Texas Republicans are going all in on the “invasion” rhetoric similar to that espoused by gunmen in multiple mass shootings, including the man accused of killing 10 people in a Buffalo grocery store on Saturday.
Citing a handful of instances in which alleged cartel members have fired weapons or been seen with them on the border, a dozen Texans in Congress, led by U.S. Rep. Troy Nehls of Richmond, signed a letter to President Joe Biden on Thursday saying the president is “failing to uphold this Constitutional duty to secure our border from invasion.”
It points to the guarantee clause of the Constitution, which says the United States “shall guarantee to every state in this union a republican form of government, and shall protect each of them against invasion.”
Andrew Thompson, an assistant professor of political science at George Washington University, said research has shown those sorts of claims can erode faith in the democratic system, especially among Republican voters who believe the system is rigged against them.
“They view their own party to be at a potential defificit in the future. They view Democrats to be at a numerical advantage on an electoral level,” Thompson said. “The tension here is short-term gain that might be allotted for, let’s say the midterms, with the erosion of democracy. There’s a real tension between these two sorts of things.”