On January 10th, Don Huffines, a former Senator in the Texas State Legislature, Allen West, a former army lieutenant colonel, and comedian Chad Prather participated in a Roundtable hosted by the True Texas Project. Huffines, West, and Prather are running to replace incumbent Texas Governor Greg Abbott as the Republican candidate for the Texas gubernatorial race in 2022. The Roundtable was streamed and recorded on the Facebook Page of the True Texas Project here. Governor Abbott, despite getting invited, was absent. Huffines, West, and Prather were all asked questions regarding key issues for the people of Texas, such as ending vaccine mandates, securing the southern border with Mexico, and bringing about property tax reform. Each of them was also asked about questionable aspects of their past experience in order to instill trust in the voters.
At the end, the audience was asked who they’d vote for, and West won the plurality of votes, per below:
- Allen West 182 votes (39.2%)
- Don Huffines 166 votes (35.7%)
- Chad Prather 110 votes (23.7%)
- Greg Abbott 6 votes (1.2%)
Additionally, 53.7% of people knew beforehand who would win their vote. Only 6.8% of people said they changed their mind.
The link to the Freedom Matters Action Group(FMAG) podcast episode recorded on Thursday January 13th, 2022 is included below, where I discuss with my friends and co-hosts of the show our comments and thoughts on the Round Table Event in the first hour of the episode. In the interest of time, we couldn’t cover all questions that were asked, but we covered the questions relating to rumors about the candidates’ past, property tax reform proposals, dealing with lobbyists, views on nullification of unconstitutional federal laws, reforms on the Texas power grid, and how they’d all fight back against the unconstitutional vaccine mandate(although the Supreme Court mostly ruled it invalid and unconstitutional on that same day).
https://odysee.com/@FMAG:b/Ep25Jan13th2022:e
From my point of view, it seemed like all three men have the same stances on the major issues, and diagnose the problems very well. All of them opposed the vaccine mandates and favored securing the border as well as reforming the budget. It was very hard to find any major differences.
But after re-watching the debate and the answers to all questions, Allen West came off as the most well-researched and prepared. West came off as the one who did his homework, more so than Huffines and Prather. On many of the critical issues, West gave specific and practical actions that he would take to deliver on the issues, whereas Huffines and Prather mostly diagnosed the problems and added good humor to the diagnoses. While the diagnoses of the problems provided by Huffines and Prather were spot on, as was West’s diagnosis of the problems, I think most of the audience, if not the entire audience, was more interested in what actionable, practical, and realistic actions the candidates will take, if they get elected governor, to achieve the policy reforms that the audience badly wants. For example, on the question regarding Property Tax Reform, West not only mentioned that Texas currently has the 6th highest property tax rate in the country, but also mentioned Karl Marx, and then got into specific action: enforcing the sunset shutdown of programs to free up funds to enable the reduction, and eventual elimination, of property taxes. Huffines and Prather weren’t as specific in the practical actions they’d take on achieving property tax reform. On the issue of lobbyists and budget cutting, West again was more specific in how he’d deal with these issues; he called out the Texas Association of School Boards as a specific lobby he’d go after and eradicate. On budget cutting, West talked about going from a baseline budget system to a zero base budget system; again Huffines and Prather weren’t as specific in their intended actionable steps to achieve practical and actionable cuts in the budget. When it comes to reforming the Texas Energy Grid, West specifically talked about bringing back clean coal plants and adding nuclear plants and was, once again, more specific than Huffines and Prather on this question. Lastly, on the question of nullification, West resonated with me more when he showed the necessary courage and audacity to say that “mandates are not laws” – as soon as he said that, I couldn’t hold my applause, and even stood up and applauded, thinking to myself “Yes, finally, thank God we finally have a candidate/elected official that will actually state the very fundamental fact publicly in front of the camera and audience”. In summary, Allen West provided more specific, reasonable, and actionable steps that he would take to achieve the policies and reforms that he wants to bring about for the people of Texas.
One other notable difference was in the final question, when the moderator asked each of the three candidates to state their favorite Bible verse. West stepped up to answer first, followed by Prather, and then Huffines. Therefore, West comes off as more courageous and ready for the job of Texas governor, which likely was one of the big factors that propelled him to win the plurality, 39.2%, of the straw poll vote at the end of the round table.
However, Huffines and Prather have some unique advantages, which is important to note and explain. Huffines has inside baseball experience as a former Texas state Senator, and so from that aspect, can argue having superior knowledge on how to achieve his agenda and fulfill what he’s telling the votes. This is why I really wish that Huffines was more specific in the actionable and reasonable steps he’d take if elected governor, the way Allen West had done. Especially when Huffines talks about achieving things like border security in a very short 30 days, such statements, while sounding very good, are also grandiose and quite frankly, I’m not convinced on how practical such an achievement in such a short time window like 30 days truly is. Huffines also seems to have the upper-hand in self-funding, and therefore resisting taking any big corporate money, such as by Big Pharma, which would give him a precluding conflict of interest to truly erradicate vaccine mandates. Texas representative Steve Toth of District 15 favors Huffines. Furthermore, Huffines recognizes the 2020 U.S. General Election Fraud, whereas West is more hesitant to do so, ACCORDING TO WHAT SOME PEOPLE HAVE TOLD ME, which is perhaps another factor favoring Huffines over West, as far as Huffines being more principled.
Prather, while by far the least experienced as a politician, brings refreshing courage and speaks like one of the people; he even used the words globalist, indicating that he has knowledge of the Deep State and its corrupt agenda against the U.S. Constitution and liberty. Interestingly, West and Huffines never used the word globalist, nor did they react to Prather using that word.
With all the above being said, I think what would be best for the people of Texas is if Allen West won the 2022 gubernatorial race, and Prather could then learn from the good, principled, disciplined, action-based example set by a governor Allen West. Conversely, Prather could be an effective way to keep West in check as governor, so that West doesn’t falter in achieving the objectives he set out to achieve as a candidate and thereby become more like Abbott. Knowing that Prather is there to replace West if West was to God-forbid inexcusably falter or fail to achieve his campaign objectives is a good way to keep West from faltering or failing, knowing that Prather would be a threat to replace him if so, similar to how West is positioning himself now as a better replacement for the incumbent Texas governor Greg Abbott.