Jace Yarborough, the Republican candidate for Congress in Texas’s 32nd Congressional District, says illegal immigration is doing more than straining public budgets in his district — he argues it’s quietly eroding the trust that holds local communities together.
Yarborough made the comments during an appearance on Breitbart News Daily, pointing to his district’s location along major migration routes from the border.
“I’ve got massive corridors that come up from the border, I-35 being one of the biggest ones. The point is that there are all kinds of monetary costs and burdens to public programs that we’re seeing more and more of because the work the Trump administration is doing,” he said.
Yarborough argued that for decades, illegal immigration has brought fraud that costs communities financially, but he said there’s a less-discussed consequence as well.
“When people in a local community see those around them taking from the community, taking from common spaces and common resources, they clam up, they stop investing in things that aren’t necessarily, you know, that are sort of common and public, and that’s when communities really fall apart and disintegrate,” Yarborough said.
He said strong communities depend on high levels of trust among neighbors, and that illegal immigration and fraud undermine that trust.
“It causes us all to turn in, and we stop doing the things that make our communities vibrant and rich and beautiful to live in,” he said.
A Blue-Collar Upbringing
Yarborough described growing up in a blue-collar family that relied on public institutions — schools, police, libraries and sidewalks.
“All of these things are being completely overrun by people who are here to simply take, take, take, because they don’t have a mindset that was formed by our American culture,” he said.
He contrasted what he called American values of generosity and dynamism with what he described as the attitude of people “our government has shipped in here,” saying they “don’t share those values” and that this has “really detrimental effects on communities, especially for people in homes like the one I grew up in.”
The Local Park Example
Yarborough recalled a man from his hometown who voluntarily maintained part of a local park without pay.
“He mowed and kind of like kept it up, and it was a great place to go and just kind of play and hang out. He wasn’t on the city’s payroll… kids all over the town benefited from the work this gentleman did, and that’s why he loved it,” he said.
Yarborough said that between regulatory burdens and what he described as drug activity by “third worlders” using such parks, a man like that today would likely stop volunteering his time.
“It is simply the case that if you do not have the resources to buffer yourself from common spaces today, then your everyday life is much more difficult,” he said.
Shared Values and Civic Life
Yarborough said civilizations form when people share common interests and are drawn together by them. He argued that dynamic breaks down when those shared values aren’t extended to citizens or newcomers alike.
“When we remove those common loves, not only from our own citizens, but certainly we don’t give them to people that immigrate to this country, then things start to fall apart, because we’re not all drawn to the same things. We’re not all ready to give of ourselves to things that we don’t control, like a common community space,” he said.
Breitbart News Daily airs on SiriusXM Patriot 125 from 6:00 a.m. to 9:00 a.m. Eastern.
