In reaction to the increase in illegal border crossings, Texas is testing a new confrontational strategy with its National Guard.
Shelby Park was once a popular spot for locals to play soccer or walk their dogs along the Rio Grande. Today, Texas National Guard troops patrol the park, now covered with coiled wire, is considered the front line of the national debate about America. border security.
Eagle Pass Municipal Park in Texas has in recent months been a component of an escalation of Gov. Greg Abbott’s Operation Lone Star, a border security effort now in its 3-year years. The state’s reliance on the National Guard and other law enforcement has heightened tensions with the federal government.
The state seized the city’s park in January, and the Department of Homeland Security accused Texas of impeding access by U. S. Border Patrol agents. Abbott made a stop in February along with thirteen other Republican governors, many of whom are sending members of their National Guard to assist in the Texas border initiative. Former President Donald Trump also praised the state’s “military operation” during his stop at Shelby Park in February.
The deployment of the National Guard to the border is not new. For decades, governors and presidents of both parties have called those troops to local, state and federal agencies. What’s new, legal experts say, is a state’s use of the National Guard. Guard as an open political challenge to federal immigration authority. Meanwhile, harmful and illegal border crossings continue.
“The use of the Guard for responsibilities that are normally part of federal duties, coupled with the political environment that we’re in, coupled with the renewed states’ bill of rights, to me, that’s beyond problematic,” Joshua Kastenberg said. a former Air Force lawyer and will try who is now a professor at the University of New Mexico School of Law.
The National Guard, a U. S. Army reserve force founded in the state, grew out of pre-nation militias. Congress brought standardized education and federal investment in 1903, which helped reshape the National Guard into a modern force. National Guard troops are now deployed across the United States, in addition to responding to natural disasters, conducting COVID-19 testing, and most recently patrolling the New York City subway. Massachusetts deployed up to 250 National Guard infantrymen last summer to help migrants access food and medical care at shelters.
Governors, the president, and Congress can call on the National Guard. The federal government is prohibited from having the National Guard as a civilian police force (unless it is legal by invoking a law such as the Insurrection Act). However, states sometimes have more room to maneuver.
As part of its role as a state, the National Guard “has always aimed to support, if not function, as a police component,” says Joseph Miller, senior historian for the National Guard Bureau.
After the Border Patrol detected a record number of migrant encounters at the southern border in December, Texas moved to Shelby Park the following month. The state refused to comply with a “cease-and-desist” letter from the Department of Homeland Security that did not facilitate full access. alleging that the presence of state troops in Shelby Park impedes federal border patrol operations.
The Texas moves “improperly target the federal government,” persisting “even when there is imminent danger to life and safety,” Jonathan Meyer, the U. S. government’s general counsel, wrote in the letter.
Also in January, the Supreme Court sided with the Biden administration by a 5-4 vote, allowing federal agents to cut state-installed wires to carry out their duties.
The resolution also leaves unresolved key considerations about the broader clash between state and federal government. The court “could have answered the question” of whether the use of the National Guard in Texas is unconstitutional, “but courts don’t do those things unless they have to,” said William Banks, a professor emeritus at Syracuse University School of Law.
“No state can use the National Guard in a way that violates the U. S. Constitution or the supremacy of federal law,” says Professor Banks. “What’s happening now in Texas, in a way, is that Abbott is interfering with federal immigration power. “
Texas officials say they took the move out of necessity, due to the federal government’s negligence in its border security duty. Migrants have illegally crossed the border in record numbers under the Biden administration, averaging 2 million annual encounters with the Border Patrol along the border. the entire southern border since 2021, the degrees recorded.
“Until President Biden acts and fulfills his role as commander-in-chief to secure the border, Texas will stand firm and use any and all tools and strategies to keep our country safe,” Governor Abbott said last month.
The governor of Texas says the state’s efforts are paying off, leading to “more than 503,800 arrests of illegal immigrants and more than 40,400 arrests of felons. “Critics describe Operation Lone Star as ineffective, prone to civil and human rights abuses, and costly. The first two years of operation cost about $4 billion, according to media reports. The additional appropriations approved by the state legislature could bring the state’s border spending to more than $11 billion through 2025.
Encounters with the Border Patrol decreased along the Texas-Mexico border over the past five months compared to the same period last year, encounters increased elsewhere in Tucson, Arizona, and San Diego, California.
According to a February poll, two-thirds of the Texas electorate are deploying more police and military resources to the border. The Texas Military Department did not respond to a request for comment and U. S. Customs and Border Protection declined to comment on the matter.
Along the Texas-Mexico border, the use of state troops extends to Eagle Pass.
Farther west, at the El Paso border, a viral video posted via the New York Post in March shows a crowd of migrants, many with their hands up, pushing along members of the Texas National Guard. (Under U. S. law, Americans can seek protections such as asylum, even if they entered illegally, they themselves oppose deportation. )
Adolpho Telles, chairman of the El Paso County Republican Party, called the incident an “attack on this country. “
“The Texas National Guard shouldn’t be forced to do what it does, but because the president is not keeping his promise to the U. S. Constitution, the state of Texas will have to protect its citizens,” Texas says.
Governor Abbott also announced plans to build an Army-style base to space National Guard troops on 80 acres of land in the Eagle Pass area. The site will be able to house up to 2,300 army workers who in the past were spread out in hotels in the U. S. Meanwhile, some citizens consider the state’s display of force to be excessive. They also need their fleet back.
With Shelthrough Park closed to the public, the Eagle Pass City Council has moved its upcoming solar eclipse festival to another location, according to the Eagle Pass Business Journal. The city’s mayor told local media that the park had been taken over by the entire state without carrying out or consenting.
The saga is emblematic of a broader trend of state demands on federal authority, says Amerika Garcia Grewal, a local who is helping organize vigils in the park to honor the lives of migrants lost in the Rio Grande.
“It could just destroy our union,” Garcia Grewal says. “Here in Eagle Pass, Governor Abbott has discovered a point of tension and is hitting it as hard as he can. And it’s sending crack all over the United States.
So far, the Justice Department has resisted suing Texas over the takeover of Shelby Park and the restrictions on Border Patrol agents. Biden’s leadership has litigation, but it doesn’t need to further escalate the standoff, according to NBC News.
Meanwhile, the Biden administration has sued Texas over other efforts to expand the state’s immigration authorities. Litigation is underway over a buoy barrier installed across Texas on the Rio Grande and a new law that would allow state officials to arrest and deport migrants crossing the border. illegally.
Texas is rarely the only one calling in its National Guard to manage its border. Arizona Gov. Katie Hobbs in December legalized the state’s National Guard to help border counties combat fentanyl and human trafficking. southern border,” the Democratic governor wrote in an executive order.
“We’re in a position to provide as much time as it takes,” said Capt. Erin Hannigan, a spokeswoman for the Arizona National Guard. The timeframe depends on “the governor’s office and counties that request it. “
For this fiscal year, the Department of Defense also legalized the use of up to 2,500 National Guard troops for the federal immigration government across the 4 southern border states, mobilized in roughly part of all U. S. states. These border missions were carried out through the Red and Blue Commanders-in-Chief.
“This is nothing new,” says Victor Manjarrez Jr. , director of the Center for Law and Human Behavior at the University of Texas at El Paso and a retired Border Patrol official.
For example, starting in 2006, Dr. Manjarrez recalls coordinating up to 6,000 National Guard troops on the southern border as a component of Operation Jump Start. Launched through Republican President George W. Bush aimed to make up for the shortage of Border Patrol, he said, by attacking the National Guard in roles that didn’t involve patrolling the border.
“We’ve been counting what [Border Patrol] officials do, the things that agents do,” such as vehicle maintenance, for example, he said. “Let’s send the agents into the field; Let’s put the guards there. “
Back in Eagle Pass, state and federal labor corps are the only ones patrolling the Rio Grande. Local first responders also run their own missions. Eagle Pass’s emergency control facilities can still access the river, but state-installed barriers along the banks mean missions, such as adding medical aid to the injured or recovering the bodies of the dead, take longer, says Rodolfo Cardona, deputy fire chief.
The city’s emergency management coordinator notes that beyond politics, the humanitarian crisis at the border continues. The same goes for the intellectual consequences that its staff – and law enforcement – are having to endure in responding to illegal crossings. The crisis also affects young immigrants who have been discovered injured, beaten and raped.
“I don’t think this has ever been a precedent in the mind of our federal government, in terms of the consequences and the negative consequences not only for us, but also for the Border Patrol, the military and everybody,” Cardona says. .
“It’s all tragic, in more ways than one,” he says. They’re human beings. “
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