Brazos County DA 2024 Election [Staff Warning]

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AgLaw09
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In reply to Mr.Short-termMemory • 12:39a, 2/16/24
I agree that the Houston donor's motivation in donating to Sifuentez was probably more out of anger that Parsons prosecuted his son than in support of her. The bigger takeaway for me is that she accepted those donations. Sifuentez's choice to fund the majority of her campaign to be the top prosecutor with money from someone who is that mad about his son being prosecuted indicates poor judgment, a willingness to compromise on her principles, or both.

For me the most revealing thing that shows Sifuentez isn't fit for the job was in her WTAW interview where she now admits she wasn't an ADA the whole time until becoming a defense attorney last year and also cites the experience she gained in the CA's office. If she really believes that that experience is a good addition to her resume, why did her campaign that claims to be big on transparency not only hide that experience but outright lie about her ADA experience? As of this post her campaign website still claims she was an ADA for over 8 years. Either her campaign is so sloppily run that they forgot that claim is still there or they just don't care.

The time has come for the Sifuentez campaign to put up or shut up on the claim that there needs to be a change in the DA's office. She wants to be elected to a position that will require her to provide proof in the courtroom. I don't think it's too much to ask that she provide proof of the claims her campaign is making in its effort to get her elected to that position. If the best she can do is trot out a radio ad of her campaign treasurer claiming that some people In law enforcement told him they want to see a change but who also donated to Parsons, then I don't see how this is even a contested race.
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histag10
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In reply to AgLaw09 • 5:16a, 2/16/24
AG
Not just an ADA. Her website claims she was THE ADA (which I feel is disingenuous and tries to lead people to believe she was the only one).

[Staff Edit]
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etj77845
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In reply to AgLaw09 • 10:04a, 2/16/24
AgLaw09,

Given the verifiable information presented here and in public documents would it be fair to call Parson's opponent a 'stalking horse' candidate?

Mr. Parson's only fault I can find is in styling himself as 'The Honorable' in public filings. I was of the impression the honorific did not extend to this level of public office. Some of his endorsements are known to me and FWiW I trust their judgment.
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trouble
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In reply to etj77845 • 10:53a, 2/16/24
AG
Apparently, it's correct since he's elected.
https://formsofaddress.info/district_attorney/


[Please use links or smaller screen shots. Thank you. -Staff]
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etj77845
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In reply to trouble • 11:02a, 2/16/24
Thanks for the clarification.
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AgLaw09
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In reply to etj77845 • 11:05a, 2/16/24
trouble found the answer to the honorable question before I saw this.

As for the stalking horse question, I have no idea. What I know has been included in my posts. I'm not plugged into the Brazos County political scene to even give an educated guess and staff has made clear that speculation isn't appropriate on this topic so I'm not going to do so.
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etj77845
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In reply to AgLaw09 • 11:32a, 2/16/24
OK, fair enough. Just one of those things that crossed my mind.
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Horn_in_Aggieland
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5:09p, 2/18/24
What happens when a new District Attorney is elected? Does he/she ask for everyone's resignation and bring in his/her own people? I imagine some ADA's resign on their own if they don't want want to work with the new DA.

If Jarvis is as bad as some say, wouldn't Maritza want everyone out of there?

If Maritza is as bad as some say, who would want to work for her?

Heading up an office with no staff and only ~8 years experience seems like a recipe for disaster.

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Smeghead4761
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In reply to AgLaw09 • 6:40p, 2/18/24
AgLaw09 said:
I agree that the Houston donor's motivation in donating to Sifuentez was probably more out of anger that Parsons prosecuted his son than in support of her. The bigger takeaway for me is that she accepted those donations. Sifuentez's choice to fund the majority of her campaign to be the top prosecutor with money from someone who is that mad about his son being prosecuted indicates poor judgment, a willingness to compromise on her principles, or both.

Looking at the JusticeWeb entries for Overbergen the Younger, it really looks to me like this is the motivation behind Todd Overbergen's donations.

Clayton Overbergen was arrested by CSPD in December 2019 for POSS CS PG 2 LESS THAN ONE GRAM (state jail felony) and POSS MARIJ <2OZ (Class B misdemeanor). Both charges were from a single arrest.

Court records show disposition in 2021 for Attempt to POSS MARIJ <2OZ (Class C misdemeanor), so the County Attorney's office pled that one down.

Then in January 2023, there's a guilty plea on the POSS CS PG 2 LESS THAN ONE GRAM charge. So the DA's office didn't plead it down.

The fact that Clayton Overbergen was also arrested in 2021 and 2022 for Public Intoxication might have had some bearing on the decision by the DA's office.

But if the DA's office had pled down the SJF charge to an Attempt, the way the CA's office did, that would have made it a Class A misdemeanor. And a misdemeanor looks a lot different on one's record than a felony.

-------

So, p***ed off parent with money uses that money by funding someone running against the guy he's mad at. IMO, it would be interesting to know if Todd Overbergen is just writing checks, or if he went so far as to try to recruit a challenger or challengers.

If Parsons wins the primary, will Overbergen start writing checks to whomever the Democrats run against him?
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Mr.Short-termMemory
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In reply to Horn_in_Aggieland • 6:55p, 2/18/24
AG
Horn_in_Aggieland said:
What happens when a new District Attorney is elected? Does he/she ask for everyone's resignation and bring in his/her own people? I imagine some ADA's resign on their own if they don't want want to work with the new DA.

If Jarvis is as bad as some say, wouldn't Maritza want everyone out of there?

If Maritza is as bad as some say, who would want to work for her?

Heading up an office with no staff and only ~8 years experience seems like a recipe for disaster.

Blank slate. A new DA (or even if Jarvis wins) does not have to retain anyone. Texas is an at-will employment state and does not have to keep anyone. And the same goes the other way, if the ADA's or staff don't want to work for the new DA (or for Jarvis) they can resign.

Some would want to keep doing the job regardless of who is in the head office. Some would choose to leave. Some Maritza would not allow to stay, some she may.

Since no Democrat is on the ballot, the winner will know March 5 they will be in the office January 1, 2025. So if Maritza were to win, she'd have almost 10 months to talk to current staff to see who's staying and leaving and to recruit others to replace the ones she doesn't keep or that leave.
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A Net Full of Jello
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In reply to Smeghead4761 • 6:55p, 2/18/24
AG
There is no one running on the DA ticket. Whoever wins the republican primary will be our DA.
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happyinBCS
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7:26a, 2/19/24
I am voting tomorrow, and this thread has been informative.

May the best candidate for the Brazos Valley win
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A Net Full of Jello
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In reply to Horn_in_Aggieland • 9:17a, 2/19/24
AG
Horn_in_Aggieland said:
What happens when a new District Attorney is elected? Does he/she ask for everyone's resignation and bring in his/her own people? I imagine some ADA's resign on their own if they don't want want to work with the new DA.

If Jarvis is as bad as some say, wouldn't Maritza want everyone out of there?

If Maritza is as bad as some say, who would want to work for her?

Heading up an office with no staff and only ~8 years experience seems like a recipe for disaster.


8 years of experience where she had held 4 different positions and already left her job as an ADA because she wanted to spend more time with family. I guess she thinks the DA has more free time than the ADAs? Your point regarding a very inexperienced office is valid and concerning.


She also is already taking out both sides of her mouth. Her radio advertisements boast how she is the only conservative in the race (and anyone who knows her knows that's debatable) but at the candidate forum hosted by The Hispanic Forum last week, she was insisting that she isn't a Republican or a Democrat. She is saying 100% whatever she thinks she needs to say to get elected. This is on top of her lies that Jarvis has never prosecuted a domestic violence case (seriously, she said this) when she is the one who has very little experience as a first chair. I think she's banking on the average citizen being too lazy to fact-check her.
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Cstx12
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9:43a, 2/19/24
I have a question, all of the people on here talking about Maritza. Have yall attended any of the debates or forums that the candidates were at? If you did, why did you not go up to her and question her? And if not then all yall are talking about is he said, she said.
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histag10
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In reply to Cstx12 • 9:45a, 2/19/24
AG
Cstx12 said:
I have a question, all of the people on here talking about Maritza. Have yall attended any of the debates or forums that the candidates were at? If you did, why did you not go up to her and question her? And if not then all yall are talking about is he said, she said.


He said/she said? It's literally on her website and in her finance reports. It's not a he said/she said
Staff has asked that everything we post on here be verifiable facts. And they have locked this thread several times to verify those facts.
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A Net Full of Jello
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9:50a, 2/19/24
AG
If we are going to accuse Jarvis of not being a republican, the same should be done for Maritza who up until the day before the filed, was much more Democrat that Republican. Though I will say she did a good job of scrubbing her Facebook of the evidence. Ask the people who know her, though. She's no Republican. She even said so last week at the Hispanic Forum's Meet the Candidates.

Meanwhile, people are upset that Jarvis, who has proven himself as our DA for 12 years, attended an historical presidential inauguration with his daughter years before we ever even elected him as DA the first time.
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Cstx12
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In reply to histag10 • 10:05a, 2/19/24
Ok so why not question her about the donations, instead of making accusations on here why they donated. So that way you can put the facts straight from the source. Did you ever stop to think that the people that supported her here locally don't have a lot of money but also support/donate time, block walking, etc.
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histag10
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In reply to Cstx12 • 10:09a, 2/19/24
AG
Cstx12 said:
Ok so why not question her about the donations, instead of making accusations on here why they donated. So that way you can put the facts straight from the source. Did you ever stop to think that the people that supported her here locally don't have a lot of money but also support/donate time, block walking, etc.


Straight from the source would be Mr Overbergen, not Maritza.

If that's the case-great! Those people can come out and vote for her, and the polls will reflect that. But I don't think that will be the case. Maybe I will be wrong, maybe I won't.
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trouble
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In reply to Cstx12 • 10:11a, 2/19/24
AG
I don't expect her to know the motivations of individuals who donate to her. I highly doubt Mr Overbergen is going to make himself available for questions.

The optics of accepting $46K from one donor is pretty bad. I don't know that she thought about that.
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BQ_90
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10:42a, 2/19/24
AG
Quote:
We'd love for someone to come here and give us reasons to vote for Maritza vs against Parsons.


As someone on the fence, this is where I'm at and I'm not getting much to make a change at this point
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Moderator
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12:20p, 2/19/24
Staff
We tried re-launching this thread, asking everyone contributing to the discussion to keep the back and forth in a narrow enough lane that there is not a lot of discussion that is highly speculative, off-topic, easily verifiable, or even relevant to the office these two candidates are running for in 2024.

The mod team does not have time to sit on this all day through the voting period and for the days following the results. The mass deletions from things posted in the last 24 hours came down to this. Many conversations about issues that have already been brought up on this thread and people are able to go and investigate on their own. Those were interwoven and in "reply strings" attached to posts that were clearly off-topic and in some cases making the thread about users instead of about the candidates. When we target those posts, every post in reply will be deleted as part of one long string. There is no conspiracy here. The mod team has no personal interests in this race or with either of these candidates. This platform is primarly built for the purpose of reporting on and talking Aggie sports for the benefit of Aggie fans.

We try our best to be a good "Brazos Valley Neighbor" and provide avenues for our great Brazos Valley based users to have a place to talk about important things(including this race) that impact them as citizens of this area. It can be a difficult balancing act. Over the course of this thread it was clear that users created accounts on this platform for the express purpose of advocating for or speaking against one candidate or another in this race. This goes against the "spirit" of what these other non-sports forums and community forums should be used for by the posting community. There is a difference between users from a common community(Aggieland in this case) that spend time contributing throughout the forums on the platform over the course of many years, chatting with each other about local campaigns during an election year and what transpired over the course of this thread.

We will consider re-launching this thread prior to the start of election day, but we may hold off and re-launch it as a way for people to RESPECTFULLY, talk about the results. We may not re-launch this at all.

Thanks and Gig 'Em!
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9:26p, 3/1/24
Staff
We will try this one more time. Please be respectful and only post information that is easily verifiable using common sources by anyone reading this thread.

Gig 'Em
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Mathguy64
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In reply to Moderator • 8:10a, 3/2/24
AG
Moderator said:
We will try this one more time. Please be respectful and only post information that is easily verifiable using common sources by anyone reading this thread.

Gig 'Em


Thanks to staff for reopening this thread for discussion.

Hopefully this public link is allowed.

Ms Sifuentez-Chavarria had a public interview on KBTX. I would encourage everyone to watch it to form their own opinion. She addresses the concerns regarding the out of town campaign contributions at around 4:30. It's enlightening.

https://www.kbtx.com/2024/02/29/meet-candidate-maritza-sifuentez-chavarria-brazos-county-district-attorney/

If/when Mr Parsons holds a similar interview I will be happy to post it here as well so that each candidate is covered equally.
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A Net Full of Jello
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In reply to Mathguy64 • 8:13a, 3/2/24
AG
Jarvis Parsons was given his interview last month.
https://www.kbtx.com/2024/02/21/meet-candidate-jarvis-parson-brazos-county-district-attorney/
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Mathguy64
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In reply to A Net Full of Jello • 8:18a, 3/2/24
AG
Ah. Thank you. I didn't see it in the candidate forum.
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Antoninus
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In reply to Charpie • 5:27a, 3/3/24
Charpie said:
Bryanisbest said:
She left the DA's office and went to work for the Public Defenders Office about 6 months ago. Also heard that she went to work for Parsons' DA office as intern right out of law school with view to becoming full fledged trial prosecutor. She may be counting that time in the number of years experience in DA's office.
That still doesn't make it right. That's like me saying, "I have 22 years of Product Management experience," when I spent 10 of those as a user and tester of those products.
no, it is not like that at all. I do not have a dog in this fight, but you were just wrong. If she went to work for the DAs office immediately after law school, but before she got word that she passed the bar, she would've been doing research, preparing cases, preparing witnesses, drafting pleadings for other people to sign, everything but signing pleadings and appearing in court.

basically the same thing that a baby lawyer does AFTER being admitted to the bar as well.
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Antoninus
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In reply to Bryanisbest • 5:49a, 3/3/24
Bryanisbest said:
Gunner0740 said:
No, I'm saying I thought it strange that someone who lives in Houston donated 25k to a local DA race. Turns out, after some LinkedIn, X, and Facebook searching I was able to figure out that Mr. Parsons' office was apparently too tough on crime for Mr. Overbergen's liking, thus causing him to get behind Maritza. I guess he didn't like his son getting a felony drug conviction while here in Aggieland.
Another post on same premise. Nothing wrong at all with accepting donations from those who have "extreme dislike" for one's opponent. Done in virtually every campaign.
no one says that there is anything "wrong" with the contribution, or with accepting it. It is interesting, however, that approx. 90% of her campaign contributions came from someone who is ticked off about the fact that the current prosecutor effectively prosecuted the contributor's son.
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A Net Full of Jello
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In reply to Antoninus • 6:32a, 3/3/24
AG
Antoninus said:
Charpie said:
Bryanisbest said:
She left the DA's office and went to work for the Public Defenders Office about 6 months ago. Also heard that she went to work for Parsons' DA office as intern right out of law school with view to becoming full fledged trial prosecutor. She may be counting that time in the number of years experience in DA's office.
That still doesn't make it right. That's like me saying, "I have 22 years of Product Management experience," when I spent 10 of those as a user and tester of those products.
no, it is not like that at all. I do not have a dog in this fight, but you were just wrong. If she went to work for the DAs office immediately after law school, but before she got word that she passed the bar, she would've been doing research, preparing cases, preparing witnesses, drafting pleadings for other people to sign, everything but signing pleadings and appearing in court.

basically the same thing that a baby lawyer does AFTER being admitted to the bar as well.

Her website still says "In her 8-year tenure as Brazos County's Assistant District Attorney..." She was not an ADA for 8 years. Period. That was not her title and to say it was is a lie. Further, it wasn't close to 8 years. She wasn't at the DA's for 6 months just waiting on her bar results and then stayed in another 7 years. The only way for her to gave even been at the DA's office for 8 years is to include the summers where she interned (and to count them as more than just the 2-3 months she was there).

She knows experience is important. She knows she does not have that. She wants desperately to appear she has more experience than she does. I will not vote for someone who has NEVER first chaired domestic violence, child sexual assault, or murder, lies about her experience, and doesn't understand the implications of accepting $46,500 (over 60% of her campaign contributions) from one person. Others might. I guess we will find out Tuesday.
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Antoninus
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In reply to A Net Full of Jello • 6:51a, 3/3/24
A Net Full of Jello said:
Antoninus said:
Charpie said:
Bryanisbest said:
She left the DA's office and went to work for the Public Defenders Office about 6 months ago. Also heard that she went to work for Parsons' DA office as intern right out of law school with view to becoming full fledged trial prosecutor. She may be counting that time in the number of years experience in DA's office.
That still doesn't make it right. That's like me saying, "I have 22 years of Product Management experience," when I spent 10 of those as a user and tester of those products.
no, it is not like that at all. I do not have a dog in this fight, but you were just wrong. If she went to work for the DAs office immediately after law school, but before she got word that she passed the bar, she would've been doing research, preparing cases, preparing witnesses, drafting pleadings for other people to sign, everything but signing pleadings and appearing in court.

basically the same thing that a baby lawyer does AFTER being admitted to the bar as well.

Her website still says "In her 8-year tenure as Brazos County's Assistant District Attorney..." She was not an ADA for 8 years. Period. That was not her title and to say it was is a lie. Further, it wasn't close to 8 years. She wasn't at the DA's for 6 months just waiting on her bar results and then stayed in another 7 years. The only way for her to gave even been at the DA's office for 8 years is to include the summers where she interned (and to count them as more than just the 2-3 months she was there).

She knows experience is important. She knows she does not have that. She wants desperately to appear she has more experience than she does. I will not vote for someone who has NEVER first chaired domestic violence, child sexual assault, or murder, lies about her experience, and doesn't understand the implications of accepting $46,500 (over 60% of her campaign contributions) from one person. Others might. I guess we will find out Tuesday.
that is all very fascinating. And it has absolutely zero relevance to my reply to Charpie's post.

He made it analogy, and it was a bad one. I told him why.
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Antoninus
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In reply to Antoninus • 6:52a, 3/3/24
oops
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A Net Full of Jello
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In reply to Antoninus • 7:28a, 3/3/24
AG
She, not be he. And I disagree. You cannot say you had the title when you didn't. It's especially bad that Maritza wasn't even close to having that title for 8 years but still claims it. She is likely using intern time (months rounded to years) which started when she was 16. She should not be saying she was an ADA for 8 years when that isn't close to the truth.
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Charpie
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In reply to Antoninus • 8:32a, 3/3/24
AG
That's like, your opinion.

If I was interviewing someone who had that kind of glaring discrepancy on their resume, I would throw it in the trash and blacklist them from my company. If you are going to lie about something like this, what else are you going to lie about?
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Antoninus
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In reply to Charpie • 8:55a, 3/3/24
[Be respectful when giving your opinion. -Staff]
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befitter
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10:39a, 3/3/24
I watched her interview on KBTX live. She gave me no reason to vote for her and I have no reason to not vote for Jarvis. Jarvis it is.
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Mathguy64
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In reply to befitter • 11:37a, 3/3/24
AG
befitter said:
I watched her interview on KBTX live. She gave me no reason to vote for her and I have no reason to not vote for Jarvis. Jarvis it is.


The interview was a bad look. She said she contacted Mr Overbergen and then had to try and correct herself. Then she may very well have violated HIPAA bringing up supposed mental health issues of the son. The whole issue of how and why those donations were made look worse and worse.
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