Tarrant County Republicans elect new chair after opponents concede in runoff

Tim Davis is the newly elected chair of the Tarrant County Republican Party after his opponents threw their support behind him in the runoff.

In the first round of voting, Davis earned the majority with 87 votes. John O’Shea was second with 58 votes. Shellie Gardner had 26 votes, and Marshall Hobbs received 16 votes.

“Understanding our democratic process that as representatives, our job is to represent you, and in that, we have decided that as a team, we are going to go ahead and throw our endorsement behind Tim Davis,” Hobbs told the audience of 184 precinct chairs who participated in the election.

Davis is an attorney with the law group Jackson Walker and has been general counsel for the county’s Republican Party and the Grapevine-Colleyville school board. Davis was also paid $172,000 by the Keller school board in five months, during which the board considered a proposal to split the district in half.

“Can you believe that that just happened? It’s so incredible,” Davis said in his first remarks after being elected. “I thank those three for their support deeply, because it shows how united we really are. It shows how we have to be a force as we go into the next months and weeks ahead.”

Davis said that as a child, his parents taught him two key things: that Jesus is his savior and to never give up.

“I make that promise to you,” Davis said. “I’ll never give up, and I want you to make that promise to me and to each other and to our county that you’ll never give up. Because if we keep it, if I keep it to you, and you keep it to me, we’ll have a better county tomorrow than we do today and the day after and the day after.”

In his speech prior to the election, Davis said his priorities would be to ensure secure, fair elections and to give the party chairs a budget to hold events and hand out flyers.

The proudest thing he has ever done for the Republican party, Davis said, was as an electorate in the 2024 election, when President Donald Trump and Vice President JD Vance were elected into the White House.

“We have to never let up,” Davis said. “We have to fight, fight, fight, as he told us, to make sure that the things that matter to us continue to be the values that define our county, our state and our country.”

O’Shea, the second-highest vote getter behind Davis, said he believes Davis represents the whole party. When Davis asked the opponents to endorse him in the runoff, O’Shea said it made sense because the others realistically would not be able to get the required votes to be elected.

“He’s been involved in and been a hard worker for a long time,” O’Shea said. “So, yeah. I mean, I genuinely think any one of the four of us up there would do a good job, and I think Tim’s got experience and know-how. If he opens the doors and keeps everybody involved, I think we got better days ahead.”

This story was originally published November 22, 2025 at 12:08 PM.