We hope the holiday season finds you in good health and happily getting together with friends and relatives.
What a busy year this has been. 2021 flew by so quickly, and 2022 is starting off with a roar. We are getting ready for the primary election in March. We are meeting and greeting candidates and trying to select the ones that share the same values we hold. We hope to sort out the best ones to run in the November general election.
The Texoma Patriots Tea Party was active all year long in 2021. We were so grateful that Texas finally opened up - no masks, no legal vaccine mandates, no contact tracing, and every person being essential, at least in our area. One of the highlights was hosting Nigel Farage of BREXIT fame. We had Katie Hopkins, the British commentator, scheduled, but she ended up in the hospital the day of our event. That was disappointing.
Our goal was to get more citizens involved in saving America. At our first meeting of the year we had the Regional Director of Heritage Action talking about the Sentinel program, and we ended the year with Debbie Georgatos of America, Can We Talk? We covered legislative issues that were being discussed during the Texas Legislative Session such as gender modification and the indoctrination of our children in our schools with Critical Race Theory and the Equality Act. Election Integrity was another important issue.
Then we hosted Allen West and Chad Prather, both who are candidates running for Governor of Texas. We also visited with Sid Miller, our Agriculture Commissioner, and Ken Paxton, our Attorney General. On the lighter side we held a Memorial Day picnic and were almost rained out. We had to cancel a few events because of the extreme weather that hit Texas early on and almost destroyed our grid.
Texans voted on 8 amendments to the Texas Constitution so voter registration was important. We showed the movie Mr. Smith Goes to Washington to point out the importance of keeping the filibuster in our US Senate, and the movie Non-Compliant by KrisAnne Hall was powerful and informative. This complimented the talk by Keisha Russell of First Liberty who spoke about our religious rights at school and in the workplace. Victor Avila spoke on the Texas border problems. And long-time friend Avi Lipkin came by to talk about problems America and Israel are facing.
We made several trips to the Capitol in Austin, to Washington D.C., and to Orlando Florida for conferences and training. We sponsored and participated in several rallies geared at “Just Say NO to unAmerican Medical Mandates.” We worked together with the national groups of FreedomWorks, Tea Party Patriots, and Heritage Action to bring awareness to issues we face. We sent out Call to Action requests, and we emphasized the need of how important it is that we all be involved in our government from the local to the national level. There is more to do than just vote.
As the year is drawing to a close, our hope is that you will continue to support us in 2022. We also hope the New Year is full of love, joy, and happiness for you and your family!
The Texoma Patriots Steering Committee