Texas Rangers opened a new tampering investigation into far-left Harris County Judge Lina Hidalgo’s $11 million no-bid ‘vaccine outreach’ contract.
Hidalgo’s office is embroiled in a bid-rigging scandal.
Lina Hidalgo’s top three staffers were indicted in April 2022 after prosecutors expanded the investigation into an $11 million ‘vaccine outreach contract’ awarded to one of the judge’s political cronies.
While Hidalgo was threatening to jail and fine people for violating her Covid rules, she was secretly trying to award one of her political cronies, Felicity Pereyra, who founded Elevate Strategies, an $11 million ‘vaccine outreach’ contract.
Hidalgo ultimately panicked and canceled the $11 million vaccine contract after questions were raised that it was with a one-person firm with no experience.
Hidalgo’s Chief of Staff Alex Triantaphyllis and Policy Director Wallis Nader along with co-defendant Aaron Dunn were charged with misuse of official information and tampering with government documents in connection with the canceled vaccine outreach contract.
Judge Lina Hidalgo with indicted Chief of Staff Alex Triantaphyllis
In August Fox 26 Houston reported that federal authorities have also initiated their own inquiry into Hidalgo’s bid-rigging.
According to Click2Houston, Texas Rangers, the same agency that initially conducted a raid of Hidalgo’s office, opened a new public corruption investigation after Hidalgo “concealed” records subpoenaed in a grand jury’s probe of the judge’s $11 million no-bid contract.
The search warrants were unsealed on Thursday according to the outlet.
The outlet reported that one of the Texas Rangers wrote in the search warrant that “it was discovered that numerous documents and communications that were ordered to be produced by Grand Jury subpoena had been concealed and made unavailable during the earlier Grand Jury proceedings.”
Excerpt from Click2Houston:
Texas Rangers have opened a new public corruption investigation after Harris County Judge Lina Hidalgo’s office “concealed” records subpoenaed in a Grand Jury’s review of how a multi-million dollar county contract was awarded, according to search warrants unsealed Thursday.
The “concealed evidence” included the following:
Harris County Judge’s office employees used their personal phones to communicate about the Targeted Community Vaccine Outreach project with the owner of Elevate Strategies; and,
Draft documents showing Harris County Judge Lina Hidalgo personally edited the scope of the Targeted Vaccine Outreach project and mentioned the owner of Elevate Strategies LLC in her editing one day before the scope of work was shared with the owner of Elevate Strategies LLC and more than two weeks before the project was publically announced; and
WhatsApp and SMS messages showing Harris County Judge Lina Hidalgo and her staff believed that the majority of the Harris County Commissioners Court were going to vote against funding the Targeted Community Vaccine Outreach project and used the County Judge’s Emergency Authorization powers to bypass the voting process and award $10,973,00 to Elevate; and
WhatsApp messages had been deleted after the initiation of the Grand Jury investigation.
“Given the four corners of the affidavit and the warrant, it would appear to be a reasonable deduction that Judge Hidalgo’s DNA is now in play in this investigation,” Wice said.
In August Lina Hidalgo announced she will be taking a leave of absence to seek treatment for clinical depression.
“Based on my doctor’s recommendation, I checked myself into an out-of-state facility to receive inpatient treatment in late July,” the corrupt Democrat said in a statement.
She continued, “It is important for me personally and professionally to confront this issue swiftly, so I will be taking temporary leave from the office while I am receiving treatment.”
Hidalgo resumed her normal schedule in October.
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