The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit on Tuesday lifted an injunction ordering Texas to remove a string of buoys deployed in the Rio Grande last year, allowing the barrier to temporarily remain in the river until a trial.
The ruling on Tuesday comes one year after Texas installed a 1,000-foot floating barrier made out of strung-together buoys in the Rio Grande near Eagle Pass in an attempt to deter illegal immigration. Soon after Texas deployed the buoys, the U.S. sued, arguing the installation of the buoys violated an 1899 federal ban on construction in a navigable river without permission.
The U.S. motioned for a preliminary injunction to reposition the buoys to the riverbanks, which was granted by U.S. District Judge David Ezra and quickly reversed by a higher court the next day. However, the Fifth Circuit Court affirmed Ezra’s ruling in December and ordered Texas to remove the buoys.
The Fifth Circuit Court has now reversed its own ruling, arguing Tuesday the the district court abused its discretion by granting the injunction.
According to the ruling, for the injunction to be granted, the U.S. must likely be able to successfully argue in a full trial the buoys violated the 1899 ban. Texas has previously argued the stretch of the Rio Grande in which the buoys were deployed is too shallow to be navigable, and the Tuesday ruling said the 1899 law only applies to navigable waters.
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott posted on X last week and said the state never removed the buoys from the river. He posted again Tuesday night celebrating the ruling.
“The Federal Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit just ruled that Texas can KEEP these buoys in the water securing our border,” Abbott wrote. President Joe “Biden tried to remove them. I fought to keep them in the water. That is exactly where they will stay.”
The state first announced its intention to install the buoys last June and installed them in July 2023. The move drew criticism from Mexican officials, who said the buoys violated international law.
The buoys are a part of Abbott’s “Operation Lone Star,” a plan meant to deter what the governor’s office said is a record level of illegal border crossings.