TEXAS – birdpuk

Migrant families wait for their bus at a bus station in Brownsville, Texas before traveling to meet relatives or sponsors on March 2, 2021. (Sergio Flores/AFP/Getty Images)

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott on Saturday launched a program that would deploy state national guard troops and other agencies to respond to the burgeoning crisis at the southern border.

Abbott announced that his office has launched Operation Lone Star, which will deploy air, ground, and marine, and tactical border security assets to prevent Mexican criminal organizations from smuggling drugs and people into Texas. The operation will be launched in collaboration with the state’s Department of Public Safety.

“Texas supports legal immigration but will not be an accomplice to the open border policies that cause, rather than prevent, a humanitarian crisis in our state and endanger the lives of Texans,” Abbott said in a statement to media outlets on Saturday.

“We will surge the resources and law enforcement personnel needed to confront this crisis.”

This comes as the number of illegal crossings at the southern border continue their steadily rise since October last year. The number of encounters at the southwest border between October 2020 and January 2021 was 296,259, which is up from 164,932 during the same period in 2019 and 2020, according to data from the U.S. Custom and Border Patrol (CBP), representing a 79.6 percent increase.

Meanwhile, Reuters has reported, citing anonymous sources, that the number of illegal immigrants apprehended by U.S. border agents spiked even further for the month of February at nearly 100,000 migrants detained. CBP has yet to release its February data.

Since taking office Biden has reversed several Trump-era border security measures that were aimed at stemming the flow of illegal immigration at the southern border and increasing America’s public security.

The increased number of unaccompanied minors arriving at the border in recent weeks has seen the Biden administration open more overflow shelters to handle the influx. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas added on Monday that instead of “expelling young children” to Mexico while processing their asylum claims, as was done under the Trump administration, DHS is working to release minors to relatives or sponsors in the United States if the minors are from Guatemala, Honduras, or El Salvador.

Some of the immigration policies that Biden implemented include temporarily ending former President Donald Trump’s Migrant Protection Protocols that sent illegal immigrations back into Mexico while their cases are decided. He has also reversed Trump’s ban on travel from terror-prone countries, halted the remaining construction of the border wall, and has issued a sweeping immigration package to Congress that offers a legalization pathway to an estimated 11 million illegal immigrants already in the country.

These actions have drawn widespread criticism, in particular, from Trump.

“Our border is now totally out of control thanks to the disastrous leadership of Joe Biden,” Trump wrote in a statement released on March 5 through an intermediary.

“Our great Border Patrol and ICE agents have been disrespected, demeaned, and mocked by the Biden Administration,” Trump added, referring to the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency.

“A mass incursion into the country by people who should not be here is happening on an hourly basis, getting worse by the minute. Many have criminal records, and many others have and are spreading covid,” he wrote, referring to COVID-19, the disease caused by the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus.

Earlier this month, a large group of migrants seeking to cross the U.S.-Mexico border held a demonstration in Mexico, calling for Biden to let them into the United States.

Biden has not yet acknowledged the crisis or announced any concrete plan to address the growing numbers of illegal crossings. When asked by a reporter this week whether there is a crisis at the border, Biden replied, “No, we’ll be able to handle it.”

House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) sent a letter to Biden on Friday requesting a meeting to address the issue, saying that he has “great concern” about how his administration is handling the border crisis.

“We must acknowledge the border crisis, develop a plan, and, in no uncertain terms, strongly discourage individuals from Mexico and Central America from ever making the dangerous journey to our southern border,” McCarthy wrote (pdf).

Source: Texas Launches Operation to Combat Drug, People Smuggling at Southern Border

The U.S.-Mexico border where the fence becomes a small barbed wire fence, west of Nogales, Ariz., on May 23, 2018. (Samira Bouaou/The Epoch Times)

President Joe Biden’s administration cannot enforce a pause on most deportations until further notice, a federal judge ruled late Tuesday.

U.S. District Judge Drew Tipton, a Trump appointee, agreed to issue a preliminary injunction that was requested by the state of Texas.

Acting Homeland Security Secretary David Pekoske directed in a memorandum on Jan. 20 “an immediate pause on removals of any noncitizen with a final order of removal … for 100 days.” Texas officials sued, alleging the pause violated an agreement between the state and the federal government reached during the Trump administration, and that the Department of Homeland Security has a responsibility to promote the removal of illegal aliens.

Tipton said Tuesday that arguments by Texas officials that they would incur financial costs from having to detain immigrants who otherwise would have been deported and from an increase in unaccompanied children requiring public education were legitimate.

“The Court finds Texas has established by a preponderance of the evidence that it could reasonably expect a 100-day pause to lead to a significant number of criminal aliens and unaccompanied children moving freely within and into Texas who would otherwise be removed,” he wrote in the 105-page decision.

“The 100-day pause will lead to a significant number of criminal aliens moving freely within and into Texas who otherwise would have been removed. Criminal aliens and state offenders have a demonstrable propensity to recidivate. Therefore, the 100-day pause will cause Texas unanticipated detention facility costs,” he added.

A preliminary injunction blocks an order temporarily until the case at hand is resolved or until a superseding decision is issued.

Tipton expressed general opposition to nationwide injunctions but cited precedent in other cases. He, therefore, issued a nationwide injunction of the deportation pause.

https://www.scribd.com/document/495874680/Gov-Us-Court-Stx-Sd-1811836850

The stay of the pause will remain in place pending a final resolution of the case or until a further order from a federal court, such as an appeals court.

Tipton had twice blocked the order for two weeks at a time before making the new decision.

The Biden administration didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

White House press secretary Jen Psaki told reporters in January that the order halting deportations “will allow the administration to review and reset enforcement policies and ensure that resources are dedicated to the most pressing challenges, and that we have a fair and effective enforcement system rooted in responsibly managing the border and protecting our national security and public safety.”

Approximately 6,000 noncitizens subject to a final order of removal are currently detained nationwide, according to the government, which alleged only some of those would be released from custody during the pause. Many are detained by local authorities, who may or may not work with federal immigration officials.

Defendants had asked the judge not to issue the injunction, writing in a filing in mid-February that Pekoske’s memo did not violate federal law and that Texas lacked standing.

“Texas has failed to show it will be harmed by the temporary removal pause at all, let alone irreparably, as is required for injunctive relief,” government lawyers asserted. In addition, they said, “multiple statutory provisions expressly preclude review in district court, and over the substantive and procedural issues raised here.”

Source: Judge Blocks Enforcement of Biden’s Moratorium on Most Deportations