Texas sheriffs uncertain on arrest law
Many lack resources to hold, transport migrants
SANDERSON, Texas — During the nine hours Texas was allowed to arrest and deport people who illegally enter the U.S., Sheriff Thaddeus Cleveland never changed tactics regarding migrants in his remote border county.
Not because he opposes the idea. There’s just no practical way to do it, said the sheriff of Terrell County, where last year an average of about 10 people each day were caught crossing the border from Mexico.
“We don’t have a van that we can use to transport people in,” said Cleveland, whose county touches more than 50 miles of border, most of which is a rocky desert landscape.
Texas’ extraordinary expansion into immigration enforcement remained on hold Thursday after a whirl of legal action that included the Supreme Court allowing it to take effect Tuesday while sending it back to an appellate court for further review. Shortly before midnight, the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals put the law known as Senate Bill 4 back on hold.
The confusion along Texas’ vast border during that brief window revealed many sheriffs were unprepared, unable or uninterested in enforcing SB4 in the first place. For months, Texas has claimed in urgent appeals to judges the state cannot afford to wait for tougher border measures. But given a chance to test Republican Gov. Greg Abbott’s latest provocation with the Biden administration over immigration, there was no indication any law enforcement agency in Texas tried.
Defiance from the Mexican government, which said it would not accept any migrants whom Texas attempts to send back across the border, and caution among law enforcement officials cast uncertainty over what a full implementation would look like.
The law would allow any Texas law enforcement officer to arrest people suspected of entering the country illegally. But Smith County Sheriff Larry Smith, the president of the Texas Sheriff ’s Association, said the law will have little effect in his jurisdiction in East Texas, which is far closer to neighboring Louisiana and Oklahoma than Mexico.
“Our office won’t have much to do with Senate Bill 4 unless we’re working with one of our brother sheriffs or sister sheriffs on the border,” Smith said, “because you have to be able to prove they came across the border illegally. And unfortunately you can’t do that this far into the state of Texas without violating some of their rights.
“If we start going and talking to everybody and asking for papers, where do we stop?” Smith said.
Once in custody, migrants could either agree to a Texas judge’s order to leave the U.S. or be prosecuted on misdemeanor charges of illegal entry. The law says they are to be sent to ports of entry along the U.S.-Mexico border, even if they are not Mexican citizens. Migrants who don’t leave could face arrest again on felony charges.
In court, Texas has argued the law mirrors the U.S. government’s immigration enforcement. The Justice Department has argued it is a clear violation of federal authority and would create chaos at the border.
Like many sheriffs and law enforcement officers who say they support the new law, Cleveland faces serious logistical problems in how to implement it.
His county has fewer than 1,000 residents, his jail has a capacity for just seven people and the closest port of entry is a drive of more than 2½ hours away.
“We’ll continue to do what we do: turn over people we apprehend to the U.S. Border Patrol and then wait for the courts to figure out what they’re going to do,” Cleveland said.