While our focus has been on the wild wild west of midterm elections, a lot has been happening on the wild west of our open southern border. Though October saw a small dip in the number of illegal border crossings, that is likely to change soon and radically with the expiration of Title 42, a public health order implemented at the beginning of the pandemic that enabled us to expel illegal aliens.
Republicans have noted that Title 42 has been an impactful tool in turning away inadmissible aliens at the border. U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) reports that 35% of the illegal immigrants apprehended along the southwestern U.S. border were expelled under the Title 42 policy.
But a ruling by a Federal judge in D.C. has put the kabosh on that policy, calling it “arbitrary and capricious.” Judge Emmet Sullivan’s decision arose from a lawsuit filed by the ACLU.
In response, Congressman Tony Gonzales (TX-23), whose district is largely Hispanic and stretches across southwest Texas, issued this statement following the judge’s decision:
“Title 42 has been the only policy in place that has kept Border Patrol and law enforcement agencies above water. In its absence, there will be complete chaos in my district and across the country.”
In tandem with this development, and with the midterms securely behind him, Governor Abbott finally declared that an invasion is taking place along the U.S. southern border, and that he will send National Guard troops and “gun boats” to secure the border and “repel” people trying to cross illegally.
This is what he tweeted: “I invoked the Invasion Clauses of the U.S. & Texas Constitutions to fully authorize Texas to take unprecedented measures to defend our state against an invasion. I’m using that constitutional authority, & other authorization & Executive Orders to keep our state & country safe.”
As if to head off the criticism of the usual detractors of his border efforts as ineffectual, he also recapped a list of the actions that he has taken on the Border issue:
- Deploy the National Guard to safeguard our border & to repel & turn back immigrants trying to cross the border illegally;
- Deploy the Texas Department of Public Safety (DPS) to arrest & return to the border immigrants who crossed illegally & deploy DPS to arrest illegal immigrants for criminal activity;
- Build a border wall in multiple counties on the border;
- Deploy gun boats to secure the border;
- Designate Mexican drug cartels as foreign terrorist organizations;
- Enter into a compact with other states to secure the border;
- Enter into agreements with foreign powers to enhance border security;
- Provide resources for border counties to increase their efforts to respond to the border invasion.
But one persistent critic, Ken Cucinelli, who served as Deputy Secretary of Homeland Security under Trump, is still not impressed. He reiterated his long held position that unless and until Abbott deports illegals and takes them back across the border, all other measures amount to a game of “catch and release,” a position the leftist mainstream media has seized upon to demean Abbott’s efforts and sow division among the Republican ranks.
As if upping the ante in this game of chicken, the Governor added another sanctuary city, Philadelphia, to the roster of destinations for the busing of illegals. Now illegals can choose between the City of Brotherly Love and Chicago, D.C or New York.
It’s not that I don’t richly enjoy New York City’s Mayor and Chief Hypocrite petulantly protest that his city’s “values are being exploited.” Or the fact that Abbott last week sent a third busload of illegals to Kamala Harris’s DC historic residence. That’s all good clean fun. But we’re talking about less than 15,000 illegals total having been bused from Texas to other states. With minuscule numbers like that, it’s easy to dismiss his “busing strategy” as a PR stunt.
As Cucinelli insists, the proof is in the pudding. Until the number of illegal border crossings stops exponentiating and then rolls back to Trump era proportions, all Abbott’s efforts, no matter how self-congratulatory, will have been in vain, including this long awaited Declaration.
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So what does the declaration of invasion mean in practical terms? Ten locations along the Texas–Mexico border will get Vietnam-era M113 armored personnel carriers (ie, tanks), with 50 trained personnel to operate them. The HQ for Operation Lone Star reports that the Texas National Guard is also increasing “aircraft flights and security efforts” on the border.
“The Texas National Guard is taking unprecedented measures to safeguard our border and to repel and turn-back immigrants trying to cross the border illegally.”
How this translates into numbers of illegal incursions remains to be seen. It is possible to envision a scenario in which such defenses act as a deterrent to the cartels and coyotes and their trans national backers. It seems obvious they seek entry at the most porous and undefended border points.
But it seems equally obvious that they will not be easily deterred. The amounts of money being made, the amount of power being consolidated, the damage being done to the sovereignty of our country are so desirable as to merit a combat situation. That, in fact, is the meaning of an invasion. We are at war with the cartels, and are presently losing badly.
The irony of Vietnam era tanks being sent to the border while continuing to withhold the authority of deportation, neatly echoes the dynamic of the war we fought in Southeast Asia with one hand tied behind our backs. We know how that turned out.
We also know that Abbott lacks the boldness of a Kari Lake, who campaigned on the promise of declaring an invasion on day one of her governorship. Her position poses such a threat to our enemies, that now she is embroiled on another battlefield, enmeshed in the intricacies and minutiae of a stolen election and the lawfare that necessarily ensues.
So perhaps our Governor’s cautiousness was well considered. With the midterms behind us, he may have been waiting for the cover that a Republican majority in the House in D.C. provides the escalation of our home grown Operation Lone Star.
The punchline was just delivered: “House Judiciary Republicans to summon Mayorkas for border investigation.”
But here’s the counterpunch that just broke this morning from the Center for Immigration Studies, at CIS.org: the administration is ramping up a formerly little used clause called, “humanitarian or significant public benefit parole,” to select hundreds of people a month for their escorted government-to-government handoffs. There are centers in Tijuana, Monterey and Cancun that fly illegals into this country where they are given a package that included health care, work authorization, and an application for asylum. They simply apply online. Word is spreading virally throughout Central America.
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CALL TO ACTION
Write Gov. Abbott and let him know we the people of Texas support his declaration of invasion, along with every option at our disposal to repel the affront on our southern border. Additionally, we believe it to be imperative that our law enforcement be authorized to return illegal crossers across the border into Mexico, delivering the necessary signal upstream to the cartels that we intend a zero tolerance policy to illegal immigration.
Governor Greg Abbott
Office of the Governor
P.O. Box 12428
Austin Texas 78711
Telephone: (512) 463-2000
https://gov.texas.gov/apps/contact-us/opinion
Write our US Senators, Cornyn and Cruz and tell them in no uncertain terms that we DO NOT support amnesty for DACA’s here in the U.S.
U.S. Senator John Cornyn
600 Navarro, Suite 210
San Antonio, TX 78205
Telephone: 210-224-7485
https://www.cornyn.senate.gov/node/5853
U.S. Senator Ted Cruz
9901 IH-10W, Suite 950
San Antonio, TX 78230
https://www.cruz.senate.gov/contact
Write or call our US House representatives from Texas who sit on the Judiciary Committee, Chip Roy and Louie Gohmert, and tell them we are fully in favor of aggressive investigations into the border fiasco and the current “humanitarian or significant public benefit parole" scam being used to sidestep legal and formal immigration processes.
U.S. Representative Chip Roy
1100 NE Loop 410
Suite 640
San Antonio, TX 78209
Telephone: (210) 821-5024
U.S. Representative Louie Gohmert
1121 ESE Loop 323, Ste 206
Tyler, TX, 7570
Telephone: (903) 561-6349
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