Paxton-Trump Gun-toting War on Mail-in Ballots

Rodney Ellis forged 750,000 ballots in an attempt to steal the election away from Donald Trump — or so say the MAGA-nauts.

Ellis supposedly did this dastardly deed all while running Harris County, which includes Houston.

I asked the alleged perp himself, County Commissioner Ellis, how he could possibly forge three-quarters of a million absentee ballots. At eight seconds per signature, it would take a normal human about 200 years to sign them all.

The Commissioner, an attorney, said, “I’m too lazy to sign hundreds of thousands of ballots. I’d be nuts.”

It would all be a laugh, except for the attempted murder and vigilantes armed with AR-15s at his daughter’s pajama party. It would be a laugh if not for the untold number of Black and Hispanic voters terrorized at ballot dropboxes. A laugh if not for Ken Paxton and his Ku-Kluxxing of the vote.

Commissioner Rodney Ellis with his bodyguards

Rich Guy Hires Bullies for Ballots

It begins with President Donald Trump claiming in 2020 that the election would be stolen from him by mail-in ballots.

It’s a charge easy to prove—if you have the ballots with the forged signatures.

Enter an uber-Right-wing uber-rich guy, Steven Hotze, who paid several million dollars to hire some 50 detectives to hunt down those faked ballots. Their target:  Ellis, the first Black Commissioner elected to the county board.  

Uber-Right-wing, uber-rich guy, Steven Hotze

It's not easy to find stolen ballots that simply don't exist. That didn't stop the Hotze posse.

In October 2020, one of Hotze’s henchmen spotted an air conditioning repairman’s truck parked near Commissioner Ellis’s home. Hotze’s gumshoe Mark Aguirre followed the repairman’s van, then ran the truck off the road, grabbed the driver and forced him out on the ground, ordering him to kneel, pointing a gun at his head.

The driver, David Lopez-Zuniga, is a lucky man. Highway patrolmen just happened by and saw the gun.  

Hotze’s vigilante Aguirre showed the police his badge — he is a retired Houston cop — and said Zuniga was hiding 750,000 stolen ballots in his van.

The cops made Zuniga open the truck’s back door, and there they were: air-conditioning ducts and tools.

Aguirre ratted out his boss, Hotze, and both were charged with assault with a deadly weapon. It looked like justice had caught up with these violent election deniers.

But there’s Justice and then there’s “Texas Justice.” 

All charges against Hotze were dropped.

Zuniga was held at gun point by one of Hotze's henchmen

Hotze is on good terms with Texas’ chief law enforcement officer, Attorney General Ken Paxton, currently Trump’s candidate for the United States Senate. When Paxton was impeached for corruption by the Texas legislature, Hotze founded the “Stand with Paxton” PAC funding the AG’s successful campaign to stay in office and stay out of prison.

Hotze’s gumshoe, Mark Aguirre

Whoever thought mail-in ballots would lead to Texas-sized corruption and violence? But the election, Trump correctly noted, was in the mail…as is Paxton’s chance of election this November.

Paxton boldly, proudly, states that if he hadn't stopped Ellis from sending out ballots to Houstonians, Trump would have indeed lost the election [Catch Paxton boasting the steal in Episode 1 of Jim Crow Reloaded.]

PJs, Purges, and Armed Protection

The war against mail-in ballots, crucial to Black, Hispanic and American tribal voters, is turning into an armed conflict. But, as voting rights activist Edward Ward says in our video, “only one side is armed.”

After the Election in 2020, after Trump went mental over his loss, the MAGA mob went after the Commissioner, surrounding his house with armed men screaming the MAGA war cry, “STOP THE STEAL!”

Ellis wasn’t at home, but his daughter was, having a pajama party with her friends. Can you imagine? The cops arrived, no arrests.

The Commissioner took me for a walk around Houston, proudly showing off his ten-story high murals and new bike trails. He apologized for having to bring along two serious looking beefy gentlemen packing heat. “Unfortunately, I’m not allowed to go out publicly without protection.”

Welcome to democracy, Texas style, MAGA style.  

Ellis is a good political chess player.  When Paxton declared war on mail-in ballots and ballot dropboxes, Ellis parried with 24-hour drive-through polling stations. Later, Texas’ GOP-controlled legislature put an end to Ellis’ brilliant experiment in McDemocracy.

Paxton doesn’t limit himself to ballot-blocking. Paxton also knows he doesn’t stand a snowball’s chance in Texas of becoming Senator if everyone gets to vote. GOP Gov. Greg Abbott to the rescue, suspending the voter registrations of 1.1 million Texans.

But not just any Texans.  Over half the voters suspended are in a single county, Travis, home of the Capitol, Austin, where Democrats outnumber Republicans by more than two to one. Coincidence? I think not.

Let me be clear: Texas has no monopoly on ballot box violence. Take a look at these vigilantes in Arizona, armed with AR-15s and dressed like faux ICE agents, they’ve been surrounding ballot drop boxes in Hispanic neighborhoods.  

Arizona Vigilantes armed with AR-15s

 

So, What Are You Going To Do About It?

Start by signing up at SaveYourVote.org, a project of the Palast Investigative Fund, NAACP Atlanta, RainbowPUSH, Black Voters Matter Fund, SVREP’s Latino Mobilization, and the Transformative Justice Coalition.

Send the link to Jim Crow Reloaded to every voter you know. Check your registration status NOW no matter where you live, because Ken Paxton isn’t the only Purge’n General in the USA.

Make a tax-deductible donation so we can get out the word. Our prior vote protection campaigns have been astonishingly successful. This time we need to feed our full-time social media staff and cover our film production and investigative team expenses. (Hey, make it a donation of $5,000 or more, you get listed as an episode producer; $100 gets you a supporter credit and the thanks of our voting rights partner groups (NAACP Atlanta, RainbowPUSH, Black Voters Matter Fund, SVREP’s Latino Mobilization, and the Transformative Justice Coalition).