As a former Austin resident (East Austin before moved out in 2023), I can tell you that this is nothing new. Democrat legislators have had to flee numerous times in order to try to slow down Texas’ slide into authoritarianism. Austin dems have been down in the trenches fighting this shit for years before Trump came along but nobody paid attention, much less helped.

Like climate change or a frog slowly being boiled by raising the water temperature one degree at a time, Republican authoritarianism has been slow moving train-wrecked that many of us have been screaming about for years and nobody paid much attention to. Texas consistent low voter turnout can attest to that. Indifference has fucked us all.