Greg Abbott's Rhetoric May Cause 'Mass Murder' Warns Civil Rights Group

A national alert issued by the League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC) is warning that Governor Greg Abbott's border rhetoric could cause a rise in hate crimes against Hispanic Americans and push people to commit "mass murders."

LULAC issued the alert on Monday, warning its members that Abbott's remarks about the crisis at the U.S.-Mexico border is "agitating people to possibly commit acts of violence and mass murder.

"We urge our members, especially those in Texas, to be on alert for armed out-of-state extremists with a hate agenda," LULAC President Domingo Garcia said in a statement.

Newsweek reached out to Abbott's office via email for comment on Monday.

Abbott has been at the forefront of the nation's immigration conversation. The governor has been embroiled in an increasingly tense standoff against the Biden administration over the influx of migrants who have arrived at the southern border since President Joe Biden entered the White House. Despite a major Supreme Court loss last week, Abbott has vowed to "continue to defend Texas' constitutional authority to secure the border."

Abbott launched an offensive on the federal government nearly two years ago when he began busing migrants to Democrat-led cities in an effort to put pressure on the Biden administration. In recent weeks, the Texas Republican has expanded the law enforcement role of state authorities, ordering the Texas National Guard to deploy miles of razor-wire along the border and to seize a public park in Eagle Pass.

Democrats and the White House have slammed Abbott for his actions, accusing him of using "political stunts" to draw national headlines. Those criticisms were echoed by Garcia, who accused the governor of "creating a media circus for political gain and to raise money" and instead called for a "multiprong approach" to immigration reform.

Monday's warning from LULAC is the second national alert ever issued by the organization in its nearly 100-year history. The first was issued in May, warning people against traveling to Florida after Governor Ron DeSantis signed the state's sweeping immigration bill SB 1718 into law.

Established in Corpus Christi, Texas, in 1929, LULAC is the largest and oldest Hispanic civil rights group in the country. The nonpartisan organization includes more than 138,000 members.

"The Supreme Court ruled that erecting deadly barriers is illegal, and it is also inhumane to let women, children, and families die because of them," Lydia Guzman, LULAC's national immigration chair, said Monday, adding that Abbott's insistence to string more concertina wire encourages "lawless" behavior that doesn't "solve the broken immigration system."

Garcia urged Hispanic Texans to recall the 2019 El Paso shooting that left 23 people dead and 22 injured. The mass shooting was investigated by the FBI as a hate crime after it was discovered that the 21-year-old gunman posted a manifesto that railed against a "Hispanic invasion" shortly before he opened fire at a Walmart. The tragedy has been described as the deadliest attack on Latinos in modern U.S. history.

"We've seen death at the hands of shooters due to hate speech. We cannot forget what occurred at the Walmart in El Paso, Texas, just a few years ago," Garcia said. "Hate speech is being used yet again to ra[t]chet up anger and hatred that are putting Hispanic Texans, law enforcement, military service members, and innocent civilians in the crosshairs."

An investigation conducted by California State University's Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism found that anti-Latino hate crimes in the nation's 10 largest cities increased by 2.8 percent in 2022, following a 41 percent uptick in 2021. Researchers specifically cited increases in three Texas cities—Houston, Austin and Fort Worth— as well as Phoenix, Chicago, New York and Boston.