Two decades after Texas Gov. George W. Bush was elected president on a “compassionate conservative” platform, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott is going out of his way to stress uncompassionate conservatism.
The latest (and arguably lowest) example occurred on Sunday, when Abbott described a slaughtered family of five as “illegal immigrants.” (It should be noted, at least one of the victims may have been a permanent U.S. resident.)
By stressing the citizenship status of the victims, Abbott—who was announcing a $50,000 reward for information about the alleged gunman—seemed to be suggesting that their lives didn’t matter as much as the lives of real Americans. As Shannon Watts, founder of Moms Demand Action, tweeted, it felt like an attempt to “dehumanize the victims.”
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In case you missed the story, the details are important: On Friday, a family of five—including an eight-year-old boy!—was massacred execution-style. The shootings reportedly occurred after the victims asked their neighbor to quit firing his AR-15 in his front yard, because it was keeping their baby awake.
According to police, the neighbor had been drinking, and said, “I’ll do what I want to in my front yard.”
Evil people do evil things. But you might expect elected officials to respond with more humanity.
Keep in mind that this isn’t some fringe right-wing yahoo on the internet we’re talking about; it’s the governor of Texas.
Abbott is 65 years old. According to his official website, he was also the “longest-serving Attorney General in Texas History” and his wife is the granddaughter of Mexican immigrants.
This is someone who clearly ought to know better.
What is more, it’s not like Abbott made a mistake or simply misspoke. His extraneous description of the victims was written in a prepared statement (and he mentioned it again in the tweet where the statement was embedded).
It’s worth asking why the governor of Texas would go out of his way to stress the victims’ immigration status. I think there are a couple possible answers—none of which are acceptable.
The first possibility is that it was strategic and partisan. Issues have built-in skews. So if we’re talking about mass shootings, Republicans are losing. But if we’re talking about illegal immigration, Republicans are winning. Ergo, it makes sense to frame the shooting in a way that says, “Guns don’t kill people, illegal immigrants kill people!”
Truth be told, Abbott could have advanced this narrative more effectively by stressing the fact that the alleged shooter was an illegal immigrant. Indeed, stressing the alleged shooter’s undocumented status (which, to be fair, Abbott notes in his statement), while downplaying the victims’ status, might have been even more useful—if his goal were to change the subject.
That’s why there is a second, even more cynical, explanation: Abbott (who has flirted with running for president, but seems unlikely to do so in 2024) realizes that the way to get ahead in the Republican Party is to be the biggest asshole possible.
In other words, Abbott’s audience is not you or me—or even the people of Texas. No, Abbott’s target audience is the national Republican base.
And what does today’s Republican base crave, nay, demand? As Adam Serwer says, “The cruelty is the point.”
This sort of performative nastiness is consistent with a governor who bussed migrants from Texas to Washington, D.C., on Christmas Eve, and wants to pardon a man who was convicted of murdering a Black Lives Matter protester.
Now, maybe only a morally bankrupt person would put political ambition ahead of decency at a time like this. But the truth is that Abbott is merely responding to the same incentives that have led so many modern Republicans to act like jerks. This is a systemic problem.
Ideally, political leaders would be authentically compassionate. Absent that, we might hope for a culture that demands they at least act humane. Today, we have entered a much more perverse environment, where Republican leaders must be mean—or at least pretend to be.
I mean, a family of five was murdered—including a child!—and the Republican governor of Texas wants to, apropos of nothing, stress their immigration status?
Perhaps I should be angry, but at this point, I am simply depressed. Could it be that the Republican Party is now completely and irreversibly committed to heartless culture war conservatism?
Don’t answer that question.
In case there was ever a doubt, Abbott’s behavior is proof that, pace George W. Bush, the GOP’s family values do stop at the Rio Grande.
