On Thursday, Texas Governor Greg Abbott (R) issued an executive order for state forces to arrest immigrants who cross the US-Mexico border illegally, while claiming the enforcement powers of federal agents and pushing the legal boundaries in the containment of immigration.

According to the Latino Rebels publication, “Abbott stopped short of authorizing Texas troopers and National Guard members – who he has already deployed to the border by the thousands – to take immigrants across the entry ports into Mexico. That disappointed former Trump administration officials who have pressured Abbott to declare an ‘invasion’ and order state forces to forcibly take migrants out of the country”.

The “invasion” declaration involves a new interpretation of the country's Constitution that allows the National Guard and/or state police to forcibly return illegal immigrants to Mexico, by passing immigration laws and enforcement procedures. The idea has been around on the right wing of the Republican Party for years, but it has gained traction among conservatives since Joe Biden took office.

Regarding the order issued, Governor Greg Abbott justified: “While President Biden refuses to do his job and enforce the immigration laws enacted by Congress, the State of Texas is once again stepping up and taking unprecedented action to protect Americans and secure our southern border”, according to The Hill.

The American Immigration Council (AIC) responded to Abbott’s order on Thursday, arguing that it ignored a previous Supreme Court ruling that states cannot carry out immigration enforcement. AIC Policy Director Aaron Reichlin-Melnick added: “Federal law is clear: states may not carry out immigration enforcement on their own and migrants have a right to request asylum and to be processed under our immigration laws”.

Abbot's initiative is still a significant and untested expansion of the normal powers of the National Guard and state police, “who until now have turned migrants over to Border Patrol agents and, in some cases, made arrests on state trespassing charges”, assert Latino Rebels.

On the Texas border, U.S. authorities stopped migrants from crossing illegally 523,000 times between January and May, up from 417,000 over the same span a year ago. According to The Hill, a press release announcing the executive order said that 5,000 migrants were apprehended for illegal border crossings over the Fourth of July weekend, “creating a border crisis that has overrun communities along the border and across Texas” and contributing to “historic levels of illegal crossings”.

Abbott’s office specifically referenced President Biden’s decisions to end Title 42, the Trump-era border management policy that allowed officials to quickly expel foreign nationals at the border under the guise of pandemic protections, and the “Remain in Mexico” policy, which forced some asylum-seekers to wait in Mexico as their applications were evaluated in the U.S.

Abbott’s executive order is the latest in a slew of actions his administration has taken to curb illegal immigration, including launching Operation Lone Star, in March 2021, citing insufficient policies from the federal government. He announced that the state would deploy resources from the Department of Public Safety and the National Guard”. The Texas Legislature dedicated nearly $2 billion toward the effort.