If you are slow to believe that the Republican Party is a death cult despite all the evidence then maybe this story will enlighten you. Texas is seemingly the blueprint for two competing ideas. On the one hand, Texas is a state ripe for Democratic takeover. Since 2008, Texas has moved closer to being a blue state. Biden lost the state by less than 6%. On the other hand, Texas is also the Republican blueprint for how to create chaos and destruction in your electorate. Case in point, Gov. Dumbfuq Abbott has signed several laws over the past year. One law puts a near total ban on abortions into effect. And bonus, the state is giving people financial incentives to report folks who may have assisted a woman in getting an abortion. Abbott also passed an insane gun law that allows people in Texas to get carry a gun without a permit or background check. (Just yesterday there was an attempted murder and a murder on my street from road rage.) Now Abbott, despite being vaccinated and getting COVID in August, just signed an executive order that will restrict any entity including private businesses from imposing COVID vaccine mandates on their customers and employees. This move goes against the Republican philosophy of restricting government from meddling in private business. Below are a few more details via CNBC:
“The COVID-19 vaccine is safe, effective, and our best defense against the virus, but should remain voluntary and never forced,” said Abbott said in a statement.
Abbott, a Republican, said in his order that it was prompted by the Biden administration’s vaccine federal mandate, which the governor called federal overreach.
President Joe Biden announced a mandate last month requiring companies with 100 or more employees to ensure that their workforces are vaccinated or regularly tested. The Labor Department has yet to release details of the emergency rule, but Biden last week called on companies to act now and not to wait for the requirement to go into effect.
Abbott, who tested positive for Covid in August, has also resisted mask mandates and requiring proof of vaccination in the state. The state has continued to experience a rise in cases and crowded hospitals, prompting the governor to invest in monoclonal antibody infusion centers.
In Monday’s order, Abbott also sent a memo to the chief clerk of the state House of Representatives and the secretary of the state Senate requesting to codify the mandate in a bill. The governor said the order will be rescinded when the GOP-controlled legislature passes the bill.
What is happening in Texas is a literal warning to the rest of the U.S. how quickly things can go downhill when you have the wrong politicians in office. Now this fool is making it acceptable for people to come breathe their COVID germs on everyone. It is like Abbott and by extension the Republican party are trying to kill as many people as possible through neglect and irresponsibility. Abbott is also trying to implement laws that won’t allow schools to implement mask and vaccine mandates. Several school districts across the state have put up a fight though. What is even more insane is that the hill that Republicans are willing to die on is killing them. I have a feeling that there will be maskholes running around screaming in people’s faces and starting brawls. Because of course, Texas. As a Texan, I stay in a constant state of rage at how badly the state is being run under Abbott’s eye.
Photos credit: Avalon.red and via Instagram
It’s amazing how the GOP has managed to convince so many people that they are the party of small government….rank hypocrites.
Party of small government and the “pro-life” party. No on both accounts.
And the party of bitter spite! My goodness,the debt ceiling– they’d rather the usa default than stand w any democrat. This would have been a global economic catastrophe. THEY are the treasonous ones!
Why aren’t these people in jail???!
Boycott Texas. I cancelled a convention in San Antonio last month. AT&T is funding this travesty with large donations to the Texas GOP. Cancel your service and let them know why. They suck donkey dick anyways. There are better and cheaper options out there.
I am a Texan and I just continually horrified at the decisions he’s made that actively harm his constituents in a very visible way. Is he TRYING to kill us all???
2022 can’t come soon enough. I hope to campaign for Beto. Abbott’s time is up. I hope people remember his poor decisions (ice storm, the border, covid and covid, etc) next year. This is the opposite of Republican small government.
Abby, l agree with you. Abbott is only doing this because he is fighting Allen West and someone else in the GOP primary. I cannot wait to vote for Beto governor.
My theory is that they have enough voters in rural and richer suburban areas that they don’t need to worry about declining votes. It’s the same thing with MO – our most populated cities vote blue, but we are outnumbered by the rest of the state.
Keep up the good fight y’all. ❤️
I always wonder what happens to these people on their death beds – do they look back and deeply regret that they choose evil to line their own pockets, do they regret the active, aggressive actions to actually hurt people so that they can retain power by courting ignorance and racism? I have to think that they know what they’re trading their integrity for.
@ Abby, I am on the same boat as you. I am disgusted by the actions of Abbott, Paxton, and the remaining Texas Repugnant’s. It’s disgusting on so many levels, yet he keeps creating new scenarios that are worse than the last!!
There was an article in the Texas Tribune, that political watchers, or specialist in politics, that Abbott and DeSantis are having a public pissing match, as to how many laws and orders. They are suggesting that the two of them are trying to out douche/dirtbag/scumbag each other. I have to agree with their analysis.
Yeah for sure. I also think they both might actually want to run for president…
Same. We can turn Texas.
It’s insane. Someone posted a meme right after the abortion law was passed that said, “turning in your neighbors for money is straight up Nazi with a touch of Judas.”
I live in a total bubble and it’s all that is keeping me sane right now. My neighborhood is 200% vaccinated (meaning we have more vaccinated people than actually live here…I live in the med center and some people probably put down the zip code where they work and not live, which means the data is a bit wonky, but the net net is everyone around me is vaccinated). My daughters’ schools require masks (our district is one of those completely defying Abbott). My employer requires vaccines and negative Covid tests to show up at our training facilities. My sons’ universities require the vaccine and have had very very few Covid cases. I’ve yet to see a single person openly carrying a firearm. MY world is ok, which lets me pretend that TX hasn’t lost its ever loving mind. But it has.
Vote, vote, vote and vote some more.
Right there in the bubble with you. I live near the med center, not in it, but my neighborhood is probably 95% vaccinated. There might be some old holdouts, who knows. I walk by one little house with my dog sometimes, about two blocks away from where I live, that still has a Trump 2020 sign. Otherwise, nothing.
I get around the city quite a bit but I’ve never seen anyone carrying a gun either, than I can remember. But my God, just knowing Abbot is in charge makes me lose sleep. I do love watching Lina Hidalgo being interviewed on MSNBC. That young woman is impressive. Thank God she is on our side and fighting the good fight for Houston and Harris County.
@ Mcmmom, can I come live with you?
I wish we could move, but my husbands business is so deeply rooted in this area and he would have an extremely hard time selling it. I would give anything to move out of this state.
But we have decided to move to Colorado for retirement, or Sedona.
re Sedona – just remember, Ducey is quieter than DeSantis and Abbott but same policies, etc. AZ’s covid death numbers are horrific – and most days it feels like most Arizonans are just ignoring it.
Every day I have more respect for my neighbor’s decision to leave her husband’s truck prominently displayed outside their house since he died of COVID in January. It may or may not be her intention, but to me it’s a reminder that, unless I choose not to look, I see every time I leave my house.
I’m also deeply rooted by work in this area so I can’t leave until I retire. I also feel though that I need to stay. I won’t be driven out of my state by the assholes. I will work to make change.
Any private company that works for the federal government is required to vaccinate any employee that steps foot on federal property. Those companies that have contracts with the federal government are quite numerous including big name companies. They can get around Abbott’s idiotic mandate easily.
As usual, it’s the schools and small businesses that will suffer from Abbott’s latest attempt to appease the crazy MAGAs.
There are tons of shining examples of evil in this world, but this m-fucker keeps saying, “Hold my beer” as he strives for the most evil.
He is literally the worst
I still think we should just airlift all the sane people and minorities out of Texas (and the entire South, really), and let them secede. I don’t know how much it would really help to elect Democrats at this point, I think they might be too far gone. I mean, it’s not enough for them to die on this hill, they’re willing to sacrifice THEIR OWN CHILDREN. They almost INVITE mass shootings. They’re offering fucking bounties to encourage people to narc on desperate women! How do you even begin to get through to people like that?
I live in GA and we are just getting started and not giving up.
My joking about secession aside, thank you for not giving up, and I very much hope that you and the other people working so hard will prevail. GA is kind of a personal matter for me, because my dad was a civil rights activist and member of CORE back in the ’60s, and chose to attend law school in GA in order to be closer to the action. He and my godfather, a Black man originally from MS who was attending Morehouse back then, get very emotional over GA’s blatant attempts to suppress the Black vote. So yes, please, keep fighting! Activists like them are getting older, and they shouldn’t have to worry that their efforts were ultimately for nothing.
I think we should airlift MORE into Texas, lol
The sane people are a (voter suppressed) majority. The Texas AG admitted that without their voter suppression last election, Texas would have gone for Biden.
And, my personal hobby horse is that the GOP has been changing votes for almost 20 years. What else explains the “red shift” in polling all the time? I have more circumstantial evidence, but we need not to write off states that are very obviously blue.
They just proposed gerrymandering my district in Texas in the most bizarre way to make sure we are now always red. Even though there’s a big blue growth in the suburb here.
Me! I want to be airlifted outta here! I’m in TX and I’m ready ta goooo
Just stop. We don’t want to leave our home. We love our state. We want to fix it. I hate secede jokes.
I apologize, I didn’t mean any offense, but I can see that it was rather thoughtless on my part. I’m just genuinely worried that things are beyond fixing there, with everything being rigged against progress, but obviously I hope I’m wrong and that you guys can still save your state from the forces of evil (a description of the Republicans which I don’t think is even hyperbole anymore).
You just can’t make this 💩 up. Texas is far from the only open carry state, see most of the south , Midwest and western , north western states…
Now the abortion and vaccine stuff … killing off your own base is an interesting strategy.
I despise this man. Utterly despise him
My former boss, who’s a staunch liberal Texan, tells me, that it doesn’t matter if the Governor is rethuglican or Democrat, the state level representatives are mainly conservative rethugs. They’ll block any reforms a Demo governor will make to the state of Texas. What’s the point? I’m doom and gloom this morning, sorry, because the rethugs and their unholy turtle mutant leader McConnell along with sell-their-souls-to-the-highest-bidder Manchin and Sinema are holding this country hostage by trying to block much needed legislation (e.g. infrastructure, voting rights) in order to sabotage Biden. McConnell and the rethugs will do anything to regain power. I’m in mood this morning.
For all the Virginia fans out there, please remember to vote in the Governors race. We need to keep Virginia blue.
@ Mireille, it’s sad to say, but you are right. McConnel has proven himself to be a constant blocker of every Democrat President. The utter fact that he publicly stated during Obama’s term, that he would fight, and block any and every attempt to block all of Obamas agenda programs.
It’s think that it’s unacceptable for a person to be allowed to maintain their position of a senator of either houses if you refuse to fulfill the duty of your oath, and that is exactly what Moscow Mitch has done for the past 15+ years. And Manchineel is about as much of a Democrat as I am Repugnant.
We have the same battle here in PA – the PA GOP runs the legislature and they are out & proud AHs (some of which were directly involved in the Jan 6 insurrection and were pushing to invalidate the results of the election here)
Nothing says leadership better than killing off your constituency. I think it’s going to be race of can the repress enough votes that outstrip the deaths of their voter base. 2022 mid-terms will be FASCINATING. Because I legitimately believe the Republicans are inadvertently killing off their voter base.
I suspect that they will keep suppressing votes and gerrymandering voting districts, and I am really worried about the mid-term elections.
People can’t vote if they’re dead. No matter how much you suppress or gerrymander shit. Like I said, I’m not sure which will win out.
@Snuffles I would not put it past the Republicans to have the dead people vote. They are definitely not beyond rigging and cheating an election.
According to the GOP, the dead CAN vote!
THIS ☝️☝️☝️☝️
There will be lawsuits and if the big companies push back (southwest airlines and United already have) rumor has it the big hospital systems and Amazon are going to push back as well. So hopefully it gets rescinded.
It’s just dumb the way the goalposts change all the time. Hospitals have mandated vaccines
I’m not sure he can legislate away federal law like that. Federal generally pre-empts state.
Yeah this is for show. Employers are required to comply with federal mandates generally and states can’t supersede in this instance. I guess technically this can impact employers with less than 100 employees or those who aren’t federal contractors in the state of Texas but large employers have already announced that they are ignoring Abbot and will comply with federal mandates. In addition a lot of employers have government contracts and are not trying to get cut off from that cash flow because Abbott is throwing a temper tantrum about being usurped in this space.
Hospitals use to require ‘mandate’ a tetanus shot too, I guess they cannot do that in TX now.
It can’t be enforced, but he’ll waste the people’s money litigating it so he can fanboy the ignorant and angry.
He is a terrible human and his political decisions are deadly. Good luck to the people of Texas.
Republican “logic”:
I think mandates are bad and take away freedoms … so I’m going to mandate there be no mandates and take away freedoms.
Lord my head hurts.
From a 4th generation Texan *rant begin Y’all I am moving from Houston to a town with fewer than 3,000 people. I can’t WAIT to hunker down for my coming remaining years ( currently mid-50’s) , in a city that provides many of its own resources (rural, farm) instead of in a city of 6 million people competing for resources AND dependent on those resources being brought in through other clearly vulnerable supply chains. My “child of the cold war” self sees such a breakdown in society happening around us, and the foreign threats that have ramped up (mostly as a result of our bull headed obsession to lord over the rest of the planet, but I digress), and I am terrified for our collective futures. Climate change. Clean water. Clean Air. Corporate accountability for chemical superfund sites. Bodily Autonomy. Voter suppression. Y’all, we are in TROUBLE. *Ends rant
I’ll be visiting Texas for the first time next week. I am excited to see San Antonio but also feel like maybe I should spend my travel money in another state. I hope dem’s in Texas throw this bum out.
Why are the GOP intent on killing off their base? I know it’s because they don’t believe it will happen to them, for various reasons (sky daddy chief among them), but the data is clear. It’s the unv’d who are dying in hospital or surviving with irreversible and life-long physical and mental side effects.
Don’t worry, they’ll make up for it by Gerrymandering and finding new ways to prevent minorities from voting.
What happened to the supposed conservative position of “small government”?
Is there a single example in the US of mask and vaccine mandates not working?
They are a death cult. And they call themselves “pro-life”. They also call themselves the party of family values yet they put a disgusting lecherous tater tot into the Oval Office.
I’m seething.
Republicans believe (or claim to believe) that corporations can have religious beliefs. If my company believes God wants everyone to be vaccinated, isn’t Governor Abbott infringing on my company’s religious belief?
Abbott doesn’t have a leg to stand on with this bs. Between him and Deathsantis, I’ll never spend a nickel again in either Texas and Florida.
As a Texan, I am so mad at what that man has done to the state. My husband (another Texan) and I are finally at a point where we can live where we want, thanks to working remotely- and our entire family is in Texas ( we are in MA). Abbott is literally the reason we won’t move home. He’s the worst.
Hate this fucker.
This is the ego of a man confined to a chair for 10+ years. His bitterness and anger results in lashing out against people, the environment, animal etc. He is out to ruin the state because he is ruined. He needs serious mental health treatment.