Texas GOP leaders defend appointee after tense exchange over diversity hiring

AUSTIN, Texas – An appointee of Texas Gov. Greg Abbott wiped away tears and gave an emotional protection of her credentials after a tense trade over range hiring insurance policies, which was later adopted by the state’s high Republicans speeding to help her publicly.

Texas Water Board Improvement Chair L’Oreal Stepney, who’s Black, was consoled at one level by lawmakers after the exchange Thursday with GOP state Rep. Brian Harrison, who questioned her and different company officers over their hiring practices.

Abbott, Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick and Home Speaker Dustin Burrows, who’re all Republicans, later issued statements of help for Stepney and her service, whereas different GOP lawmakers criticized Harrison over the trade.

“Whereas passionate and open dialogue will all the time be welcomed, feedback that demean and belittle won’t ever be tolerated,” Republican state Rep. Greg Bonnen, chairman of the Home Appropriations Committee, posted on X.

Harrison is an outspoken critic of range, fairness and inclusion efforts in state authorities. He questioned Stepney and Edna Jackson, who can also be Black, over a line within the company’s strategic plan that its workforce ought to mirror the state’s rising range.

Harrison didn’t straight query the credentials of Stepney or another company employees in the course of the listening to.

On Friday, he defended his questioning in the course of the listening to.

“My line of questioning was excellent {and professional},” stated Harrison, including that he had posed related inquiries to dozens of different company heads. “It was Democrats on the committee who raised the problem of her {qualifications}. I by no means stated a phrase about it.”

Harrison’s line of questioning prompted Democratic state Rep. Nicole Collier, who’s Black, to specific her outrage at having “to observe two Black girls should defend 246 years of systemic racism.”

Stepney then delivered an emotional protection of her credentials to the panel. She stated March would mark 33 years working for the state and listed off her two engineering levels from the College of Texas at Austin, one in aerospace engineering and the opposite in civil engineering.

“It was a deep honor for me to be appointed to the board, to be confirmed by the board, and to be appointed chair,” she stated. “I’ve all the time been grateful to the governor. What have I finished? I’ve protected the ingesting water provide of 31 million Texans.”