Texas Republican Rep. Tony Gonzales (R-San Antonio) accused his fellow Republicans of politicizing the border for their own benefit, further escalating his standoff with more conservative members of his party who he said stood to gain from a sustained migration conflict.

In January, Republican Chip Roy (R-Austin) introduced legislation, dubbed the Security and Border Protection Act to give the Secretary of Homeland Security the ability to shut down border crossings and detain asylum-seekers while their cases are processed in court. Gonzales was one of the republican opponents of the moderate wing saying that, in essence, the device would create a mechanism to end the asylum, something that a characterization that Chip Roy denies, as we noted earlier.

The bill was slated to get a floor vote early this Congress but was instead sent to the House Homeland Security Committee for further debate after it became clear there would not be enough votes for it to pass the House. Gonzales sits on the committee.

According to The Texas Tribune, “The bill faces little chance of passage with a Democratic-controlled Senate and President Joe Biden’s veto power. Many Republicans in the Senate are striking a more moderate tone on border issues relative to the House, hoping to pass a bipartisan package due to the political realities of working in the minority”.

Tony Gonzalez, in an interview with the Washington Examiner on Thursday (16), accused members of the house of the current migration crisis. He said, “There is a reason why we haven’t gotten significant border security done and why we haven’t seen significant immigration reform done. It is in the interest of many politicians to have this crisis continue to flare up”.

In a statement to The Texas Tribune, Roy responded that the way to depoliticize the border is to “end the crisis”.

Gonzales is a close ally of a bipartisan group of senators urging the House to get a package coupling border security legislation with immigration reform. U.S. Sens. Kyrsten Sinema, I-Arizona, and Thom Tillis, R-North Carolina, created an outline to do so late last year, consulting with border members including Gonzales and Rep. Henry Cuellar, D-Laredo. Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, helped Sinema lead the Senate group to the Texas and Arizona borders last month”, according to The Texas Tribune.

“Gonzales and Cuellar have also worked together in the past on legislation to combat suicide among U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents and to build more migrant processing capacity at the border. They presented a centrist State of the Union response this year after Biden’s annual address”.

Chip Roy defended his bill by saying it is a hard-working asylum law, however, it ends with allowing asylum seekers to wait in the country while their cases are heard.

He said in an interview with the Tribune in January, the bill “allows for asylum claims, but it puts the responsibility on the Homeland Security secretary to do his job. You can’t come here and claim asylum when you don’t have an actual asylum claim”.