Tomorrow is the public swearing-in ceremony for Mayor Annise Parker. After she retakes her oath of office, she will then administer the oath to all new and returning City Council members. One of them is the newly elected Member from District F, Al Hoang, whose official City Council webpage says the following:
While some of his opponents might advocate for gays and liberals’ rights, Al is defending Christian and family values.
He has some other right wing red meat on there as well, as Texas Cloverleaf notes, but this is what I want to focus on. Ironically, Hoang also claims to be “a longtime member of International Pen based in London advocating for human rights and freedom”. For some and not for all, I suppose.
Now I don’t know exactly what Hoang means by this. Maybe he’s just forgotten that the campaign is over and that it’s time to shift from candidate mode to public servant mode, even if all that means is to push stuff like this to the background. But one interpretation of this statement is that Hoang does not intend to try to represent every person in District F, only those who aren’t gay or liberal. (One wonders if you’ll have to pass a quiz or something when you contact his office in order to get a response.) Another is that as Hoang was the only winning candidate to proudly embrace the Hotze endorsement, he sees himself as a counterweight of some kind to Mayor Parker and that he intends to stand firm against the gay agenda. Again, I don’t know exactly what he has in mind by this, so let me ask publicly right here: What do you mean by this, Council Member Hoang? Do you intend to be a Council Member for all of District F, or only for the people you approve of? Feel free to leave a comment or send me an email (kuff – at – offthekuff – dot – com) and I’ll be happy to print what you have to say for yourself. Oh, and if you think you’ll just deal with this by quietly editing the text of your page, please be aware that I’ve already got a screenshot of it. What say you, Council Member Hoang?
UPDATE: Stace and John join in.
UPDATE: Hoang’s page is now “under construction”. Good thing I got that screenshot as a memento. Looks like Maverick Welsh may have been the first person to write about this.
UPDATE: KHOU posted a report about this earlier today.
Daniel Santamaria, a spokesman for Hoang, said the biography was unauthorized and no one in Hoang’s office gave the city’s Webmaster permission to publish it.
Santamaria said he didn’t know where the text came from but an archived copy of Hoang’s campaign Web site showed the same languauge in a biography published there.
[…]
In a statement to 11News, Hoang said “District F is one of the most diverse districts in the City of Houston. “I’m proud and honored to represent the diverse values and views that make this Council District so great.”
“I’m looking forward to being a voice and representative for my entire constituency on Houston City Council,” he said.
I’m glad to hear that. If Hoang proves my concerns about him to be unfounded, I’ll be delighted. But I’m going to have to see him do it. It’s all up to him.
Hopefully, Council Member Hoang will revise his page and his mindset as he is reminded by others that he holds a non-partisan seat, and represents all people in his district.
Kuff,
The website was not seen by not approved by the councilman or his staff. I suspect foul play here.
The city does screen all website change requests. Nothing official was ever sent to the city.
On a side note, Laster lost. Sorry. No matter how incompetent you think Hoang is, you are others who backed Laster with full force came up short. Maybe that speaks to your side’s offense incompetence. This “nanny nanny boo boo” journalism is unbecoming of you. Please research the situation before posting an emotionally based blog entry.
As you remember, the Chronicle published a retraction to their fabricated residency story. What is this trend of shoddy left wing reporting on Al about?
I’m so glad Welsh tipped you off. Are you already pushing for this losing 2011 at large 2 try?
Eric
Foul play by whom, Eric? Please do say more. You want to make a formal statement, I’ll be happy to print it.
I’ve never accused Hoang of being incompetent, though clearly someone needs to help him with campaign finance reports. Pointing out that he isn’t following the law isn’t “nanny nanny boo boo journalism”, it’s pointing out that a now-elected official isn’t following the law. If he gets it right for the January report, that would be nice.
You have denied that Hoang or his staff had anything to do with the words that appeared on his official Council website. Perhaps this was an error, or an attempt to make him look bad. But I note that neither you nor he has distanced him from those words. Given his embrace of the Hotze endorsement, that’s not a surprise. It is the root of the problem I have with Hoang. I hope he will prove my concerns to have been unfounded by his actions in office. But based on what I’ve seen, I don’t think he will.
Right. This guy that was proud to have Hotze’s endorsement denies any and all association with text that appears on his own bio page that sounds strangely just like a position that Hotze would advocate. Absolutely bizarre. Maybe Hotze put it there?
As the KHOU story notes, Hoang used the same bio that appeared on the City website–including the statement reflecting Hoang’s disdain for gays and liberals (and painting these groups as lacking Christian and family values)–on his campaign website. Notwithstanding Hoang’s staff’s attempt to now distance Hoang from those statements by pretending not to know where they came from, thanks to KHOU’s reporting and the blogging of folks like Kuff, we now know better. Having said that, good luck to the good folks of District F who aren’t right-wingers during Hoang’s (hopefully one-time) term.
Guy Heights if you live in The Heights you obvioulsy have voted w/ your feet by moving there and not Sharpstown. Like him or like it or not Al does identify with his neighbors in Sharpsown of all colors and constituencies that did vote for him and you likely do not.
Kuff,
It seems that you finally realized Al’s competency by saying “I’ve never accused Hoang of being incompetent”. Isn’t it true that what bothering you is how come a rookie like Al Hoang could win a historical run-off election with a wealthy-powerful opponent.
Having said of competency, let’s support this Houstonian Al Hoang for his future service to this city as a rookie councilman.
“Isn’t it true that what bothering you is how come a rookie like Al Hoang could win a historical run-off election with a wealthy-powerful opponent.”
Wealthy-powerful opponent? Dude, it’s Hoang that has a McCain-like number of houses. Let’s get real here.
And what bothers me are the homophobic and anti-immigrant views that were on his campaign webpage – you know, the ones that were temporarily on his official Council webpage. There’s no place for that in Houston, and especially not on Council. When and if he proves that he no longer believes such things, then we can talk about my willingness to support him
Burt,
Although your post was mostly unintelligible, based on the portion of your post that I could understand, you are correct in assuming that I live in the Heights. While my residency prevented me from voting in the District F race, it does not prevent me from expressing my opinion that the hate-filled text posted on Hoang’s official City Council webpage should have never appeared on a taxpayer-funded website. Furthermore, I don’t think it’s a stretch to assume that some of Hoang’s constituents are gay, liberal, moderate, etc. My point was that those folks deserve the same representation as folks who identify with Hoang. As I said before, in light of Hoang’s views, good luck to those District F residents who don’t share Hoang’s worldview.