Tarrant County Judge O'Hare cleared meeting chambers, had ex-Rep. Lon Burnam arrested during his public-comment turn

On August 4, 2026, Tarrant County Judge Tim O'Hare ordered sheriff's deputies to clear the Commissioners Court public chambers in Fort Worth, Texas, roughly two hours into a contentious hearing on a proposal to nearly halve the county's Election Day polling sites. The clearing came after several attendees applauded a speaker who criticized how O'Hare was running the meeting; O'Hare directed deputies to "clear the entire chambers now," and residents were removed while chanting "shame" and "vote them out." A separate, earlier incident — one attendee who yelled and used profanity during his own turn to speak — had already been resolved by removing that individual alone, before the chamber-wide clearing.

Less than 30 minutes after the chambers were cleared, sheriff's deputies arrested former Texas state Rep. Lon Burnam, a frequent critic of O'Hare, during Burnam's own allotted public-comment time. When O'Hare told Burnam to set down the microphone he had picked up to address the audience, Burnam continued speaking and then lay down on the floor as deputies moved to remove him; four deputies carried him out by his hands and feet, and he was booked into the Tarrant County Jail on a charge of disrupting a meeting or procession. No source reported a weapon or a safety threat from Burnam or any other attendee.

After the recess, O'Hare resumed the meeting under a new procedure bringing speakers in one at a time and warned that further disruption would prompt another clearing and arrests; a second speaker was later removed in addition to Burnam. Commissioners ultimately voted 3-2 to table the proposed polling-site reduction to a September 1, 2026 meeting rather than act on it that day.