Statehouse in Austin Could Be Scene
of Next Trump Riots Based on FBI Info

Patrick Runs Risk of Mob Revenge with Admission

Mike Hailey
Capitol Inside
January 11, 2021

The Texas Legislature convenes in regular session on Tuesday at a Capitol that could be the target for a violent attack by President Donald Trump allies in the Boogaloo movement this weekend based on FBI warnings of coordinated strikes around the country as a follow up to the failed coup in Washington D.C. last week.

Governor Greg Abbott and GOP legislative leaders haven't indicated whether they plan to tighten security at the statehouse in Austin as a proactive move aimed at preventing a replay of the riots that Trump incited at the nation's Capitol in one of the most shocking and disgraceful displays of sedition in American history.

Abbott and the Republicans who control both chambers in Austin spent more than six months trying to lead constituents to believe that socialist extremists from the Antifa and Black Lives Matter movements had been responsible for protests and rioting in Texas cities last spring.

Some Texas Republicans who had roles in the insurrection like Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton claimed that Antifa engineered the assault on the nation's Capitol before the FBI found no evidence whatsoever to support the red herring allegation. The top Texas lawyer and his wife State Senator Angela Paxton of McKinney appeared together in an attempt to fire up the mob that killed five people including a police officer at the nation's Capitol less than a week ago.

U.S. Senator Ted Cruz - a Texas Republican who had a major supporting role in the insurrection - spent a considerable sum of taxpayer money last year leading a subcommittee probe into alleged Antifa activity while ignoring the dangerous fringe elements within his own party.

But the Republicans who still rule in Austin have an opportunity to show Texans that they've learned from their shamed allies' mistakes with the way they choose to confront the threat of violence that the FBI has discovered the Trump Boogaloos plotting to unleash in armed marches at state capitols on Sunday.

Abbott and the Republicans could gamble that the Texas Capitol is safe without added security precautions as the largest state on the losing side in November. The FBI has identified Minnesota and Michigan as the states where federal agents have evidence of credible threats based on information from collaborative sources.

But the FBI says that Boogaloos are planning protests six days from now at capitols in all 50 states - and Austin could be more vulnerable in the wake of Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick's admission on Sunday that Trump supporters were the chief culprits in the attack in Washington.

Abbott has been claiming in recent months that Austin is one of the nation's most dangerous cities based on a reform plan that city council here approved in August in a move that the governor has falsely portrayed as a vote to defund the police. Abbott has been playing on Antifa fears to promote a plan to put the Department of Public Safety in charge of law enforcement in the Texas Capital City.

But the FBI has confirmed that the Trump far right poses the most dangerous threat to the Lone Star State.

more to come ...