Texas Immigration Law Struck Down by Judge in Win for Biden

A new Texas law authorizing the arrest and removal of migrants who enter the country without lawful documentation infringes on the sole authority of the federal government, a federal judge ruled Thursday.

Handing a win to the Biden administration, Senior US District Judge David Ezra of the Western District of Texas said individual states can’t create immigration laws independent of those set forth in the US Constitution. Ezra issued a preliminary injunction, blocking Texas’ SB 4 less than a week before it is set to go into effect March 5. He also denied Texas’ request for a stay of the injunction pending appeal.

In a written ruling, Ezra said to allow Texas to implement its own immigration laws “would amount to nullification of federal law and authority.” His comments square with those from a Feb. 15 hearing when he strongly challenged Texas’ lawyers, saying the law would establish precedence for states to enforce a patchwork of immigration laws. That would be a “nightmare,” he said.

Texas is expected to appeal Ezra’s ruling to the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, which is already handling challenges from the federal government to an array of Texas border enforcement measures.

Gov. Greg Abbott (R) has defended the need for state-level enforcement, pointing to a record numbers of border crossings that he says are overwhelming border communities. Biden has failed to enforce federal laws to thwart those crossings, Abbott has said.

SB 4 grants state officials the power to arrest, detain, and remove from the US individuals who don’t have legal authority to be in the country. Illegal entry can be prosecuted as a state crime as a Class B misdemeanor. The law in Texas resembles one from Arizona that the US Supreme Court mostly struck down 12 years ago.

Abbott is hopeful that the court’s conservative shift will result in a favorable outcome for Texas if it decides to revisit the issue under SB 4.

SB 4 drew a lawsuit in December from El Paso County, a large Democratic border community joined as plaintiffs by immigration groups. That case was then consolidated into a second lawsuit the federal government brought in January.

The case is U.S. v. Texas, W.D. Tex., No. 1:24-cv-00008, 2/29/24.