Congressman, Direct Action Raise Concerns About Election Fraud In Texas, Offering Over $1M In Rewards

By Bethany Blankley | The Center Square

Northeast Texas Republican Congressman Lance Gooden, representing a region east of Dallas, claims that Democrats working in the Dallas County Elections Office banned his poll workers from observing ballot counts on Election Day and if election fraud allegations are not taken seriously, the same problems, if not worse will occur in the next election and continue to erode confidence in the election system.

On Nov. 7, Gooden posted on Facebook that he filed a lawsuit against Dallas County officials “because they’ve continually kicked my poll watchers out of the counting room and did so again today during the counting of mail-in ballots.”

He said, “Remember some Dallas County races are too close to call even though I’ve won by a large margin. Many candidates are afraid to fight ballot fraud after they lose because they don’t want to be called sore losers, and the fraud just continues.

“Democrat-run state and local governments must follow the law and here in Texas these Dem-led election overseers are as crooked as ever.”

Gooden and Rodney Anderson, chairman of the Dallas County Republican Party, filed a petition with the state Supreme Court, which the court denied.

In it, they asked the court to compel the Dallas County Elections Office to accept Gooden’s poll watchers “for service barring any instances of ineligibility as dictated by the Election Code, and to cease from further impeding their lawful service.” They asked the court to “issue a temporary order directing the county to immediately desist from barring poll watchers from entering the ballot board room pending resolution of this case.”

Republican Commissioner J.J. Koch told the Texas Scorecard, “Congressman Gooden’s claims are troubling, particularly because my office has received similar claims,” he replied. “I have been focusing on forwarding allegations of criminal wrongdoing in Dallas County Elections to the appropriate law enforcement agencies.”

Gooden also mentioned that the Dallas District Attorney’s Office claimed that the signature verification judge, “who is appointed by the county, approved by the county, and working for the county and the early voting clerk, and who is a government and election official while conducting their job is not a ‘Dallas County Official’ that they are required to defend.”

The Dallas District Attorney “is just trying to get out of representing a county official whom they know has broken the law,” Gooden said, adding that he sued the chair of the Signature Verification Committee over poll watchers’ rights in 2018. Dallas County attorneys represented members of the committee, “the exact same lawyers represented them both,” he said.

Systematic firing of key Republican election workers was reported in Dallas, Comal, and Williamson counties, Direct Action Texas, the state’s lead election advocacy organization, also reported.

During the 2020 election, Direct Action alleges, “progressive activists … aggressively worked” to undermine the election, including “subversion of election law by local officials, vexatious litigation, and seeding false narratives.”

The organization’s executive director, Daniel Greer, said the organization is “in the early stages of investigating several allegations of fraud following this election. There will be actionable complaints that arise from these starts.”

Both Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick and former state senator Don Huffines, a Dallas-area businessman, announced monetary awards for individuals who provide verifiable information about voter fraud in the state that occurred in the 2020 General Election.

Huffines offered a $5,000 reward to anyone who calls the Direct Action voter fraud hotline (877-267-8687) or sends an email (tips@directactiontx.com) with information leading to a criminal conviction. The information about those reporting fraud “will be kept in confidence,” Direct Action states.

Patrick offered up to $1 million in total from his campaign fund to any individual who provides verifiable evidence of fraud.