Immigration revives the first separatist front in the US.

We are fed up with bureaucrats in the capital who They keep our taxpayers money. We want to make our own laws, be an independent country that starts and ends with our borders and be the sole masters of our lives and our destiny.

The manifesto, which Carles Puigdemont or any Catalan or Basque libertarian could sign with his eyes closed from the first word to the last, presides over the website. The Texas Nationalist Movement. And we can add a new declaration that seems strangely familiar to us these days: we Immigration powers Controlling the entry of immigrants regardless of what is decided across the country.

For now, TNM is manageable Include the word “Texit” in public discussion, A play on words such as Brexit or the unborn Greek Grexit that wants Texas to leave the Union, which is totally unthinkable. A country as proud of itself as the United States.

Are Texan independence activists really to be taken seriously or are they just a rant from a state in the deep American West that is being abandoned by the capital? Although there is no reliable survey, the promoters of this movement assure that Popular support has risen from 20% to 80% in a few years According to the Texas Tribune, those currently “somewhat” support independence.

For now, already They have collected 620,000 signatures “To make Texas independent again,” an incredible figure.

Glorious past, “independent” leader and a legend

Like any self-respecting nationalist movement, Texit has glorious past

(Nine Years Temporary Freedom), legends (line drawn in the sand) and, of course, An “independent” hero was martyred For the cause of the famous Battle of the Alamo.

Indeed, to find the roots of Texan pride, one must go back to the cinematic Battle of the Alamo in 1836, a two-week siege that pitted the Mexican army against a band of rebellious Texas soldiers who dreamed of an independent Texas.

According to legend, the colonel in command of the troops and today The hero-martyr of Texas nationalism, William Barrett TravisGathered his men before battle, drew his sword and drew a line in the sand, inviting those who were willing to defend the castle to cross it. Everyone involved died, including Travis, but they were avenged. In the subsequent Battle of San Jacinto that ended the revolutionary movement.

From that year, Texas would become an independent country (not recognized by Mexico) until 1945 when it decided to join the United States.

Leader of the Texas Nationalist Movement

Daniel Miller, the current leader of the Texas nationalist movement, clings to these epic stories, telling how on Saturday, August 24, 1996, in a hotel lobby in Texas City, He had a vision that his current position in Texas should follow the same pathFind his heroes (for example, himself), his line in the sand, and his Alamo.

A battle ensued on many fronts, with conferences, campaigns, signature gatherings and attempts, for the time being, to request an independence referendum. It’s a long-distance race in the light rain for the “Texeaters,” who are known by their Texan hats, their tall boots, and their highly critical speech toward Washington bureaucrats.

One of the drivers of Texit, almost always in these cases, is money. This movement is maintained every year Between $103,000 and $160,000 from Texas taxpayers They detoured to Washington.

But after the United States Supreme Court’s ruling, the separatist fuse has rekindled a bit more these days because of the bitter controversy over immigration. Break down the barbed wire barrier erected by Texas Governor Greg AbbottTo contain immigration along the border with Mexico.

The move has infuriated the Texas governor and a significant portion of the population, especially the most conservative, who feel that the decisions on immigration are unfair. They are driven thousands of kilometers away by rich executives who do not have to deal with this issue.

. And, of course, it has been taken advantage of by Donald Trump, who could not pass up the opportunity to bounce such a ball in this area in the middle of the election campaign.

“Texas barbed wire is an effective deterrent Stop the illegal border crossings that President Biden encourages with his policies. “I will continue to defend Texas’ constitutional authority to secure the border and prevent the Biden administration from destroying our assets,” Abbott said.

“All Americans should support the common sense measures taken by Texas authorities to protect the security and sovereignty of Texas and the American people,” said Trump, who has asked neighboring states to deploy troops to the Texas border. “of the colonists.

“The federal system is broken and Texans are paying the price. It makes more sense for Texas to rule Texas,” Miller explained in a recent Newsweek interview in which he blamed the federal government for rising gas and food prices. In the national debt.

Currency of independent Texas

What would an independent Texas look like? Included in the TNM Roadmap Dollar as national currency, In the medium term give way to a monetary union with Washington that would include its own currency. Additionally, according to Miller, Texas will not have to pay a portion of the debt “accumulated by the federal system.”

Once independent, Texas would be formed as a “unitary nation-state”, which would then be divided into smaller provinces. Of course, he would have an independent army among other things They have their own army and, of course, control their own barbed wire along the Mexican border.

The path to independence, however, did not seem easy, among other things because the Supreme Court definitively ruled in 1869 with the Texan lawsuit that leaving the Union was unconstitutional. Texas nationalists aren’t so clear, and say they’ve found a loophole: “Article 1, Section 10 of the United States Constitution lists all actions that the states are prohibited from taking. Subtraction is not on that list. Therefore, under the Tenth Amendment, the Constitution, express constitutional The lack of prohibition means that it is a right reserved for the states and the people,” Miller explains.

And, political scientist and lawyer Matt Quartup, who has studied independence movements around the world, explained to Newsweek, is Texas. “Maybe the only place in America that has a sense of identity” Usually associated with an independent state.

Taking the referendum, scholars argued, would require “potential political change in the Republican Party,” after which a legal battle could end up in the Supreme Court. Qvortrup acknowledged that this would be very difficult, but added: “100 years ago I think there were about 35 countries in the world. Now there are 195. In fact, it is not entirely impossible to see how countries could be established.”

Before co-founding TNM in 2005, its leader Daniel Miller spent two years studying separatist movements around the world, including in Scotland, Catalonia and Quebec. And he came to the same conclusion as the libertarians of these regions. “Texas is a nation without a state,” he has stated on numerous occasions. It has a distinct culture, history and philosophy of life. “It is a nation in every sense of the word.”