Even by her own grim standards, OVSD trustee Gina Clayton-Tarvin’s social media smear campaigns this week have reached all new lows. It’s hard to process. Never before has this city witnessed such a thin-skinned, paranoid, dishonest politician take to Facebook to launch so many baseless attacks and accusations.
She recently went after her fellow Trustee, Norm Westwell, accusing him of “organizing” a recall effort against her. The citizens that actually did organize it told me Westwell had absolutely nothing to do with it. But that doesn’t stop Tarvin from smearing, and in the process inciting her small-but-rabid band of supporters (more on that in a moment):
I reached out to Westwell, who flat-out denied Tarvin’s smear:
Westwell: “She’s lying. That conversation never happened. We did discuss social media, she made some outlandish accusations but I then simply wished her a Merry Christmas and moved on. I think it’s unfortunate she is spending so much time on social media saying so many untrue things about so many people. Citizens in Huntington Beach deserve better. She is not elected to attack and lie about people on social media. If the district would simply answer questions and meet with the citizens that are requesting some time, none of this mess would exist. The district has brought it on itself and in fact it’s their behavior that is costing taxpayers a lot of money.”
Tarvin continues to insist she is being “harassed,” “attacked” and worse, driving her supporters to believe to buy into to her fantasy, and then begin their own attacks.
Here is Tarvin conversing with one of her confidants, Bob Barnett, who casually informs her that he was “trolling” me the day before:
Here is an example of Barnett’s “trolling.” THIS is who the school board trustee associates with? Then again, after watching her over the years with Pat Mahoney, Vern Nelson, Victor Valladares, Gustavo Arellano and other unsavory characters, maybe it’s just par for the course:
Gina must be very proud. But then again, I’m sort of used to this from her close stable of “supporters.” Here was a message from Pat Mahoney to me:
Welcome to the low-rent world of Gina Clayton-Tarvin. These are her friends. These are the people she directs. And she is STILL denying that she blocks local citizens on Facebook, giving a typical legalese excuse to cover the fact that the account she uses to attack myself and others is OFF LIMITS to those she attacks:
This is not about having access to a campaign page, and Clayton-Tarvin knows it. She KNOWS it’s about being denied access to the account that she uses to attack, as I illustrated this morning:
And here is how it looks on Twitter:
Westwell is correct in my opinion. She is a liar. And a sleazy one at that. An elected official that blocks citizens not from just engaging with her on policy – but on simply defending themselves against incomprehensibly false and manipulative attacks. She is dangerous, in my opinion. She will say what she has to publicly to incite her followers, but then privately she states the truth. Several examples:
See how it works? If she is going to make accusations about being “libeled” then she needs to be specific – and not just have an emotional meltdown whenever someone says something that exposes her dishonest. Another example:
Gina Clayton-Tarvin’s problem, is Gina Clayton-Tarvin. There are new, formal complaints I have become aware of that will too be filed against her. As well, I will have another LARGE expose coming up to illustrate how she lied about my interview with her, actually using her child as a political prop to craft a new lie. What kind of mother does that? In my opinion, one that put politics one everything – even her family.
Stay tuned.
Surf City Chronicles 