Texas governor's costly border operation plagued by low morale, fuzzy math, mission confusion, politics

Texas is spending $2 billion a year on Operation Lone Star, launched by Gov. Greg Abbott (R) last March to address a purported emergency on the Texas-Mexico border with 10,000 Texas National Guard troops plus Department of Public Safety officers.
"Abbott and DPS have repeatedly boasted in news conferences, on social media, and during interviews on Fox News that the border operation has disrupted drug and human smuggling networks," The Texas Tribune reported Monday with ProPublica and The Marshall Project. "But the state's claim of success has been based on shifting metrics that included crimes with no connection to the border, work conducted by troopers stationed in targeted counties prior to the operation, and arrest and drug seizure efforts that do not clearly distinguish DPS's role from that of other agencies."
"The whole reason for all this, you know, playing with statistics, is for optics so that the governor could get reelected," Gary Hale, a former Drug Enforcement Administration intelligence chief now at Rice University's Baker Institute for Public Policy, told the Tribune. That's worked for Abbott, "but what's the net gain? I don't think there's any. Zero. We really haven't had any significant impact on migrant smuggling or drug trafficking."
The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
The Tribune and Military Times reported in late February that a leaked survey of some 250 National Guard members deployed in south Texas found widespread disillusionment, confusion about their mission, unhappiness with the involuntary deployment, and a common assumption they were there to help Abbott's re-election campaign. There have been a handful of suicides.
"I hate it here," one respondent said. "Most of us signed up to help Texas in times of need like hurricanes," another Guard member said. "This doesn't feel like we are helping any Texans besides the governor."
Some of the Operation Lone Star units are posted far from the border, including about 30 Guard members ordered in January to stand idly outside giant private ranches 80 miles north of Mexico, the Tribune reported last week. Two of the most prominent ranches, King Ranch and the GOP-connected Armstrong Ranch, told the Tribune they did not ask for the National Guard sentinels. "We really don't understand why we are there," one Guard member told the Tribune. "We're essentially mall security for ranches that already have paid security details to protect them."
You can read more about Operation Lone Star at The Texas Tribune and watch the Tribune's James Barragán discuss his reporting on Austin's KVUE.
A free daily email with the biggest news stories of the day – and the best features from TheWeek.com
Peter has worked as a news and culture writer and editor at The Week since the site's launch in 2008. He covers politics, world affairs, religion and cultural currents. His journalism career began as a copy editor at a financial newswire and has included editorial positions at The New York Times Magazine, Facts on File, and Oregon State University.
-
September 14 editorial cartoons
Cartoons Sunday’s political cartoons include RFK Jr on the hook, the destruction of discourse, and more
-
Air strikes in the Caribbean: Trump’s murky narco-war
Talking Point Drug cartels ‘don’t follow Marquess of Queensberry Rules’, but US military air strikes on speedboats rely on strained interpretation of ‘invasion’
-
A tour of Sri Lanka’s beautiful north
The Week Recommends ‘Less frenetic’ than the south, this region is full of beautiful wildlife, historical sites and resorts
-
‘Democracy is under threat globally’
Instant Opinion Opinion, comment and editorials of the day
-
House posts lewd Epstein note attributed to Trump
Speed Read The estate of Jeffrey Epstein turned over the infamous 2003 birthday note from President Donald Trump
-
Supreme Court allows 'roving' race-tied ICE raids
Speed Read The court paused a federal judge's order barring agents from detaining suspected undocumented immigrants in LA based on race
-
South Korea to fetch workers detained in Georgia raid
Speed Read More than 300 South Korean workers detained in an immigration raid at a Hyundai plant will be released
-
DC sues Trump to end Guard 'occupation'
Speed Read D.C. Attorney General Brian Schwalb argues that the unsolicited military presence violates the law
-
RFK Jr. faces bipartisan heat in Senate hearing
Speed Read The health secretary defended his leadership amid CDC turmoil and deflected questions about the restricted availability of vaccines
-
White House defends boat strike as legal doubts mount
Speed Read Experts say there was no legal justification for killing 11 alleged drug-traffickers
-
Epstein accusers urge full file release, hint at own list
speed read A rally was organized by Reps. Ro Khanna and Thomas Massie, who are hoping to force a vote on their Epstein Files Transparency Act