Texas Gov. Greg Abbott has been threatening to arrest and/or fire Democratic state legislators who fled the state to prevent a quorum and block passage of a new gerrymandering scheme to create five new Republican congressional district. The Dems have gone to friendly blue states where governors are open to doing their own retaliatory redistricting plans, like New York, California, and Illinois, where Gov. JB Pritzker has not only offered about 30 of them a place to stay, but may or may not be helping to finance the walkout, seeing as how he’s a billionaire and all. (The Hill says he is; Pritzker tells Politico that he hasn’t “written a check or supported them financially, though I am not reticent to do so.”)
On Tuesday, Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas), who is a federal lawmaker and not the boss of the FBI or the Texas Lege, called for the FBI to go round up the Texas Dems and arrest them, even though he knows damn well that the FBI doesn’t arrest people over state civil matters, and that the Democrats haven’t broken any federal law. Donald Trump, who doesn’t know anything at all, agreed that the FBI “may have to” get involved.
Pritzker has been making the rounds of media outlets to make clear that he’s exactly the kind of fighter for democracy that Democrats have been telling pollsters they like; he told NPR yesterday that he isn’t askeered of any silly Texas Republicans flapping their gums about arresting people.
“There are no federal laws involved here, so this is just a threat, an empty threat. You know, they think they can intimidate these lawmakers into going back home. They have no plans to go back home until they know that there’s going to be a fair process to deliver emergency funding for the victims of the floods and not make it about redistricting.”
Pritzker also told Meidas Touch that he’s happy to have Texas and federal lawmen come to Illinois to “take in the great views and enjoy the incredible restaurants we have. But they won’t be taking anyone home with them, or out of the state,” which is a pretty good way to deliver a very hospitable “fuck you.”
In that interview, Pritzker also repeated his condemnation of an unnamed “right-wing podcaster” who had videotaped himself at the hotel where the legislators were, including a map with its location, the night before a bomb threat against the hotel. The very best people.
Pritzker even went on the Late Show with Stephen Colbert last night to say the threats by Greg Abbott and Texas state AG Ken Paxton (who clumsily and hilariously avoided a process server himself a few years back) aren’t scaring anyone, and to explain why the power grab in Texas is very bad for democracy. Enjoy!
Colbert at one point showed Pritzker a couple of very oddly shaped districts in Illinois and asked, “Since all states to a certain extent do this, why is what Texas is doing particularly egregious in this case?” Pritzker joked that obviously a kindergarten class had been the “independent commission” who drew the districts, and got back to the main point: Texas isn’t merely gerrymandering, it’s just plain not playing by the rules.
“Every 10 years we do a Census in this country, and right after the Census we redraw districts in every state. But what the Republicans are trying to do, and the Texas Republicans, frankly, at the behest of Donald Trump, are doing it mid-decade. That is extraordinarily rare.”
Pritzker also pointed out — as he has in every speech on the Texas scheme — that Texas is also breaking up Black and Brown districts to achieve its gerrymander, which from the boos that erupted, suggested to us that the audience didn’t include a lot of US Supreme Court members or their billionaire friends. If you want to see the rest of the interview, here it is, though the Texas stuff was all in the first part. (Good joke about how he’s likely to be the first Illinois Democratic governor to finish two full terms — assuming Trump doesn’t find a way to sent him to prison in El Salvador.)
So hell yes, JB Pritzker is fighting back against the authoritarianism that’s taken over the Republican Party, and he’s rightly being seen as a model of solidarity with embattled Democrats in red states.
Fun Fact that isn’t fun in any sense of the word: Since the Supremes overturned Roe v. Wade, Illinois last year was where fully a quarter of red-state residents seeking abortions traveled to get care. It’s the freaking abortion refugee hub of the nation. Similarly, Illinois is also among the top states welcoming trans folks who have fled red states that are trying to erase them. Says Noah Berlatsky,
The federal government’s rabid anti trans stance under Trump means even trans people in Illinois face difficulties getting health care and finding jobs. But my own trans daughter says that the efforts by the state make a real difference—not least because it creates the conditions for a thriving trans community, and has made it easier for people to support each other without fear of being targeted by the authorities.
This matters, all of it, because, he says, “as Pritzker knows, our neighbor’s mess is our mess too. Texas’ attack on democracy is going to affect the composition of the House, and that affects everyone in the country.”
And let me tell you, as a progressive living in the bluish island of Boise, surrounded by the scarlet horror that’s Idaho, knowing that there are real allies in the Free States means a hell of a lot. I see it every single time Rachel Maddow shows the big crowds in Boise during her roundups of local protests against the fascist. We may not all live in the same places, but those of us who want to kick Trump and Trumpism to the curb are the majority of Americans, and it’s good to have these reminders.
Greg Abbott Gonna Teach Texas Democrats A Lesson About Trying To Fight Back
Texas AG Ken Paxton Bravely Flees Subpoena, Because Something Something Pro-Choice Violence
[The Hill / Politico / NPR / Everything is Terrible]
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