Opinion: Good Apples, Bad Apples

Public school teachers in Texas overwhelmingly consist of dedicated educational professionals who have committed their lives to teaching and nurturing our most precious resource, our children. Teachers sit beside us in church on Sunday, parent their own children, and become an important influence in the development and lives of future citizens and leaders.

Arguably, the teaching profession today faces more challenges than any other time in history. Teachers have become the scapegoat for societal woes and the break-down of the traditional family. More and more children depend on their time in public school for nutritional and emotional nourishment.

Instead of providing critical support, politicians readily berate teachers to score political points with their extremist base. Whether it’s Governor Abbott echoing “Education not indoctrination,” Agriculture Commissioner Sid Miller calling public schools a “closed socialist system that hurts kids,” or Michael Quinn Sullivan saying public education is a “babysitting service…about employing otherwise unemployable adults,” political figures at the highest (and lowest) levels have centered their careers on tearing down public school teachers.

As the propagandist mouthpiece of the Farris Wilks and Tim Dunn political machine, the Texas Scorecard seems hellbent on unfairly smearing Texas public schools. While the occurrence is rare, any time there is a case of a teacher acting inappropriately, the Scorecard pushes out an article blasting all public schools in general. While these few teachers should be held accountable and justice should be served in cases of illegal behavior, these few bad apples are not representative of all 370,000 Texas educators. Percentage-wise, bad acting teachers are a minute fraction of all Texas teachers.

Many political operatives from the Wilks & Dunn political network, along with other billionaire funded out-of-state organizations, continually trash-talk our public schools.

They should take a look in the mirror before throwing the first stone at public schools. Mr. Dunn, Mr. Wilks, and Ms. Betsy DeVos should focus on weeding out the deviants in their own organizations.

Just recently, reporters uncovered and alleged that Corey DeAngelis, self proclaimed “school choice evangelist,” previously engaged in the performing of homosexual pornography. Disturbing and lewd photos were released as part of the report. DeAngelis works for a DeVos funded organization and is a regular guest on Fox News segments. His lobbying got him into meetings with top officials, including Governor Abbott.
The former Defend Texas Liberty PAC’s President and CEO of Pale Horse Strategies, Jonathan Stickland, infamously once wrote, “rape is nonexistent in marriage, take what you want.” Cary Cheshire, Pale Horse Strategies Senior Advisor, and Tony McDonald, General Counsel to the Texas Scorecard, were recorded making derogatory remarks about Governor Abbott’s use of a wheelchair in 2020. This was the event that led to the Empower Texas group “dissolving” and reappearing as Defend Texas Liberty.

Yet, after those incidents and revelations, these bad actors were kept as essential employees of the political machine…and they continued their outrageous behavior. Stickland and his Pale Horse Strategies company went on to host known neo-Nazi sympathizer and anti-semite, Nick Fuentes, meeting with him for 6.5 hours. Reports say that after a week of a negative news cycle, Tim Dunn was forced to replace Stickland as President of Defend Texas Liberty with Luke Macias and to once again rebrand the organization, this time as Texans For a Conservative Majority.
But take a look at Macias; he was a political consultant for disgraced former State Representative Bryan Slaton, expelled from the Texas House after an investigation concluded he got his 19 year-old staffer drunk and then had sex with her at his apartment. Slaton received large sums of money from the Wilks & Dunn funded Defend Texas Liberty PAC.

In another instance, Luke Bowen, the Political Director of Wilks and Dunn funded Texas Right to Life, was arrested for solicitation of a minor. Montgomery County officials say that Bowen communicated via social media with who he thought was a 13-year old girl; he asked for explicit images, sent pictures of his genitalia, and arranged to have sex. He was arrested upon his arrival. In February, 2023, he pleaded guilty and was sentenced to five years in prison.

Wilks and Dunn, just two men, yield an incredible amount of power, control, and sway in Texas politics. One would hope that they would use that power for good, first by assembling a team of outstanding citizens and then ethically pursuing causes that benefit all Texans. But that is not the case. When looked at on a per capita basis, the small workforce behind the Wilks and Dunn political machine appears to have a large ethics problem. The number of incidents of bad behavior goes way beyond the ones mentioned here. It seems with them, bad roots can grow no good fruit.

Don’t give Texas Scorecard’s tabloid trash any attention when they paint the noble teaching profession with a broad brush of negativity and false accusations. Good apples dominate the teaching profession.
The endgame of Dunn & Wilks' myriad of organizations, along with other out-of-state billionaires, is the privatization and elimination of our public schools. Texas teachers and public school employees are in their crosshairs. Make no mistake, rather than teachers, the financiers, puppets, and puppeteers carrying out these nefarious operations to destroy public education are the BAD APPLES.

Glenn Rogers is the representative from Texas House District 60, which includes Parker County.