This is a fascinating development and a heartwarming one at that. Days ago a number of red state legislators and law enforcement officials went on record and made it clear that anybody protesting today would do so at their own peril. Greg Abbott went out of his way to prepare the National Guard to quash turnout in Texas on June 14, both No Kings Day and the Army’s Birthday (and yes, Wanna Be King Donald’s birthday, too.) Abbot called out an unexpectedly large number of troops, as reported by The American Statesman.

One officer told the Statesman they were shocked by the amount of people Abbott is mobilizing in Texas, saying it doesn’t make any sense to have such large numbers deployed against the citizens they are sworn to protect.

Two National Guard members told the Statesman they have deep concerns about the scale and scope of the deployment, which dwarfs Abbott’s 1,000-troop response to protests in 2020 over George Floyd’s murder by police. They spoke on the condition of anonymity because they are not authorized to speak to the media.

“I was shocked that they were mobilizing the amount of people that they were mobilizing,” one of the guardsmen, who is an officer, told the Statesman. “It doesn’t make any sense to me why we would be activated in such large numbers against the citizens we’re sworn to protect.”

The obvious play here is that Abbott is looking to intimidate people. Despite that, here’s what turnout in Dallas, of all places, looked like.

Is that not a sight for sore eyes? And so is this, in Salt Lake City, Utah, another state that went for Trump in 2024. This is not happening in California or other committed blue states, this is happening in MAGA country.

Meanwhile, this is the scene in D.C., where $45 million has been spent to salve Donald’s fragile ego.

Here’s the scene in Bozeman, Montana, yet another red state. This is particularly amazing, because certain states are “written off as red.” There aren’t too many of them, but I can tell you that Montana, Idaho and Wyoming are the main ones to have that label.

I wonder who’s going to tell Donald about this — and then duck as the ketchup bottles take wing. He’s not going to like this. And this also doesn’t bode well for the GOP as a whole. All these states, Montana, Utah and Texas have been solidly red for some time. Utah and Montana may stay that way, but the demographics are changing in Texas.

A lot of immigrants settle in Texas and if there is this level of anti-Trump, anti-fascism kind of activity, that could be real bellwether. If Texas, one of the largest states in the Union ends up going blue at some point, that would make quite a difference.

Methinks that Greg Abbott isn’t having such a terrific day today. Sad.

Help keep the site running, consider supporting.

Support the site with a subscription today and see no more ads!

Go Ad-free Now!

RELATED ARTICLESMORE FROM AUTHOR

4 COMMENTS

  2. A government of the people, by the people, for the people…it’s heartwarming to see so many patriots across the land, and the video of his gathering looks like a few chickens that are wandering in the yard.
    “success is not final…failure is not fatal…the courage to continue is all that counts”…Winston Churchill

    15

  3. Brian Allen writes: ” Dallas, deep red, oil-soaked, and MAGA-aligned is now flooded with anti-Trump protesters.”

    Not sure who this Brian Allen is from, but surely not from Texas. He seems to be thinking of the Dallas of 1963. Dallas today is a majority-Democrat city. In fact, the major cities of Texas are all majority-Democrat with the exception of Fort Worth (quite close to Dallas geographically), which is also one of the few large cities in the entire U.S. that is Republican.
    Of course the suburbs of these TX cities are more Republican, as suburbs tend to be.

    9

    • “Of course the suburbs of these TX cities are more Republican, as suburbs *stupidly and racistly* tend to be.”

      Fixed that for you.

      7

  4. I fear some rightwingdinger MAGAt loony driving a vehicle into one of these crowds. That’s how Heather Heyer, 32, was murdered at a rally in August, 2017, in Charlottesville, Virginia. Such cowardly attacks have become a hallmark of rightwing extremism since then.

LEAVE A REPLY

Please enter your comment!
Please enter your name here

The maximum upload file size: 128 MB. You can upload: image, audio, video, document, spreadsheet, interactive, text, archive, other. Links to YouTube, Facebook, Twitter and other services inserted in the comment text will be automatically embedded. Drop files here