In one of the best reports I’ve read in a long time, Texas Tribune reporter James Pollard writes that Sid Miller filed the lawsuit as a private citizen in order to prevent Black Texas farmers from receiving debt relief from the USDA. The debt relief is part of the reckoning the USDA is attempting to resolve after a century of excluding Black farmers from aid offered to white farmers nationally.

Miller’s complaint against the U.S. Department of Agriculture says the definition in the program fails to include “white ethnic groups that have unquestionably suffered” because of their ethnicity, such as those of Irish, Italian, German, Jewish and eastern European heritage.

Sid Miller, the Texas Agriculture Commissioner is suing in his capacity as a private citizen to block aid for Texas farmers. I try to say it and write it in different ways and there is just not any way that isn’t racist AF.

Really, the report is worth reading. I’ve included a small excerpt pertinent to the main point but the background information included in the article is top notch. The whole piece is well researched and well written. Pollard can’t call Miller a nasty sumbitch, but he provides all the facts anyone will ever need to prove it to be the truth.

For Black Texas farmers, Sid Miller’s lawsuit increases mistrust | The Texas Tribune

Nationally, Black farmers have lost more than 12 million acres of farmland over the past century, according to the Washington Post, due to biased government policies and discriminatory business practices. In 1920, there were over 925,000 Black farmers in the United States, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. But by 1997, their numbers had fallen to just under 18,500.

Recent data suggest the USDA continues to disproportionately reject Black farmers for loans. According to a CNN analysis, 42% of Black farmers were rejected for direct USDA loans in 2021, more than any other demographic group.

As agriculture commissioner, Miller leads an agency tasked with “advocat[ing] for policies at the federal, state, and local level” beneficial to Texas’s agriculture sector and “provid[ing] financial assistance to farmers and ranchers,” among other duties. In a statement to The Texas Tribune, Miller called the debt relief program “facially illegal and constitutionally impermissible.”

This sumbitch thinks if you challenge a law with big words and invoke the constitution you can just be as racist and discriminatory as ever. The fact that he filed the suit as a private citizen tells you all you really need to know. He’s campaigning 100% on being a good ole’ boy racist and shame on Texas for electing this scum.

Deep Fryer Sid Miller, famous for using taxpayer dollars traveling to roping events and to get his “Jesus shots”, took a political hit today as his top consultant, Todd Smith, was indicted for theft and commercial bribery in connection with his apparent selling of state hemp distribution licenses.  The licenses normally $100 each, were allegedly sold by Smith as “exclusive” for $150,000.  Miller’s Ag department is charged with managing these licenses.  Oops.

Miller, a braggadocios redneck shitbag and Trump Humper who loves to post radically partisan manure on his social media accounts, is a national embarrassment for Texas, well known for spending thousands of donor dollars for decorating his state office and for traveling on the taxpayer dime for personal trips.  He was shamed into reimbursing the state for the trips, likely motivated by a Texas Rangers criminal investigation of his spending.  You’ll recall that Miller used $55,000 of donor funds to outfit his state office with lots of dead animals and hairy furniture.

Worse, now his political cronies have apparently been profiting from Miller’s political office.  No one should be surprised.

Try to act shocked, now, as I tell you another tale of corruption in Texas politics. Meet Todd Smith, good ole’ boy and political aide to Sid Miller. He was indicted Thursday of last week on felony theft charges. He allegedly used his credentials to tell prospective Hemp licensees that they had to pay him up to $150,000 for required surveys and paperwork and such in order to get Hemp Licenses. By spending approximately 6 hours in jail Thursday night before being released on his own “personal recognizance” he has already been punished more than any corrupt Texas Republican likely ever has. At least we have that.

Miller immediately threw him under the bus saying:

“That was Todd, between him and his clients,” Miller said, adding that he would reserve judgment until he could learn more about the situation.

Miller noted, however, that hemp licenses are not particularly expensive for those who want them, with farmers having to pay $100 for a one-year license. Texas Tribune, 5/7/2021

According to the indictment, Smith acquired clients looking for Hemp licenses that cost $100 a year and milked them for $25,000 in “required surveys’ and up to $150,000 each for “campaign contributions” and cash.

According to the Tribune: “The affidavit includes the account of one man who wanted to get involved in the hemp industry and met the middle man at a social gathering in August 2019. The affidavit says the middle man told the license-seeker that he was “working directly with senior leadership at the TDA” and that he “needed $150,000.00 in cash, with some of the money going toward campaign contributions, in order to receive the ‘guaranteed’ hemp license.”

If they aren’t cheating, they aren’t breathing. These crooks spend lots of time bloviating about small business and agriculture and how important it is to the Texas economy and so we can never raise minimum wages for employees while extorting six figures from small businesses trying to get their foot in on the ground floor of a new billion-dollar industry.

This is not the first time Todd Smith has been in trouble for selling access to Sid Miller for campaign contributions. In 2018, the Austin American Statesman reported that Todd Smith solicited a $1,000 campaign contribution from a man named Richard Branson, a physician’s assistant from San Antonio (not the other Richard Branson) in exchange for a position in Miller’s rural Texas health program.

Knowing Miller, the rural texas health program is probably a slush fund for rural texas campaign contributors to be compensated for their political support. But that’s beside the point. The point is, Todd Smith took this guy’s $1,000 and then asked him for a personal bribe loan for $29,000. Branson didn’t get the job, however, nor did he get his bribe loan paid back. Play stupid games, win stupid prizes, Branson. He exacted his revenge by taking all of the e-mails and such to the authorities and the Austin American Statesman.

Instead, Miller appointed Rick Ray Redalin to his rural Texas Health Task Force. Redalin had contributed much more money to his campaign than Branson. Do we really want a man on our rural Texas health task force that married his 15-year-old stepdaughter? Did I forget to mention that? It’s buried way at the bottom of the Statesman article, like it’s the least slimy thing this guy has done.

Redalen’s appointment was also questioned by ethics watchers. Redalen is the owner of a health care consulting business that offers telemedicine services and said he has used his position on the rural health panel to advocate for wider use of that technology.

Another reason for scrutiny of Redalen is his history. Redalen has had his medical license suspended or revoked in three states, including once in Iowa for pleading guilty to perjury in a case centering on his 1988 marriage to his 15-year-old former stepdaughter. 

I can’t make this shit up, yall.

Ok, where were we? Rick Ray Redalin, who goes by three names and thus must be an alleged serial killer has married his 15 year old daughter and bought himself a seat on a rural Texas health care task force to make more money for his for-profit telehealth business and he is actually not even the guy this article is about, I just found out about him. We will call him an incidental finding, to use medical terminology.

This is exhausting, really.

Back to Todd Smith. Todd Smith, is the second-highest “paid” lobbyist in the nation, making 5.1 million dollars over the last two years. So, his fancy lawyers will talk his way out of court and he’ll pay them a tenth of what he took in bribes loans and nothing will happen. No worries, I’m certain that our Attorney General Ken Paxton will not stand for this and will absolutely send a harshly worded letter to Mr. Smith.

Texas Ag Commissioner Sid Miller has announced he has COVID and is quarantining at his ranch.  Known for prodigious lying and spreading conspiracy theories on social media, he’s also just another anti-masker and science denier.  Maybe he’ll take another Jesus Shot on the taxpayer dime.

We all know Sid Miller, childish Ag commissioner of Texas, is a complete jerk, devoting much of his time to insulting half of Texas’ population and publicly displaying his stupidity on social media.  We also know about his weird obsession with the “Jesus Shot”,  which apparently  maintains whatever feel-good it provides, and his use of taxpayer funds to finance his trips to get those shots.  We also know that he wants to replace healthy food options in schools with deep-fried garbage, and are very familiar with his battle against the non-existent “war on cupcakes” for kids’ birthday parties.  One of his most infuriating habits is posting bullshit on Facebook to foment fake outrage against fictional grievances.

We get all that.  Ol’ Sid is a self-absorbed weirdo with an affection for stuffed animals on the walls of his office and screwy conspiracy theories.  In truth, he is the Sas to Louie Gohmert’s Shay.  Between the two of these clowns, it’s all goofball, all the time, and they regularly compete for the title of National Embarrassment of Texas.

Sid’s latest crusade?  BBQ joints.  Sid, as the self-appointed arbiter of everything animal protein, has decided to defy state law and the governor’s directives to go after…wait for it…your neighborhood BBQ spot.  That’s right, even though the state of Texas has exempted small BBQ places from paying big bucks to certify their scales to weigh BBQ, ol’ Jesus Shot Sid himself has decided that, uncharacteristically, he is the Righteous Protector of BBQ Consumers, prosecuting independent pitmasters over a bullshit rule that he invented for some unknown reason, beyond being able to put his name on some Texas state certification sticker.  You do know that he’s printed stickers to put his name on every gas pump in Texas, right?

The only good news here is that Deep Fryer Sid is being opposed by an actual adult in the 2018 race.  Kim Olson, retired Air Force officer, farmer, and Normal Person, is aggressively campaigning to retire him back to the ranch.  We say, come on, Kim!

Look – We all know that Sid Miller is a gigantic asshole. Like Trump, he loves to piss people off just for the pleasure of pissing people off.  We also know that he is self absorbed, corrupt, and has modeled his behavior as Trump’s Mini Me.  I get all that.  But all that aside, Deepfryer Sid is interfering with the National Business of Texas – BBQ.  And when he does that, he disqualifies himself as not only a true Texan, but more importantly, an actual human being.

Go home, Sid, please stop helping.

Texas Agriculture Commissioner Sid Miller is becoming a national favorite based purely on his goofiness quotient.  His Facebook page is a sonnet to ignorance and he is plenty proud of that.  Honey, he makes Donald Trump look like a constitutional scholar.

Today, Sid took to Facebook to endorse Kid Rock for senate in Michigan against Debbie Stavenow.

Kid Rock has been arrested for assault on a DJ at a strip club and paid a half million dollar settlement to the man he assault. He was charged with assault on Mötley Crüe drummer Tommy Lee and plead guilty. In October 2007, Rock was involved in a brawl at a Waffle House in Atlanta, Georgia and charged with simple battery.  He plead no contest.

In short, he likes to hit people.  And cuss. Oh child, that boy can cuss.  So, it seems kinda weird that a big-butt  Super DeLux Brand Christian like Sid Miller would love Kid Rock.

But then, Rock made up for it all when he and Ted Nugent had a special visit to the White House.

Thelma asked me to tell you that The Rock (her favorite hunka hunka burnin’ love) strongly denies being Kid Rock’s father.

So Sid is starting to make endorsements, huh?  That’s entertainment, y’all.