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Post by Webster on Mar 19, 2024 17:39:51 GMT -5
(The Guardian) Supreme court allows Texas law that empowers police to arrest suspected undocumented migrants to go into effectThe supreme court has allowed a law passed by Texas’s Republican-dominated state government that gives police the power to arrest people suspected of crossing the border illegally to go into effect. The court’s six conservative justices turned down an appeal from the Biden administration, which wanted the law blocked while it challenged it in lower courts. The court’s three liberals dissented. The measure had been on hold due to a stay authorized by conservative justice Samuel Alito, who was among the group that allowed it to go into effect. -Read more: www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/mar/18/supreme-court-extends-block-texas-police-migrant-law
The Texas law allowing police to arrest suspected undocumented border crossers comes amid a wider confrontation with the Biden administration over border security. Here’s more on that, and the supreme court’s decision to allow the law to go into effect, from Reuters: The US supreme court on Tuesday declined to block a Republican-backed Texas law allowing state law enforcement authorities to arrest people suspected of crossing the US-Mexico border illegally, rejecting a request by President Joe Biden’s administration.
The administration had asked the justices to freeze a judicial order allowing the Texas law to take effect while the US government’s challenge to the statute proceeds in the lower courts. The administration has argued that the law violates the US constitution and federal law by interfering with the US government’s power to regulate immigration.
Governor Greg Abbott last December signed the law, known as SB 4, authorizing Texas law enforcement officers to arrest people suspected of entering the United States illegally, giving local officers powers long delegated to the US government.
Abbott said the law was needed due to Biden’s failure to enforce federal laws criminalizing illegal entry or re-entry, telling a press conference on 18 December that “Biden’s deliberate inaction has left Texas to fend for itself.“
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Post by Webster on Mar 19, 2024 17:41:39 GMT -5
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Post by Webster on Mar 19, 2024 17:42:24 GMT -5
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Post by Webster on Mar 19, 2024 17:43:20 GMT -5
(The Guardian) White House warns Texas immigration law will 'sow chaos and confusion at our southern border'White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre blasted Texas’s SB4 immigration law, saying in a statement that allowing state police to arrest people suspected of entering the country illegally will upend border security: We fundamentally disagree with the Supreme Court’s order allowing Texas’ harmful and unconstitutional law to go into effect. S.B. 4 will not only make communities in Texas less safe, it will also burden law enforcement, and sow chaos and confusion at our southern border. S.B. 4 is just another example of Republican officials politicizing the border while blocking real solutions. We remained focused on delivering the significant policy changes and resources we need to secure the border – that is why we continue to call on Congressional Republicans to pass the bipartisan border security agreement, the toughest and fairest set of border reforms in decades.
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Post by Webster on Mar 20, 2024 13:53:20 GMT -5
(The Guardian) Appeals court again blocks Texas law allowing police to arrest suspected undocumented migrantsIt was only a few hours ago when the supreme court cleared the way for a potential upending of US immigration enforcement by allowing a Texas law that gave state police the power to arrest people suspected of crossing the border illegally to go into effect. But hours after the top court’s Tuesday afternoon order, a federal appeals court once again blocked the law – at least for now. The decision prevents what could have become a confusing and unprecedented situation from playing out in the massive, Republican-governed state along the border with Mexico. Texas’s police would have been able to arrest people suspected of being in the country illegally – a task reserved for federal law enforcement. Texas enacted its law as Republicans nationwide attack Joe Biden over the surge in undocumented migrants that has played out since he took office. In Congress, the GOP continues to demand the president support tougher border policies, though they blocked a compromise that would impose those and approve new aid for Ukraine and Israel. The White House views the Texas law as “harmful and unconstitutional”, and the legal wrangling over it is unlikely to end anytime soon.
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Post by Webster on Mar 20, 2024 13:55:22 GMT -5
(The Guardian) Experts warn of chaos if Texas immigration law is eventually allowed to take effectIt was only for a few hours that Texas law SB4, which allows state police to arrest people suspected of crossing the border illegally, was in effect, and the Associated Press reports that it does not appear anyone was detained under its provisions. The law is currently being wrangled over at the appeals court level, and may again wind up before the supreme court, where the conservative justices yesterday allowed it to go into force, without ruling on its merits. Experts the AP spoke to warned that if it eventually does becomes law, it could have a chaotic range of effects across the second most-populous state in the country. Here’s what Ricardo Samaniego, the executive of El Paso county, said: Heightened law enforcement presence in the city of El Paso during a previous migrant surge brought high-speed chases and traffic stops based on assumptions that passengers were in the country illegally. “We had accidents, we had injuries, we got a little glimpse of what would happen if the state begins to control what happens in respect to immigration,”Daniel Morales, an associate law professor at the University of Houston Law Center, warned the law would be “a mess, very clearly, to enforce”: “It’s very clear that Greg Abbott wants to enforce the law so he can get lots of photo ops and opportunities, but it’s gonna take a lot of state resources to implement. And I don’t know, in fact, how much appetite and capacity for that the state government actually has.”Greg Abbott is the state’s Republican governor, and a champion of the law. Executive director of the Sheriffs’ Association of Texas, Skylor Hearn, said deputies across the state have been training for the past year in case the law takes effect. But he added: “As long as the federal government is willing to do its part that it is supposed to be doing, it is ideal for them to take possession and custody of these people.”
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Post by Webster on Mar 20, 2024 13:56:29 GMT -5
(The Guardian) Mexico government objects to Texas immigration lawMexico’s government issued a strongly worded statement yesterday after the supreme court allowed Texas police to arrest people suspected of being in the country illegally, saying it would not accept any person forced out by state authorities. “Mexico recognizes the importance of a uniform migration policy and the bilateral efforts with the United States to ensure that migration is safe, orderly and respectful of human rights, and is not affected by state or local legislative decisions. In this regard, Mexico will not accept, under any circumstances, repatriations by the State of Texas,” its secretary of foreign affairs said. The objections from the United States’s southern neighbor underscore why immigration enforcement is typically left up to the federal government and not the states. A person arrested under the Texas law could agree to leave the United States, according to the Associated Press, but Mexico’s objections complicate that.
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Post by Webster on Mar 20, 2024 14:07:29 GMT -5
(The Guardian) Appeals court to hear another round of arguments on Texas immigration lawMore federal court action could be coming today on the Texas law allowing police to arrest people suspected of crossing the border illegally. The fifth circuit court of appeals will at 11am ET hear arguments over the law. It’s unclear when they will decide whether to allow it to go into effect.
The University of Texas law professor Steve Vladeck predicts that the fifth circuit appeals court is likely to leave SB4 on hold until the supreme court weighs in again: The supreme court yesterday briefly allowed the law to go into effect, until the fifth circuit put it back on hold again hours later. The appeals court is hearing arguments over the measure again today, and however they rule, it is likely it will be appealed back to the supreme court. The fifth circuit court of appeals has in recent years become known as a bastion of conservative jurisprudence, often handing down decisions that represent losses for the Biden administration and Democrats. The supreme court, meanwhile, has a six-justice conservative majority.
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Post by Webster on Mar 27, 2024 13:38:29 GMT -5
(The Guardian) Appeals court keeps Texas law allowing police to arrest suspected illegal border crossers on holdA ruling late on Tuesday from a federal appeals court will for now block a Texas law allowing police to arrest people suspected of entering the country illegally, the Associated Press reports. The law passed by Texas’s Republican government has drawn criticism from the Biden administration, which warned it will undermine border security by involving state police in the enforcement of federal immigration law. Texas’s governor, Greg Abbott, argues it’s necessary to deter migrants entering from Mexico, after such arrivals surged following Biden taking office. This isn’t the final word on the law – its legality will likely be decided by a federal appeals court, or the US supreme court. Here’s more on the ongoing saga, from the AP: The 2-1 ruling late Tuesday from a three-judge panel of the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals will likely prevent enforcement of the law until a final decision on its merits, either by the 5th Circuit or the U.S. Supreme Court.
The ruling followed a March 20 hearing by a three-judge panel of the court. It’s just the latest move in a seesaw legal case over Republican Gov. Greg Abbott’s strict new immigration law that is not yet ended.
The Justice Department has argued that Texas’ law is a clear violation of federal authority and would create chaos at the border. Texas has argued that President Joe Biden’s administration isn’t doing enough to control the border and that the state has a right to take action.
Chief Judge Priscilla Richman, an appointee of Republican President George W. Bush, cited a 2010 Arizona law that was largely stricken by the U.S. Supreme Court to say immigration enforcement is exclusively a federal responsibility.
“For nearly 150 years, the Supreme Court has held that the power to control immigration — the entry, admission, and removal of noncitizens — is exclusively a federal power,” wrote Richman, an appointee of Republican President George W. Bush.
The Texas law, Richman wrote, “creates separate, distinct state criminal offenses and related procedures regarding unauthorized entry of noncitizens into Texas from outside the country and their removal.” She was joined in the opinion by Judge Irma Carrillo Ramirez, a Biden appointee.
Judge Andrew Oldham, an appointee of former President Donald Trump and a former aide to Abbott, dissented with the majority decision.
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Post by Webster on Mar 27, 2024 13:39:52 GMT -5
(The Guardian) Christian D Menefee, the attorney for Texas’s populous Harris county, said the federal appeals court decision putting the state’s contentious immigration law on hold “shows that Republicans in Texas are overstepping their authority once again and disregarding the federal government’s jurisdiction over immigration laws”. Menefee, a Democrat whose county includes the city of Houston, continued: Our communities should not have to live in a state of fear and confusion, which is exactly what SB4 was designed to do. Unfortunately, Republican leaders in Austin are more interested in fueling anti-immigrant rhetoric than actually creating real, workable solutions to address our immigration laws.
While this back-and-forth can create a sense of uncertainty for the people who live here, this ruling makes me hopeful that the Fifth Circuit will follow clear Supreme Court precedent and rule against the law when it considers the merits.
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