After drawing outrage for firing off a press release identifying the victims of last Friday’s mass shooting in Cleveland, Texas, as “illegal immigrants,” Gov. Greg Abbott’s office expressed a modicum of regret in a followup statement.
The regret embodied in the two-paragraph statement shared Tuesday by Abbott spokeswoman Renae Eze appears limited to the governor’s office getting the facts wrong about one of the people who died. As pointed out in the wake of Sunday’s release, one of those slain was, in fact, a permanent U.S. resident.
“Following the horrific shooting on Friday night, federal officials provided the state of Texas information on the criminal and the victims, including that they were in the country illegally,” Eze said in the statement. “We’ve since learned that at least one of the victims may have been in the United States legally. We regret if the information was incorrect and detracted from the important goal of finding and arresting the criminal.”
Despite the inclusion of a sentence stating that “any loss of life is a tragedy,” Eze’s statement misses — or more likely ignores — the outrage over Abbott’s initial comments.
The fury voiced by immigrant-rights groups and others wasn’t focused on the Republican governor’s factual error. Instead, it was that his labeling of the victims as “illegal immigrants” in what should have been a moment of grief and solidarity only served to dehumanize them.
It’s difficult for Abbott or his handlers to make the claim that dehumanizing effect was an oversight given his frequent comparison of border crossers to “invaders” and his stunt of busing asylum seekers to Democrat-controlled cities. Indeed, immigrant bashing has become part of Abbott brand.
To be sure, the governor’s non-apology apology doesn’t appear likely to earn walk backs from critics such as Fred Guttenberg, the father of a victim of the 2018 Parkland, Florida, school shooting, who called the governor a “low life asshole” on Twitter. Or from San Antonio State Sen. Roland Gutierrez, who tweeted that Abbott’s press release marked a “new low.”
Perhaps Abbott and his handlers should stop looking to score political points in the face of tragedy and take a lesson from the authorities on the ground at the Cleveland shooting. While the officials told the press the victims were all Honduran, they didn’t feel the need to trumpet their immigration status.
“My heart is with this 8-year-old little boy,” San Jacinto County Sheriff Greg Capers said at a press conference reported on by NBC News. “I don’t care if he was here legally, I don’t care if he was here illegally. He was in my county, five people died in my county, and that is where my heart is — in my county, protecting my people to the best of our ability.”
It’s increasingly apparently that the only thing Abbott has shown an appetite for protecting to the best of his ability is his image with the most extreme and intolerant fringe of his party.
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This article appears in Apr 19 – May 2, 2023.
