TEXAS — Rep. Dan Crenshaw, R-Texas, caught heat on social media Wednesday for drawing comparisons of COVID-19 rates between Texas and New York that don’t exactly add up.

What You Need To Know

  • U.S. Rep. Dan Crenshaw, a Republican from the Houston area, posted a tweet saying New York and Texas had similar COVID-19 rates despite how differently the states have governed during the pandemic

  • Many on social media criticized him for not considering the whole data, including Texas’ higher death and hospitalization rates

  • The tweet came as Texas Gov. Greg Abbott is fighting to block a federal vaccine mandate for private enterprises

In a Twitter post, the Houston-area representative stated that despite “completely different public health restrictions,” New York and Texas had the exact same COVID-19 case numbers per 100,000 population. 

The implication seemed to be that New York, where mask and vaccine mandates have been more widely adopted and accepted, was doing about the same on new COVID-19 infection rates as was Texas, where Gov. Greg Abbott and the Republican-led legislature have been fighting at every turn against federal laws aimed at mitigating the spread of the disease.

Those comments drew immediate criticism online, including some who accused the Texas congressman of spreading misinformation.

So what are the facts?

Crenshaw might have been referring to COVID numbers on The New York Times’ extensive pandemic data pages, which draw daily from state and federal health agency numbers. 

From that data, as of Oct. 14, Texas and New York did, in fact, have a close rate when it came to the average number of new COVID cases in a seven-day period per 100,000 population. On that chart, New York was at 24 while Texas was at 23. 

Those numbers are close at first glance. Broken down, they look like this: The average daily number of new cases in New York State over a seven-day period as of Oct. 14 was 4,673 in a state with a population of 20.2 million. 

In Texas, that average during the same time period was 6,672 with a state population of 29 million. 

Looking at the average new cases per 100,000 population, New York was just 1 case point ahead of Texas, which has a larger population.

But critics of Crenshaw’s tweet said he failed to consider other factors in the data, which could indicate that the pandemic continues to take a larger toll on Texans when compared to New Yorkers.

According to the same data charts compiled by The New York Times, Texas, over the last seven-day period, has seen 25 hospitalizations from COVID-19 per 100,000 population, or an average of 7,267 daily hospitalizations. New York State had 13 hospitalizations per 100,000 or 2,547 on average per day. 

Then there are the death rates from COVID, where we see a significant distinction in the numbers between the two states. New York during the past seven-day period averaged 38.7 daily deaths while Texas averaged 224.6 each day. 

Some 65% of New York State residents who are eligible for the COVID-19 vaccine are fully vaccinated. In Texas, that number is 52%.

Crenshaw dug his heels in as the criticism came rolling in after his Wednesday tweet. 

“The point being, as policy makers, we should admit that our most drastic policy actions have had little effect on the spread,” he tweeted. “This has been a consistent theme since the pandemic began.”

In Texas, Crenshaw’s comments certainly appear to follow the thinking of Abbott and other Republican lawmakers.  

Since the start of the pandemic, Abbott has gone back and forth on mask mandates and lockdowns, creating confusion across the state. When President Joe Biden announced last month that he was working on a Labor Dept. vaccine requirement for all federal workers, private employers with more than 100 workers, and health care staff, Abbott issued several executive orders to counter the move. He banned mask and vaccine mandates for any entity that received state government funds, as well as vaccine passports. 

This week, he issued an executive order banning private enterprises from adopting vaccine mandates and asked the state legislature to take up the issue during its current special session to make it a state law. 

This isn’t the first time a Texas lawmaker has taken heat online for trying to compare the Lone Star State with other large states. 

Republican Sen. Ted Cruz in August 2020 posted a tweet about Californians being asked to conserve energy during an extreme heatwave, accusing that state’s government of being “unable to perform even basic functions of civilization, like having reliable electricity."

He later recanted as his own state lost power in February when Texas’ independent power grid failed in one of the worst winter storms in a decade. Tens of thousands were left without heat and water in single-digit temperatures. Hundreds died as a result of the storm’s impact.

Cruz apologized for his previous snark, saying in a tweet, “I’ve got no defense. A blizzard strikes Texas & our state shuts down. Not good. Stay safe!”