Chapter 45
“And what country can preserve its liberties, if its rulers are not warned from time to time, that this people preserve the spirit of resistance? Let them take arms.”
The headlines in newspapers the next day were an interesting study in contrasts from a red state vs. blue state perspective:
Texas Commits Treason, Kills 18 Feds
– The Boston Globe
Texas Militia Under Governor Kills 18 Federal Troops
– NY Times
High Noon in Texas; State Repels Arrests; Kills 18
– Washington Post
Texas Governor Responsible for 18 Deaths
– San Francisco Examiner
Treason in Texas! State Kills 18 Feds
– Philadelphia Inquirer
Texans Kill 18 Feds While Serving Warrants
– Chicago Tribune
Feds Attack State Capitol, 18 Die, Feds Surrender
– Houston Chronicle
Feds Fail in Attempt to Attack Capitol – 18 Dead!
– San Antonio Express
Constitutional Showdown at Capitol – 18 Die
– Dallas Morning News
Feds Clash with Texans – 18 Feds Die
– Daily Oklahoman
Constitutional Crisis in Texas – 18 Die
– Atlanta Journal Constitution
Texas Repels Federal Invasion; 18 Dead
– New Orleans Times-Picayune
Texas Embarrasses Feds & Justice at State Capitol
– Orlando Sentinel
The vivid scenes played over the next twenty-four hours on every news channel and Internet new media websites included personal recordings from cell phones at street level and from adjacent rooftops to the Texas state capitol building. Images of dead federal agents and U.S. Army Rangers invoked anger from many parts of the country, where citizens didn’t understand that the unit attacked the Texas militia position and fired first.
Images of the feds surrendering and being placed on school buses, along with images of the piles of surrendered weapons, ran repeatedly. There were also scenes of patriotic Texans who showed up on the streets of Austin by the thousands to voice their support for their governor, the Texas Rangers, the Texas Guard and Militia for thwarting what they felt was a clumsy attempt by Washington to embarrass the governor and the state.
Images of the few isolated youths throwing rocks at the school buses were played mostly by MSNBC, who gave the impression that the buses were pelted by angry Texans during the entire trip to the airport.
At the airport, six ATF agents, four FBI agents and six Army Rangers refused to sign the non-aggression and no re-entry agreement documents that conditioned their release and were arrested and taken into custody. Their comrades were escorted to the C-130 for transportation to an Air Force base outside of Texas to be determined by the Department of Defense and the Justice Department.
The announcement of a government cover-up amidst new evidence was the secondary story, but many of the traditional mainstream media were not expanding coverage on that monstrous topic and were instead focused on Texas and its state government as having committed treason for its use of a state military to resist the execution of legitimate federal arrest warrants.
Gov. Cooper issued a press statement shortly after the C-130 took off from the temporarily shut-down Austin airport:
“In light of the events of yesterday, the federal government’s encroachment into Texas sovereignty, and this administration’s refusal to acknowledge the U.S. Constitution, I am hereby calling a special session of the Texas Legislature, effective the day after tomorrow.”
The events of the previous twenty-four hours gave every talking head, no-name congressman, political pundit and self-proclaimed historian a platform to either condemn Texas or condemn the administration. Although most Democrats condemned the state, even Republicans as a whole were deeply and angrily divided over how the issue was handled, with establishment Republicans primarily believing the state should relent, offer up the intended targets of the federal arrest warrants and let the courts sort it out.
Naturally, the Tea Party and ultra-conservative base of the GOP wanted the administration to be punished for its incursion into state sovereignty but, even more importantly, they wanted more information about the Rash Sally cover-up and the persecution of their grassroots movement.
Steve Milford, who had to literally scare his wife to the point of sheer terror to get her to immediately drop what she was doing and get their family to Reagan National Airport by 8:30 a.m. that fateful morning, was trying to explain the circumstances in more detail to his wife and several of Gov. Cooper’s state staffers on the Hawker 800 jet that picked them up.
At approximately 10:00 a.m. CST that morning, news came over the pilot’s radio of the events that were unfolding in Austin. The pilot was instructed to divert from Austin and land at Hooks Airport, a small private airport northwest of Houston in a small bedroom community called Tomball. Texas Rangers met them there to escort them to safety, just as they had Chuck Dixon’s family. Hours later, the Milford family was introduced to the Dixon family at a large, private and secure ranch just west of Austin in the Texas hill country.
Gov. Cooper’s office began systematically releasing the documents and files provided by Tim Spilner to news-friendly organizations such as Fox News, Breitbart, The Daily Caller, The Blaze, Rush Limbaugh, and others the very next morning following the two major incidents in Austin. Later that afternoon, the same files were released to the mainstream media, including MSNBC, CBS, ABC, Politico, Real Clear Politics, the BBC and others.
By that evening’s news cycle, the released files were blowing up the worldwide news. There were calls for the impeachment of Tibbs and Johnson from conservatives and even from some moderate Democrats. The mood at the White House was not gleeful.
That same evening, President Johnson summoned those involved in the Department of Justice raids conducted by FBI and ATF, as well as Homeland Security, his chief political advisors, the Democratic National Committee chairman, Smith, Gould, McDermott, Radford and various White House attorneys.
Smith led off the meeting. “Gentlemen and ladies, we have a monumental problem. We need to figure out how to respond to this leak of classified documents and we need to figure it out this evening. The news media is bombarding us for a response from today’s official leak of the documents. We have the usual nutjobs running around in Congress pandering to the hysteria. Now, make no mistake, we have some serious problems here. One: How do we diffuse and discredit the nature of the documents leaked and two: How do we deal with Texas?”
“I’ll start,” said Tibbs. “First, the leak and publishing of classified documents is a breach of national security. Those responsible should be punished to the fullest extent of the law, including Gov. Cooper.”
“Okay, we can deal with that after we have our full response and talking points figured out,” responded Radford. “First and foremost, we should categorically deny all allegations. The best defense is a good offense. The documents have been altered, and they are also not complete. This is an attempt to embarrass the administration, pure and simple.”
“Okay, I like that so far,” beamed Smith.
“We also should demonize Spilner. What dirt do we have on him? Paint him as a disgruntled employee or someone with extreme ideological proclivities,” added Tibbs.
“Does he have any Tea Party ties?” asked Gould.
“Well, interestingly enough, his dad has some,” added Wodehouse.
“Good, follow up on that. Even the slightest and most remote thread of relevance to the Tea Party should be used,” noted Tibbs.
“Damn, Jamail, you would have made a good propagandist back in the old Soviet Union,” laughed Gould nervously. Tibbs didn’t look too pleased at the comparison and didn’t know if it was a back-handed compliment or a slap.
Writing on a large whiteboard that had been brought in for the meeting, Smith continued, “Okay, so what I have so far is that we are going to do the following action items:
“One: Attack the validity of the documents. We should claim there are more documents and these particular documents were taken out of context.
“Two: Destroy Spilner’s credibility. State he was under investigation for spying and treason. Dig up any dirt you have. Arrests, employee reviews, I want to know what kind of positions he and his wife had sex in. I want to know what porn he watched. Also, dig up the Tea Party ties. It’s very important we tie him to a motive or an extremist agenda.
“Three: Lean on congressmen and senators who aren’t towing the party line. They know we have been through significant attacks before, especially Justice,” Smith glanced accusingly at Tibbs, referring to the fact Justice always seemed to be in the headlines, with gun running to Mexican cartels, voter ID registration laws and immigration. “Let them know that to bet against the administration could be their political suicide. And I do mean lean on them heavily, Radford! Now is the time to call in any and all markers.
“Four: The staff will continue to work through the evening to put together talking points. Once these talking points are established and approved, I want them out to all of you. You should be taking any opportunity you have to go on talk shows or broadcasts to counter this leak, but stick to your talking points.
“Five: Any talk of impeachment needs to be met with a vast amount of incredible disgust, surprise and political rancor. Dismiss it outright; laugh in its face, do not let it grow legs. We will provide you information to counter any questions regarding the legitimacy of any requests for impeachment and those impeachment suggestions need to be turned around and pointed at the governor of Texas.”
Tibbs dismissed several in the room at that point, saying the next topic needed to be addressed only by cabinet and director-level staffers. Only senior staff aides were allowed in the room. Once all other staffers had left, Tibbs had the floor.
“Okay, now on to Texas and Gov. Brent Cooper,” he said, looking like he was very anxious to get into this particular topic. The governor and state of Texas had foiled every move by Justice and had made the DOJ, the FBI and ATF look amateurish.
“The acceptance of and the distribution of classified material related to national defense is a felony. This needs to be fully demonstrated to the press. If the strategy mentioned previously is to attack the validity of the information in regard to context, this should dovetail with that strategy.”
“Okay, so the governor committed a felony. We’ve tried to arrest him once. Now, it would appear the entire state is behind him. Let’s face it. He embarrassed us and embarrassed some very proud departments and this administration,” commented Homeland Secretary Sarah McDermott.
“We need to reverse the trend and make him as unpopular in Texas as he is in the Northeast or on the West Coast,” said Smith.
“How do we do that? What do you suggest? We don’t have a lot of time here,” Tibbs said.
“How do we normally topple a regime? With both external and internal pressures,” said Secretary of Defense Brooks.
“Okay, let’s talk about external pressures,” said Tibbs, as he stood and began pacing.
“Normally, we put in sanctions first. So let’s figure out how we sanction an entire state,” said Radford.
“First, cut off any and all federal funds. I’m talking education, highway, Medicare!” Tibbs yelled.
“I like the way you’re thinking.” Johnson lounged in his chair, more relaxed than his staff.
“The next thing we would do is blockade the country, so let’s do the same to Texas,” said Radford.
“Blockade? That’s extreme, but we have some extreme circumstances. We’re already hearing rumblings from other states. We can’t let this defiance spread. If we put Texas in its place, the other states won’t challenge federal authority. We need to make an example of Texas,” Tibbs contributed.
“That’s right. We’ll block all incoming and outgoing traffic on every road on every Texas border. We’ll shut down aircraft coming in and out, and we will not provide FAA support, effectively grounding all air traffic. We’ll shut down their ports in Galveston, Houston, Corpus Christi, Port Arthur and Brownsville. Also, we can turn off the Internet to Texas,” offered Radford.
“I’m really starting to like this!” smiled Johnson.
“Next,” said Gould, “we shut off the banking system, not allowing incoming or outgoing transactions. I also propose we suspend their congressional and senatorial seats.”
“Can we do that?” asked Johnson, sitting up straighter and taking notice.
“If Texas is in a state of war against the U.S., we can do anything. I think we can make that claim based on their actions in Austin,” responded one of the senior White House attorneys.
“Those are some very effective external pressures,” laughed Johnson.
“Oh, there’s more!” exclaimed Gould. “We shut down all telecommunications in and out. Also, by blockading the highway system, rail and shipping, we can starve them out. And yes, we can shut down and suspend all federal payments of any kind, including Social Security and Medicare payments.”
“Yikes, now that starts to get personal. Are we sure we want to start to affect individual voters?” asked Johnson.
“Absolutely. That’s where internal pressure gets applied to remove the governor. When you start impacting people’s daily lives and start making life hard for basic necessities, they will start to put pressure on their leadership to get things right with Washington. Hell, they may arrest him themselves and hand him over to us. This may take a shorter amount of time than you think,” Gould said gleefully.
“Okay, I’ll leave it to the staff to plan this,” said the president. “I’ll need the public statements discussed as soon as possible. Do we need to draft executive orders to effect these maneuvers?”
“It depends. Several of these items may; some may not,” replied Tibbs.
“All right, we have a plan. I want a direct call placed to Gov. Cooper to tell him what’s going to happen. Avery, can you do that?” asked Johnson.
“I think it needs to come from an administration official,” Tibbs stated. Smith shrugged, like he didn’t care who made the call.
“Well, it sure can’t be you, Jamail. He’ll probably just hang up on you. He hates you,” laughed McDermott.
“The feeling is mutual.”
“I can make the call. He’ll know that I can and will shut off all federal payments. At the end of the day, he’ll know he has limited time before his constituents start beating down his doors for their lives to return to normal,” explained Gould.
“This is a good plan,” affirmed the president. “Can you guys wrap this up? I have a tee time in about thirty minutes. Just call if you have any questions.” He beamed at his personnel.
Within the hour, the White House issued a press statement:
“Despite repeated attempts, the state of Texas, in particular its state government, certain Texas law enforcement units and the governor have thumbed their nose at the rule of law.
“The state has unlawfully arrested federal agents and military personnel and has refused to comply with legally issued federal arrest warrants. This criminal activity has led to the deaths of eighteen Americans serving their country in law enforcement or the military, with at least eleven more wounded and still in hospitals.
“Texans must decide if they will continue to allow this current state government to set policies that are detrimental to the people of Texas and their fellow Americans. If the state does not begin complying with federal laws, including the voluntary surrender of the governor, lieutenant governor and the Texas Rangers involved in the operations at Ellington Air Force Base, the federal government will commence actions to force the state to comply with federal law.
“We have reached out to the governor to explain the actions we are going to take that, unfortunately, will likely affect every Texan. The governor must decide if he is a governor for the people and turn himself over to federal authorities by noon tomorrow, or the federal government will start imposing sanctions on Texas.”
Some of the more liberal Democrats in Congress from Texas and the Texas State Legislature immediately called for the impeachment, recall or removal of Gov. Cooper and Lt. Gov. Foster. Several state legislators indicated they would file bills to force a recall election in the upcoming special session called by Gov. Cooper.
Firearms dealers throughout Texas reported record sales. Many sporting goods retailers had bare shelves where inventories of guns used to be. Not since Johnson’s first election had dealers seen this type of a run on firearms and ammunition.
Although many editorials and op-eds in major Texas newspapers were critical of Cooper, Texans showed support for their governor and anger at Washington, D.C. Those feelings were overwhelmingly strong and getting stronger.
Texas and Washington, D.C., which had been polar opposites for years on a multitude of policies, but which had gotten further apart during the first term of the Johnson administration, were now accelerating to an unavoidable collision of historic proportions.