Migrant advocates are reeling following the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling to allow enforcement of the controversial Texas Senate Bill 4, which would give state police and judges the ability to arrest and deport people suspected of unlawfully crossing into the country from the Mexican border. The law was put on hold again hours later by an appeals court.
The bill, signed into law late last year by Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, was initially blocked by a district court. The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals effectively undid the decision, and the Supreme Court declined to review that suspension, according to the American Civil Liberties Union of Texas. The legislation would have originally gone into effect on March 5.
Supreme Court Justices, in a 6-3 vote on Tuesday, cleared SB 4 to take effect until the appeals court reinstated the district court’s injunction, temporarily blocking the law again as litigation continues to strike it down completely.
“SB4 is cruel, inhumane and clearly unconstitutional,” Kate Melloy Goettel, the senior legal director at the American Immigration Council, said in a statement released after the Supreme Court ruling. “We have a blueprint for fixing our broken immigration system and politically-motivated and hateful laws like SB 4 don’t solve any of our root problems, it only creates more chaos.”
The appeals court scheduled a hearing Wednesday morning to discuss whether the law should be implemented, and according to reports, the judges did not appear receptive to Texas’ arguments that SB 4 “mirrored” federal law.
Opponents and supporters of the immigration law released a flurry of statements following the initial ruling on Tuesday. Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton in a post on X, formerly Twitter, called it a “huge win.” Texas Democratic Party Chair Gilberto Hinojosa said in a statement that the “inhumane” border law would “force American citizens to carry passports in their own neighborhoods.”
Mexico’s Ministry of…
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