Janelle
Shepard
Exec Director
TX4TX

A long time conservative activist inspired by Ronald Reagan, Shepard is a working registered nurse at a Fort Worth hospital. 

After helping elect many conservatives, she wanted to be more involved in educating Texas grassroots conservatives about important state issues. Shepard is the executive director of TEXANS FOR TEXAS, publishing a newsletter than reaches thousands. She is the mother of 2 and lives with her husband in Parker County.

Eric
Stratton
Project Dir.
Texas Shark
Watch

A committed conservative, Stratton serves as the Project Dir of Texas Shark Watch. He currently is President of Stratton Strategies, a full-service political consulting firm in Austin, specializing in strategic planning, grassroots advocacy, and media relations.

Prior to opening his own company, he spent five years in Washington, DC serving as a Senior Advisor, Grassroots Advocacy, for the National Rural Electric Cooperative Association where he assisted co-ops in building formal grassroots networks.

He also directed the cooperative candidate training schools, a non-partisan program that teaches the “how-to’s” of campaign strategy, fundraising, and communications.

A veteran of numerous congressional and state legislative races in Texas, Ohio, and Pennsylvania, Stratton currently lives in Austin with his wife and daughter.

Heightening Awareness...

Heightening awareness regarding political contributions has never been very interesting. While Texas Shark Watch has positive feedback from many in the grassroots and the state capitol, it has been surprising to note the criticism from a few conservatives across the state who believe reporting on this topic is wrong.

Divide & Conquer...

Economic and social conservatives have achieved remarkable success in Texas. Yet liberal trial lawyers' divide and conquer scheme threatens to undo all of that. It is our hope that the citizens of Texas will be aware of our only motive for publishing a report regarding trial lawyer political contributions: pro-litigation special interest groups should not own both political parties in Texas.

When researching the report, the names of many friendly individuals who have fought for the right causes kept coming up. But it would not be a credible report if those names were left out, regardless of their conservative credentials.

Accurately Report The Facts...

It was important to track the dollar contributions accurately and report the facts as found in the public data. 

Thus, the story is really about murky water. Murky because we are just seeing the early stages of non-traditional donors into the Texas GOP. Murky because many of the trial lawyers contributions are not producing the desired votes. 

Murky because some of the legislators and candidates are unaware the money from certain PACs is really from trial lawyers. Murky because many cannot see conservatives being preyed upon - or imagine declining numbers.

Texas Shark Watch will continue to simply look at the facts. Hopefully the waters will become clearer and the discussions more focused.