Governor Greg Abbott hailed Donald Trump as an American legend on Saturday night after the former president survived an attempted assassination at a campaign rally in Pennsylvania where he was shot by an apparent sniper in the ear lobe while he spoke. But Abbott may have been the only politician in Texas and beyond to celebrate Trump's survival with a stab at poetry in a post on X.
They try to jail him.
They try to kill him.
It will not work.
He is indomitable.
As Abbott made his debut as a poet with the floating of the conspiracy theory, the FBI revealed on Sunday that the would-be assassin was registered as a Republican in the Quaker State. Trump's other top Texas allies declined in the immediate wake of the attack to echo Abbott's rhythmical insinuations on forces behind the latest mass shooting in a country immersed in gun violence.
Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick sent a text to Trump on Saturday night that portrayed the ex-president's emergence from the shocking event with only minor wounds as as a miracle from the heavens. Attorney General Ken Paxton responded in a post on X post that sought to assure Americans that Trump had the country's back in turn.
But Texas Agriculture Commissioner Sid Miller's reaction to the attempt on Trump's life was more intriguing and insightful than the other high-ranking Texans' rhetorical responses to the attack combined. That's because Miller was just feet away from Trump when gunfire erupted and the ruler of the Republican Party grabbed his ear before dropping to the ground.
Miller said he stayed on his feet until realized that others around him had been hit as well. "I stayed up looking for the shooter trying to help the Secret Service," Miller told the Houston Chronicle last night. "I didn't duck down until I saw that the person behind me had been shot."
Miller acknolwedged that he could have been shot and should have been more careful. "I look back on it now and I should have ducked down like everyone else," Miller said. "It probably wasn't my smartest move, but in my mind, I knew they weren't shooting at me. I was trying to be helpful."
Patrick - the Texas campaign chairman for Trump - gave the Christian god that he and Trump worship as protestants exclusive credit for the fact that he wasn't killed.
"By the slightest turn of your head in a mere microsecond or the shield of a teleprompter, your life was spared by the Grace of a Merciful and Holy God," Patrick marveled on X. "I shared with you not long ago, on our flight to Houston, that God has had his hand on you since you first ran for President. That I believe. No man could survive all you have been through without the Grace of God upon you."
Paxton arguably has been Trump's favorite Texan since the state lawyer tried without success to overturn the 2020 election on the Republican's behalf at the U.S. Supreme Court. The Texas AG pinned the case on the same lies on massive voter fraud that Trump's lawyers concocted in a failed bid to reverse President Joe Biden's victory at the polls in the courts. Paxton was more judicious with words in his reaction to the assassination attempt.
"Trump has you America!" Paxton tweeted last night.
The FBI identified the shooter as Thomas Matthew Crooks, a 20-year-old resident of Bethel Park - a Pennsylvania city about 35 miles from Butler where the abbreviated rally took place. Crooks died at the scene along with at least one other person who attended the event. Authorities said another bystander was seriously injured in the attack.
The revelations on Crooks as a card-carrying member of the GOP blew a hole through Abbott's conspiracy on "they" as the force behind the botched assassination. But Abbott could take some consolation based on the apparent fact that the attempted assassin had contributed to a political action committee that backs Democratic candidates despite his formal affiliation with the GOP.
more to come ...
