A federal judge ruled that Texas had no standing to install the border barriers. Texas was granted a stay.
In this Aug. 1, 2023, file photo, buoys are placed in the Rio Grande River in Eagle Pass, Texas.floating barriers
"Governor Abbott announced that he was not 'asking for permission' for Operation Lone Star, the anti-immigration program under which Texas constructed the floating barrier," Ezra wrote. "Unfortunately for Texas, permission is exactly what federal law requires before installing obstructions in the nation's navigable waters."Adam Davis/EPA via Shutterstock, FILETexas Gov. Greg Abbott has said the state will appeal the ruling, calling it "incorrect.
In court filings, Texas has said the buoy system was deployed as part of that strategy to protect against a surge of "[t]housands of aliens ... including members of cartels that traffic in people, weapons, and vast quantities of drugs like fentanyl.""By any account, this amounts to 'ent[ry] in a hostile manner.' And the State has the constitutional power to repel that invasion," the state said.
Though the Lonestar State has repeatedly asserted its sovereignty to defend the border, federal "power to prevent unauthorized obstacles in the nation's navigable waters trumps state policy preferences," the judge said. But this is a "convenient" claim from Texas that "contradicts its own description," the judge wrote -- since the state had said the buoys were designed as a "physical barrier" created "to deter illegal crossing in hotspots along the Rio Grande."
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