Aaron Reitz, among the GOP candidates running to be Texas attorney general, suggested Monday, without evidence, that the Texas House Democratic leader, who is Asian, lied during the citizenship application process and should have his citizenship revoked.
“As AG, I want to see [Rep. Gene Wu] de-naturalized,” he posted on X in response to a 28-second clip of an interview with Wu years ago about racial divisions in the country.
The clip, from a 2024 interview, instantly angered some Texas Republicans who accused Wu, a Democrat from Houston, of being anti-white and racist for his suggestion that non-white communities could come together to win elections in Texas once they realized they “share the same oppressor.”
Reitz faces three others for the GOP nomination in the March 3 primary: state Sens. Joan Huffman of Houston and Mayes Middleton of Galveston, as well as U.S. Rep. Chip Roy of Austin. He appeared to be the only candidate offering to take action against Wu for his comments.
“On what basis? He probably hid his anti-American sentiment throughout his citizenship application process – the details of which are conspicuously absent from the public record,” Reitz wrote on social media. “Wu is a subversive whose citizenship should be revoked.”
Through a spokesman, Wu declined to comment.
Denaturalizations are historically rare and, under federal law, can only happen if someone has committed fraud while applying for citizenship. The federal government can also denaturalize someone if they become affiliated with the Communist Party or a terrorist organization within a few years of becoming a citizen.
President Donald Trump has increasingly pointed to denaturalization as a means of stepping up his crackdown on immigrants. Last year, the administration issued guidance to U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services field offices, issuing monthly quotas for offices to initiate denaturalization cases.
The video clip that went viral shows Wu talking about the relationships between different immigrant communities. The entire nearly 40-minute interview features a conversation about Texas GOP leadership, life in Texas for immigrants, and Wu’s life since migrating as a child from China with his family and seeing Houston’s Asian-American community flourish.
“I always tell people the day the Latino, African-American, Asian and other communities realize they share the same oppressor is the day we start winning,” Wu says in the short clip circulating on social media. “We have the ability to take over this country and do what’s necessary for everyone and do the right thing. But the problem is that our communities are divided.”
The video was posted on Saturday night by an X account with nearly 4 million followers. A few hours later, it was reposted by LibsofTikTok, the right-wing disinformation account with nearly 5 million followers.
By Monday morning, many Texas Republicans were outraged by Wu.
US Senator Ted Cruz said that “the Democratic Party is built on bigotry.” Paxton called Wu a “radical racist who hates millions of Texans just because they’re white.”
Roy, in a heated primary contest against Reitz, has said Wu should resign his state House seat, a move cheered by other conservative influencers and commentators.
“Unlike many Democrats, he admits his racism against white people and calls for a ‘takeover of this country,'” Roy wrote on social media. “He should resign or the TX House should strip him of all power.”
Bo French, the former Tarrant County GOP chairman who is running for a seat on the Texas Railroad Commission, referred to Wu as a “comium,” even as Wu shared personal stories about how his family was victimized by the Chinese Communist Party.
Texas Republicans on Capitol Hill and beyond have for years baselessly accused Wu of similar crimes and questioned his loyalty to state and country. Criticism reached a new peak last summer when Wu and other House Democrats left the state to delay passage of a new congressional map designed to maximize GOP gains in the US House.
Two lawsuits seeking to remove Wu from office for violating the quorum remain pending before the state supreme court.
At one point in the interview from which the viral clip came, Wu talks about how he sees all residents of his district as Americans, regardless of their legal status. The journalist’s host then asks Wu about his biggest fears for Houston’s undocumented population during Trump’s second term, assured by promises of a historic deportation effort.
“It’s not just the fate of undocumented people. It’s the fate of all immigrants,” Wu replies, pointing to the internment of 120,000 Japanese Americans during World War II. “People say I’m not worried. I’m a citizen. . . . When the mass deportation starts, I promise you it’s not just illegal immigrants that will be affected, it’s Americans.”