There’s no shortage of radicalized Republican candidates seeking office this year, but Bo French, the GOP’s nominee for Texas railroad commissioner, stands out — for all the wrong reasons.
Texas Monthly recently published a rather devastating profile on French, highlighting, among other things, his willingness to peddle “fascist conspiracy theories,” his eagerness to “round up” Chinese Americans and Muslim Americans, his references to Native Americans as “third world savages” and a since-deleted poll he posted to social media last year in which he asked his followers, “Who is a bigger threat to America?”
Respondents were asked to choose between Jews and Muslims.
GOP primary voters nevertheless backed French in his bid for statewide office, which has not curtailed his extremism. Over the weekend, for example, he published racist social media posts targeting students of color celebrating at Saturday’s University of Texas football game. After some Republicans, including retiring Sen. John Cornyn, responded with condemnations, French doubled down. The Washington Sun reported:
Bo French, the Republican nominee for Texas railroad commissioner, stood by a series of racist social media posts he sent targeting Asian students at the University of Texas, dismissing criticism from fellow Republicans as he campaigns for a seat that oversees the state’s oil and gas industry.
French dismissed the backlash he garnered over his post on X showing a photograph of students celebrating Texas’ football victory over Ohio State, and suggested the students pictured benefitted from discriminatory admissions practices designed to exclude American-born students.
“Social media is exposing how many Americans have been displaced by foreigners,” he wrote in a subsequent post. “It’s everywhere and far worse than any of us could imagine.”
It was around this time when Karl Rove, a longtime adviser to George W. Bush, called French a “bigot” and said he would vote for French’s Democratic opponent.
Time will tell whether other prominent Republicans, in the Lone Star State or elsewhere, step up in similar ways, but it’s hard not to notice that GOP officials have had extraordinary success in recent months making a Twitch streamer named Hasan Piker one of the most prominent figures of the 2026 election cycle, with Democrats — some of whom have never even spoken to Piker and couldn’t pick him out of a lineup — being forced to respond to the commentator’s most controversial comments.
Piker, however, is not a candidate for public office, and the idea that the entirety of the Democratic Party bears responsibility for Piker’s commentary has long been ridiculous.
But if the political game is going to be played this way, why shouldn’t Republicans — in Texas and elsewhere — be forced to answer for French?
The post Why Republican silence about Bo French’s radicalism in Texas is not a credible option appeared first on MS NOW.
