Republican Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick unabashedly hyped the white supremacist “Great Replacement” theory on Thursday night, ominously warning Fox News viewers that Democrats are using immigrants to “take over our country without firing a shot.”
Appearing on Fox News’ The Ingraham Angle, Patrick discussed Texas Gov. Greg Abbott’s emergency order shutting down six points of entry along the southern border amid a renewed surge in migrants. In the border community of Del Rio, U.S. Border Patrol says there are more than 9,000 migrants crowded into a temporary staging area, with thousands more expected to cross the border soon.
It didn’t take long for the lieutenant governor to liken the massive wave of migrants to an invasion of the country and the destruction of the GOP.
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“Let me tell you something, Laura, and everyone watching: The revolution has begun,” Patrick told Fox News host Laura Ingraham. “A silent revolution by the Democrat Party and [President] Joe Biden to take over the country.”
Calling on “every red state” to invoke Article IV, Section 4 of the Constitution—which guarantees the nation “shall protect” each state from being invaded—Patrick said that an invasion is defined as “an unauthorized, uninvited, unwelcome incursion” into a territory.
“This is not authorized by the state of Texas, it is not welcomed by the state of Texas or any other Republican state I know, and they are not invited,” he fumed. “Every red state should invoke this clause because every red state is being impacted and the blue states reportedly don’t care.”
At that point, Patrick then went full “Great Replacement” theory, which has been described as a “white supremacist tenet that the white race is in danger by a rising tide of non-white” and a belief that liberals are replacing white voters with Black and brown immigrants.
“When I say a revolution has begun, they are allowing this year probably 2 million—that is who we apprehended, maybe another million—into this country,” Patrick dramatically exclaimed. “At least in 18 years, even if they all don’t become citizens before then and can vote, in 18 years every one of them has two or three children, you’re talking about millions and millions and millions of new voters, and they will thank the Democrats and Biden for bringing them here.”
He added: “Who do you think they are going to vote for? So this is trying to take over our country without firing a shot. That is what is happening.”
Patrick concluded the interview by saying “this is denying us our government that’s run by our citizens with illegals who are here, who are gonna take our education, our healthcare.”
The conservative Texan is essentially echoing the same extreme rhetoric—which has been the inspiration behind several racist mass shootings—that’s become increasingly common on Fox News and within the Republican Party.
Fox News star Tucker Carlson, for one, has repeatedly advanced the replacement theory, prompting the Anti-Defamation League to call for his firing this past spring. The network, however, waved off the ADL’s complaint and stood fully behind its host.
