Texas Takes Charge: State Sovereignty and the Immigration Crisis

Rick Green: 0:00

Welcome to the Intersection of Faith and the culture is WallB uilders. We're taking on the hot topics of the day from a biblical, historical and constitutional perspective, and today we've got a special interview coming at you from the tavern. That's my show over at Warrior Poets Society Network and over on Patriot U, and Mark Meckler will be our special guest today. I'm Rick Green, America's Constitution Coach and a former Texas legislator, normally here with David and Tim Barton. Tim is a national speaker, pastor, president of WallB uilders. David's, of course, America's premier historian and our founder here at WallB uilders. All three of us thank you for being listeners and for being people of action, for actually taking these things and doing something with them in your community, taking that biblical perspective, that constitutional knowledge and that historical just comparison to what works and what doesn't work, taking all of that information and and applying that into the issues of your neighborhood, your community, your state and, of course, our nation. So thanks for being a part of that. Check out south today at WallB uilders. com that's wall WallBuilders. com a wealth of resources available to you there. Let's jump right in. This is Mark Mechler joining me in the tavern. We're gonna be talking about those revolutionary strategies and tactics that it takes to save America, of course, addressing what's going on at the border and so many other issues.

Rick Green: 1:21

Here we go into the tavern. Well, welcome back to the tavern. We got Mark Mechler back with us from conventionestates. com. Mark, I want you to know, man, we're about 20 shows in to the tavern. You are the first guest to be invited back. You're the only twofer that we've had. So, hey man, how about it? You got a mug on y ou got anything to drink here we get to clank. Uh, all right, here's our - y'all, look at there, love it. All right, hey man, welcome back to the tavern. Buddy, I figured, since we're apparently on the brink of civil war and all that good stuff. You know, international crisis, standoff at the border, the the president is, clearly continues to degrade whichever robotic version we have of him now. Anyway, a lot's happened since we were together out at the campus around the fire. That was a great episode, man. We moved the tavern to the campus just for Mark Mechler. Anyway, I love you, man. Thanks for coming back.

Mark Meckler: 2:16

Well, you know I got to say something about that episode just for folks who saw that. Yeah, we had the, I mean, I'm just so impressed with your technical staff because the high-tech lighting rigs that we had to set up to do that stuff at night it was so awesome. Just so you like. It takes literally thousands of dollars equipment to light something like that. It's two pickup trucks with their headlights turned on, I mean, like we're talking we're talking the full redneck lighting rig.

Rick Green: 2:43

What was that? There was a golf movie where I think it was A Legend of Bagger Vance. Maybe or maybe it was, I don't know. One of these golf movies were at the very end. That's what they did. They literally lit the, let the fairway.

Mark Meckler: 2:58

That yeah the vibe was there. We're sitting around the fire, but for Rick and I we're looking into the grills at two pickup trucks, with their headlights on.

Rick Green: 3:07

Yeah, it was more like I went to undergrad out in west Texas, in San Angelo. It was more like you know, tailgating party after the football game on a Friday night.

Mark Meckler: 3:15

Yeah yeah, pretty much that's what it felt. I know to y'all it looks so professional and kind of romantic. I don't mean that in that romantic romantic, but you know just.

Rick Green: 3:24

Yeah, I just got through saying hey, love you man. Now we got. I already did a whole episode with Victor Marx joking about how he doesn't look gay. I don't look gay. We, we had a whole you know it was a whole scenario, so let's not go there.

Mark Meckler: 3:35

Well, here we were sitting out by the fire, yeah, under the moonlight, and uh, but we had headlights on us, yeah, so that's, you were looking at us. We were looking into the grills at two pickup trucks.

Rick Green: 3:46

We, we were doing Texas friday night lights. That's what we, that's what we were doing.

Mark Meckler: 3:50

All pro. Let's just put it that way.

Rick Green: 3:51

Then let's jump in. I think. First topic you know, obviously, the border and the whole thing with with. Can the feds cut the wire? And at what point does Texas defend the border for the whole country? All of all of these things, a lot of our viewers are not in Texas. So you know, you and I are right here in central Texas. We're three hours from the border.

Rick Green: 4:11

Yep, we're dealing with this all the time, but the rest of the country is now dealing with it. You know, as you and I have talked about before, not great that we're just, you know, funneling these folks further into the country, but it did make guys like Eric Adams in New York and others feel just a little bit of the pain that that we were feeling here in Texas and our friends in Arizona. So, just, you know your thoughts at this point and and and how all of the border stuff could, could potentially play into our effort to restore federalism in the country and get governors and states thinking in terms of the feds have certain powers, the states have more power and theirs are supposed to be few and and limited. Here's one of the few that they actually have, but they're not doing so. I'm throwing a lot at you, bro, but just kind of where you think we are as a nation as we're moving into this very hostile season that it looks like it's turning out to be.

Mark Meckler: 5:00

Well, I'm going to start with the broad and we can drop back into the minutiae. I think the minutiae is super important here and I think a lot of people are getting it wrong. It's it's hard to understand exactly what's going on technically and legally, but I want to start in the big picture.

Mark Meckler: 5:13

Yeah, so, what's going on here in Texas from my judgment about it perspective. What do I think of it? I think it's awesome, I'm super excited about it, I'm really glad it's happening, and I know that sounds a little bit wild and I don't mean that in an inflammatory way. I think the most important discussion we can have in America is a discussion about who decides. We've talked about this before with the politicians. Want us fighting about is not who decides. They want us fighting about what's the issue? Should the border be open? Should it not be open? How many people should come across? What should be the criterion? Do we need border reform, etc. Etc. On every issue.

Mark Meckler: 5:51

The underlying premise in all of those fights is always that the decisions will be made in Washington DC, and this fight is completely different. This fight is about who gets to decide what happens, and so this is a standoff between the federal government and a state government- two sovereigns, right? We have a federalist system. It's a we believe in federalism or constitutionalist, but we have a republic. We don't have a democracy, and that means you have sovereign states that have certain rights vis-a-vis the federal government, and the fight here is who has the right to protect Texans? Who gets to decide what's safe and secure for Texans? And what we're saying is while the federal government, we all acknowledge, as the primary responsibility for securing our borders, Texas has the right to protect its own citizens, and the right of self-defense is one of the most, if not the most, fundamental right we have. Somebody comes into your mind.

Rick Green: 6:47

That's right and called by the founding fathers the first law of nature. So it's, it's not even just a Constitutional right, it's literally a natural right that they said was number one.

Mark Meckler: 6:56

Right.

Mark Meckler: 6:56

So we've got people pouring across our border. There's absolutely violence taking place in all these border towns and all across our state. There's human trafficking, there's drug trafficking. By the way, when I say human trafficking, I want to be really clear. Slavery. There's slavery going on sex slavery, labor slavery. We have more slaves in the United States of America today than we had during the traditional period of slavery in America. These are incredible numbers. The federal government is allowing that to happen.

Mark Meckler: 7:24

When I say drug trafficking, let me redefine that. Murder. These people are murdering now. The last number I saw for last year is over a hundred thousand people in the United States of America died of fentanyl or related poisoning last year. This is murder. The reason I say it's murder and I'm not being hyperbolic, is because these people know that these drugs kill people. Yeah, they know that 70 to 100,000 people are going to die every year and they still bring those drugs in and they still sell them. So that's intentional. That's murder. So what we have is people being murdered on a mass scale. We have our border being crossed on a mass scale by people who intend to us harm, by criminals all that stuff going on. We have the right to defend ourselves. It is, as you said, the first law of nature. So I think this fight saying like, hey, do the states have this right? Do the states not have this right? Put aside all the legal nuance I think it's the right fight. It's about who gets to decide.

Rick Green: 8:19

Yeah, man, our mutual friend, a legislator from Utah, Ken Ivory, always says if government, so should government be involved at all? But if government, which one? Which is the same way of saying who decides? Or which level of government. In this case, if it is going to be government instead of you and me, or the church, or whatever it might be, in this case it is a government role. And the question is which one? And in this case, the one that's supposed to do it's not doing it. Can the state do it? Absolutely, Mark, you had a massive rally at the Capitol.

Rick Green: 8:45

What was that? Seven, eight, nine, ten months ago, something like that and you said how many more? I mean, that was essentially the question was how many more kids got to die, how many more people got to die? How many more kids got to go in it? What is it going to take? I mean, this seems to be an inflection point where there is more of a wake up. There's more attention on it. It's almost salacious, though. It's like people want the fight between feds and state, so that's more what they're paying attention to than the damage that's been done with the open border, but at least it is getting attention. Do you feel a difference from nine or ten months ago to right now?

Mark Meckler: 9:17

Yeah, I feel a big difference. I mean, I think one is general public opinion has shifted pretty dramatically. When you look at the polling right now I just had a new poll, I just saw it got released to me early. Number one issue among the American public immigration and border security. That's one in two. So that's incredible.

Rick Green: 9:38

And I saw one last week when this all first came down like 70% supporting what Governor Abbott did. Maybe it was 69, but it was right at 70%. I mean that's huge.

Mark Meckler: 9:50

Another stat, a number one issue among Hispanics. This is the most important issue for Hispanics. It's not the most important issue for whites. I mean, this is incredible juxtaposition. It's high for whites, but Hispanics it's their number one issue period. And so all of America seems to be coming around this issue because if you look at it, you just how do you say anything else? That's right, the images are incredible, the images are astounding, and so I think one is just public perception. Two, and I think it's really interesting, and I want to be nuanced here you and I always try to say you know, we want to do actual thinking man's politics. I was not happy with what Governor Abbott had done in the past, not enough in my opinion.

Mark Meckler: 10:33

And one of my great frustrations that I'm now feeling a little bit better about is, Governor Abbott and other members, members of our legislature, including people that I really admire and like Ken Paxton, Lieutenant Governor, said yeah, hey, we're doing everything we can. Well, this is really interesting to me, Rick, because they're doing more now. I mean, that's just call me simple. They said we're doing everything we can, and now they're doing more. One of those things was not true.

Rick Green: 11:02

Can't be true, right, right.

Mark Meckler: 11:04

And so, look, I want to give kudos to the governor for stepping up and for really stepping into the breach here and ordering DPS in and our state guard and our national guard. I'm really glad that's being done. Kudos to Lieutenant Governor Patrick for showing up at Shelby Park. He showed up at one o'clock at the deadline, kind of rolled in gangster style in the black cars. I thought that was pretty awesome. Made an awesome statement in the federal government right. I wish the cars had had big come and take it signs on the side, or come and cut it.

Mark Meckler: 11:38

But, really good. I like the imagery. You've got, Ken Paxton issues a letter, not just saying hey, we're not going to listen to you guys, but making eight demands, like here's the things you got to prove to us before even going to listen to y'all. Like you say you own this property. Show us the plat maps, show us the chain of title whereby you got possession of this plot.

Rick Green: 11:59

And pointing out the specific statutes that they're not following and not where they. Yeah, yeah.

Mark Meckler: 12:04

So I thought they're all really bold. So I'm happy with what they're doing. But I would also say, like, where were they likke when they were saying they couldn't do all this stuff? Look, there's a guy I really love in the legislature I'm going to name him by name and he's a good friend of mine, but Brian Birdwell. Senator Birdwell, great proponent of border security and a warrior on COS. But you know, he and I had some pretty serious discussions and he said point like we're doing all we can. That was, seven, eight, nine months ago. Now they're doing more. So I think circumstances force people to step up, and now we're seeing people step up and doing some of the things that they should. So overall, I'm glad what we're doing. I want people to understand there's razor wire that's being put up on under two miles of border.

Rick Green: 12:48

Right, and we've got how many? 1400?

Mark Meckler: 12:51

I think it's 1300 miles of border I think we have in Texas, so it's a tiny fraction. I want to say to credit to the governor, like a lot of people like, well, the whole border is not secure. One patience. Two, I think what they're doing this is just my guess is that they're testing stuff, and I think it's important. You really want to go lay 1300 miles of razor wire, whatever they would have to lay to secure the border? Obviously some of it doesn't need this, but you really want to lay all that razor wire and then the Supreme Court says you got to take it all down. That doesn't make any sense. So I think right now Abbott and Paxton are acting incrementally. Do something, see how the courts react, see if it sticks. If it sticks, do more of it. If it doesn't stick, do something else. I think that's the right approach to border security right now. So I think we're seeing improvements. I'm happy with the trajectory, but it's nowhere near enough yet.

Rick Green: 13:47

All right, folks, gotta take a quick break. What you're hearing right now is my conversation with Mark Mechler in the Tavern. If you'd like to get the entire interview, it's available right now at patreonacademy. tv. That's patreonacademy. tv, where we house Patreon U Lots of other things there for you as well, but check that out today for the full interview. Let's take a quick break. We'll be right back on WallBuilders.

Rick Green: 14:10

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Rick Green: 15:13

We're back here at WallBuilders. Thanks for staying with us. We're going to jump right back into the tavern in my interview with Mark Mechler talking about the border, talking about things that were going on there in the last couple of weeks and where this all may go. If you want to see the entire interview, you can check that out over at Warrior Poets Society Network or at PatriotU, and you'll find PatriotU at patriotacademy. tv. Here we are back in the tavern with Mark Mechler. So many things I want to ask you about. I want to come back to what more can we do? Because I think, even if they say we're doing everything we can now, there's still a whole lot more they can do.

Rick Green: 15:47

Maybe talk about some of what Russ Vaught and some of these other guys are saying should have been done a long time ago. But then let me back up though. First, to even just the Hispanic polling and the fact that they are more interested in this than anybody, and to me it's because you've got people that I've got friends that are first generation Americans or second generation Americans that stood and did the line, went through the proper channels, got their citizenship, all of those things, and I can imagine why it would be more important to them and they're more passionate about it than people who were born here and this white guilt stuff and white liberals that just have no common sense whatsoever. I mean, this would be like going to the- you got tickets to the Super Bowl

Rick Green: 16:29

If you're unfortunate enough to be a San Francisco fan or a Kansas City fan, either way, you buy your ticket. You spend like $5,000 for your two tickets to go to the game. You show up at the stadium and the stadium's packed out already and it's all people that got in for free broke the lines to get in and they say sorry, you don't get to enjoy your seat because this and they didn't pay. That's essentially what we're talking about here. That's what's happening for the, so is that what you think is driving it? Is it culture? I mean, what do you think is behind that part?

Mark Meckler: 16:59

I think that's part of it, but I think it's also it's having more of an impact in Hispanic communities than anywhere else. If you go to these, especially go to these communities on the border. You know, frankly, anywhere all over the country you have a lot of first generation immigrants who came here legally, a lot of them working entry level jobs and then you have illegal immigrants coming in taking away those jobs.

Mark Meckler: 17:22

So that's number one. Like you've got people here legally, they need the work and it's being taken away by people who are coming here illegally. Number two they're depressing wages. Generally speaking, even if you can keep a job, if there's a bunch of folks here illegally, a lot of them will take lower paying jobs and they're outside the system, quote, unquote. They're being paid cash, not necessarily paying taxes. That depresses wages in those communities. And then I want to say, finally, there's a lot of crime coming with this and that crime is particularly targeted in those communities. Got MS-13 pouring across the border, the cartels pouring across the border. All this criminal influence is having a very negative impact in those communities. So they're paying the highest price. The people who pay the price or the people who are gonna stand up and say this has got to stop.

Rick Green: 18:11

Okay, so you mentioned the wages, so I gotta veer off on another topic here. Then I was on a show recently with our friend Floyd Brown from Western Journal and he was talking about, very, very frustrated and upset with our Republican friends who do not take these issues. Or actually they want the open borders. Not just that they don't take it seriously, they want the open border for those depressed wages, especially big, big business. How much of a factor is that in causing, first of all, Abbott not to do enough up until now, starting to do more, but also, just, you know, both federal and state politics in general not closing the border or securing the border, because even those on the Republican side benefit from the open border.

Mark Meckler: 18:52

Yeah, I think that's true and it's been true for a long time, and so what you would call the Chamber of Commerce Republicans the one that I hear the most and you know I come from California originally that's one of the bread baskets.

Rick Green: 19:03

Oh, that's it, this interview's over.

Mark Meckler: 19:06

Come on, man, I was smart enough to move to Texas. It's one of the bread baskets of America, the Central Valley there of California, and I hear this all the time. Well, you know we can't find Americans to pick our lettuce. Well, number one. Thanks for letting me know you're a racist, like. I really appreciate knowing you're a straight up, open, admitted racist, because if you say that it's like oh, I get it. So we need essentially slave labor, brown people from Central and South America to pick our agricultural products for us. That's how our economy is based on. Slave labor is essentially what you're saying and what I'd say and this is not popular, Rick, and I understand this we should pay Americans whatever it costs to pick our labor. That's called a market economy and our to our produce.

Mark Meckler: 19:52

So what that means is you and I and everybody we're going to pay a lot more and it's harsh and the economy would have to rejigger and adjust to that. But if it costs us 15 bucks an hour, 18 bucks an hour, for somebody to be out in the fields pick and lettuce, then that's what we need to pay. We shouldn't be relying on devalued slave labor from Mexico or Guatemala or Ecuador or wherever to pick those products or to be nannies for the kids or to clean houses. We should pay the wages that it takes to get people who are legally in our country to do that stuff. The economy, eventually, there would be a shock, but the economy would adjust to that eventually over time and that's a healthier economy and it's actually a moral economy as opposed to an immoral one which we have right now.

Rick Green: 20:45

Right and also even allowing the market to dictate legal immigration that can come over and work but also pay taxes and not be the underground economy that we get from illegal immigration. Again, the market would work that out and of course I mean I usually start these immigration discussions always saying listen, we're for immigration, we think it ought to be a thousand times easier to come legally and we know who you are and you're here to work or you're here to assimilate or whatever and a thousand times harder to come illegally. That's a whole other topic. But right now at the border we talked about the politicians, we talked about what can or can't be done and we were about to talk about what more could be done.

Rick Green: 21:26

And of course, Russ Vaught, Ken Cuccinelli, those guys that you're good friends with as well they've been saying for a long time to properly do Article 1, section 10, you have to take a quote, unquote, war footing and literally encroach on Mexican ground to push those people back across the river.

Rick Green: 21:48

And a friend of mine, that's a state senator, used a term the other day that I thought made perfect sense and he said really, we're going to have to essentially go in and create a green zone. We're going to have to go in and American military, Texas military, whatever create that green zone and push them back across and literally physically place them there. Because this business of just bringing them in and processing them and then let them go and just like the whole case, is based on that one day on September 20th 4,555, that the feds helped across in there through the wire that they cut that day and about half showed up at the processing center a mile down the road. So that's obviously not working. Talk to me about that and what the political will necessary to take those kind of steps.

Mark Meckler: 22:34

Yeah, so I might even be more radical than those guys on this. I don't think there's any way to solve this permanently without military action. We can create a buffer on our side of the river, on our side of the border, and that's helpful. Sealing a 1300 mile border very difficult, and I think he said a boarder a buffer zone? I would call it. It's like the DMZ between the Koreas. Yeah, it needs to be a kilometer of cleared territory. That is a no man's zone. I mean, here we, we believe you're hostile, you have a hostile intent and we're going to clear you out and it needs to be that way.

Mark Meckler: 23:11

That would require military action. Whether that's from Texas or the federal government, I would prefer it's the federal government does that. I think that we ought to acknowledge that the cartels have declared war on the United States of America and, whether they say it or not, in their actions, they've declared war on us. They control our border. Now I don't know if you've seen Ben Shapiro's new special on the invasion. It's absolutely incredible. He's got a drone flying around.

Rick Green: 23:37

I thought you were going to ask me if I saw Ben Shapiro's new rap song.

Rick Green: 23:40

Number one, by the way which he's very proud of. It's just weird, man.

Mark Meckler: 23:44

But it's goo Same week a number one rap song, full length interview with Elon Muske Auschwitz and the border documentary released. I don't know how he did that, tha doesn't sleep. But in one of the scenes there's a drone flying directly above him and he goes oh, is that one of ours in the Border Patro Twenty four year Border Patrol guy said no, that's, that's a cartel drone. He goes well, are you going to shoot it down, what? And he said no, we're not allowed to. And he goes what do you mean? You're not allowed to? And he said you have to get permission personally from Secretary Meierku to shoot down any drones. And he said that drone is watching us because they know we're not a normal patrol and they're trying to figure out what we're doing here, so they send a drone to check us out.

Rick Green: 24:26

Oh, wow, and so this is why tell that stor

Mark Meckler: 24:29

aHe said that the cartels have operational control of the border. We don't. We're not doing that kind of stuff. They are, and so we have to get that operational control. The only way to do it is militarily. I think that the federal government ought to go in and make military strikes against the cartels. We know where they are, we know where they're headquartered, we know where their people are. We need to do it in this country in a mass coordinated fashion, because the cartels are well ensconced in this country retty much in every major city and most of the minor cities in this country.

Mark Meckler: 24:58

We need to round them up, throw them in prison, send them back to Mexico. I mean, frankly, I'm going to use really harsh word we need to exterminate the cartels, and so that means going into Mexico. Now people would say well, you're violating a sovereign country's territory. Well, Mexico is not a sovereign country any longer. Mexico is a failed narco state. The federal government is not in control of their military. The federal government is not in control of their police. Their state governments are not their local governments not in control of their police forces. That is a failed narco terrorist state, and so we have to treat it as such.

Mark Meckler: 25:32

And I don't mind. Let's go in, let's clean out the cartels, let's do what has to be done. Prop up a government that is actually a government that is going to be friendly in the United States and is going to continue to work with us to limit cartel activity in Mexico. So if we don't do that, we're going to have a terrorist state, which we have right now, on our border forever. To me, this is like Gaza they're invading our country, they're invading our country every day, they're killing our people, and we have to go in and use maximum force to oust them. Create a buffer zone along the border. If we do that, we'll have border security. It's that simple.

Rick Green: 26:12

Ou folks were out of time for today that was Mark Mechler in the tavern talking about solutions for the border, talking about the situation there, and of course we get into a lot more in terms of the standoff between Texas and the feds. What's the constitutional answer to all these things? If you want to hear the whole interview, visit us over at patriotacademytv. That's the home for Patriot U, that's patriotacademytv. Or you can go to Warrior Poets Society Network. Our friend John Lovell has all kinds of great programming over there and the tavern is one of the programs that you can get over at Warrior Poets Society Network. Thanks for listening. Today You've been listening to Wall Billers.