Good morning,

Many of the foolish decisions in the American government arise from the simple fact that too many politicians have too little fear of the voters and taxpayers. More on that to close out the week.

But first, this is the Texas Minute for Friday, May 24, 2024.

– Michael Quinn Sullivan 

DPS Arrests 57 Illegal Aliens for Criminal Trespass in Maverick County

• Over a 24-hour period this week, 57 illegal aliens were arrested by officers with the Texas Department of Public Safety. Will Biagini has the details.
        
• The group consisted of 42 males and 15 females. They came from Cuba, Columbia, Peru, Honduras, Ecuador, the Dominican Republic, and Nicaragua. 
     
• This comes as illegal border crossings in Maverick County have increased, and DPS continues to apprehend small groups of illegal aliens.
      
• Human smugglers have also started using guerrilla-style tactics of transporting illegal aliens across the border. For example, a DPS drone captured footage of a smuggling guide leading a group of aliens across the Rio Grande with a ladder carried via raft.

Gov. Abbott Joins Other Republican Governors in Opposing World Health Organization Treaty

• Texas Gov. Greg Abbott has joined 23 fellow Republican governors in opposition to a proposed “Pandemic Agreement.” As Sydnie Henry reports, this proposal would grant the World Health Organization “unprecedented and unconstitutional powers over the United States and its people.”
       
• In their letter addressed to President Joe Biden, Abbott and his colleagues say the proposal essentially strips elected officials of their role in setting public health policies and would compel citizens to comply with WHO directives.
      
• The Republican governors write that the proposal would give unelected and unaccountable WHO officials "the authority to restrict the rights of U.S. citizens, including freedoms such as speech, privacy, travel, choice of medical care, and informed consent, thus violating our Constitution’s core principles.”

LGBT Group to Host All-ages Events in Denton

• A group called PriDenton is planning to host multiple LGBT events in the City of Denton throughout June, several targeting children. Emily Medeiros has the story.
    
• Some of the events will be on city property, including the “Big Gay Swim” and “PriDenton Night Out Near the Square,” both of which will be hosted at the Denton Civic Center. Their first event is the “Pride Path” and will take place on June 1 at the Denton County Courthouse.

North Texas Teacher Arrested for Assaulting 4-year-old Child

• With the school year almost over, a North Texas teacher is facing a felony charge for assaulting a pre-K student. The alleged incident took place in the Princeton Independent School District last November, but the teacher was arrested only this week.
    
• Linda Dueer was allegedly caught on video swinging a 4-year-old student into a wall and slapping him. The boy's parents were shown the video shortly after the incident and assumed law enforcement was being involved. In fact, police were not notified until the parents filed a report weeks later.
      
• Princeton police referred the case to a grand jury, which indicted Dueer on a third-degree felony charge of injury to a child.

Analysis: Texans for Lawsuit Reform PAC Spends Big to Save Incumbents

• Establishment groups are out in force ahead of the Republican primary runoff election next week, spending big to keep additional incumbents from succumbing to challenges from the right. Daniel Greer analyzed the spending.
    
• The establishment juggernaut Texans for Lawsuit Reform is spending heavily on a handful of primary runoff races, mostly to defend incumbents from conservative challengers.
      
• For example, TLR has donated $68,000 to embattled House Speaker Dade Phelan (R-Beaumont) in his runoff election against David Covey. 

Friday Reflection
Fearing Correctly

Fear is powerful. Improperly applied, fear can cause us to make irrational choices without thinking.

The difference is what we fear. As Proverbs 9:10 states, “Fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom.”

A healthy fear is critical to success in all facets of life. Of course, it is very easy to fear the wrong things, leading to poor outcomes.

We need not look any further than politics. I have come to believe that many of the foolish decisions in American government arise from the simple fact that too many politicians have too little fear of the voters and taxpayers.

Consider specifically at the Texas Legislature. The politicians have for too long very clearly feared the lobbyists, bureaucrats, and even their colleagues more than they fear their voters and taxpayers at home.

If this were not so, for example, they would have rushed to end the corporate welfare programs opposed by both parties and overwhelming majorities of citizens. Instead, Republican and Democrat lawmakers have yet again fallen over each other in finding new ways to siphon cash from the taxpayers’ wallets into the pockets of corporate cronies.

Similarly, Republicans would have banned the lobby-endorsed practice of appointing Democrats to chair key legislative committees rather than lie to their constituents about the process.

And yet those politicians, those lobbyists, those corporate cronies… they are all just taking advantage of the sycophantic culture we as voters have allowed to fester. If politicians feared the voters more than the lobbyists and their corrupt colleagues, Texas would be different. Texas would be better.

Corporate welfare simply wouldn’t exist. School choice would have been established. Property taxes would be significantly lower if not abolished. Taxpayer-funded lobbying would have been banned. And Democrats would no longer control vast swaths of legislative power in the GOP-dominated chamber.

All that would have happened already if the politicians feared the citizens more than each other and their lobbyist pals. Why don’t they? That is our fault.

As citizens, we have failed to inspire sufficient fear in our elected servants. We fawn over “our party’s” politicians like royalty. We’ve allowed them to think they, rather than the citizens, are masters of this republic.

Too many citizens fail to even participate in elections. And even fewer of our neighbors bother to take the steps necessary to hold politicians truly accountable for their actions and inactions. The downward spiral of cause and effect blur, with the result being lawmakers who don’t sufficiently fear the citizenry.

It’s up to us, as citizens, to inspire greater fear in our elected servants than the lobby and the bureaucracy. Rather than accept table scraps, we must unwaveringly demand that politicians seek the voters’ approval and the voters’ approval alone.

The future of our republic depends on it.

Quote-Unquote

"Where the people fear the government you have tyranny. Where the government fears the people you have liberty."

– John Basil Barnhill