Texas Seizes Control of Eagle Pass, Denies Access to Federal Authorities

In a new escalation of tensions between the State of Texas and the Federal Government regarding Border Security, the State has seized control of all city property along the Rio Grande in Eagle Pass under Governor Abbott’s emergency powers.

Reporter Ali Bradley of NewsNation broke the news on X on Thursday:

On Friday, multiple videos emerged of Texas Military Department (TMD) and Texas Department of Public Safety (DPS) personnel setting up barriers around Shelby Park, which borders the Rio Grande in Eagle Pass, and denying access to federal personnel. Our sources on the ground indicate that federal authorities would only have authority to enter the controlled area in order to retrieve federal equipment or to provide emergency medical aid, as necessary.

Confirming this report, the Department of Justice filed a memorandum with the Supreme Court of the United States related to an ongoing case concerning the federal government’s destruction of border barriers installed by the State of Texas.

Shelby Park has been in the news since virtually the beginning of the Border Crisis that kicked off with the inauguration of President Joe Biden and his subsequent rolling back of Trump Administration policies and attempted moratorium on deportations. Most recently, Eagle Pass made national headlines for the tens of thousands of illegal border crossings per month before a lull in crossings in January.

Texans for Strong Borders has called upon Governor Abbott to take the initiative to secure the Texas Border since early 2022, and views this as a positive step, although we wish the Governor would go even further.

Currently, the Governor’s office has stated that they intend to arrest every person crossing in this area for Criminal Trespass, a strategy that has been employed to varying success in Eagle Pass prior to the illegal alien surge in Fall 2023. Criminal Trespass, however, does not guarantee removal and we fully anticipate that illegal aliens turned over to ICE after serving time will have an opportunity to apply for asylum and, regardless of the merits of that claim, will be released into the interior of the United States with a court date several years into the future.

As we have stated, Governor Abbott has the full authority under Article I, Section 10, Clause 3 of the U.S. Constitution and Article 4, Section 7 of the Texas Constitution to defend the State of Texas against invasions. This would include physically repelling illegal border crossings and returning apprehended illegal aliens directly back to Mexico. We urge the governor to take these steps, not only in Eagle Pass but in every region of the Texas Border that is seeing a surge of illegal alien crossings.

Indeed, preventing illegal crossings in Eagle Pass is already driving large groups of illegal aliens to cross elsewhere in Texas. Ali Bradley shared a video on Friday from a source in nearby Normandy, Texas showing groups of 100+ illegal aliens walking along the road after crossing the border illegally:

Ultimately, this escalation will end in a battle in the Supreme Court of the United States, where we fully anticipate that the current makeup of the Court will offer a more favorable outcome for Texas than the previous landmark case, Arizona v. U.S.

Texans for Strong Borders urges the State of Texas to stand firm on its duty to her citizens to protect its territorial sovereignty and resist the actions of the Biden Administration to fundamentally undermine U.S. immigration law and national security.