Immigrant rights groups backed by the American Civil Liberties Union filed a federal lawsuit against Texas Governor Greg Abbott over his executive order restricting the transportation of migrants, claiming it goes against federal law and amounts to racial profiling at the southern border.
The legal challenge was brought by the nonprofit Annunciation House, a migrant shelter provider in El Paso, along with immigrant advocacy groups Angry Tias & Abuelas of the Rio Grande Valley and FIEL Houston,. They are represented by attorneys with the ACLU’s Immigrants’ Rights Project and the ACLU of Texas.
This lawsuit, filed late Wednesday in El Paso federal court, comes six days after the U.S. Department of Justice sued Abbott to block the order. On Tuesday, a federal judge in that case issued a temporary restraining order blocking enforcement of the order until a hearing on an injunction can be held.
Echoing the DOJ’s claims, the ACLU and immigration groups allege that the order violates the supremacy clause of the U.S. Constitution by attempting to regulate the movement of migrants, which is for the federal government to decide. They also say the order unlawfully attempts to regulate the federal government.
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In Wednesday’s lawsuit, the ACLU argues the order will directly impact people who have been released from the federal government’s custody into the country to await their immigration hearing. Those people will be unable to get any form of transportation after being released from CBP custody, according to the complaint, which points out that state law enforcement officials would be taking migrants back to CBP after the agency released them.
The groups also claim the order allows Texas police to racially profile travelers along the border region.
“It directs state officers to make their own determinations about passengers’ immigration status, wholly independent of the federal government, and to impose harsh penalties based on those unilateral immigration decisions,” the lawsuit states. “It opens the door to profiling, standardless detention, questioning, vehicle seizure, rerouting, and heavy fines. The executive order is already having a profound chilling effect on people’s movement in border communities and throughout the state.”
In addition, the immigrant advocacy organizations say they will be directly affected by the order if it is allowed to be enforced. Annunciation House transports migrants who have been released from federal immigration custody to its facility, which houses migrants in the El Paso area. Angry Tias funds numerous services for migrants, including a taxi service that is kept on retainer. Both groups say they would be unable to provide such services under the governor’s order, would face having their vehicles impounded and would be left with no way of assisting migrants.
See here and here for background on the suit filed by the Justice Department. As before, I don’t really know enough to say much of value – I’m not fully clear on the differences in the claims made by the two groups of plaintiffs. It may be that this suit winds up getting combined with the other one, as often happens. Whatever the case, I’m rooting for the plaintiffs. The Texas Signal and Daily Kos have more.
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