Former Bexar County employee Joseph Brantley poses for a portrait in his home in Universal City on Tuesday, Nov. 11, 2025. Brantley was recently designated a “Zealous Requestor,” a new policy by the city identifying those who file large numbers of record requests.
Clint Datchuk
Joseph Brantley had a few bones to pick after he resigned from his job helping manage Bexar County’s budget nearly two years ago.
The 38-year-old Army veteran believed he hadn’t been paid fairly, and that his bosses had worked him too hard and sabotaged his efforts to find another job. He felt wronged and was looking for a way to balance the scales.
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Brantley found it in a right that belongs to every American: requesting government records. Since July, he has flooded county government with hundreds of open records requests.
He has acknowledged that he started blitzing the Bexar County Courthouse with such requests out of spite. But he says his motivation now is higher-minded — it’s about informing the public.
Brantley is billing himself a “citizen journalist.” His vehicle is a Facebook page where he posts frequently inflammatory stories about county government based on the records he gets his hands on.
Now he wants to prove to county officials that he’s a member of the media.
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Why? Because he wants to get around restrictions Bexar County Commissioners Court imposed last fall on so-called “zealous requestors” to rein in a surge in records requests — which was largely driven by Brantley.
READ MORE: One man is bombarding Bexar County with public record requests. Here’s why.
The policy targets anyone who submits more than 15 open records requests in a month or 36 in a calendar year. Once someone hits that threshold, they’re notified of their “zealous” status. When county staffers spend a total of 36 hours in one year, with no more than 15 hours in a single month, tracking down the documents for such requesters, the county can start charging them for the time.
In the five months since the policy went into effect, Brantley is the only person who’s been designated a zealous requester. Well, Brantley and “Audie Kyle” — an alias that he uses to file records requests to get around the limits.
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Texas’ open records law says that professional journalists are exempt from any policies that cap how much time staff can spend on records requests. Anyone who makes a “substantial portion” of their livelihood by publishing news or does so for “substantial financial gain” is exempt from the rules.
So, earlier this month, Brantley started pushing for the county to strip his “zealous” label, arguing that his Facebook page, called “Citizen Veteran Journalists of Bexar County,” has grown so big that he qualifies as a journalist.
“For a platform that has existed for only a few months, the scale of CVJ’s audience reach and investigative output reflects a rapidly growing journalism operation focused on government transparency and public accountability,” he said in an email to county officials.
Joseph v. Larry
Brantley’s campaign to change his status to journalist started on March 9 with an email to Larry Roberson, the head of the Bexar County District Attorney’s office’s civil division. It was in response to a notification that Audie Kyle, one of a handful of aliases he uses to file requests, had been designated a zealous requester.
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Brantley wrote that his Facebook page had racked up 5 million page views, and he described his page as a “monetized journalism platform.” Therefore, he’s just like any other reporter, he said.
Brantley started the Facebook page in October, and it has since picked up 5,000 followers. Brantley said he could make money off his page through a program for popular posters that Facebook launched in 2024. A dashboard attached to his page says he’s eligible to make between $4 and $9 for some of his posts. But Brantley said he hasn’t taken money for any of his posts.
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He does not meet the 10,000-follower minimum for creators on Facebook to make money off advertisements in videos. And he doesn’t advertise himself or offer subscriptions, which some Facebook content creators use to generate revenue.
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Roberson responded the next day, refusing Brantley’s request to be exempt from the policy. He said that regardless of how many views Brantley is getting, he didn’t prove that his Facebook page helps him earn a living.
What followed was a back-and-forth between Brantley and Roberson that lasted two days, though most of it took place while Roberson was in his usual front-row seat at that Tuesday’s Commissioners Court meeting.
Brantley asked Roberson for proof that the county had vetted reporters from mainstream outlets in town to make sure their journalism pays the bills. Roberson said he can only get such information if he submits an open records request. Brantley obliged within minutes.
Roberson pointed out that he has submitted about 1,000 requests from “numerous aliases or alter egos.” But the main roadblock to Brantley being treated like a journalist is that he hasn’t proven that he makes any money off his Facebook page.
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In an email to Brantley, Roberson said “self-identification as a member of the media isn’t enough.”
The ping pong-style email exchange was inconclusive.
Roberson said in an interview that Brantley is wrong to think that he’s a “newly crowned journalist” who is just like the reporters from newspapers and TV stations who submit records requests to Bexar County.
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He spoke disparagingly of Brantley’s posts.
“He makes inferences, allegations. He criticizes. He insults. He doesn’t do any investigation. He’s not bringing any stories to the public — he’s insulting,” Roberson said. “He’s defaming. He doesn’t tell a story. He complains about individuals, or what he’s not getting or believes to be true.”
Brantley uploads all the documents he obtains to a public Dropbox folder, but it’s generally his writings that grab his followers’ attention. His posts are studded with emojis, all-cap declarations and accusations aplenty. He has accused Sheriff Javier Salazar of lying about whether outside law enforcement agencies investigated the 2019 Anaqua Springs murders of a mother and her two daughters. He blasted a constable for allegedly campaigning on county time. He mocked a sheriff’s deputy and congressional candidate whose gun was stolen while he was off duty.
Lately, Brantley’s range has widened. He has posted candidate questionnaire responses from district clerk hopefuls. He also publishes bios of people he dubs “legends of local government,” like New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani.
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‘His job isn’t Facebook’
In February, the DA’s office’s civil section, which Roberson leads, took over the county’s handling of public records requests in an effort to improve its ability to meet the 10-day deadline required by state law.
In a March 24 email to Roberson, Brantley tried a different approach. He temporarily dropped the journalist argument, contending instead that disabilities related to his military service affect his “ability to navigate opaque, undefined, or discretionary administrative processes,” such as the county’s policy.
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Roberson repeated that Brantley still hadn’t proven that he qualifies for the exemption under state law.
This time, Roberson pointed out that Brantley has a day job at Texas A&M University-San Antonio, and he often submits records request during work hours. He said if Brantley could prove that his records requests had to do with his job, he might qualify for the exemption, since Texas’ open records law also has an exemption for scholars.
“His job isn’t Facebook,” Roberson said in an interview. “His job is to work for a university.”
Brantley said Bexar County should be more concerned about elected officials he alleges are using county work time for political activities than about whether he submits his records requests at his day job as a budget manager at the university.
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Brantley seems to relish the role he thinks Bexar County has cast him in: villain. After receiving three letters from the county about his records requests, he declared himself the holder of “TRIPLE OG ZEALOUS REQUESTOR STATUS.” He often shares an AI-generated cartoon of a figure in military garb bearing his Facebook page’s name punching a suited man labeled “county” in the face.
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“Oh no, Bexar County, dont tell everyone that I’m a zealous man who fights the government too much…I’d hate to look too fkn cool,” he wrote.
The page has its fans. In the page’s reviews, people praise Brantley’s “commitment to transparency and public accountability” and “revealing answers to what we are all wondering.”
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Others are less impressed, criticizing his posts as thinly verified and largely written by ChatGPT. Brantley relies on the AI chatbot to write records requests, sift through long documents and craft most of his posts.
One commenter said Brantley’s “demeanor is that of a spoiled child.”
Brantley has jabbed at Roberson personally on his Facebook page. He’s attacked him for contracting with outside law firms to help the county with legal matters. He wrote that his “open records requests have provided more value” to Bexar County than Roberson’s “entire career” and referred to him as “Leisure Suit Larry,” a reference to an adult-themed video game character.
Roberson said the insults have nothing to do with stance on Brantley.
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“Believe it or not, I have been insulted by many people,” he said.
‘I don’t really care’
Brantley left his job at the county’s budget office in the summer of 2024. He later filed a complaint with the federal Equal Employment Opportuntiy Commission arguing he was “constructively discharged” after being overworked and denied workload reductions he sought to manage combat-related mental health issues.
His allegations haven’t gained traction with federal agencies.
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The EEOC declined to look into the case and said Brantley could sue instead. Meanwhile, the Department of Justice declined to take up another complaint Brantley filed with the Department of Labor, arguing that the county had violated a federal law that protects the employment rights of veterans by allegedly not paying him on par with his colleagues.
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Brantley started his public records barrage a year after he left his county job.
When commissioners approved the “zealous requestor” policy in October, Bexar County started tracking the hours staff spends processing each person’s records. County staff have logged nearly 650 hours fulfilling requests from Brantley’s personal email address since July. He was designated “zealous” weeks after the policy was adopted.
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The only other person to reach that status has been Audie Kyle, one of Brantley’s aliases. The name is a combination of two Texas-born veterans: Audie Murphy, the World War II hero, and Chris Kyle, the former Navy SEAL whose life story inspired the film “American Sniper.” County staff have spent 292 hours working on Audie Kyle’s requests.
County officials know that Audie Kyle — along with a handful of other email addresses — is Brantley. In a letter notifying him that the alias had been designated a zealous requester, the DA’s office addressed him as “Audie Kyle/Joseph Brantley.”
Brantley’s effort is part principle, part financial. He thinks his work qualifies him as a journalist, but he also wants to avoid the fees that come with being a “zealous requestor.” After Audie Kyle hit the zealous threshold, the county quoted Brantley more than $15,000 for a folder of budget documents. Brantley ocassionally pays for documents, estimating that he’s spent $300 so far.
“I don’t really care about the zealous designation. I think it’s funny,” Brantley said. “But I don’t want to (Bexar County) to get into a position where they can force me into that category so that then they can just come up with these ridiculous cost estimates over and over again.”
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Chip Stewart, a media law attorney and professor at Texas Christian University, said Brantley’s argument likely hinges on whether he meets Texas law’s definition of a journalist — including whether he earns a substantial portion of his income from the work. He said the rise of social media and AI tools has blurred those lines, making it easier to churn out records requests and harder to define who qualifies as a reporter.
Still, Stewart said, anyone has the right to file as many records requests as they want, and the government has to fulfill them.
“A journalist has no greater or lesser right than any other citizen and vice versa,” Stewart said. “The Constitution doesn’t lay out that journalists have any special privileges. The first amendment applies to citizens and journalists alike.”
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“Somebody who is doing journalism activities is a journalist,” he said.
If Brantley wants a definitive answer, Stewart said, he would likely have to sue.
For now, Brantley is focused on workarounds. He files requests from many different email addresses, including his mom’s and sister’s.
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Brantley has also been posting the text of requests he wants to submit on Facebook. He asks his army of followers to file them on his behalf and report back what they find.