Texas this week blocked federal agents from accessing a section of the state's border with Mexico in the latest episode of the fight between Gov. Greg Abbott (R.) and President Joe Biden.
Members of the Texas National Guard stopped Border Patrol agents from operating in a 2.5-mile stretch of the border that includes Shelby Park in Eagle Pass, Texas, one of the boundary's most highly trafficked areas. The federal government called out Texas's move Friday in a filing in the Supreme Court.
The filing includes an affidavit from Robert Danley, a Customs and Border Protection official, who said a Texas official told him "that it is the position of the State of Texas, through the National Guard, that it will not allow Border Patrol or DOD personnel who support Border Patrol into the approximately 2.5-mile stretch along the national border near Shelby Park in any operational capacity."
Danley went on to allege that Texas's troops cut off Border Patrol's access to a boat ramp it uses for operations in the area, greatly reduced its surveillance capacity at the border, and stopped it from using the area as a place to hold migrants awaiting processing.
"The Texas National Guard has maintained a presence with security points and temporary barrier in Shelby Park since 2021," Michael Perry, spokesman for the Texas Military Department, which controls the state's National Guard, told CBS News. "The current posture is to prepare for future illegal immigrant surges and to restrict access to organizations that perpetuate illegal immigrant crossings in the park and greater Eagle Pass area."
In the Supreme Court filing, Biden's solicitor general Elizabeth Prelogar argued that Texas's actions are more serious than the federal government had previously seen.
"Texas’s new actions since the government’s filing demonstrate an escalation of the state’s measures to block Border Patrol’s ability to patrol or even to surveil the border and be in a position to respond to emergencies," Prelogar wrote.
This development is the latest in Texas's months-long legal fight with the Biden administration over border security measures. Prelogar's filing adds new details to the federal government's petition earlier this month for the Supreme Court to overturn the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals's December ruling that stopped it from destroying the state's razor wire on the border. That ruling came after a district judge in November allowed the administration to continue cutting the concertina wire.
Another point of contention between Biden and Abbott has been Texas's floating buoy barrier in the Rio Grande near Eagle Pass, which it received orders from the Fifth Circuit early last month to dismantle.