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Dallas Mayor Eric Johnson faces ethics complaint over social media post about City Council endorsement

Dallas Mayor Eric Johnson will face a city ethics panel later this month after a complaint was filed over a tweet he shared about an endorsement in a South Dallas City Council race.

Barry Jacobs filed the complaint that argues the mayor violated city code prohibiting elected leaders from using their official city title when endorsing other candidates. Jacobs is a retired lawyer and publisher of Reform Dallas, a website linked to a popular Facebook group focused on city politics.

At issue was a post Johnson shared, or “retweeted,” on his Twitter account, @Johnson4Dallas, regarding a  article. The story was about the mayor’s endorsement of Donald Parish Jr., a candidate who came in third in Saturday’s municipal election running against incumbent Adam Bazaldua in District 7.

Parish shared the original tweet with the News article featuring the headline “Mayor Eric Johnson backs opponent in City Council race over incumbent Adam Bazaldua” that Johnson retweeted.

“The city has rules,” Jacobs said. “And in this case, they’re pretty straightforward. As an accomplished lawyer and the highest elected official in Dallas, he should know the rules. If anyone is expected to know the rules, it’s him.”

Parish’s campaign literature announcing the endorsement cited in the article did not use the mayor’s official title, referring to him as “The Honorable Eric Johnson,” which is permitted in ethics policy.

Johnson unsuccessfully endorsed two candidates during the May 1 election: Parish and Yolanda Williams in District 5. Both came in third.

The mayor declined to comment Thursday.

The complaint, filed Tuesday, sparks a lengthy bureaucratic process. The first procedural hurdle is that an ethics advisory commission panel will meet May 18 to decide whether the complaint has merit. If the complaint travels through the entire process, the City Council ultimately would be responsible for any disciplinary actions.

This is not the first time Jacobs has raised flags about city officials’ ethics. In 2017, he successfully filed a complaint against former council member Philip Kingston after Kingston filmed a campaign video inside his city office. The council ordered Kingston to take ethics training.

Elected officials and politically involved citizens are navigating a whole new world with social media, exacerbated in large part by former President Donald Trump, who was quick to attack enemies and make policy announcements on Twitter. Courts, including those in Texas, also have ruled that elected officials can’t block their constituents on official social media channels.

“In this climate, political boundaries are constantly being pushed to the outer limits,” said Kimi King, a political scientist at the University of North Texas. “Consider carefully the consequences of your expression. That’s not just something I’d say to officials but to anyone. Social media has rocked our world to the point we’re in outer space.”

Jacobs acknowledged that the complaint will not change the outcome of the election. However, he hopes the outcome forces city officials to think twice before engaging in elections that aren’t their own.

“If we want to have clean government, we have to have clean elections,” he said. “The only way someone will be incentivized to follow the rules is if they’re tagged when they’re not following them.”

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