Posted on 09/05/2009 2:41:34 PM PDT by BuckeyeTexan
Two former Texas Tech University System regents said Friday that allies of Gov. Rick Perry's pressured them to resign after their support for Perry's political rival — U.S. Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison — became public.
One of the former regents, Windy Sitton, said that Scott Dueser, then chairman of the board, told her last year that the governor's office had said for Sitton "to cease and desist supporting Kay Bailey immediately or resign from the board." She said that she did neither. Perry replaced her this year after her term expired.
Mark Griffin, a Lubbock businessman whom Perry appointed to the Board of Regents in 2005, said he got the resignation call from former Perry chief of staff Brian Newby after praisingHutchison at an August campaign rally. She is challenging Perry in the March Republican gubernatorial primary. Griffin said he resigned shortly after Newby told him that the governor "expects loyalty out of his appointees and if you can't be loyal, it's probably not best to be on the team."
Neither Dueser nor Newby could be reached Friday. Perry spokeswoman Allison Castle said she was not aware of the governor's office asking anyone to tell Sitton to stop supporting Hutchison. Castle declined to address whether Perry or his staff asked Newby to call Griffin.
Sitton, a former Lubbock mayor whom Perry appointed to the Tech board in 2004, said Dueser contacted her after her name was published last fall in a list of Hutchison supporters. She said she declined to resign because she "did not want to call any negative attention to Texas Tech."
She said she supported Perry for years and never expected him to run again.
"If somebody gives you a good appointment, you support them," Sitton said. "I feel like I did support him." She added: "I think when politics supersede and override good governance for a public institution, it doesn't serve the citizens of Texas."
According to Griffin, during his his conversation with Newby, he asked what the governor wanted him to do. Griffin said Newby, a former Tech regent,told him Perry would not ask him to resign, but would accept his resignation if he offered it.
Griffin wrote a letter of resignation to the governor, dated Aug. 21. The letter doesn't say why he resigned, but on Friday, Griffin said, "I was concerned that my staying on would be a distraction and could possibly place the institution at political risk."
Castle said that aside from Griffin's resignation letter and Perry's response accepting the resignation and thanking him for his service, "our office has not had any contact with Mr. Griffin regarding his resignation."
At the Aug. 20 rally in Lubbock, Griffin introduced Hutchison as "a lady who can transcend politics by strong, effective, principled leadership of the state of Texas," according to the Lubbock Avalanche-Journal.
Griffin said Friday that the introduction was "in my capacity as a private citizen; I was not acting in any official capacity" as a regent.
The Board of Regents is responsible for approving a budget, setting tuition rates and hiring top administrators for the university system and its campuses. A spot on a board of regents is one of the most prestigious appointments a governor can make.
Another Perry-appointed regent who resigned under pressure was Robert Rowling of the University of Texas System's governing board.
Rowling quit that post and his position as chairman of the Board of Regents' investment arm in February during questioning by the state Senate Finance Committee. Some senators were upset about bonuses awarded to investment arm employees as the financial markets were plunging. The hearing came after Perry and Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst wrote a letter to Rowling criticizing the bonuses.
It was also shortly after Rowling, a billionaire who contributed more than $200,000 to Perry's campaigns, had signed on as a member of Hutchison's campaign leadership team.
Perry has also been linked to controversy at the Texas A&M University System.
Some legislators criticized Perry this year for moving money from one of his economic-development funds into another fund to give an unusually large grant to the A&M System for a pharmaceutical manufacturing center.
"We are shocked and dismayed to hear that Perry is yet again playing politics with Texas' universities," Hutchison spokesman Jeff Sadosky said. "Here we were thinking he only used A&M as his political playground."
cmaclaggan@statesman.com; 445-3548
jembry@statesman.com; 445-3572
Additional information from staff writer Ralph K.M. Haurwitz.
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Me thinks it is called the spoils system.
The same thing obamma turd is using to place Marxist unAmerican garbage in positions of power within our govt.
I note that both were appointed at the pleasure of the Governor, and both know they were appointed BECAUSE they were his supporters. So it was already a political spoils system.
On the other hand, neither person seems to have been forced to resign. And the people who TALKED to them were not in the employ of Perry when they talked to them about resigning.
The truth wins out again — thank you!
What are the records of Sinton and Griffin while on the Board? I have no idea.
As a political ally in 2005 they got a plumb job. No one told them it would be lifetime tenure.
But yes, others are right, the political system in the US is the ‘Spoilage’ System.
Well if I were the boss and my employee decides to back my rival, then I would can them too.
All the rinos at the Universities are pulling for Kay. No surprise here.
She’s like the confused liberal aunt the family doesn’t care to have around.
Let’s see he replaced one after her term expired, nothing wrong there. He expected a person he appointed to a job to be loyal to him, nothing wrong there either. Both of these people owed their positions to him, why would they think he would stand for them touting the idiot KBH?
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