Texas Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick appears on Fox News' "The Ingraham Angle". Screenshot via Fox News
Lt. Governor Dan Patrick blamed Texas' COVID-19 spike on Democrats failing to get Black residents vaccinated.
Patrick claimed that Democratic leaders were doing nothing to help the African American community.
However, Texas COVID-19 cases involving white Texans are twice as common as those involving black Texans.
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Texas Lieutenant Governor Texas Lt. Governor Dan Patrick diverted criticism from the COVID-19 epidemic in his state by blaming Democratic leaders for failing to get enough Black Americans vaccined.
Like much of the rest, Texas is experiencing an explosion in COVID-19 cases. This is mainly due to the spread of the Delta variant. It is especially dangerous for people who are not vaccinated. According to The New York Times, COVID-19 cases, hospitalizations, and deaths have increased by 39%, 55%, respectively, in Texas over the last 14 days.
Patrick, despite being elected as the president of a state in which Republicans control all the state offices and the legislature, chose to blame Democrats for failing to get Black Americans vaccinated when Fox News' Laura Ingraham asked him to address criticisms of the state's handling the pandemic.
"Well Laura, COVID is spreading. Most of the numbers are among unvaccinated people, and Democrats like to blame Republicans for that. Patrick stated that the largest group in most states is made up of African Americans who are not vaccinated. "And last I checked, more than 90% of them vote Democrats in their major cities or major counties. It's up the Democrats to get, just like it's up the Republicans to get as many people as possible vaccinated.
"But we recognize that people may not want to get the vaccine. We won't force them to have it. That's their choice. Patrick said that while we don't criticize the Republicans for their actions, we encourage people to get it. However, they are doing nothing to help the African American community with a large number of unvaccinated.
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Democrats swiftly condemned Patrick's remarks. New Jersey Democratic Congressman Bill Pascrell tweeted in response: "This is the republican party: murderous fail, contempt for humankind, and rancid racism."
Mike Collier, a Democratic candidate to be lieutenant governor in 2022 said that Dan Patrick's negligence has caused more than 55,000 Texasans to die. Blaming Black people for their own mistakes is not only unacceptable, but straight from the Jim Crow playbook. Texas deserves far better."
It is not true that Texas's Black residents are responsible for the increase in COVID-19-related cases.
According to the Kaiser Family Foundation, black residents make up 15% of Texas' state population. They also account for 11% of Texas' deaths and 9% of all vaccinations.
Texas' 39.8% non-Hispanic white population accounts for 32% of all cases, 42% deaths and 38% of vaccines.
According to the US Census Bureau's Household Pulse survey, 2.1 million non-Hispanic white Texans said they would not, definitely not or have not received the COVID-19 vaccination, compared to 703,594 Black Texans.
Bloomberg reported that while black and Hispanic vaccination rates have been slow in some communities, there have been notable increases in Hispanic and Black residents receiving the vaccine in regions hardest hit by the Delta variant spike.
Patrick placed the burden on local governments to ensure that people are vaccinated. However, the governor of the state signed an executive order prohibiting localities and government agencies from mandating vaccinations. He also signed a law barring private businesses from requiring customers to be vaccinated.
The state is currently involved in a legal battle for enforcement of an order that bans mask mandates within localities and school district.
Business Insider has the original article.
