Well … I’ll be deep fried and rolled in oats. I had just urged U.S. Rep. Van Taylor, a Plano Republican, to “get busy” and start working to get his supporters to the polls for a May runoff with former Collin County Judge Keith Self. Then the word came out.
It seems that Taylor had been busier than I ever imagined. He admitted to having an affair with a Plano woman — and then he dropped out of his re-election bid. The withdrawal hands the GOP nomination to Self, who now is slated to be the prohibitive favorite to be elected from Texas’s Third Congressional District.
Oh … boy! What a revelation!
Taylor and a woman called an “ISIS bride,” as she was married to an Islamic State fighter, reportedly had a months-long fling. News of the affair reportedly got into the hands of Suzanne Harp, another GOP candidate for Congress who, I guess, was about to spill the beans.
Taylor issued a statement via e-mail to his supporters, which stated, in part: “About a year ago, I made a horrible mistake that has caused deep hurt and pain among those I love most in this world. I had an affair, it was wrong, and it was the greatest failure of my life. I want to apologize for the pain I have caused with my indiscretion, most of all to my wife Anne and our three daughters.”
Taylor said he has spoken with Self and wished him well as he seeks to win the election to Congress.
https://www.texastribune.org/2022/03/02/van-taylor-reelection/
I hate to be the predictor of terrible news, but it appears to me — and to anyone with half a brain — that Self is going to be elected in a rejiggered congressional district that is even more GOP-friendly than it was before reapportionment. Self is a member of The Big Lie cabal of cultists who insist that the 2020 election was stolen from The Donald. Self managed to parlay his view into forcing Taylor into a runoff, denying the incumbent the 50% vote he needed to win the nomination outright.
Self now is going to run against Democratic nominee Sandeep Srivistava, who doesn’t have a prayer of defeating Self. Not in this climate. Not in this district.
I don’t know what in the world to say about Van Taylor’s mistake. It likely will doom any thought he might have had about further public service.
There are so many astonishing factors about this development. One of them happens to be this fact: Taylor enjoyed strong endorsements from fervent conservative organizations, such as the National Rifle Association and the Heritage Foundation. Yet he drew the wrath of The Donald’s cultists simply because he voted (a) to certify President Biden’s election in 2020 and (b) to establish a bipartisan independent commission to examine the 1/6 insurrection. Never mind that Taylor then opposed House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s decision to appoint a select committee to look at 1/6. He committed — in the eyes of the Trump cultists — a mortal sin by voting to accept Joe Biden’s election and seeking an independent panel to examine the insurrection.
I am stunned to the max.