A prominent Odessa family has spent $215,910 on campaign donations and political action committees during a heated election to help incumbent Odessa council members and the mayor keep their seats.
Mayor Javier Joven and Councilmembers Denise Swanner and Mark Matta have been supported by Saulsbury family donations to their campaigns and to the PACs, according to required election financial filings. Joven faces Odessa attorney Cal Hendrick, Swanner faces Meals on Wheels Executive Director Craig Stoker and Matta faces Odessa restaurant owner Eddie Mitchell.
Early voting, which continues through Friday, has for the first time seen out-of-town paid political poll workers trying to get Odessans to vote for Joven, Swanner and Matta.
Valor Strategies, listed out of Flower Mound, TX, has been paid the most out of three PACs’ coffers. Valor was paid $197,510 total from the PACs. The only other expense listed was for rent to ICA Properties for $3,400.
The filings detailed Valor was paid for a number of things including “canvassing and polls.”
Odessa GOP Precinct Chair Ronnie Lewis recently videoed the paid workers who were campaigning for Joven, Matta and Swanner. The workers who couldn’t pronounce Joven’s name, said they are being paid to be here until the election is over and are staying in local hotels.
Elected city offices pay about $10 a meeting and some are questioning why anyone would bus in fake supporters to campaign at the polls. They also wonder who is paying the bill for the paid poll workers.
“The fact that Mayor Joven, Council members Denise Swanner and Mark Matta felt they needed to use paid out-of-town and out-of-state political activists to scratch and claw their way to remain in office is shocking,” Lewis said after releasing the video last week.
State Rep. Brooks Landgraf, who is unopposed in this year’s election, had not heard of paid poll workers for local races prior to this year’s brutal local campaign.
“Each candidate is free to run his campaign as he sees fit, and I don’t claim to be an expert in campaign strategy,” Landgraf said. “I don’t recall ever seeing paid out-of-towners working polling locations in Ector County, or anywhere else in West Texas.”
Landgraf’s opponent two years ago was Casey Gray, who was supported by Dick Saulsbury. That campaign by Gray was as vicious as this year’s city council races. Gray lost by almost 80 percent.
THE PACS
Three of the PACs raised a total of $200,910. Those PACs are:
Save Odessa, a PAC out of Austin with a campaign treasurer listed as Sean McGree, filed paperwork Oct. 28 detailing donations and expenditures. Under the general purpose report on the PAC, they listed Mayor Javier Joven and Councilpersons Denise Swanner and Mark Matta as candidates they support. They listed challengers Cal Hendrick, Eddie Mitchell and Craig Stoker as candidates they oppose.
The PAC listed raising $49,938.72 in contributions with all of that coming from various members of the Saulsbury family. Dick Saulsbury donated $15,768.72, Mark Saulsbury and Matt Saulsbury each donated $9,396.75, Bubba Saulsbury donated $6,834 and Dianne Zugg (Dick Saulsbury’s daughter) donated $8,542.50.
All of the money raised by the PAC was spent on “advertising expense” with Valor Strategies.
Camino Prospero Action Group, a PAC listed out of Odessa with a campaign treasurer listed as Esteban Ruvaicaba filed paperwork the same day as Save Odessa. Under the general purpose report on the PAC, they listed Mayor Javier Joven and Councilpersons Denise Swanner and Mark Matta as candidates they support. They listed challengers Cal Hendrick, Eddie Mitchell and Craig Stoker as candidates they oppose.
The PAC listed raising $58,350.48 with all contributions coming from Saulsbury family members. Bubba Saulsbury donated $20,502, Dick Saulsbury donated $10,512.48, Mark Saulsbury and Matt Saulsbury each donated $9,396.75, and Dianne Zugg donated $8,542.50.
All of the money raised by the PAC was spent on “advertising expense” with Valor Strategies.
We Love Odessa, a PAC listed out of Odessa with Lisa Armstrong listed as treasurer, filed paperwork also on the same day as the other two PAC’s. Under the general purpose report on the PAC, they listed Mayor Javier Joven and Councilpersons Denise Swanner, Steve Thompson and Mark Matta as candidates they support. They listed challengers Cal Hendrick, Eddie Mitchell and Craig Stoker as candidates they oppose.
This PAC listed raising $92,620.80, again with all contributions coming from Saulsbury family members. Bubba Saulsbury donated $6,834, Dick Saulsbury donated $37,948.80, Mark Saulsbury and Matt Saulsbury each donated $15,376.50, and Dianne Zugg donated $17,085.
This PAC reported spending $3,400 on rent to ICA and $89,220.80 to Valor Strategies for ads, video, text messages, emails, data, flyers, direct mail, canvassing and polls.
ODESSA’S ACCOUNTABILITY PROJECT
The Odessa Accountability Project page has not filed paperwork as a PAC but between July and Oct. 27 has spent almost $15,000 on Facebook boosting to support Joven, Matta and Swanner.
OTHER RECORDS
Joven’s political filing in October showed Dick Saulsbury donated $5,000 to his campaign. Swanner’s October filing also listed $5,000 from Dick Saulsbury as did Mark Matta in his October filing.
Joven, Swanner and Matta all paid Valor Strategies for services. A call to the phone number listed for Valor wasn’t answered.
SOME BACKGROUND
The heated election blew up in September when city officials and former Odessa Development Corporation (ODC) Vice President Jeff Russell had a falling out.
Russell took to his social media platform and painted City Manager John Beckmeyer and Beckmeyer’s wife as Machiavellian characters, so ruthless that he alleged they would use race and city resources as a means to further their political ambitions.
Teresa Beckmeyer is the senior political adviser to the Saulsbury family.
In August, the Odessa City Council removed Russell from his ODC post just a few weeks after firing ODC President Kris Crow in a dispute over the ODC’s portion of sales tax revenue and whether it can be spent on the city’s failing infrastructure.
The men issued a news release accusing the council of knowingly trying to use the money illegally. Joven responded with a post on the City’s Facebook page, stating Crow and Russell were using the ODC as “their personal political and economic organization.”
Russell posted an article on his Odessa Headlines website and Facebook page alleging the Beckmeyers provided “strategy and guidance” to local Republican Party precinct chairs prior to the March primaries, but they’ve now turned their eyes toward November’s city council races. He said the couple are “blurring the lines between city employment, public service and political manipulation.”
Russell alleges the Beckmeyers are so determined to get Joven re-elected they signed off on a plan crafted by out-of-town political consultant Matt Armstrong that included “staging divisive events to provoke anger among Hispanic voters and drive them to support Joven.”
As proof of that plan, Russell posted a copy of an email he said was written by Teresa Beckmeyer summing up a March meeting he said was held at the Beckmeyers’ home and attended by both Beckmeyers, himself and Armstrong, as well as Bubba Saulsbury, who attended the meeting via Zoom.
Item 1 on the list of strategies for the mayor’s race was “Hispanic voters- (sic)business leaders/owners awareness of importance to keep Javier. Public events, speaking events,” Russell reported.
Listed under the heading of City of Odessa was “1. Social media-more reach, set the narrative.(sic)”
The email also included the following: “Candidate problem. 1) Come out publicly or drop out and let us find a new candidate.” Russell stated in his article this was in reference to Matta writing inappropriate texts to a City of Odessa firefighter’s wife, which Matta would later admit to in a Facebook video.
John Beckmeyer has said he did have conversations with Odessa Fire & Rescue Chief Jason Cotton about Matta and the texts, but was left satisfied the situation hadn’t caused any problems within the City.
“I appreciate that Mark Matta came out and went public with it and asked for forgiveness for it,” Beckmeyer said. “He’s a bigger man than many for doing that, but it’s had no effect on the City. It’s not a City issue.”
Russell said that during a second meeting in March, the Beckmeyers confirmed Armstrong would also help Matta and Swanner with their campaigns and form several political action committees.
“The Beckmeyers, along with Armstrong, were committed to using racially charged tactics to sway the election In (sic) favor of their chosen candidates,” Russell said in his article.
John Beckmeyer acknowledged campaign strategy meetings were held at his house and said he offers his opinion when asked, but he would do that for any candidate.
In fact, he said, he tries to go to every campaign event regardless of whose it is. However, he added that he doesn’t try to influence anyone.
“I’m really not involved in the campaigns. It’s not my business to be involved,” he said. “My business is the City of Odessa.”
Beckmeyer insisted he’s not “very political.”
“Even with the Republican Party, I wasn’t very political. I went out and I tried to get a job done,” he said. “I did fundraising. I dealt with all factions of the Republican Party and dealt well with them.”
Beckmeyer denied there were any discussions about promoting racial discord, but said there were discussions about Odessa’s large Hispanic population.
“We have the first Hispanic mayor,” he said. “So would he not be justified in trying to pull the Hispanic population? It would be the same as if it was the first African American mayor.”
Beckmeyer said if there were any “plots” about race it would be to bring the races together.
“That doesn’t even make sense — not in this day and age,” Beckmeyer said of Russell’s allegations.
In an interview, Russell said he doesn’t have any written documentation about how the group planned to create racial division, but pointed to a Joven Facebook video as proof the plan is being carried out.
“It’s this whole kind of nasty New York Democrat style deal of, you know, ‘I’m Hispanic and I’ve been oppressed by the white guys and the rich white elites that have ruled Odessa and they want to take us back to that,’” Russell said. “Just watch the video. It is just laced with really ugly racial overtones in what I believe is an effort to stir up Hispanics.”
Beckmeyer said Joven, Matta and Swanner are running their own campaigns with the help of Armstrong. The first required financial filings by the candidates in Early October did not list any expense related to Armstrong. Joven, Swanner and Matta do list Valor Strategies.
“Mr. Russell talks about Matt Armstrong,” Beckmeyer said in September. “That’s their resource. It’s not my wife.”
Beckmeyer said he suspects his relationship with Russell and Crow began to sour when he declined to terminate some employees they wanted him to fire. Russell denied ever pushing for anyone to be fired.
Russell also pointed out in his article that many people suspect Joven, Matta and Swanner’s campaign videos were made using city resources. While writing about Joven’s Facebook response to their news release, Russell said, “the city’s communication apparatus appeared to have been weaponized to serve the political interests of Beckmeyer and his allies.”
Russell called upon the city council to “stop any abusive use of taxpayer-funded resources by Beckmeyer and should also appoint a special committee to investigate the extent to which the Beckmeyers are attempting to tip the scales in the current council elections.”
Beckmeyer said City resources were not used in the making of the campaign videos.
As for Joven’s statement on Facebook regarding the removal of Russell and Crow from the ODC? “I approved that because we felt like the attack was made at the council, not any individuals. Maybe I should have looked at it in a different way, but we felt like we needed to defend the council and their actions.”
Russell said he never thought they’d play out the racial division strategy, but once he saw evidence of it, that was the final straw for him. he said that is when he decided to write his article.
Odessa voters need to research what is going on before heading to the polls, Russell said.
