Tim O'Hare, Alisa Simmons clash over taxes, polling place cuts in Tarrant County judge race

Tarrant County is a major political battleground. It's the largest Republican-controlled county in Texas and the United States.

Republican Tarrant County Judge Tim O'Hare is facing Democratic County Commissioner Alisa Simmons in the November election. O'Hare has said for years that one of his top priorities is to keep the county red.

O'Hare said one reason residents should re-elect him is his work leading efforts to cut county and hospital district taxes over the past four years.

"Four straight years below no new revenue," O'Hare said. "When I took office, Tarrant County did not have a homestead exemption. We now have the full 20% offered by both."

O'Hare said Tarrant County is now more affordable and safer, citing lower crime rates.

"Crime in the county is down three years in a row. We support law enforcement. Fort Worth is now the 10th-largest city in the country. You can walk around downtown Fort Worth any time, day or night. Feel totally safe," O'Hare said.

"It's a safe place to live. It's a cheaper place to live. From the time I walked in the door. And I believe we deserve another opportunity for four more years. And I believe Tarrant County is going to give me those four years," he continued.

Simmons, however, argued that the tax cuts O'Hare praised have also led to cuts in county programs.

Simmons said she is promising fiscal responsibility, open government and transparency in leadership.

"So what we have experienced in these last three and a half years that both the judge, and myself and Commissioner Myers have been on the court is increased spending, dipping into reserves and lower reserves," Simmons said. "We've experienced a commissioners court body that has become almost completely partisan. We have a decorum policy that only one individual drafted and implemented."

CBS News Texas' Jack Fink also spoke with both candidates about the county's decision to eliminate dozens of polling locations, which has prompted a lawsuit.

The following excerpts have been lightly edited for clarity.

Fink: Another issue in the campaign, as you know, is the reduction by the county of the polling locations. And now there's a lawsuit against you and the other Republicans on the court and the county itself. What do you say to that?

O'Hare: If you go back and look at, I think it was 2022, in the bluest precinct in the county, also the smallest precinct in the county, precinct one, there were 93 voting locations on Election Day. On the largest and the reddest, there were 70. Now, [Democrats] like that. That's an advantage for them, they believe. So we said no.

What we want is we want equal polling locations across the precincts. If you really want to be fair, we should have more polling locations in precinct four, which is the reddest, because it's so large and less in precinct one. But that's not what we did. We said make it equal. Jack, we eliminated polling locations that were literally across the street from polling locations. 

There were literally polling locations in Tarrant County where, if you parked in the parking lot for a polling location, you were closer to another polling location across the street. In 2024, there was one polling location that had nine people in 12 hours. There were multiple polling locations that had less than 25 all day long on Election Day. So now what we have is we have equal across the precincts.

We also have 15 early voting locations less than a third of a mile from a bus stop. Between early voting locations, you're never more than 2.8 miles apart. Midpoint 1.4 miles. And on election day, never more than 1.4 miles apart. So there are plenty of polling locations. Everybody will have a chance to vote.

Fink: What do you want to see come out of this? First of all, do you support the lawsuit and what do you want to see come out of it?

Simmons: Well, I was not supportive of cutting our polling places. So it's unfortunate that there is a lawsuit, yet another lawsuit because of the actions and leadership of our current county judge. Lawsuit after lawsuit after lawsuit cost us money, cost taxpayers money. We're the third-largest county in Texas, around the 14th-largest county in the country. And we're cutting polling places. What's the rationale? It's only political. It does not take into consideration that folks ought to have ease of access to the ballot box. Everybody knows that Tarrant County is the largest Republican county, not only in Texas, but in the entire country.