This QAnon-Baiting Trump Ally Wants to Run Texas

As chairman of the Texas GOP, Allen West has backed Donald Trump’s bogus claims of election fraud and even suggested that Texas and other states should secede from the rest of the country.

Now, he wants to be the state’s next governor—and he’s not going to let the current Texas governor, who is also a Republican, stand in his way.

West is a former one-term congressman from Florida and retired U.S. Army lieutenant colonel, who was once fined for allowing troops under his command to beat an Iraqi policeman during an interrogation and personally threatening to kill the man. West made the announcement that he would run for Texas governor at his church near Dallas on July 4, as first reported by the Texas Tribune. He stepped down as GOP chair last month, but he’ll remain the chair until a replacement is selected on July 11.

"There comes a time when a warrior understands he has to go back and pull out that sword," West said in the video, referencing the Alamo. "I am now drawing my sword and I will draw that line in the sand."

“I’ve not been in elected political office for a decade, but I can no longer sit on the sidelines,” West added. During the service, West also gave a sermon and read the Declaration of Independence aloud.

Texas’s current governor, Greg Abbott, is a conservative Republican who said last year that he plans to run for a third term in 2022. Abbott has come under fire from the right, including West, over his handling of the coronavirus pandemic. Last October, for example, West and the state GOP held a rally outside the governor’s mansion in Austin demanding that Abbott rescind coronavirus restrictions.

West is also not the first primary challenger Abbott has received, as former Texas state senator Don Huffines announced a bid in May. Huffines released a statement Sunday welcoming West to the race, saying the two would “make clear that Texans can do better than Greg Abbott."

Long an outspoken right-winger, West has openly embraced the far-right since becoming the state GOP chair last July. iIn April West appeared at an event in Dallas organized by a QAnon influencer and featuring several figures popular in the QAnon community. And after he became chair West changed the state party’s motto to the QAnon slogan “We are the storm,” though West claimed it had nothing to do with QAnon and was instead from one of his favorite poems.

He has also taken a hard line on refusing to accept the 2020 election results, appearing at a Stop the Steal rally in December and saying that “we don’t want chaos, we don’t want violence, but we will not be subjugated.” When the Supreme Court rejected a bid from Texas and 17 other states to throw out the election results and declare Trump the winner, West suggested forming a breakaway republic in response.

“Perhaps law-abiding states should bond together and form a Union of states that will abide by the constitution,” West said at the time.

But despite West’s affinity with the GOP’s right-wing base, he’s facing a tough fight against Abbott. The former state attorney general easily won election in 2014 and re-election in 2018. Abbott has an enormous fundraising advantage; as of the end of December 2020, he had nearly $38 million on hand, according to Texas campaign finance reports.

And last month, Trump endorsed Abbott for re-election. “Governor Greg Abbott will continue to be a great leader for the Lone Star State, and has my Complete and Total Endorsement for re-election,” Trump said in a statement in early June. “He will never let you down!”

As for West, he’s so far declined to mention Abbott during his early campaign, saying in a blog post on his campaign website Monday (that included a photo West says he took at the Texas border at 1 in the morning) that his campaign “is not about running against anyone.”

At the same time, West implicitly acknowledged what—and who—he’s up against.

“There are those who say this is an uphill battle. Well, to them I say, David took on Goliath with a few small stones, but with immense faith,” West wrote. “Thirteen small colonies took on the greatest power the world knew at that time. Texas won its independence by fighting one of the mightiest armies of the day. And, never forget, US Army paratroopers are always given the tough missions. We like it that way.”