Democratic State Rep. Gene Wu of Texas told a podcast audience that Latino, African American, Asian, and other minority communities should unite against a shared "oppressor" because they now have "the ability to take over this country." The remarks, originally made on a December 31, 2024, episode of the podcast "Define American with Jose Antonio Vargas," resurfaced on X and detonated — racking up over 12.5 million views after the account "End Wokeness" reposted the clip.
The backlash was swift. Sen. Ted Cruz and Elon Musk both criticized Wu's comments. The RNC issued a blistering statement. And Democrats, as has become routine, said nothing.
According to the Daily Caller, Wu — who serves as Chairman of the Democratic Caucus in the Texas House of Representatives, not some backbencher — laid out his vision in terms that would be career-ending for any Republican who reversed the racial polarity. Speaking with host Jose Antonio Vargas, Wu framed American politics as a liberation struggle against a singular, unnamed oppressor:
"The oppression comes from one place. I always tell people the day the Latino, African American, Asian, and other communities realize that they share the same oppressor is the day we start winning. Because we are the majority in this country now. We have the ability to take over this country and do what is needed for everyone and to make things fair. But the problem is our communities are divided. They're completely divided."
Wu never names the oppressor. He doesn't have to. The rhetorical architecture does the work for him — every group is listed except one, and the "oppression comes from one place." The audience knows exactly which blank to fill in.
Earlier in the exchange, Wu expanded on the framework:
"Our country — and the powers that be — have spent tremendous time, effort, and money to make sure those groups are never united, that they always see each other as enemies or competitors, without ever realizing that they share one thing in common: their oppressors are all the same."
This is not a call for unity. It's a call for a coalition organized around racial grievance and directed at a common enemy that just happens to go unnamed. Strip the euphemisms, and you're left with a state legislator — a caucus chairman — arguing that demographic change should be weaponized for political conquest.
RNC spokesman Zach Kraft captured the dynamic in a statement to the Daily Caller News Foundation:
"These disgusting comments are wokeness at its worst, and the silence is deafening from Democrats. Look no further than the Senate primary to see how the woke mind virus has spread like wildfire among the ranks of Texas Democrats."
Kraft didn't stop there. He connected Wu's comments to a broader pattern among Texas Democrats:
"James Talarico spent last week apologizing for his 'white privilege,' and Jasmine Crockett is taking a page out of Kamala Harris' playbook by preemptively blaming racism and sexism for why she will lose."
That's three Texas Democrats in the same news cycle — one calling for racial "takeover," one genuflecting over his skin color, and one pre-loading excuses for electoral failure. This isn't a series of unrelated incidents. It's a party culture.
No prominent Democrat has condemned Wu's remarks. Not one has distanced themselves. Not one has suggested that framing American governance as a racial conquest might be, at a minimum, unhelpful. The silence tells you everything about where the party's center of gravity actually sits.
Here's the part that should keep Democrats up at night — and probably explains why Wu felt the need for his little pep talk in the first place. The very communities he's trying to organize against their supposed oppressor have been moving in the opposite direction.
CNN exit polling across three presidential cycles tells the story:
Every single demographic Wu named moved toward Trump — significantly — over three consecutive elections. Hispanic support didn't just tick upward. It nearly doubled. Asian support grew by 13 points. Black support, while still modest in raw terms, grew by more than 60 percent from its 2016 baseline.
Wu made his comments barely two months after Trump defeated Kamala Harris in the 2024 election. He looked at those numbers and concluded the problem wasn't the Democratic message — it was that minorities hadn't been sufficiently organized against the right enemy. The possibility that millions of non-white Americans simply disagree with Democratic policies doesn't appear to have crossed his mind.
This is the contradiction at the heart of the modern progressive project: it claims to champion minority communities while refusing to respect their agency. When Hispanic voters choose border security over open borders, they've been tricked. When Black men vote on economic issues rather than racial solidarity, they're victims of division. When Asian Americans reject affirmative action policies that directly penalize their children, they've been co-opted.
Wu's framing requires minority voters to be objects, not subjects — pieces on a board to be "united" by enlightened leaders like himself. The moment those voters make independent choices that break from the progressive script, they become evidence of oppression rather than free citizens exercising judgment.
It's a closed loop. Support Democrats, and you're liberated. Support anyone else, and you've been deceived. There's a word for a political philosophy that tells people their choices are only legitimate when they align with the party's interests.
Imagine, for thirty seconds, a Republican state legislator — a caucus chairman — going on a podcast and saying white Americans need to realize they share a common oppressor, that they are the majority, and that they have "the ability to take over this country." The clip wouldn't just go viral. It would lead every network broadcast. Congressional Democrats would demand censure before lunch. The legislator's career would be measured in hours.
Wu said the equivalent of the races reversed. He still chairs his caucus. No Democrat has called for him to step down. No Democrat has even said the remarks were inappropriate.
The 12.5 million views on X suggest the public sees what the Democratic Party refuses to acknowledge. Americans of every background can recognize racial demagoguery when they hear it — even when the speaker is careful enough to leave one word unsaid.
The voters Wu wants to conscript into his revolution are already casting their ballots. They're just not casting them the way he wants.