WASHINGTON D.C. (Nexstar) — The ongoing standoff between Texas and the U.S. government regarding border security in Eagle Pass took center stage in a Congressional hearing Tuesday.
It comes after months of escalating tensions, which are coming to a head after Gov. Greg Abbott said Texas will defy a U.S. Supreme Court order related to the state’s concertina wire along the Rio Grande river. Last week, the high court said Texas must let federal border patrol agents remove Texas’ concertina wire along the Rio Grande river. It’s part of an ongoing lawsuit from the Biden administration, which argues Texas is overstepping its state authority by installing the razor wire, which has injured some migrants crossing since it was first installed.
Texas First Assistant Attorney General Brent Webster defended the state’s action before the House Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution and Limited Government.
“The federal government continues to fail us,” he said. “The governor has a duty and obligation to protect the citizens of Texas. And when he sees harms coming upon Texas, he has an obligation to act.”
Throughout the roughly two-hour hearing, lawmakers and witnesses grappled over defining what constitutes an “invasion” — a key part of the governor’s argument that it has the constitutional right to defend itself at the border. Mark Brnovich, the former Attorney General of Arizona, agreed with the Lone Star State’s arguments during testimony to the committee.
“The courts have never said that states do not have the ability to protect themselves that states do not have the ability to stop or repel an invasion,” Brnovich said, arguing that dangerous cartel activity is enough to define the situation as an “invasion” at the border.
Democrats in the committee countered that characterization of the issue, calling it dehumanizing and dangerous. U.S. Rep. Veronica Escobar, D-Texas, criticized the repeated use of the term, reminding her colleagues that it was cited in a manifesto by the gunman who targeted Hispanics in the 2019 Walmart shooting in El Paso.
“The repeated cries of an invasion, which is a dog whistle for the great replacement theory, the great replacement theory actually was a motivator for a white supremacist who drove to my community and slaughtered 23 people and injured dozens more,” she said. “So there’s deadly consequences to this kind of hate speech.”
Encounter numbers over the years
In 2023, federal agents encountered the most migrants in Texas in December. For comparison, Nexstar looked at the numbers during the same time frame over the past few years, according to data from U.S. Customs and Border Protection.
CBP’s encounter data includes any migrants who were arrested, expelled and or deemed inadmissible into the country.
December 2023: 149,854 encounters
December 2022: 148,786 encounters
December 2021: 100,443 encounters
December 2020: 40,517 encounters
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