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Houston Mayoral Candidate Voices Regret, But Doesn’t Confirm Her Identity on Recorded Audio
US Representative Sheila Jackson Lee, currently in the running for the position of Houston’s next mayor, has expressed remorse and emphasized the importance of treating everyone with dignity and respect in response to the emergence of an unverified audio recording. The recording purportedly features the long-serving Democratic lawmaker admonishing her staff with a string of profanities. This audio, which was anonymously sent to various news outlets on Friday, captures a woman resembling Jackson Lee berating a male staff member. The staff member informed her that the information she sought could be found with another colleague, according to the Associated Press. The exact date of the recording’s origin remains unclear.
In the audio, the woman can be heard exclaiming, “I want you to have a (profanity) brain. I want you to have read it. I want you to say, ‘Congresswoman, it was such and such date. That’s what I want. That’s the kind of staff that I want to have.” The 95-second recording goes on to depict the woman castigating the staff member she was speaking to, as well as another staff member, whom she referred to as a “fat ass stupid idiot.” She continues, “Two goddamn big ass children, (profanity) idiots who serve no goddamn purpose. Ain’t managing nobody, nobody’s respecting them, nobody gives a (profanity) about what you’re doing, and you ain’t doing (profanity), and this is an example of it.”
In a statement issued on Monday evening, Jackson Lee did not explicitly confirm that she was the individual in the recording but emphasized her belief that everyone should be treated with dignity and respect, including her own staff. She acknowledged her imperfections and expressed regret, recognizing that her past actions had fallen short of her own standards, and she offered no excuses for her behavior. Jackson Lee, a congressional member since 1995, attributed the release of the recording, which occurred just days before early voting began on November 7th, to her main rival in the mayoral race, state Senator John Whitmire.
