The Republican governor of Texas, Greg Abbott, is allegedly generating confusion and mayhem at the border and should be forced out of office, according to the White House.
Prior to President Biden’s Friday visit to the Central Intelligence Agency, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre conducted a brief news conference and fielded questions.
A reporter questioned Jean-Pierre about if the Biden administration planned to take legal action in response to Abbott’s executive order allowing state law enforcement and the Texas National Guard to detain and deport illegal immigrants.
Just as counties pushed him to declare the migrant situation an invasion, Abbott issued an order on Thursday permitting Texas law enforcement to send illegal aliens arrested in the state back to the US border.
The Texas Department of Public Safety (DPS) and the Texas National Guard are able to detain and send back illegal aliens who have crossed the southern border between ports of entry according to Abbott’s directive. The directive states that illegal immigrants would be brought to the US but not to Mexico.
It happens during a period of historically high migrant border contacts. More than 239,000 migrants were encountered in May alone, and according to Abbott, 5,000 migrants were apprehended in Texas alone on the Fourth of July holiday.
In order to deal with the influx of migrants that has hit the state, Abbott has taken a number of dramatic actions, such as busing migrants to Washington, DC. Last year, the state increased its law enforcement and resource deployment to the border as part of the still-active Operation Lone Star to apprehend those who were crossing the border illegally.
