Tarrant County Democratic Party lays off all paid staff, declines to share details

Tarrant County Democratic Party Chair Crystal Gayden said Tuesday that her party is strategically restructuring, although she declined to share details on what that restructuring looks like.

Lon Burnam, a Democrat who represented Tarrant County in the Texas House between 1997 and 2015 and remains involved with the party, confirmed that the party has laid off its three paid staff positions. The layoffs were first made public in the Lone Star Left newsletter.

Gayden declined to confirm how many staffers were laid off, when the layoffs were implemented or how they stand to impact the party. She said the party is currently focused on fighting gerrymandering and a redistricting effort in the Tarrant County Commissioners Court.

“The Tarrant County Democratic Party’s recent restructuring is a strategic decision, not a financial crisis,” Gayden, an attorney and previous judicial candidate who has served as chair since 2023, said in a statement to the Report. “It is common for parties to adjust staffing between election cycles.”

Several other leaders within the party declined to comment, referring questions to Gayden.

The layoffs come one month before the May 3 election, when City Council, school board and other local races will be on the ballot across Tarrant County. Local races are all nonpartisan positions, but both the county’s Democrat and Republican parties have become increasingly involved in recent years.

Burnam said he’s disappointed by the layoffs but noted that it’s common for political parties to struggle with fundraising after a presidential election.

“Let’s be clear that it is always the case that after any presidential election, it is hard to raise money for either party — but it’s particularly hard if you lose,” Burnam said.

President Joe Biden narrowly won Tarrant County in the 2020 presidential election, becoming the first Democrat to do so since 1952. The county reverted to red in 2024, supporting President Donald Trump with 51.82% of the vote.

Tarrant Republicans are celebrating the layoffs as a victory. Bo French, chair of the Tarrant County Republican Party, was outspoken before and after the November election about his goal to make the county “inhospitable to Democrats” through more involvement in local races. In response to the layoffs Tuesday, French posted on X that his “plan is working.”

In an emailed statement to the Report, French said the Democratic Party’s members “continue to take the 20% position on 80-20 issues.”

“It’s no wonder they are having trouble raising money,” he said.

For Burnam, the layoffs aren’t all bad news. He said he’s hopeful and confident that “a lot of good reorganization” will come out of the situation.

“Right now, we’re just kind of at our bottom situation. We will be rebuilding, we will be rehiring,” Burnam said.

Cecilia Lenzen is a government accountability reporter for the Fort Worth Report. Contact her at cecilia.lenzen@fortworthreport.org. 

This article first appeared on Fort Worth Report and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.