God bless Texas. The state is doing everything it can to curb the flow of illegal immigrants. They erected a floating barrier in the Rio Grande, which the courts slapped down. The state legislature opted to pass a law empowering police to detain persons who entered the country illegally.
Most, if not all, of SB4 is already federal law. Still, the inability and unwillingness of the Biden administration to tackle the southern border has forced Texas Gov. Greg Abbott to make moves. The deadline for a decision about this bill was to expire at 5 PM EST. Justice Alito opted to extend the injunction concerning the enforcement of SB4 as the courts sift through the legality of the legislation (via CBS News):
The Supreme Court just fully blocked Texas from enforcing SB4, which allows state police to arrest and deport illegals.
— Greg Price (@greg_price11) March 18, 2024
Insanity.
The executive branch is allowing millions of illegal to enter the country, the legislative branch is doing nothing to stop it, and the Supreme Court…
Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito on Monday extended an order barring Texas officials from detaining and jailing migrants suspected of crossing the U.S. southern border without authorization under a new state immigration law known as SB4 that the Biden administration has called unconstitutional.
Minutes after a self-imposed deadline passed, Alito issued an order continuing to pause enforcement of the controversial Texas law, one of Gov. Greg Abbott's signature immigration policies, on an administrative basis.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit is considering the measure's legality, and the Justice Department asked the Supreme Court to put the law on hold as the court challenge plays out. The full court has not yet acted on that request.
Passed by the Texas legislature last year, SB4 criminalizes unauthorized migration at the state level, making the act of entering the U.S. outside of a port of entry — already a federal offense — into a state crime. It also creates a felony charge for illegal reentry at the state level.
At the request of the Biden administration, a federal judge last month blocked SB4, finding that the state measure is at odds with federal immigration laws. That ruling was then suspended by the 5th Circuit until Alito paused the appeals court's order on administrative grounds. Alito's administrative stay maintains the status quo while the court considers the Justice Department's request for emergency relief.
The fact that the Biden Justice Department threatened to sue when this bill was passed is parred for the course concerning the open borders policy this president has promoted and nourished. It’s led to American deaths, with Laken Riley becoming a national story. The nursing student was murdered while on a morning run in February by Jose Ibarra, an illegal alien from Venezuela who entered the country in 2022. There have been other shooting deaths and rapes committed by people who shouldn’t be here. Crime is already spiking nationwide—adding illegal alien criminal activity is compounding the issue, which has become a top concern for voters this cycle.