Jasmine Crockett shows support to Texas Democrats with her framed arrest warrant

Texas Democrats are now facing the threat of civil arrests after fleeing the state to prevent Republicans from advancing a congressional map that targets majority Black and Latino communities.

As Texas House Democrats face threats of civil arrests and removal from their offices amid a political battle over the voting rights of Black and Latino voters in the state, U.S. Rep. Jasmine Crockett, D-Texas, is sending them support with a reminder of her own threatened arrest.

“Here is my beautifully framed warrant from ‘21!” Crockett wrote in the caption of a post with an image of her framed arrest warrant sitting on top of her office desk when she served as a Texas state representative.

In 2021, Crockett and more than 50 Democrats had civil arrest warrants issued against them by the State House of Representatives after they similarly fled Texas to prevent the passage of a controversial voting restrictions bill. The legislation imposed several restrictions that experts said disproportionately burdened Black and Latino voters, including mandating voter IDs, restricting voting-by-mail, and even barring election workers from distributing applications to request mail-in ballots.

Democrats argued that the bill, similar to other bills proposed in Republican-controlled states, was in direct response to the high voter turnout among Black and Brown voters in the 2020 election, which resulted in the loss of President Donald Trump in the presidential race against former President Joe Biden.

In July 2021, Crockett and other Texas Democrats successfully delayed the bill’s advancement when they crossed state lines in a procedural strategy that prevented Republicans from holding a quorum—the needed number of lawmakers to conduct legislative business.

Nearly four years later, Crockett, now a United States congresswoman, encouraged state House Democrats as they attempt to fight a congressional map drawn by Texas Republicans that would eliminate a majority-Black district represented by longtime Congressman Al Green and significantly divide Black and Latino communities, essentially diluting their voting power in districts shared with majority white, Republican-leaning voters.

Crockett reflected on her experience fleeing Texas in 2021 to protect her constituents’ voting rights. She did so while also slamming Trump (referring to him as “47,” representing the 47th president of the United States), who ordered Texas Republicans to redraw the map to give Republicans in Congress five additional seats to maintain their slim majority on Capitol Hill in next year’s midterm elections.

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A post shared by Jasmine Crockett (@jasmineforus)

“Almost to the day 4 years ago, for the only time in my life, a warrant was issued for my arrest, not because I was sexually abusing people (coughs like 47), not because I was defrauding people (coughs like 47), not because I staged a coup (coughs like 47), but because I had the AUDACITY to represent for the people in my district that the Texas Republican legislature sought to trample upon,” wrote Crockett.

The popular Texas lawmaker added, “Well as the song says, I’m still STANDING!,” telling her fellow Democrats, “When a bully punches you, you KNOCK THEM OUT!”

Urging the public to support Texas Democrats, most of whom fled to Chicago, Crockett added, “Show Texas House Dems some love! They are beyond courageous and are frankly heroic! Follow them, share their message out, pray for them!”

Jamarr Brown, executive director of Color of Change PAC, said of the controversial Texas congressional map: “A lot of those lines are being drawn based on race and partisanship, and they’re being drawn in a process that already determines an outcome.”

“It doesn’t put people at a fair playing level in terms of running for office, in terms of showing up to vote, in terms of actually doing the things that democracy says we’re supposed to do,” Brown told theGrio. He added that in a democracy, lawmakers must “earn power,” not simply “draw and mandate and legislate their own power.”