A federal appeals court issued a ruling late Tuesday that continues the halt on a Texas immigration law that allows local law enforcement to detain those believed to have entered the country unlawfully.
The 5th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals’ panel of three judges voted 2-1 has extended the delay on Senate Bill 4. The appeals court’s decision prolongs the long legal battle over the legislation, which reached the Supreme Court before the appeals court halted its enforcement last week. halted its enforcement last week.
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“Texas does not show why it would be entitled to reversal of the preliminary injunction,” the court stated in its opinion. “Constitutional text, structure, and history offer strong evidence that federal laws addressing matters such as noncitizen entry and removal remain supreme even when the State War Clause has been invoked.”
The statute makes a crime the unauthorized entry into the Lone Star State outside of an official entry point, leading to a possible six-month jail term, or up to 20 years for subsequent crossings.
Judge Andrew Oldham, the only dissenter in the recent ruling, argued Texas should “retain at least some of its sovereignty” in the federal system.
“And its people are supposed to be able to use that sovereignty to elect representatives and send them to Austin to debate and enact laws that respond to the exigencies that Texans experience and that Texans want addressed,” Oldham stated in his dissent.
Last week, the law became effective briefly following a Supreme Court decision.
The Biden administration urged the justices to block the law, which was passed last year by the state’s GOP-controlled Legislature and signed by Gov. Greg Abbott (R), arguing that it was an “unprecedented intrusion into federal immigration enforcement.”
In defending the law, Texas officials have argued that the state has a constitutional right to protect itself, stating that the administration was unwilling or unable to defend the border.
During the brief time it was in effect, no arrests were reported, per The Associated Press.
