President Biden urged to federalize troops to prevent 'chaos' in Texas

If there is one single flashpoint for the ongoing national debate over immigration and border security, it is likely centered along a relatively small stretch of the Rio Grande River that separates Shelby Park, in Eagle Pass, Texas, from neighboring Piedras Negras, in Coahuila, Mexico. It's there, at one of the busier routes used by migrants crossing north into the United States, where Texas' Republican Gov. Greg Abbott has overseen the installation of miles of razor wire as part of his hardline "Operation Lone Star" effort to block and deter undocumented immigrants from entering his state. It's an initiative described as "inhumane" by one Texas state trooper tasked with enforcing a policy that has drawn condemnation not only over human rights concerns, but also for using local law enforcement and military deployments for operations broadly understood to be under federal jurisdiction. 

This week, the United States Supreme Court affirmed this jurisdictional control, ruling 5-4 that U.S. Border Patrol agents could remove portions of the state-installed concertina wire to access the border and render services to migrants in need of medical attention and federal processing. Abbott, who has predicated much of his tenure on anti-immigration policies, not only vowed to fight the ruling after it was delivered, but on Wednesday took things a step further, claiming in a statement that his authority "supersedes any federal statutes to the contrary." 

In the past Abbott has made little secret of his plans to consolidate border security under his state-level control, but has he now crossed a line in need of a federal response?  

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'Create chaos at the border' 

Abbott's defiance "could be the beginning of a constitutional crisis," Houston Public Media reported, pointing out that the governor's confrontational statement came after several state Republicans urged him to defy the high court's recent ruling. The last time this happened, University of Texas, Austin, constitutional law professor Teddy Rave told the outlet, "was resistance to desegregation orders" — something to which the court didn't "take [...] kindly," prompting a unanimous decision in Cooper v. Aaron explaining that states need to follow its constitutional rulings.

Abbott's "performative defiance" along with continued provocations from other right-wing lawmakers "illustrates the larger stakes" of a situation in which "our constitutional democracy is threatened" by selective adherence to judicial rulings,  The San Antonio Express-News Editorial Board wrote on Thursday. Moreover, encouragement from elected officials like Louisiana Rep. Clay Higgins (R) — who recently wrote on X that "the feds are staging a civil war, and Texas should stand their ground" — is "reckless and incendiary" and either ignorant or coming from people who are "trying to speak it into being."

The governor is politicizing the Texas National Guard to "obstruct and create chaos at the border," Texas Rep. Joaquin Castro (D) claimed, before encouraging President Joe Biden to "establish sole federal control" of the military force "now."

'Quite unprecedented'

Texas Air Force Maj. Gen. Thomas Suelzer, an Abbott appointee, is for now following the governor's lead, telling his agency that "troops will repair any obstacles destroyed by federal agents" and "won't allow the feds to set up migrant processing centers in areas they’ve blocked," The Texas Tribune reported. The Texas Military Agency also released a statement to the outlet, claiming they will "[continue] to hold the line in Shelby Park to deter and prevent unlawful entry into the State of Texas." 

The standoff between federal and state officials is "quite unprecedented" UT-Austin law professor Stephen Vladeck told the Poynter Institute's Politifact, adding that he wasn't aware of "a prior case in which state authorities physically impeded the federal government's access to an international border." Given that the SCOTUS ruling this week merely allowed federal officials to remove razor wire, "there's no way Abbott *could* defy that ruling — even if he wanted to," Vladeck added on X. Instead, the "invasion" rhetoric is "posturing with an eye toward future judicial rulings; not a thumb in the eye of this one."

White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre demurred when asked by CNN whether Biden was indeed considering the federalization of Texas' national guard, saying simply that she won't "speak to any actions that the president might take, might not take."