what's happening
in texas
Montgomery County GOP Censures Representatives Cecil Bell & Will Metcalf
Photo taken courtesy of mctxgop.org on March 4, 2025 during Montgomery County
CEC meeting at the Alan B. Sadler Commissioners Court Building, Conroe, TX.
Op-Ed by Elizabeth RIckard
MCTXGOP Precinct 58 Chair
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On January 14th a bus full of Republicans wearing red "Ban Democrat Chairs" left Grace Woodlands Church in the wee hours of the morning before the sun rose, headed to Austin's capitol. You may ask yourself, why? Because we were going as your elected chairs to make sure that the House Representatives that YOU elected, voted according to our Republican Legislative Priorities when electing our House Speaker.
With a majority of State Representatives being Republican (88 in total) we were hoping that they would vote for Cook. We asked that they vote for Cook.
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The Capitol was full of red shirts. Precinct Chairs and faithful Patriots filled the Rotunda, the lawn, each floor as they went in and out of Representatives' offices. They spoke their minds, and attempted to represent their precincts by speaking with different State Representatives. Vote conservative. Vote for true and proven Republicans.
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We all waited outside of the gallery as a line started to form. When the line wasn't moving some of us went up to the front to see what was happening and word soon spread to the rest of us. We weren't allowed in without a ticket. Since when? Where was the posted? Why weren't we notified? They had designated rooms from which we could watch the House Speaker Vote but we held on to hope as we SAW that the gallery was LESS THAN HALF FULL.
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Hour by hour we watched as more and more groups left the capitol to go to the designated watch rooms. We stayed outside and move up the line, getting closer to the gallery doors, and watched on our phones. My group was the last group standing. There were 6 of us left waiting, hoping that the DPS officers assigned for the day might let us in. We weren't rowdy, we weren't singing, we weren't disrespectful. This is our house, why couldn't we go in? What were they scare of?
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I even went up to one of the officers and asked, "so, no chance at all you can let us in to see the end?" "No ma'am , I'm sorry. We can't let anyone in without a ticket."
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It was a sad day for We the People. When it was all done, we were already on our way down when one of the people I was standing with said "It's over. Burrows got the Speaker position." We watched in disbelief as we saw our own Republican Representatives joining forces with Democrats to elect Mr. Burrows. (Not my Representative) 36 Republicans joined 49 Democrats to elect Dustin Burrows. He received more Democrat votes than his own party. Maybe they knew that Burrows would be more amenable to passing their bills. Maybe he plays both sides? Maybe he's a puppet? Maybe he's planning to bring Casinos into Texas? Who knows, only he and his group of supporters know.
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THE AFTERMATH
Many Republicans are fed up with this kind of misrepresentation and the result was that the CEC (County Executive Chairs) began going back and forth as to what course of action to take with two of the representatives from Montgomery County that voted FOR Justin Burrows: Mr. Cecil Bell (D3) and Mr. Will Metcalf (D16). The result: a countywide censure voted on by precinct chairs. You can find the video online but I'll spare you the grandstanding done by Mr. Bell and Mr. Metcalf's "factual" defense. If you want to hear some of their supporters - only 3 were allowed to speak "for" the censure, and 3 "against"- you can also find those online on YouTube and even on X.
Photo taken of the Memorandum issued by the Chair of the Committee on House Administration, Representative Will Metcalf, District 16.
MAP OF DISTRICT 16
If you live within the orange line, Mr. Metcalf is your Representative.
MAP OF DISTRICT 3
If you live within the orange line, Mr. Cecil Bell Jr. is your Representative.
Since then, there has been a lot of chatter and flat out lies about the CEC attempting to "rig the 2026 primaries" (Precinct Chair, Scott Baker) along with not allowing people to be in the room at the time of Bell's and Metcalf's censuring. If you watch any video out there, you will see our courtroom packed and after multiple warnings of no clapping (including hootin' and hollerin') it was ordered to have the doors closed. The guests that were outside could still he ar what was going on as there was a tv with audio provided outside of the courtroom.
Even with the doors closed we could still hear them when they chose to clap and cheer. We had already been there a while so moving business along was a priority. The censuring of these two representatives was NOT the only business at hand. We had to wait to get to other business until after the vote. It was sad to see some of our fellow precinct chairs leave after Bell and Metcalf were censured. I understand that these precinct chairs did not agree with the outcome but they still had a job to do and they still have a precinct to represent.
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Like I mentioned, you can find videos on YouTube but I would be weary of the source. Some are outright inflammatory and incorrect. Do your homework and ask questions. As always, please visit our party's ACTUAL website for more detailed and accurate information. Whether you agree with it or not, what is reported there is fact and sourced.
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Here is video on Rumble of that meeting WITHOUT commentary at the beginning. Just a plain video that you can add CC (closed captioning) for better understanding.
You can listen to the whole thing or fast forward to 1:50:50 to hear a few questions before they get started.
The Chairwoman gives guidelines as to how we will proceed at: 1:54:15.
The Representatives begin at 1:54:49.
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After watching the video, I encourage you to go to Texas Legislature Online to see, read, and listen to actual meetings going on. I wish I could tell you that our House Representatives are taking care of business. (Toth is ours in Precinct 58 and he is busy fighting for our kids with dyslexia, among other issues) You would think because Republicans control the House that we are passing conservative legislation. You would assume that they are showing up to vote! My friends, sadly, you would be wrong. But again, go and see for yourself. All I can do is bring attention to what is going on and how our elected officials are "representing us."
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Since Bell and Metcalf threw their vote behind Dustin Burrows, contrary to what most Republicans in Montgomery County wanted, if you watch our legislature in action you will see the lack of action being taken and the actions that ARE taken show that our "republican legislation" is highly supported by Democrat chairs....which should lead you to ask yourself why? Bell and Metcalf tote that they did not vote for Democrat Chairs but as a result of this, Democrats were put in subcommittee chair positions leading to what you can now see has resulted in a horriffic budget being passed.
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Follow, Representative Brian Harrison on Facebook, Instagram, and X to see how he attempts to bring this to light.
​Facebook: Representative Brian Harrison Budget Callout I encourage you to take some time and scroll through his social media to see who and what he is calling out, holding accountable, and shining a spotlight upon for voters to see.
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As a newly elected chair, I am not happy with what is happening in our House, I am upset with the memorandum that was sent out preventing us from going into the gallery on opening day, I disapprove of how Bell & Metcalf supported Burrows even after hearing from visitors on opening day that Cooks was our preference, and even though they are helping with some non-partisan bills, Representatives Bell & Metcalf helped make this happen.
Maybe they were hoping for better but this was truly a naive belief.
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Actions have consequences and Texas, who was a shining light of Conservative Republican representation, is now a laughing stock in the eyes of our nation due to our elected House Speaker. He is no leader. He is not what Texas needed for this 89th Legislative Session. I am so sorry, Texas.
Senator Brandon Creighton named President
Pro-Tempore
In a unanimous vote, we were thrilled to hear that the Texas Senate elected Republican State Sen. Brandon Creighton of Conroe as President Pro Tempore during the first day of the legislative session.
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Click on the link HERE to read Texas Scorecard's article on the vote.
burrows
cook
COOK LOSES TO BURROWS
89th Legislative Session in Texas began on January 14, 2025
We find it important to share that Burrows had more Democrats vote for him as speaker of the House than his own Party. In the Texas House we have 88 Republicans and while this should've been a "no-brainer" in terms of having a Republican Speaker, we as grassroots, conservative, Republicans were deeply disappointed to see that Cooks was not unanimously voted in by his fellow Republicans.
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As a Precinct Chair, I went to Austin with a large group of Republicans from Montgomery County to speak with our State Representative to remind them of how we expected them to vote that day.
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I am sad to report that we were not even let into the gallery to watch the vote go down. They required you to purchase a ticket to enter the gallery and while many of us would have done so, had we known, at that point there were no longer tickets available for purchase. If you watch the livestream of the vote you can see that the gallery wasn't even half full. I am suspicious that this was done on purpose and am highly disappointed that We the People were not allowed in.
WHAT DOES THIS MEAN?
As True Conservative Republicans we are taking down the names of ALL "republicans" that voted for Burrows. We overwhelmingly did NOT want Burrows as the Speaker of the House as we have already seen what he has done to the House: while he claims to have held true to Banning Democrat Chairs, what he did was create subcommittees with Democrat Chairs. Why should we be concerned with this? Just watch this video:
The Elizabeth Rickard Campaign does not own the rights to this video but you can find it on Facebook, YouTube, Instagram, and most social media outlets.
As True Conservatives we should not be celebrating what some of our Representatives are lauding as a victory. The people in this video stand against our Republican Legislative Priorities. This was a huge disappointment for the GOP.
For more information on how this has affected our Republican Party, Platform, & Legislative Priorities, I highly suggest that you SUBSCRIBE below to Texas Scorecard and the Republican Reporter to see how a large portion of Montgomery County is concerned with our 89th Legislative Session.
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