TX 75703

Office: 903-534-1975 Home: 903-534-1975

Website:

Regular Meetings:

Montgomery County

Chairman: Dr. Wally Wilkerson

Email: drwally@consolidated.net

310 Metcalf St.

Conroe, TX 77301-2856

Office: 936-441-5621 Fax: 936-539-5858

Website:

Regular Meetings:

2010 Democrat and Republican Party of Texas Platforms - An Objective Comparison

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2010 Democrat and Republican Party of Texas Platforms - An Objective Comparison - Click Here (Thanks Montgomery County Eagle Forum)

SREC Member David Bellow successfully changes state Republican bylaws to include an Official Chaplain

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The SREC has had a chaplain in the past but not officially, so to recognize the spiritual foundation of America and the incredible reliance upon God as our moral guidance, David Bellow submitted an amendment to make the chaplain an official position.

Statement from State Republican Executive Committeeman David Bellow:

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America has entered into a new world of moral decay and constitutional devastation. The government “of the people, by the people and for the people” has become the government “by the judges and for the politicians.” The inalienable rights we get from God have become alienable rights given to us by people simply because having a mention of God in the constitution is not constitutional, even though it is a part of the constitution itself and the belief in God is the cornerstone of our great American ideology. It created democracy and freed much of the world. But now the people have no representation and absolutely no ability to have their voice be heard. When the people do speak up and overwhelmingly want to protect their borders, stop excessive taxing and spending or even protect the sacred institution of marriage, there is always one judge who will come in and with the stroke of a pen can become the tyrant of a nation founded on defeating tyranny. There is no longer a balance of powers and instead the judicial branch has become the end all of any major issue. Most politicians are too afraid to stand up for the majority for fear of losing a few votes from the minority. They fail to stand for what is right for fear of upsetting someone, but the very fact that you are standing up for something means that there is someone who is against you. In other words, there is no way to make everyone happy by trying to pander to both sides. Respect the other side, listen to the other side, work with the other side, but stand up for what you believe. Some people will not like you but that is inevitable. We cannot choose what we stand for based on the shaky foundation of convenience or opportunism. We must be bold and stand up for what we believe because it is the right thing to do and not because it is the politically correct thing to do. Now is the time to stand. This next couple of years can make or break what is left of the foundation that our great country was built on. Let us stand up. Let us be bold. Let us go forth in such a way so history will show that, win or lose, we stood up for what we believed and we fought hard and had no regrets.

Visit http://www.davidbellow.com/ for more info about David Bellow and read other statements from him, including info about his Lawsuit against Obama's Healthcare!

The Greg Abbott - Take back Texas Conservative rally was a HUGE success!

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We will try to make this an ANNUAL RALLY from now on!

We had SOOO many Republican candidates and elected officials like all the area’s local Republican candidates to State Board of Education to State Senate and State Reps to Appeals Judges and Attorney General Greg Abbott!

Never have we had an event in southeast Texas with all the area Republican candidates and officials. This was an amazing opportunity to meet candidates from the entire area all in one place and it was an awesome get out the vote rally right before the election. So we decided that we will do this every year before the election.

It will only get bigger and better!

Click Here for a few pictures from the rally.

Contact David Bellow to be a part of this yearly area-wide Conservative Republican rally! www.DavidBellow.com