Court keeps Texas border law on hold
A US appeals court has kept on hold a Republican-backed Texas law that would let state authorities arrest and prosecute people suspected of illegally crossing the US-Mexico border – a statute that President Joe Biden’s administration has argued intrudes on the authority of the federal government.
In a 2-1 ruling late Tuesday, a panel of the New Orleans-based 5th US Circuit Court of Appeals denied a request by Texas to let the law take effect while the state’s appeal of a judge’s ruling blocking it plays out at the appellate court.
The law, formally called S.B. 4, has become a flashpoint in a broader battle between Texas and the Biden administration over border security and immigration. It would make it a state crime to illegally enter or re-enter Texas from a foreign country and would empower state judges to order that violators leave the United States, with prison sentences up to 20 years for those who refuse to comply.
The 5th Circuit panel’s action was the latest of three rapid-fire rulings on the status of the law. The Supreme Court last week had let it take effect, but the 5th Circuit panel hours later restored US District
Judge David Ezra’s February injunction blocking enforcement.
Ezra, based in Austin, cited a 2012 US Supreme Court ruling involving an Arizona law that held that states cannot adopt immigration enforcement measures that clash with federal law.
The 5th Circuit panel is scheduled to hear arguments on the merits of the state’s appeal on April 3.
Circuit Judge Andrew Oldham, an appointee of Republican former president Donald Trump who dissented in Tuesday’s decision, predicted that the panel would uphold the ruling blocking S.B. 4 over his
objections.
“Today’s decision means that we’ll likely never know how Texas’s state courts and its state law-enforcement officers would have implemented S.B. 4,” the judge wrote in his dissenting opinion.
The US Department of Justice and the office of Republican Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
Civil rights groups that joined the Biden administration in challenging the law praised Tuesday’s ruling, saying it will temporarily prevent Texas authorities from violating migrants’ rights and potentially engaging in racial profiling.
“This unconstitutional proposal should never have gotten this far, and we look forward to the courts blocking it permanently so we can get back to discussing real policy solutions,” Edna Yang, co-executive director of the group American Gateways, said in a statement.
THE LAWSUIT, filed in January, argued that the measure violates the US Constitution and federal law by interfering with the US government’s power to regulate immigration as well as running afoul of the 2012 Supreme Court decision.
The administration has said immigration is the exclusive province of the federal government and that the Texas law would upend enforcement of complex US laws that establish procedures for deportation and allow migrants to apply for asylum and other legal status.
Immigration and security along the border with Mexico are hot topics for voters ahead of the November 5 US election in which the Democratic president is seeking a second term in office. Donald Trump, the Republican candidate challenging him, pursed restrictive immigration policies during his presidency. (Reuters)