Bexar Sheriff's Office Employee Under Fire After Calling Local Republicans Racist in Facebook Post

A Bexar County Sheriff's Office community liaison is facing public backlash after saying on social media that local Republicans are racist.

In a now-deleted Facebook post, Robert Vargas III wrote that GOP candidate for sheriff Gerry Rickhoff's performance in Tuesday's primary proves Bexar County Republicans are racist. Vargas is the former campaign manager for and community liaison under current Sheriff Javier Salazar, who will be Rickoff's Democratic rival in the November election.

As evidence of his statement, Vargas said Rickhoff didn't have a strong campaign yet garnered a majority of the vote.

"It's important to note how racist Republicans are in Bexar County," Vargas wrote in the Facebook post. "A white man who didn't have a headshot, didn't put out a yard sign and didn't even run an actual campaign garnered 52% of the vote."

Rickhoff beat out Willie Ng and Gary W. Garcia for the Republican nomination.

The Deputy Sheriff's Association of Bexar County responded to the controversy in a Facebook post of its own.

"Regardless of how one feels about the candidates for sheriff and their supporters, it is completely unacceptable for Sheriff Salazar's community liaison, a county employee whose salary is paid by taxpayers, to post racist, divisive comments," the post reads.

DSABC president Jeremy Payne is among those calling for Vargas to be removed from his position and asking Salazar to be consistent in his discipline.

"The sheriff has definitely held our guys accountable," Payne told KENS 5. "We've been seeing guys fired, we've seen guys put on administrative leave and we expect the same type of punishments to happen across the board."

The Bexar County Sheriff's Office announced Vargas is now under investigation.

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