National Guard seeks to make U.S. Capitol fortress for inauguration amid Texas governor protest. AP photo

Governor Blasts Feds and Local Police
Amid Claims on Texas Troops Offended

Mike Hailey
Capitol Inside
January 18, 2021

Governor Greg Abbott launched a bizarre attack against the Pentagon and the FBI on Monday when he claimed that National Guard members from Texas had their honor besmirched as a result of tightened security efforts for the inauguration of Joe Biden as president this week.

"This is the most offensive thing I've ever heard," Abbott snapped on Twitter.

Abbott appeared to have been shocked and offended by reports on a special vetting process for an estimated 25,000 guardsmen who are in Washington D.C. to assist federal, state and local law enforcement authorities amid unprecedented threats of violence in the aftermath of the riot that erupted after a rally for President Donald Trump there this month.

"No one should ever question the loyalty or professionalism of the Texas National Guard. @TexasGuard

"I authorized more than 1,000 to go to DC.

"I'll never do it again if they are disrespected like this," the Republican governor warned.

The angry Abbott outburst today came less than a week after he'd appeared to be annoyed with questions at a media event about the potential for Trump's impeachment in Congress on charges of inciting the insurrection that GOP grassroot militants had carried out in his name.

Abbott had blame Antifa left-wingers for violence at protests in Texas cities last spring. But the governor portrayed calls for Trump's early resignation as political gamesmanship while refusing to call out the president's base supporters who assaulted the nation's Capitol when Congress had been in the process of certifying the election results.

Abbott didn't say in the critical tweet today if he'd been aware that an undisclosed number of armed service members have been arrested in connection with their participation in the mob attack. Police in New Jersey apprehended an Army reservist for his role in the shocking act of domestic terrorism that got under way at a rally for the president on January 6.

Abbott also failed to reveal whether he realized that the president has the power to summon the National Guard to major emergencies without the need for authorizations from governors in their home states.

The Abbott venting on the Internet today was curious on multiple fronts including the implication that the sensibilities of the reservists who'd he sent to Washington as a favor were a higher priority than protecting the president and the public as the purpose of their mission there.

But Abbott's righteous indignance on the added security measures isn't the first time that the governor has been suspicious of the American military. Abbott set himself up for a deluge of mockery and criticism during his first term when he activated the guard here to monitor the so-called Jade Helm exercise that special ops forces were conducting in Texas.

Republicans on the far right here had been swapping conspiracy theories about a federal round up of conservatives who would be held in abandoned Wal-Mart stores.

Abbott has been taking pages from the Trump playbook with fear tactics, conspiracy peddling and baseless accusations about socialist invaders and voter fraud. The governor's Monday tweet simply may have been a bid for Trump base attention in anticipation of an Abbott campaign for president in 2024.