Texas GOP Sen. John Cornyn on Thursday stated the FBI will seek out the Texas Democratic lawmakers who fled the Lone Star State to stop Republicans from passing an undemocratic gerrymander of Texas’ congressional districts.
“I am proud to announce that Director Kash Patel has approved my request for the F.B.I. to assist state and local law enforcement in locating runaway Texas House Democrats,” Cornyn stated in an announcement, referring to a letter he despatched to Patel on Tuesday asking for the FBI to become involved in returning the Democratic lawmakers. “I thank President Trump and Director Patel for supporting and swiftly acting on my call for the federal government to hold these supposed lawmakers accountable.”
Sen. John Cornyn
After all, Texas Democratic lawmakers usually are not committing a federal crime by leaving the state to disclaim Republicans a quorum, which successfully blocks the GOP’s try to rig the state’s congressional districts to offer Republicans an extra 5 seats at Expensive Chief Donald Trump’s behest.
“The key question here is on what grounds would the FBI be doing this. What is the crime they are investigating? The FBI can’t just use its vast surveillance powers to locate random citizens. In fact, that’s what conservatives have long been so concerned about re [Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act] authorities,” MSNBC justice correspondent Ken Dilanian wrote in a publish on X.
“There actually is not any federal legislation relevant to this case, none they will say that they’re sending F.B.I.,” Pritzker said, adding that Republicans are “grandstanding.”
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But that hasn’t stopped Cornyn and different Republicans from making an attempt to threaten the Democratic lawmakers with every thing from arrest to expulsion from workplace.
Cornyn clearly has ulterior motives right here. He’s dealing with an existential menace to his political future in subsequent yr’s U.S. Senate major, with polls displaying him presently in a detailed battle with Texas Lawyer Common Ken Paxton.
Paxton is working towards Cornyn by saying he’s not sufficiently conservative or loyal to Trump, with Paxton stalking Trump to try to get a failed endorsement. So Cornyn getting the FBI concerned to attempt to get Trump the end result he desires out of Texas’ congressional maps is probably going his means of making an attempt to beat again these allegations. That makes Cornyn’s request to sic the FBI on Democratic lawmakers much more abhorrent, as he’s weaponizing federal legislation enforcement for his personal political acquire.
Democrats lambasted the weaponization of the FBI.
“This isn’t about ‘locating’ anyone—they’re not hiding. It’s about silencing dissent and weaponizing law enforcement,” former Rep. Colin Allred (D-TX), who’s working for Senate in 2026, wrote in a publish on X. “Cornyn is deputizing the FBI and Paxton is trying to expel lawmakers because they’re both too weak and corrupt to stand up to Washington. Enough is enough—Texans deserve better.”
“One big problem here—what is the crime? If leaving Texas is a crime, like Cornyn implies, the FBI needs to go get Cancun Cruz first,” Rep. Gwen Moore (D-WI) wrote in a publish on X, referring to Texas GOP Sen. Ted Cruz, who was bestowed the nickname after he fled Texas amid lethal winter energy outages in 2021.
This isn’t the one time Trump and the GOP have reverted to fascist ways. In June, Trump despatched within the army to police protesters demonstrating towards the fascist Immigration and Customs Enforcement raids.
In the end, Democrats stated they’re undeterred by the most recent undemocratic actions of Trump and the GOP.
“Shouldn’t the F.B.I. be tracking down terrorists, drug traffickers and child predators?” Home Minority Chief Hakeem Jeffries stated in a publish on X. “The Trump administration continues to weaponize law enforcement to target political adversaries. These extremists don’t give a damn about public safety. We will not be intimidated.”
