State Rep. Bryan Slaton, the Royse City Republican who had been accused of having inappropriate relations with a staffer, has declined Thursday to discuss his attendance at a closed-door hearing of a house investigation panel that has been looking into these allegations.
Slaton did not answer questions from reporters as he left the room where a due-process hearing was taking place. He was absent from the House floor as the investigative panel was meeting in a separate part of the Capitol.
The meeting of the General Investigating Committee came after the five-member panel voted unanimously on Monday to conduct a private due-process meeting.
Last month, a Capitol staffer alleged in a complaint to the committee that Slaton, 45, had sex with one of his employees, a woman under 21, and also provided her with alcohol. The said incident is thought to have occurred in Slaton’s Austin apartment in March.
Slaton has since refused to comment on his allegations, instead referring reports and the likes to his lawyers who have since released a statement claiming the allegations to be “false” and “outrageous” without specifying further.
The committee has kept its investigation under wraps, refusing to name the lawmaker currently being investigated and referring to the investigation as “Matter B” in public hearings. The committee is also believed to be looking into allegations of an “abusive and hostile” work environment by state Rep. Jolanda Jones, D-Houston.
The committee also issued a subpoena in “Matter B” directing a man “to provide all relevant testimony and information concerning the committee’s inquiry” as well as the issuing of “one or more subpoenas for a part or portion of any relevant testimony or information as necessary to avoid overburdening a witness or the committee.”
The identity of the man who has been subpoena has yet to be identified.
The committee members then walked across the hall for their 2 p.m. due-process hearing and almost immediately went into executive session. About an hour later, Slaton was seen exiting the room through the same door he’d entered.
Slaton, one of the most far-right social conservatives in the Legislature, has been married to his second wife since 2017.
He joined the Texas House in 2021 after a campaign financed heavily by far-right Texas groups that framed him as a Christian family man and touted his previous work as a Southern Baptist youth pastor.
The allegations of an inappropriate workplace relationship created shockwaves through the most conservative wings of the Texas GOP. After days of rumors at the Capitol about Slaton’s unexplained, multiday absence last month, he faced calls to resign from two lawmakers with whom he is ideologically aligned.
