Candidate for House seat urges GOP here to mobilize
TEXARKANA, Texas — When Patrick Fallon, Republican candidate for the Texas U.S. congressional 4th District seat, spoke at the Texarkana Texas Convention Center Tuesday, he said he knew he was among friends.
“We believe God is great and we believe our country is great,” Fallon said to about 250 audience members.
Fallon, who was selected Aug. 8 to replace John Ratcliffe in the Nov. 3 election, said he first started to think about running for office in 2008 when he heard Barack Obama say in his presidential victory speech that he wanted to fundamentally change America.
“That’ when I decided I needed to get involved so I first ran for city council,” Fallon said. “Then in 2012, for state representative.”
Fallon added that even before he decided to get into politics, one presidential race he would always remember was the 2000 election when George W. Bush won Florida by just 537 votes.
“It still amazes me to think that a small number people, who might be able to fit inside another room just this size, changed an entire election,” he said.
Fallon then said it still amazes him that rural voters in Texas just barely saved U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz with only a 2.8% popular vote margin in 2018.
“When you vote for me, I want you to think that you have voted for the very best candidate ever,” Fallon said. “When I started going door to door, I found out that if you treat your constituents like the wonderful giants that they really are, they will always be with you. I have since learned that America isn’t an ethnicity, it’s an idea.”
Fallon went on to say that when he recently visited Washington, D.C., he started walking in an area where the city was building a World War I monument.
“I saw where the monument stated that we lost more than 100,000 servicemen in that war.
“Then I went to the World War II monument and found out we lost more than 400,000 servicemen.
“And then I went to the Vietnam Memorial Wall and saw that another 58,000 were lost,” he said.
“For me, it was one of the most emotional 2.3 miles I have ever walked. It’s incredible to think that there are now seven billion people in the world and we are only 330 million of them living in a country that’s as free as this one.”
Fallon then encouraged his audience to mobilize as many people as they can to vote on Nov. 3.
“It’s been a privilege to be here tonight and I want to say thanks and I will go to D.C. and make a commitment to vote the way you want me to vote as long as I’m there,” he said.