OPINION: This article may contain commentary which reflects the author's opinion.
A federal judge ruled against plaintiffs in a case involving the Biden administration’s lax use of parole for illegal migrants but at the same time gave former President Donald Trump — and strict border enforcement advocates — a win.
In separate rulings issued Friday in Victoria, Texas, U.S. District Judge Drew Tipton ruled that Texas and other states that challenged President Joe Biden’s parole policy that allows “migrants from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua, and Venezuela to apply for entry into the United States and temporarily reside here upon approval,” had no standing to do so, UPI reported.
The newswire added: “The policy enables up to 30,000 migrants from the four nations to arrive monthly and has enabled more than 386,000 people from those nations to arrive in the United States over the past year. In his ruling, Tipton said there is no evidence that the parole policy harms Texas or any other states, so they have no standing to challenge it in federal court, CNN and the Miami Herald reported.”
Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas praised Tipton’s ruling.
“These processes—a safe and orderly way to reach the United States—have resulted in a significant reduction in the number of these individuals encountered at our southern border,” he noted in a statement Friday.
“Those who do not have a legal basis to remain in the United States will be subject to prompt removal, a minimum five-year bar on admission, and potential criminal prosecution for unlawful re-entry,” Mayorkas added.
However, Tipton also ordered the administration to resume construction of a border wall authorized under the Trump administration. In that case, filed by Texas, Missouri, and other co-plaintiffs, it was alleged that the Biden administration had ignored the intent and will of Congress when it allocated $1.4 billion in border wall construction by diverting those funds elsewhere.
Tipton signed off on the state’s request to prevent DHS from misappropriating the funds and using them instead for the intended purpose of building Trump’s border wall along the southwestern border.
George P. Bush, the commissioner of the Texas General Land Office, along with the states of Missouri and Texas, in separate court filings, challenged the constitutionality of the Biden administration’s reallocation of funds while also seeking an injunction to halt the parole policy, UPI reported.
The lawsuits said that Congress in 2020 and 2021 approved $1.4 billion to finish a border wall between the U.S. and Mexico, but Biden, on taking office, “had a different view on how these funds should be spent” and “via proclamation, paused the obligation of these funds the day he was inaugurated,” the states said.
“Instead, Biden ordered the Department of Homeland Security to assess the matter, which resulted in two plans that didn’t involve building the border wall. Instead, the DHS would only ensure any existing structure is stable,” UPI reported.
The Biden administration diverted funds originally designated for the construction of a barrier system along the southern border towards “environmental remediation, flood control, and cleanup projects” as well as “smarter border security measures.” The states argued that this reallocation of the funds is inconsistent with their intended purpose and constitutes a misappropriation of them.
Tipton said Texas demonstrated that building additional physical barriers “would result in fewer illegal aliens entering the country,” which DHS data supports, the newswire reported.
“DHS data show an 87% decline in illegal crossings in the Yuma sector during the 2020 fiscal year compared to a year prior and a 79% decrease in apprehensions in the Rio Grande Valley sector,” UPI added.
DHS also noted that the “El Paso sector has experienced a significant reduction in drug and smuggling activities in areas where the new border wall system was built,” as well as reductions of 61 percent and 81 percent, respectively, for illegal border crossings at two areas within the El Paso sector, Tipton found.
