Twitter / ericcervini
Video shared on Twitter shows Trump supporters harassing a Biden campaign bus along a stretch of I-35 near San Marcos in 2020.
The plaintiffs, which include former State Sen. Wendy Davis, sued San Marcos’ director of public safety and the city's marshal's department in federal court in 2021, alleging local law enforcement officials ignored phone calls from a Biden campaign bus asking for help as supporters of Donald Trump forced it nearly to a stop while it traveled Interstate 35.
As the case played out in San Antonio's U.S. District Court for the Western District of Texas, plaintiffs asked for sanctions against San Marcos for failing to preserve relevant phone and email records for three people no longer employed there.
Late last month, Magistrate Judge Mark Lane ruled that the city was "out of line" in purging electronic communications from Cole Stapp, a former deputy marshal subpoenaed to testify in the case. Even so, he added that the plaintiff couldn't demonstrate that the city deliberately acted to derail the case.
"To be clear, San Marcos was negligent, and its conduct is sanctionable," Lane wrote. "But despite San Marcos’s misconduct, Plaintiffs have failed to establish San Marcos’s behavior was motivated by bad faith."
The San Antonio Express-News first reported on the judge's ruling.
The Trump supporters' harassment of the Biden bus made national headlines, and at least one minor collision was captured in footage. Citing safety concerns, Democrats canceled three Central Texas campaign gatherings following the incident.
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