The government of Texas recently decided to step up and do what the federal government seems either unable or unwilling to do: defend the border and arrest and deport illegal immigrants to try to staunch the flow of illegal border crossers into the state. It did so with a law that makes it a state-level crime to cross into Texas illegally. Now, the Biden Administration’s DOJ is attacking Texas for the law, threatening to sue.
Gov. Abbott, describing the border defense measures when he signed them into law, said, “Four years ago, the United States had the fewest illegal border crossings in decades. It was because of four policies put in place by the Trump Administration that led to such a low number of illegal crossings. President Biden has eliminated all of those policies and done nothing to halt illegal immigration. President Biden’s deliberate inaction has left Texas to fend for itself. Today, I will sign three laws to better protect Texas—and America—from President Biden’s border neglect. These laws will help stop the tidal wave of illegal entry into Texas, add additional funding to build more border wall, and crackdown on human smuggling.”
Predictably, the Biden Administration was furious, and it just responded with a letter from Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General Brian M. Boynton in which Boynton argued that the Texas law making illegal entry into Texas a crime, a law that will go into effect in March, is unconstitutional and will disrupt the federal government’s immigration enforcement activities.
In the letter, Boynton goes on to say that “the Department of Justice intends to bring a lawsuit to enforce the supremacy of federal law and to enjoin the operation of SB 4.” He added that “the United States will pursue all appropriate legal remedies to ensure that Texas does not interfere with the functions of the federal government.”
The letter went on to explain why the Texas law is, from its perspective, unconstitutional, saying, “Indeed, the Supreme Court has confirmed that ‘the removal process’ must be ‘entrusted to the discretion of the Federal Government’ because a ‘decision on removability’ touches ‘on foreign relations and must be made with one voice.’”
Further, Boynton’s letter says that the U.S. Constitution has tasked the federal government with regulating immigration into the country and controlling the nation’s borders with other countries. Thus, it argues, the law “therefore intrudes into a field that is occupied by the federal government and is preempted.”
Gov. Abbott has so far refused to back down. His director of communications, Renae Eze, said, “Texas is prepared to take this fight all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court to protect Texans and Americans from President Biden’s open border policies.”
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Continuing, Eze ripped into the Biden Administration for its refusal to defend the border, saying, “President Biden’s deliberate and dangerous inaction at our southern border has left Texas to fend for itself. Gov. Abbott signed Senate Bill 4 into law last week to help stop the tidal wave of illegal entry into Texas as the President refuses to enforce federal immigration laws.”
Featured image credit: By World Travel & Tourism Council – Greg Abbott, Governor of Texas, CC BY 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=54703342