With the Biden administration pursuing radical open-borders policies, Texas is moving to defend America’s borders in place of the federal government.
During his Monday State of the State Address, in which he advocated for a number of conservative policies, Governor Greg Abbott announced that Texas would step up its efforts to secure the U.S.-Mexico border.
“Because of the federal government’s open border policies,” Abbott stated, “Texas must fortify its efforts to secure our border.” The governor noted that the state already had “planes in the air, boots on the ground, boats on the water, and cruisers on the roads,” and he pledged to expand those efforts.
This is not the first time Texas has moved to secure the border with Mexico. In June 2014, as The New American reported, former Texas Governor Rick Perry ordered the state’s Department of Public Safety (DPS) to begin emergency “surge operations” in response to a wave of illegal migration that year.
Less than two months later, DPS had established a sophisticated “multipronged” border operation, including 1,000 Texas National Guard troops, helicopters with infrared technology, a surveillance airplane, and support from multiple law-enforcement agencies in the state.
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Texas’s efforts have increased since then, with the state allocating up to $800 million for border security in the 2016-17 budget and hiring 1,000 additional DPS troopers, among other actions.
Abbott’s border-security announcement is one of several actions already taken by Texas to counter the Biden administration’s leftist, globalist policies.
Shortly before Biden took office, Abbott announced that the state was preparing for potential lawsuits against the new administration, and he later directed state agencies to sue over Biden’s anti-energy orders. Already, Texas has secured a temporary victory in federal court blocking Biden’s 100-day deportation moratorium.
There is still much more Abbott can do to counter radical administration actions and federal overreach. This includes enacting the Texas Sovereignty Act, a bill that would create a robust and constitutionally sound process for nullifying unconstitutional federal actions. This would allow Texas to substantively push back against illegal Biden administration actions and enforce the U.S. Constitution as understood by the Founding Fathers.
However, Governor Abbott’s existing actions are good initial steps toward defending the country. It will take courageous individuals acting over these next four years to preserve the United States and its freedoms.
