Freshman Cong. seeks to escalate rancor on issue Texans support
Texas Insider Report: AUSTIN Texas Rio Grande Valley leaders agree that the $12 million per month of taxpayer money you plan to spend (with no defined metrics to measure success) would be better invested in supporting local police and sheriff departments in those communities. Furthermore any attempt to give domestic police
power to soldiers is ill-advised wrote Cong. Joaqun Castro (D-TX)
to Gov. Rick Perry earlier this week when an ongoing war-of-words seem to escalate.
Mondays missive is just one of several letters exchanged between the two Texas pols. According to Politico In a July 23 letter Perry told Castro the National Guard troops would not militarize the border.
Castros comments Perry wrote indicated a basic misunderstanding about the very positive role the Guard will play in tackling the border security crisis.
Nonetheless Castro said in his letter earlier this week The people of South Texas do not want to and should not have to live in a police state.
In July Perry announced he was sending 1000 National Guard troops to the U.S.-Mexican border to help combat the flow of trafficking amid a surge of unaccompanied minors from Central America. Perry said the
troops are needed because of federal inaction but Castro expressed significant concerns about their presence.
Castro also criticized Perry for riding a gun-mounted patrol boat with Fox News host Sean Hannity which he said could lead to uglier demonstrations of hostility.
I am disappointed that your first instinct was to head down to the Rio Grande to pose by mounted machine guns as if on a trophy hunt. These actions imply hostility toward young children fleeing violence in their home countries and give license to uglier demonstrations of hostility he wrote.
Gov. Perrys office did not respond to a request for comment on Castros letter.
