Their cause has been helped by a surge in tensions between Texan authorities and the federal government over the past few months, particularly over illegal migration and education.
On its official website the Texas Nationalist Movement (TNM), which campaigns for the state to leave the Union in a move it dubs TEXIT, said: "The inclusion of these planks in the Republican Party of Texas Platform is a major step that could have far-reaching implications for the TEXIT movement in the next legislative session."
Newsweek contacted Texas Governor Greg Abbott for comment on Wednesday by email outside of usual business hours.
The Republican Party of Texas first backed calls for an independence referendum as part of its legislative platform in 2022, after it was approved by members at its convention that year in Houston.
In January the Supreme Court ruled razor wire placed along the Texas-Mexico border on the orders of Governor Abbott could be removed by federal agents.
Then in May, Governor Abbott instructed universities and community colleges in his state to ignore an update to Title IX equality legislation introduced by the Biden administration which would ban discrimination based on gender identity.
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I'm staying in my sea of blue until I retire or they manage to do something idiotic like actually leave and start a fucking war with the all the military bases here.
I'm selfish, so I'm gonna need you to survive because you're funny as shit and understand the dumb things I say on here.
I'm assuming you're either in Austin or Houston. If you're in Austin, meet me at my place and we'll carpool to salvation. If you're in Houston, I'll meet you at yours. If we take any interstate other than 10, it'll only be a lateral move.
H-Town, but I wouldn't mind heading over to Austin. Salvation on 34th? I haven't been in more than a decade and didn't even know they were still open. I remember it was delicious, but I stopped having a reason to go to Austin when my brother moved to Corpus so he could surf more often.
Oh, I meant salvation out of state. I don't know many places in Austin, but I actively try to avoid that town. I feel like people try too hard there. Love H-Town though!
This sounds great to the base and a few wealthy dudes, but this is a real bad thing for literally everyone including Republicans - if they somehow did leave, it'd turn the remaining US permanently blue, plus they would immediately be invaded for their oil...
The problem with TEXIT is the same with BREXIT and pretty much any libertarian policy in that it expects so many things to stay the same.
As soon as this happens, assuming the US take direct military action, all the US bases are gone. Same with all defense contractors. Technology companies are gone too, they do not want to go through the headache of working with the US a foreign company. That's Texas Instruments and HP.
Taxes will skyrocket. They will lose all the US tax subsidies that allow them to have no state income tax and now they need to replace all military personnel and infrastructure.
They will probably not bottom out but they aren't going to be a world power. They will pretty much be Spain in terms of economy.
You assume America would just casually let that happen. It's one thing to leave a multinational body, that doesn't cost you citizens and can be (incorrectly) argued that it would benefit The UK. There would be no benefit to America if they let Texas secede so they won't allow it. So if America won't allow it then Texas would have to secede by force
I guarantee you the moment a drone strike hits a Houston suburb a whole bunch of wealthy Republicans will realize playing revolutionary isn't nearly as fun as it sounds. Shortly after most of the people in the state would gladly roll over to come back to America
Would it only be Texas though? Is there a chance that other US states might also join along with them, not because they wanted to secede before, but because the GOP is a cult and they can convince their people to go along with anything? Plus, how many military personnel would “defect” over to this new Texas Republic? The idea of Texas leaving and trying to go it alone against the rest of the current US is fairly one-sided, but what if Texas peels away a sizable chunk of the US with it? I wouldn’t doubt that Trump would support it if it meant saving his skin from all the trials he’s involved in (though given the status of most of them it may not be necessary).
Any state with ruling Republicans is likely to try and follow suit, as Texas leaving would mean they no longer have to votes to win a majority in federal congress or the executive ever again.
Or rather, was found to have never had the right to secede in the first place. Any vote to leave is less a declaration of secession and more a declaration of a war of independence against the United States.
Presumably somewhere in Texas, this time they'll have nukes. They shouldn't 🤞 have a way to use them, but it's curious what would happen with them if a vote to secede was successful.
Why would that be the case? Nuclear missile silos are concentrated in the north central United States specifically to give them more time to fire before detection and landfall of incoming ICBMs.
The vulnerability of Texas to a submarine launch is too great to consider it a base for launch in a mutually-assured destruction scenario. It also doesn't have any reactors capable of producing isotopes needed for nuclear weapons.
I won't claim to know about ability to produce the components of a weapon or ability to actually use one, but it appears that the only facility in the US that has the capacity to assemble or disassemble nuclear weapons is in Texas.
Nuclear armed hostile state in political upheaval within the boarders of the contiguous US, also with substantial oil reserves ... That's like the royal flush of getting invaded
If they seceded I'm sure the federal government would make the argument that they are on federal land, even if it's within the Texas borders. Since it wasn't state land, their secession wouldn't apply so it would remain the USA. If Texas wanted to refuse the US Federal government access to them, they'd learn a swift lesson. Texas has a lot of guns, but the army has more.
Texas already owns all its oil, including ocean mineral rights. This was part of the terms of statehood.
They were allowed to keep their unallocated lands and mineral rights in order to pay off their debts and become a state, rather than the United States assuming the debt.
This turned out to be a huge financial boon for the state and continues to be.
Perhaps you missed the sarcasm of "spread democracy". I was referring to the United States' history of invading or meddling in countries with oil. I don't know why you think ownership is any obstacle to possession.
GOP knows it too. They'd lose +13 R seats in Congress and +2 R seats in the Senate. As well as 38 votes in the EC, which despite Texas becoming more purple hasn't gone D in a presidential election since 76. Taking Texas out of the equation could easily make both chambers and the executive D.
