Republicans Reject Supreme Court's Power at Texas Border

Some Republicans have recently said Texas Governor Greg Abbott should ignore the United States Supreme Court's ruling that the federal government has authority to remove Texas' razor-wire barriers at the U.S.-Mexico border.

The Court handed down the border ruling on Monday, deciding on a key issue amid the political and legal border battle between Texas and the Biden administration. Texas authorities have defended constructing the wire barrier because they believe the federal government failed to address what they view as an "invasion" of the southern border, while the Biden administration has argued the federal government, not an individual state, has authority to control the border.

There were more than 2.4 million encounters at the U.S.-Mexico border during the 2023 fiscal year, up from roughly 1.7 million in 2021, according to U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) data. Abbott, a proponent of stronger border control, constructed the razor-wire as a series of measures he says is intended to prevent illegal entry from Mexico into his state, which shares more than 1,200 miles of the border.

Notably, the ruling does not bar Texas from constructing more razor wire and only says that the federal government must be able to take it down when deemed necessary. While Texas has built more wire since Monday, it has not appeared to take efforts to block the federal government from removing it.

Some Republicans have suggested Texas should ignore the order. Meanwhile, Abbott has vowed that the fight is "not over" and declared that Texas has the "right to self defense."

"It's like, if someone's breaking into your house, and the court says, 'Oh, sorry, you can't defend yourself,' what do you tell the court? You tell the court to go to hell, you defend yourself, and then figure it out later," Representative Chip Roy wrote in a Thursday post to X, formerly Twitter.

In a separate post, Roy wrote the ruling was "unconscionable" and that the state should "ignore it" on behalf of U.S. Border Patrol agents.

Meanwhile, Representative Clay Higgins, a Louisiana Republican, wrote in an X post earlier this week that Texas authorities "should stand their ground."

Representative Thomas Massie, a Kentucky Republican, said Congress could make the decision "irrelevant."

"Everyone is overthinking this. Congress can render the 5-4 Supreme Court decision against Texas IRRELEVANT by simply refusing to fund Biden's removal of border security measures. It really is that simple," he wrote to X on Friday.

Newsweek reached out to Abbott's office for comment via email.

Michael McAuliffe, a former federal prosecutor and former elected state attorney, told Newsweek on Friday ignoring the ruling would pose a "direct threat" to the rule of law.

"Texas Governor Greg Abbott's pronouncements to the contrary ignore the basic constitutional principle expressed in the supremacy clause and appear designed to foment discontent within the political world. His language about Texas law trumping any other authority creates, or at least furthers, the notion that one can disregard court decisions when one doesn't like them. That type of advocacy is a direct threat to the rule of law," he wrote.

McAuliffe added that while the decision "didn't address or resolve the whole case," it does mean it will likely agree that immigration enforcement is a "core federal responsibility" and that federal law "controls over inconsistent state action" that may interference with federal immigration enforcement.

Former federal prosecutor Neama Rahmani told Newsweek on Friday that if Texas were to ignore the ruling, the Biden administration "could bring law enforcement or even the national guard in to enforce the Supreme Court's order."

He pointed to the U.S. Constitution's supremacy clause, which states that federal law prevails when there is conflict between state and federal law.

"Under the related doctrine of preemption, when the federal government intends to occupy an entire area of the law, the states can't enact laws related thereto. Immigration has always and continues to be an exclusively federal issue. It wouldn't make sense for there to be a patchwork of different state immigration laws across the country," Rahmani, president of the West Coast Trial Lawyers law firm, said.