Is time up for 40 years of Tarrant County Republican rule? Not yet, but it’s close | Opinion
.JPG "The newly rebuilt upper portion of the Tarrant County Courthouse is easily seen now that scaffolding is almost completely gone on Tuesday Apr. 17, 2012 . (Star-Telegram/Ron T. Ennis)")
When Republicans lose the Tarrant County courthouse someday, this is how they will lose it:
▪ Showing outright hostility and aggression against women, minorities, longstanding charities, community institutions and even a 140-year-old Baptist church.
▪ Running a jail where the boss, the county sheriff, has political delusions of grandeur but can’t do the one job Texas law assigns solely to him: safely running a jail.
▪ Having a county Republican Party chairman whose goal is to make Tarrant County “inhospitable to Democrats” and who publicly attacks the Texas A&M Law School, TCU (repeatedly), establishment Republicans, government employees and anyone else somehow deemed less pure.
▪ Puppeting a tax board run by a majority of directors from Southlake and Colleyville who give “hot” neighborhoods tax breaks while outright robbing money from taxpayers in established neighborhoods in Fort Worth and Arlington.
▪ Turning public health and welfare into a public disaster, starving the county hospital of money it needs to get out of a hole and finish neighborhood clinics in Kennedale and northwest Tarrant County, along with a psychiatric unit that was approved by voters way back in 2018 and is now more sorely and urgently needed than ever.
▪ Running the county courthouse like a political headquarters, barring volunteers from registering new voters and questioning early-voting locations for college students that in 2020 served up to 13,000 voters each.
![Tarrant County Republican Party chairman Bo French wrote on his X.com account on Aug. 12, 2024, “There are just some things where you can’t trust women TBH [”to be honest”].” He was replying to the Kamala Harris post, “Trust women. Trust them to make decisions about their own body, health care, and future.”](https://www.star-telegram.com/public/latest-news/6br5u6/picture292003620/alternates/FREE_1200/image_123650291%20(9).JPG "image_123650291 (9).JPG")
▪ Canceling required county equal-rights training that protected female employees from bigotry, harassment and discrimination.
▪ Avoiding reporters from digital and TV news agencies, often speaking only through a political website owned by a major campaign donor.
▪ Having the starting quarterback for the Texas Longhorns lead the invocation at Commissioners’ Court and snubbing the hometown TCU Horned Frogs.
This isn’t imminent. Republicans are not going to lose courthouse seats this year.
But one year soon — depending if or when the county Democratic Party actually gets organized — it will happen.
When Tarrant County loses Republican leadership, we will lose the good work thoughtful Republicans have led for 40 years: business success, wise transportation planning, careful spending and a practical criminal justice system.
But when you are making somebody new mad every day, sooner or later you lose.
This story was originally published September 6, 2024 at 5:34 AM.
