'Economic arsonist' Greg Abbott slammed by Beto O'Rourke over supply chain-threatening truck inspections
On Thursday, former Congressman and Texas gubernatorial candidate Beto O'Rourke slammed incumbent Republican Gov. Greg Abbott, accusing him of singlehandedly disrupting supply chains across the country with a controversial truck inspection policy that caused massive delays at the border.
"Abbott is the arsonist who torched the Texas economy by shutting down trade with Mexico to score cheap political points," tweeted O'Rourke, a native of the border city of El Paso. "Now he wants credit for putting out the fire. Texans aren't buying it and we'll never forget the chaos Abbott caused to our economy and our communities."
O'Rourke's condemnation comes as Abbott agreed to a deal with the governor of the Mexican state of Chihuahua to roll back the policy. Earlier in the week, he struck a similar agreement with the state of Nuevo León.
Abbott is the arsonist who torched the Texas economy by shutting down trade with Mexico to score cheap political points.\n\nNow he wants credit for putting out the fire. Texans aren\u2019t buying it and we'll never forget the chaos Abbott has caused to our economy and our communities.https://twitter.com/elpasotimes/status/1514736435877797891\u00a0\u2026— Beto O'Rourke (@Beto O'Rourke) 1649977072
The enhanced truck inspections were implemented by Abbott in retaliation for the Biden administration moving to cancel the Title 42 order, a controversial Trump-era policy which authorizes summary removals of some migrants under the pretense of COVID-19 containment. Those inspections resulted in trucking delays and a blockade on the Mexican side, which led to alarms about shortages of produce that could exacerbate already-elevated inflation across the country. Even some Texas Republicans, like Agriculture Commissioner Sid Miller, came out against the truck inspections.
Abbott has also sought to protest the border policy changes by sending buses of migrants to Washington, D.C., which even Fox News' Brit Hume has derided as a "publicity stunt."