Those of us old enough to remember the beginning and heyday of the Tea Party know just how spontaneous and organic it was. Ordinary average Americans from all walks of life were fed up with bigger and more encroaching big government. At the time, the prime example of that bloated government was Obamacare. Tea Party people felt like the people in Washington, D.C., were not listening to them. So, they took to the streets and the ballot box in 2010 and made them listen. That same thing happened again in 2024. Big government was once again on the ballot, and it inspired one woman to go beyond voting and do something about it.
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Shelley Luther, the former Dallas salon owner who was put in jail after she reopened her salon during the COVID-19 pandemic, is heading to the Texas state house! This is the way!! 🤘 pic.twitter.com/m6dOit31Y1
— Jason (@Jason_The_Texan) November 10, 2024
Shelley Luther, a former hair salon owner, won a seat in the Texas State Legislature last Tuesday. Luther defeated her Democrat challenger, Tiffany Drake, with 78 percent of the vote for Texas State District 62. Luther will represent the residents of Fannin, Grayson, Franklin, and Delta counties. Luther, like a lot of Americans, said she was not very political until it became personal. As COVID spread across the U.S. in 2020, so did heavy-handed lockdown mandates. To comply with the mandates, Luther shut her salon down. Within a month, Luther was getting desperate phone calls from her hair stylists.
“After about a month, my hair stylists were calling me, saying, ‘I can’t feed my kids. I don’t know what to do,’ so, we just made the decision to open back up, and I ended up in jail.”
To keep her hair stylists working, Luther defied the lockdown order and reopened her salon. For her troubles, she spent one week in jail and paid a $7,000 fine. All of this as the dog grooming business next door to her salon remained open.
This isn’t Luther’s first run for public office. In 2020, she ran for the Texas State Senate, and in 2022, she ran for the State District 62 seat but lost to the incumbent, state Rep. Reggie Smith. This time, Luther defeated Smith in the March Republican primary.
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I’m so glad Shelley Luther won a Texas Legislature seat.
She was jailed for operating her salon during COVID-19.
Meanwhile Nancy Pelosi had her hair done in San Francisco and got caught.
— Ryan Fournier (@RyanAFournier) November 10, 2024
While COVID might have been extreme circumstances, it is that all-encompassing intrusive government overreach that has brought so many average Americans to their breaking point and they have said “Enough.” Luther has not been the only everyday American in recent history who knew they could do a better job and has been inspired to run for office. In 2019, now-Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-CO) was also one of those average Americans. Boebert attended a rally held by then-presidential hopeful Beto O’Rourke, who, during a Democrat presidential debate, made the now-famous statement, “Hell, yes, we’re going to take your AR-15, your AK-47.” Boebert replied to O’Rourke’s statement regarding gun confiscation, saying, “Hell no, you’re not.” The rest, as they say, is history.
Shelley Luther’s victory is one of many. State-level Republicans who rode President-elect Donald Trump’s coattails and did well in state legislatures across the nation. Before the election, Republicans controlled 57 state legislatures, and Democrats controlled 41. In some states, GOP candidates broke up Democrat majorities in both chambers of state houses. Vermont Democrats lost their House super-majority as Republicans picked up 18 seats. South Carolina Republicans flipped four state Senate seats and now have the first super-majority since Reconstruction. In Tennessee, Democrats lost all four of the state House races they had hoped to gain to put a dent in the GOP super-majority in the Volunteer State.
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Attention tends to get focused on national politics, but it’s the state legislatures where many policies begin and eventually make their way to the federal level. Chances are there are many more Shelley Luthers out there.
Shelley Luther, who was jailed for opening her salon during Covid, was elected as a Texas state representative.
“My hair stylists were calling me, saying, ‘I can’t feed my kids. I don’t know what to do,’ so, we just made the decision to open back up, and I ended up in jail.” pic.twitter.com/kDFDZ18B48
— Julianna Frieman (@JuliannaFrieman) November 9, 2024
