Texas Dem pol and ex-Biden appointee arrested for allegedly posting fake racist social comments about himself
An ex-Biden White House appointee and current Democratic candidate for a county commissioner seat in Texas allegedly created a dummy social media account to post bogus racist comments about himself.
Taral Patel, 30, the challenger running for county commissioner in Fort Bend County Precinct 3 just outside of Houston, was arrested for online impersonation last week after an investigation initiated by his opponent, incumbent Andy Meyers.
The Fort Bend District Attorney’s Office started the probe in October, shortly after a lengthy Facebook post Patel made in September in which he painted himself and his family as victims of a vicious race-based smear campaign perpetrated by his opponent’s supporters.
Included with the post was a collage of about a dozen racist messages he claimed he received over the course of his candidacy, calling him vile names such as “monkey” and “subhuman” and attacking his Hindu faith.
Patel’s campaign website says he previously worked for the Department of Justice’s Criminal Division in the Public Integrity Section and was appointed by President Biden to serve in the Office of White House Liaison, as well as the White House Asian American Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander Committee.
“These hateful images (a small sample attached here) are from a place of deep and misguided fear – incited by people like former President Donald Trump, and today’s extremist Republican party fear that immigrants are ‘taking their jobs’ and setting out to hurt our own communities.” Patel wrote.
Meyers became suspicious when he recognized one of the names in the collage, “Antonio Scalywag,” as someone who had previously assailed him online, ABC 13 wrote, prompting him to request an investigation into Patel’s claims.
Investigators subpoenaed Facebook and Google to obtain account information about the user profile, which led them right back to Patel — including his address, phone number, bank card number and more.
On Wednesday Texas Rangers arrested Patel for online impersonation in the third degree — a felony — as well as a Class A misdemeanor charge for misrepresentation of identity.
He was briefly held in Fort Bend County Jail before posting bond Thursday morning, putting up $20,000 for the felony charge and $2,500 for the misdemeanor. His next scheduled court appearance is July 22.
Patel’s campaign website cites a number of jobs he’s previously held, including chief of staff for Fort Bend County. He says he also worked for the Department of Justice’s Criminal Division in the Public Integrity Section as deputy finance director for a governor and as a legislative staffer for the Texas House of Representatives.
According to the campaign website, Patel was appointed by Biden to serve in the Office of White House Liaison to work on matters related to housing, urban development, and disaster recovery and resilience.
The website says Patel was also a “key member” of the WHAANHPIC.
The Patel campaign did not immediately reply to a request for comment by The Post on Sunday afternoon.
