President Donald Trump says that the FBI ’may have to’ get involved in the situation.
U.S. Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) asked the FBI to intervene to help bring back state House Democrats who left Texas earlier this week to block the GOP from advancing a congressional redistricting map, prompting President Donald Trump to say that the federal government may have to get involved.
In a letter to FBI Director Kash Patel on Tuesday, Cornyn said he wants the bureau to “take any appropriate steps to aid in Texas state law enforcement efforts to locate or arrest potential lawbreakers who have fled the state” before referring to the Democrats who left.
Dozens of Texas state House Democrats left for other states, including Illinois and New York, this week, preventing state Republicans from doing business in the House on Monday. The remaining representatives voted to issue civil arrest warrants to the Democrats, while Gov. Greg Abbott ordered their arrest later that day.
“I request the FBI’s assistance, as federal resources are necessary to locate the out-of-state Texas legislators who are potentially acting in violation of the law,” Cornyn told Patel in the letter, adding that the FBI can help Texas state law enforcement when “parties cross state lines, including to avoid testifying or fleeing a scene of a crime.”
Cornyn, who is up for reelection in the 2026 midterms, then expressed concerns that the Democratic legislators had “solicited or accepted funds to aid in their efforts to avoid their legislative duties” and “may be guilty of bribery or other public corruption offenses.
During a news conference on Tuesday, Trump was asked about whether the FBI could get involved. “They may have to,” Trump said.
On Sunday, Abbott cited an opinion by the state’s attorney general that Texas district courts may determine whether legislators have forfeited their offices “due to abandonment,” saying that would empower him to “swiftly fill vacancies.”
But Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, who is running in the Republican primary for Cornyn’s seat, told podcast host Benny Johnson on Monday that it would be a “challenge” to prosecute the Democrats who left the state, noting that his office would have to go to court in “districts that are not friendly to Republicans.”
It would be “different” in every state House district, he said. “We’d have to go sue in every legislator’s home district.”
Abbott also said any lawmaker who solicited funds to pay the $500-per-day fine that Texas House rules impose on absent legislators could violate bribery laws. He vowed to try extraditing any “potential out-of-state felons.”
The Democrat lawmakers departed their home state after their Republican counterparts proposed a congressional redistricting map, which the Democrats alleged was an illegal power grab.
Abbott said Texas needs to redraw its districts because of constitutional concerns raised by the U.S. Justice Department surrounding four Democrat-controlled districts.
A July 7 letter from Assistant U.S. Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon and Deputy Assistant U.S. Attorney General Michael Gates of the Civil Rights Division outlines concerns that the state’s ninth, 18th, 29th, and 33rd congressional districts create unconstitutional “coalition districts” that run afoul of the Voting Rights Act and the 14th Amendment. Coalition districts combine different minority groups to create a potential majority.
Some legislators who left said the threats to remove them from office or prosecute them are without merit.
“He’s trying to get sound bites and he has no legal mechanism,” Democratic state Rep. Jolanda Jones told reporters at a briefing in New York on Monday.
Adding to the political tensions during the standoff, California Gov. Gavin Newsom said in a statement in July that the Democratic-led state legislature would “fight fire with fire” and implement a similar redistricting measure.
While Cornyn did not mention the redistricting effort in his letter to Patel, he said that lawmakers still need to pass legislation to address the deadly flooding that occurred in Texas last month.
“These legislators have committed potential criminal acts in their rush to avoid their constitutional responsibilities and must be fully investigated and held accountable,” Cornyn wrote in the letter. “I urge you to work with Texas public officials to provide them the support they need.”
Kimberly Hayek and Reuters contributed to this report.
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