James O’Keefe and his Project Veritas captured Battleground Texas organizer Jennifer Langoria admitting that the group uses its voter registration drives as data-mining operations for their political operations. Whatever one thinks of Project Veritas, it did not put words into Battleground Texas’ mouth.
“So every time we register someone to vote we keep their name and number,” Langoria says.
According to Texas election law, it is unlawful to transcribe, copy, or otherwise record a telephone number furnished on a voter registration application.
Battleground Texas has, therefore, been caught in what appears to be election fraud.
It’s not the first time. Earlier this year, Project Veritas captured a Battleground Texas volunteer discussing forging a signature on official voting documents. “It happens all the time,” she said.
It’s also illegal. Project Veritas did not put those words into the mouth of that Battleground Texas volunteer.
Texas Lieutenant Governor David Dewhurst and state Sen. Ken Paxton, candidate for attorney general, are calling for the group to be investigated.
The media in Texas have done their dead-level best to ignore both of Project Veritas’ videos as long as they possibly could. When the media here do cover them, they have tended to downplay the videos’ potential significance. The Texas Tribune even interviewed a Democrat election lawyer — but not a Republican one — to defend Battleground Texas’ actions seen in the Veritas video. The prevailing media opinion seems to be that, because leftwing outfits have often criticized Project Veritas, every story that it unearths is worthless or worse.
Leftwing outfits are often created expressly to attack Republicans and to defend Democrats and their allies. The media ignore that, too. Media often cite these leftwing groups as if they are non-partisan watchdogs, while either joining criticism of Project Veritas or downplaying what the group finds. This is neither fair nor balanced journalism.
Wendy Davis should not be allowed to ignore the Project Veritas videos. Wendy Davis should answer for them. Davis is the presumed Democratic Party’s nominee for governor in Texas. She is running for office, presumably, to represent all of Texans and Texas values.
Battleground Texas has our state’s name in its, but it is not a Texas group. It is led by out-of-state operatives who hail from Barack Obama’s presidential campaigns. It is bringing the values and tactics of those campaigns into Texas in an attempt to shape Texas toward those out-of-state values. Those values — curbing Second Amendment rights, expanding federal government power at the expense of the states, Obamacare, on-demand late-term abortion, high taxes, extreme and economically damaging regulations — do not play well in Texas. The majority here soundly reject them.
Davis has allied her campaign to Battleground Texas and its values, even lumping in her fundraising totals with theirs to claim that her campaign is outraising the Republicans. Having made that choice, she has not given herself the option of ignoring the videos showing Battleground Texas advocating forging election documents, and engaging in what appears to be illegal data-gathering activity.
The media in Texas, which have the duty of fairly covering this election and which have covered the old remarks of a rock star who supports a Republican candidate non-stop for the past couple of days, must ask Wendy Davis for her opinion of the content of those videos. Not for her opinion of Project Veritas or James O’Keefe, but for her opinion of what Battleground Texas operatives are saying and doing in those videos.
Wendy Davis should join Dewhurst and Paxton in calling for an investigation of Battleground Texas. If she does not, the media should put her on the spot, as it has put Republicans on the spot about a far less important issue than the integrity of our elections. If she does not, and if the media do not call her to account for the actions of her allies with the same energy it has called for and obtained an apology from Ted Nugent, what will that say about the media’ fairness? What will silence say about the character and values of Wendy Davis?
Wendy Davis must either explain and defend her continued alliance with Battleground Texas, or disavow the group and send it packing. The media must make sure that she makes that choice in front of all the eyes of Texas.
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