Meet Hawk Dunlap
A Blue-Collar Rebellion for Texas
Who Is Hawk Dunlap?
Hawk Dunlap is a fourth-generation oil worker with 35 years of experience — and he's nothing like the politicians currently running the Texas Railroad Commission.
His great-grandfather drilled wells in Oklahoma. His grandfather built a career in oil and gas in Kilgore. His father worked pipelines. Oil has been in Hawk's blood his entire life. Even while earning his degree at Stephen F. Austin State University, he was driving vacuum trucks hauling saltwater at night.
That work ethic carried him around the world. Hawk has worked in oil fields across more than 100 countries — from Nigeria to Iraq, Kurdistan, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Indonesia, and Venezuela — dealing with blowouts, fires, and complex drilling challenges in some of the most dangerous conditions on Earth. Through sweat, skill, and tenacity, he rose to lead global operations, manage well integrity, and direct critical interventions at the highest levels of the industry.
At every stage, he looked out for the workers around him — mentoring, training, and demanding the highest standards of safety and efficiency.
When he returned to Texas, he was shocked. Our oil fields — in the state where he was born and raised — are among the worst he has ever seen anywhere in the world.
Why Hawk is Running
The Texas Railroad Commission has nothing to do with railroads. Its job is to regulate oil and gas. And it is failing the people of Texas.
Across our state, thousands of unplugged abandoned wells are poisoning water supplies, destroying crops, and ruining livelihoods. Massive radioactive cesspools sit unaddressed. As Bloomberg put it: "Texas Oil Boom Spawns a Toxic Crisis of the Industry's Own Making." Hawk was interviewed for that article — because he has spent years traveling across Texas, meeting with landowners, ranchers, and homeowners who are suffering, and taking his own measurements at contaminated sites.
This is not an inevitable result of oil production. It is the result of neglect, incompetence, and corruption by the very people who are supposed to be solving it.
The current RRC chairman, Jim Wright, has overseen these failures. The Texas Tribune reported that Wright initiated new waste disposal rules while owning stock in hazardous waste management companies — and that industry representatives had more than two years to help shape those rules while the public was given only a month to comment.
This isn't small government. It's a government agency in bed with big business, while working Texans pay the price.
Hawk is running because these problems are real and they have to be fixed. He's not running out of any personal ambition. As he puts it: he'd rather eat dried manure than ask people to fund a political campaign. But here we are — and he rolled up his sleeves, coveralls and all, and entered the race.
A Voice for Working Texans
This race is about more than who runs the Railroad Commission. It's about whether the government will finally listen to the hardest working people in Texas.
Blue-collar workers are widely ignored by the government. On the campaign trail, candidates say they'll work for us, listen to us, fix our problems — and then they get into office and don't pull through. Project Censored reports that only 1.6% of state lawmakers are working class, compared to 50% of the workforce. We rarely have candidates like us to vote for. And we know it — which is why we're less likely to vote at all.
Hawk is a fourth-generation oil worker who drove vacuum trucks at night to put himself through college. He's not beholden to big business. He's not running to feel important. He's running to deliver a real voice for working people into the halls of power — and to finally clean up the mess the RRC has made of our state.
If he wins, he's promised one thing: he will deliver the blue-collar rebellion.
Endorsed Across Texas
Newspapers across Texas have taken a hard look at this race — and they all landed in the same place.
The Houston Chronicle: "A bona fide, skoal-dipping roughneck whistleblower who stands up for Texas… Dunlap's industry experience sets him apart. He has the credibility and personality to thrive in this job. He certainly wouldn't back down if he detects a whiff of conflict of interest from his fellow commissioners."
The Austin American-Statesman: "Hawk Dunlap is not a politician. He's an outsider, a renegade, a veteran West Texas oil and gas man looking to shake things up… We believe his no-nonsense, common-sense advocacy for Texans... provides just the dose of accountability the Railroad Commission needs."
The Fort Worth Star-Telegram: "Hawk Dunlap would make the best commissioner… a well-control specialist with three decades of domestic and international experience… sounding the alarm about a threat not getting enough attention: the huge increase in fracking wastewater returned to the ground."
The San Antonio Express-News: "Unlike the incumbent, Jim Wright, who has shown himself to be overly cozy with the companies the commission is supposed to be holding accountable, Dunlap takes that responsibility as paramount… It's past time for the commission to include someone who understands the industry while also being committed to making it as responsible as it should be."
Texas Panhandle Updates: "Hawk Dunlap understands rural Texas. He understands energy. And he understands that the decisions made in Austin affect families, jobs, and businesses right here at home."
The Pecos Enterprise (editor and publisher Smoke Briggs): "For the first time in my lifetime, voters have an option to vote for someone who really should be on the Railroad Commission. This year, we have a third choice — a real choice — Hawk Dunlap. Hawk is a roughneck's roughneck."
League of Independent Voters of Texas: "Hawk is a genuine working class hero — our kind of Texas independent."
Vote in the Republican Primary — March 3
The Republican primary is March 3.
Any registered Texas voter can vote in the Republican primary - you do not have to be a registered Republican. This is the only contested race for this seat, and the outcome will directly affect Texas' future. Find your polling location at
https://www.votetexas.gov/voting/where.html.
If you're able to, donate or volunteer. Unlike his competitors, Hawk isn't backed by big business, and every bit of support goes directly to fighting for Texas.