Texas official warns of civil war if Obama wins

AUSTIN, Texas — A county judge and emergency-management official in Texas said unrest may erupt if President Barack Obama is re-elected, that the president would respond by sending in United Nations troops, and that he needs more sheriff’s deputies to deal with it.

“He’s going to hand over the sovereignty of the United States to the U.N.,” Lubbock County Republican Tom Head said this week on a Fox News television station in the Texas Panhandle region. “Then what happens? I’m thinking worst-case scenario — civil unrest, civil disobedience, civil war maybe.”

“We’re talking take up arms and get rid of the guy,” he said. Obama’s response? “He’s going to send in U.N. troops. I don’t want them in Lubbock.”

The White House declined to comment on Head’s statements. The county Democratic Party released a statement calling the comments “pure paranoid fantasy” and said Head should resign.

Head elaborated in an interview Wednesday with the Lubbock Avalanche-Journal, which serves the county of about 284,000 people that is the home of Texas Tech University and the Prairie Dog Town tourist attraction.

As the county’s chief emergency-management official, Head told the newspaper, he must prepare for worst-case scenarios, which he said included Obama’s re-election and Democrats retaining control of the Senate and a category 5 hurricane.

“Do I think U.N. troops are going to be rolling into Lubbock? Probably not going to happen,” he said. “F-5 hurricane? Probably not going to happen.”

Head offered the scenarios as partial justification for a 1.7 percent property-tax increase to hire more deputies and add other law-enforcement resources.

“It’s not the first time he’s said something ridiculous,” Kenny Ketner, who heads the Lubbock County Democratic Party, said Thursday.

Carl Tepper, head of the county Republican Party, said Head “really is a very nice man. He’s been a good officeholder.”

“Individual officeholders sometimes say outrageous things,” Tepper said, adding that Vice President Joseph Biden is known for occasionally blurting out controversial comments.