Republican Dan Simons and Democrat Sean Teare are set for a showdown to see who will replace incumbent Harris County District Attorney Kim Ogg.

Sean Teare, formerly the supervisor of the vehicular crimes division for Ogg’s office, resigned last year to pursue a successful Democrat primary challenge against his former employer. He received 75 percent of the vote in March, compared to Ogg’s 25 percent.

Simons also has experience working as a prosecutor in Harris County. In 2013, he became assistant district attorney under former Harris County District Attorney Mike Anderson and, after his death, Anderson’s wife Devon Anderson. Simons worked in that position until Devon Anderson lost to Ogg in 2016.

Donations & Endorsements

According to Transparency USA’s state reports, Teare’s campaign has received at least $113,887 from the Texas Justice & Public Safety PAC this election cycle, which is primarily funded by billionaire George Soros.

Other top contributors to Teare in the state reports included the Harris County Democratic Party and the Texas Gulf Coast AFL-CIO Working People PAC. Teare further hauled in at least $10,650 this election cycle from ActBlue Texas and $2,500 from the Houston LGBTQ+ Political Caucus PAC.

Harris County campaign finance records showed that Teare took in $25,000 from real estate mogul Peter McCarthy during the July 15 to October 7 reporting period. In addition, he received $15,000 from trial lawyer Kurt Arnold and his wife, Tara Arnold, and $10,000 from businesswoman Susan D. Sarofim’s Committee For A Safer America PAC.

Simons primarily received money this past reporting period from Jan Duncan, the widow of Texas oil businessman Dan Duncan, to the tune of $25,000. He also received $12,000 from Harris County Commissioner Tom Ramsey and $10,000 from businessman Tommy Barras.

Teare is endorsed by Democrat U.S. Reps. Sylvia Garcia of Texas’ 29th congressional district and Lizzie Fletcher of Texas’ seventh congressional district. He is also backed by Planned Parenthood, the Texas Gulf Coast AFL-CIO, and Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America.

Simons is backed by Texas Land Commissioner Dawn Buckingham and Republican U.S. Rep. Brian Babin of Texas’ 36th congressional district. The Harris County Republican Party and Houston Police Officers Union have also endorsed Simons.

Interviews

Texas Scorecard reached out to both candidates with two general, campaign-related questions and three candidate-unique questions. The questions were not shared with either candidate before the interviews.

Dan Simons

Why did you decide to run for Harris County district attorney?

Simons: “I was going to go a different path in my life until the DA’s office came calling. I went into the DA’s office with 12 years of business experience, military experience, and a lifetime of adversity and hardship. … In the DA’s office, most prosecutors, in three years, get about 20 trials. I tried over 70 trials in [that] same span of time.”

“I always knew that I wanted to run for DA. I bought DanForDA.com five years ago. I didn’t think it would be this soon, but when I saw what was going on—on the other side with Kim Ogg and the party—and her doing her job and going after Democrats for corruption and what they were about to do with her, and then I saw the person who left the office and the way he did it. … those are problems, and there’s no way I was going to sit on the sidelines.”

What are your top three priorities once you get into office if you win the race?

Simons: “Number 1 is I need to change the culture in the DA’s office. I need to give prosecutors their discretion back. I need to create a positive work environment and bring in experienced prosecutors to help train the staff that’s there. … No more stepping on each other’s heads to get to the top.”

“That will then trickle into numbers two and three. I need to bridge the gap [to] law enforcement. The DA’s office is an asset to the law enforcement community. I want to have good communication so that law enforcement can trust the DA’s office.”

“The other side, I need to bridge the gap with the judges and the Commissioners Court. I think the judges will be pretty easy to basically be able to work with them because I worked with all those judges down there for years. …[With] the Commissioners Court, I’d like to get it to where they understand that we can’t spend more on defending people than prosecuting them, which is kind of where we are right now. We have to take care of the citizens of Harris County and provide safety.”

What were your initial thoughts when you saw Sean Teare beat incumbent DA Kim Ogg in the Democrat primary?

“What I saw whenever he beat Kim Ogg, I thought that now we have a non-incumbent to run against, which is better for us. I have somebody who doesn’t know how to campaign running against me. I do have some experience campaigning because I already ran a race prior to that. And I saw that I wasn’t going to go against a female; so honestly, I thought it’s the best opportunity to actually win because I think Kim Ogg would have been very difficult to beat.”

The last time Harris County elected a Republican for DA was in 2012. What do you think makes you the best Republican candidate to be the first in quite some time to win the position?

“I have been running a very independent, moderate Republican campaign. I understand the demographics of Harris County are stacked against Republicans. But I’m trying to show everybody that I’m willing to work with everybody because this is in the best interest of everybody in Harris County. I don’t have the big endorsements from Austin. I don’t have Trump or Cruz. The main endorsements I wanted were the two people in Harris County [whom] when the county fails you, you turn to for help. And that’s Commissioner Ramsey, and that’s Mattress Mack.”

“You have to have a DA [who] represents everybody, not just their own special interest groups. … Look at my opponent’s supporters. … A lot of the defense attorneys have given him money. Nothing to me. What do they want for their money? … What does [Harris County Judge] Lina Hidalgo want for her endorsement? She’s under investigation. Three staffers [were] indicted. What [do] [Harris County Commissioner] Rodney Ellis and [former Houston Mayor] Sylvester Turner want for their endorsement? Everybody wants something from this guy.”

Attorney General Ken Paxton has faced a lot of pushback from Democrat DAs in big Texas cities like Dallas, Austin, and Houston for his election integrity efforts. They have argued, for example, that it is beyond his office’s role to investigate potential vote-harvesting schemes. What do you believe the role of the DA and AG should be on election-related issues?

Simons: “The DA’s office needs to get back to just following the law. And if now part of the law has to do with election integrity… honestly, I would bring in Ken Paxton. Why not? Why leave those resources outside? Bring them in, and if there are issues, investigate them. Treat it like every other crime we have on the books.”

“The one thing most sacred is your vote. Nobody should ever have to question, ‘Is my vote going to count?’ And I think working with the AG’s office is really important. And right now, with it being incumbent on the district attorney’s office, it terrifies me that Soros owns the DA in Dallas [and] owns the DA in San Antonio and Austin. Is he going to own the DA in Harris County as well? Would they even look at voter fraud? … Well, I’d [not] like to give them that opportunity.”

Sean Teare

Why did you decide to run for Harris County district attorney?

Teare: “In 2005, when I started as an intern, I think in the back of my mind kind of always wanted to be able to craft policies and help lead the office. I didn’t know that it was going to be as the elected, but I always wanted to rise and become an integral part. I think it solidified for me when I was inside the office in 2020 and ’21 and watching, quite frankly, the mismanagement and failures at the top and not having the ability to change it. When I figured out I couldn’t change it from within, I decided to leave and run for the office.”

What are your top three priorities once you get into office if you win the race?

Teare: “They’ll begin January 1. We’re going to fix the intake division. We’re going to fix how we accept charges from the police. It’s going to help foster a better relationship with law enforcement. It’s going to increase the quality of cases that we actually accept from the police and thereby [shrink] the time from arrests to disposition of the case—whatever that is. And that’s going to have an incredible impact on the legal system as a whole.”

“We’re also going to create the very first Domestic Violence Bureau. All of the intimate partner violence cases are going to go to the same group of prosecutors, regardless of what court it gets assigned to. They’re going to be trauma-informed prosecutors. They’re going to have the resources behind them in social work, cultural outreach, protective order work, and with caseworkers. … [This will] eliminate a lot of the fatigue that we see. … So, those two changes are going to be implemented [on] January 1.”

“My third is a longer-term fix, but it is just as if not more important than the other two. We’re going to improve morale—be a leadership team that is present, that is visible, that empowers our line prosecutors in actually fulfilling their oath, which is to see that justice is done in every case. While that’s not as tangible, it’s going to result in better outcomes for everyone involved in every case we file.”

Some citizens in Houston have concerns over the current bail system allowing repeat offenders onto the streets. Other citizens believe that the traditional bail system disproportionately benefits the wealthy and powerful. If you are elected, how do you plan to address the bail system while considering both of these viewpoints?

Teare: “The fact that we are the only developed country that still ties reconviction relief to a monetary amount is ridiculous. That being said, that is the law of the land that is fixed right now. The Texas Constitution does not allow a judge to hold people at no bond. People are entitled to a bond, with the exception of two very [specific] types of cases: one being capital murder, where the defendant is seeking the death penalty and is likely to succeed … the other is if someone is on bond [f]or an indicted felony and violates the conditions of that bond.”

“What we’re going to do in that circumstance is I am going to have a group of prosecutors who every morning are going to go down to intake, and their job is going to be to go through every case we file over the last 24 hours and see which individuals are out on bond or felony already. When that happens … they’re going to proceed with a hearing … at which point the judge then has the ability to hold people at no bond. And it’s counterintuitive, but in doing that, we are going to actually shrink the time from arrest to disposition of the case.”

How would you answer someone in your party who might see you as a better candidate than Ogg but have concerns about you also once serving under her as the supervisor of the vehicular crimes division?

Teare: “I’m not sure what their concerns would be. I worked extraordinarily hard for a number of years to try to get the higher administration to live up to the promises that were made during the campaign. And when I found out that was not possible, I left.”

Republicans have criticized your decision to accept millions of dollars from billionaire George Soros, who is known for his very distinct views on reforming criminal justice in the United States and has funded other DAs across the country who share his views. Do you believe this is a fair criticism?

Teare: “I think that that group that contributed a significant amount of money to me—I share their views in a lot of different ways that we can make the criminal justice system better. I think that I’m relatively unique in the type of prosecutor that they have backed in that I am a career prosecutor. My problem with the system as it is currently instituted comes from the inside, from seeing the failures of the system when we know it.”

“But I am not an abolitionist. I am a pragmatic prosecutor. I believe in the oath and believe, in certain circumstances, in the death penalty. I think my track record should speak for itself in that, for the vast majority of my career, holding violent criminals accountable. … That’s not going to change. We’re going to hold dangerous people accountable. We’re just not going to be in the business of creating the next generation of those criminals unnecessarily.”

The Election

A recent survey from the University of Houston’s Hobby School of Public Affairs found that Teare leads Simons 52 percent to 38 percent, with 10 percent of voters undecided.

The Harris County District Attorney election will take place on November 5. Early voting begins on October 21 and runs until November 1.

Luca Cacciatore

Luca H. Cacciatore is a journalist for Texas Scorecard. He is an American Moment inaugural fellow and former welder.

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