Greg Abbott Promises to Keep Using Migrants as Political Pawn at RNC
Texas’s border battle with the Biden administration is apparently not going to end anytime soon, at least according to its governor.Speaking at the Republican National Convention on Wednesday, Governor Greg Abbott bragged about the contentious back-and-forth he had with federal border agents earlier this year. That spat ended with the Supreme Court siding in favor of the Biden administration. In a 5–4 decision, the high court ruled that Texas had overstepped its authority by placing razor wire along the Rio Grande section of the U.S.-Mexico border. It also gave the green light to the federal government to snip and move sections of the wire that had prevented federal border agents from doing their job. But all of that was in the rearview mirror for Abbott, who insisted Wednesday that not only had he brought the “border crisis” to President Joe Biden but that the job was far from over.“We have continued busing migrants to sanctuary cities all across the country,” Abbott said, accusing the undocumented immigrants of being “rapists,” “murderers,” and “terrorists” while attendees waved signs calling for “mass deportations now.” “Those buses will continue to roll until we finally secure our border,” he added.Before the Supreme Court ruling, Abbott’s signature Operation Lone Star had bused more than 100,000 migrants from Texas detention centers to cities across the country. That included sending more than 37,000 undocumented people to New York, 30,000 people to Chicago, and 12,500 people to Washington, D.C., according to the governor’s office.But continuing the highly controversial and extraordinarily cruel program could prove to be legally dubious, economically unsound, and possibly ineffective. In a May report, the American Civil Liberties Union of Texas found that the state had spent $11 billion on increased border security funding, including the busing program, with the intent to “detect and repel illegal crossings, arrest human smugglers and cartel gang members, and stop the flow of deadly drugs like fentanyl.” But the massive expenditure doesn’t seem to have paid off. The majority (43 percent) of those caught and arrested were charged with misdemeanors, while less than 3 percent of the individuals arrested actually went before a judge for drug offenses. Even fewer (2 percent) went to court on weapons charges.“Texas has no business trying to run its own immigration enforcement program,” Sarah Cruz, policy and advocacy strategist for border and immigrants’ rights at the ACLU of Texas, told Texas Public Radio at the time. “Governor Abbott and other state politicians conflating immigration with drugs and crime is as false as it is inflammatory and dangerous to our communities.”To top it off, some political operatives have accused Abbott—and Governor Ron DeSantis, who operated a similar program in Florida—of engaging in human trafficking, while legal experts have roundly criticized the program as unconstitutional.
Texas’s border battle with the Biden administration is apparently not going to end anytime soon, at least according to its governor.
Speaking at the Republican National Convention on Wednesday, Governor Greg Abbott bragged about the contentious back-and-forth he had with federal border agents earlier this year. That spat ended with the Supreme Court siding in favor of the Biden administration. In a 5–4 decision, the high court ruled that Texas had overstepped its authority by placing razor wire along the Rio Grande section of the U.S.-Mexico border. It also gave the green light to the federal government to snip and move sections of the wire that had prevented federal border agents from doing their job.
But all of that was in the rearview mirror for Abbott, who insisted Wednesday that not only had he brought the “border crisis” to President Joe Biden but that the job was far from over.
“We have continued busing migrants to sanctuary cities all across the country,” Abbott said, accusing the undocumented immigrants of being “rapists,” “murderers,” and “terrorists” while attendees waved signs calling for “mass deportations now.”
“Those buses will continue to roll until we finally secure our border,” he added.
Before the Supreme Court ruling, Abbott’s signature Operation Lone Star had bused more than 100,000 migrants from Texas detention centers to cities across the country. That included sending more than 37,000 undocumented people to New York, 30,000 people to Chicago, and 12,500 people to Washington, D.C., according to the governor’s office.
But continuing the highly controversial and extraordinarily cruel program could prove to be legally dubious, economically unsound, and possibly ineffective. In a May report, the American Civil Liberties Union of Texas found that the state had spent $11 billion on increased border security funding, including the busing program, with the intent to “detect and repel illegal crossings, arrest human smugglers and cartel gang members, and stop the flow of deadly drugs like fentanyl.”
But the massive expenditure doesn’t seem to have paid off. The majority (43 percent) of those caught and arrested were charged with misdemeanors, while less than 3 percent of the individuals arrested actually went before a judge for drug offenses. Even fewer (2 percent) went to court on weapons charges.
“Texas has no business trying to run its own immigration enforcement program,” Sarah Cruz, policy and advocacy strategist for border and immigrants’ rights at the ACLU of Texas, told Texas Public Radio at the time. “Governor Abbott and other state politicians conflating immigration with drugs and crime is as false as it is inflammatory and dangerous to our communities.”
To top it off, some political operatives have accused Abbott—and Governor Ron DeSantis, who operated a similar program in Florida—of engaging in human trafficking, while legal experts have roundly criticized the program as unconstitutional.
