In Southlake, Republican leaders want to ‘save America starting with Tarrant County’
Should Fort Worth, Arlington and Tarrant County be like Southlake?
That’s the new goal of Republican activists.
Stoked by faith-and-values conservatives’ takeover of four suburban school districts, Southlake’s cellphone-company culture warriors now want to evangelize the rest of Tarrant County and Texas.
The state Republican Party made that clear Thursday, emailing a fundraising appeal praising Grapevine-Colleyville schools’ new 36-page policy on pronouns, bathrooms, library books and the teaching of race.
Texas has 1,200 school districts. The party announced: “We are working to bring this conservative policy to each one.”
That’s on top of the Tarrant County takeover promised by Southlake-led Patriot Mobile Action PAC, the political arm of a cellphone service reseller promoted nationally by former Donald Trump adviser Steve Bannon.
On its homepage, Patriot Mobile Action writes in bold letters:
“Help us Save America starting with Tarrant County
“ ... Tarrant County is larger than 15 states. Texas is critical to the nation. Let’s keep Tarrant red to keep Texas red to save America.”
A line from the book of Proverbs follows: “When the righteous are in authority, the people rejoice: but when the wicked beareth rule, the people mourn.”
Patriot Mobile Action has made news lately, not only for replacing school boards with faith-and-values conservatives but also for donating “In God We Trust” signs that schools in Fort Worth and across Texas are required to display under a law passed by an East Texas state senator.
Patriot Mobile corporate and PAC leaders Glenn Story, Leigh Wambsganss and Scott Coburn, all of Southlake, have made multiple appearances on Bannon’s Trump-worshipping podcast, “The War Room.” Patriot Mobile offers a discount code to Bannon listeners.
At a recent conference in Dallas, Wambsganss, chief of the PAC (a “separate entity” from the wireless company, she says repeatedly), told Bannon that until Patriot Mobile Action funded electing new school trustees in Carroll (Southlake), Grapevine-Colleyville, Keller and Mansfield school boards, “100,000 students had leftist leadership. Now they have conservative leadership.”
She made no secret of Patriot Mobile Action’s primary goal.
“Tarrant County is the largest county in the U.S. that’s conservative,” she said, “so it’s important to save Tarrant County and that’s what our focus is.”
Bannon turned to his audience and shouted: “Are we gonna save Tarrant County?”
The crowd cheered loudly.
That was not the first time Patriot Mobile leaders described a Tarrant County takeover as their goal.
In June, on KSKY/660 AM host Mark Davis’ show, Wambsganss said the group’s focus is “keeping Tarrant red to help keep Texas red and ultimately win the nation.”
“If we don’t save Texas,” she said, “we’ll never have another Republican president.”
She said Patriot Mobile Action is “here to please God” and plans “to expand to other counties, other states, and be in every state.”
According to Patriot Mobile’s website, the company was founded by Story with friends from Grapevine Church of Christ. It resells cellular service for Washington-based T-Mobile.
He wrapped the company in the cross, saying the cellphone reseller’s mission is “to support His causes and to lift Him up. We put Jesus Christ at the head of our business.”
All this meshes perfectly into an election year where suburban voters will decide Texas’ next governor.
It also uplifts the campaign of Southlake lawyer Tim O’Hare, a former county Republican Party chairman running against Fort Worth Democrat Deborah Peoples for the office called “county judge,” the most powerful position in county government.
Following a tried-and-true formula in suburbs, O’Hare first launched a parent movement against Carroll schools’ teachings on race, then announced his political campaign.
As county judge, O’Hare told The Texan political website, his goal would be “taking back our country — stopping the garbage that’s being taught in our schools.”
“We have one [party] that — by and large, the people pushing that party hate our country,” O’Hare said, adding that he wants to “fight this anti-American, hate-our-country teaching.”
This weekend, O’Hare is on a national “Truth and Courage” tour in Atlanta. It features U.S. Senate candidate Herschel Walker and U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz.
Southlake aims to save Tarrant County and America.
This story was originally published August 26, 2022 at 12:00 PM.
