Judge to decide if Texas border barrier stays in river

A US federal judge gave attorneys until the close of business Friday to submit written arguments on whether he should issue an emergency injunction to make Texas Governor Greg Abbott remove a water barrier to deter migrant crossings while legal challenges proceed.

Judge David Alan Ezra said the key point is whether Abbott has the power to unilaterally try stopping what the governor has described as an "invasion" on America's southern border.

In early July, Abbott deployed about 1,000 feet of floating marine barrier made of a line of buoys along the Rio Grande to deter illegal crossings at the US-Mexico border, at a cost of about $1 million.

Arguing that Abbott's floating barrier in the Rio Grande is a safety hazard that violates international treaties and harms relations with Mexico, the US Department of Justice (DOJ) asked a federal judge to order Texas to remove the barrier in late July.

The DOJ said that a significant portion of the buoy barrier was located in Mexican territory. A survey by the International Boundary and Water Commission found that about 787 out of the 1,000 feet was on the Mexico side of the river. Last week, Texas sent a crew out to move the buoys closer to the US side.

The bodies of at least two migrants have been found by the water barrier since it was set up.

The placement of chained buoys by Texas authorities is a violation of our sovereignty," the Mexican Foreign Ministry wrote in its statement on one of the drownings in early August. "We express our concern about the impact on the human rights and personal safety of migrants of these state policies."

The water barrier is part of Abbott's border-control program Operation Lone Star, for which almost $10 billion was allocated by Texas lawmakers. Barbed wire also was deployed along the banks of the Rio Grande, and some migrants were injured as a result.

The more aggressive measures at the border by Abbott have some of his supporters regretting the moves.

Eagle Pass Mayor Rolando Salinas initially agreed in June to declare Shelby Park private so that state troopers could arrest migrants for trespassing, according to The Texas Tribune. At least 500 migrants were arrested after crossing the river into the park in July.

Residents voiced their anger over this arrangement at the City Council meetings in late July.

"I am deeply saddened to see Shelby Park become a place of militarization, human rights violations and xenophobic rhetoric instead of a place of recreation and friendship," 19-year-old Eagle Pass resident Karina Flores said to the council members, reported the Tribune.

In response to residents' reaction, the council unanimously rescinded the agreement with the state and made the park public property again.

Salinas told The New York Times that he then had declined a recent request from the state to construct a gate on a boat ramp near the river.

"They said, 'Well, we just wanted to ask you. We are going to put it in anyway because we are under an emergency declaration by the governor. That's our authority,'" he told the Times.

Magali Urbina and her husband Hugo own a pecan farm by the Rio Grande. Supportive of Abbott's border initiatives, the couple allowed the state to install barbed wire along the riverbank on their property, cutting off their own access to the river.

One afternoon in late July, Magali Urbina spotted a pregnant woman cross the Rio Grande and push her way through the wire. The woman's arms were cut and bloodied. Urbina told the Tribune that she called nearby Border Patrol agents, who cut through the state's fence to reach the woman. This became too much for her, she said.

The Urbinas asked the state to remove the razor wire from their property, but they were told that Abbott's disaster declaration for the border allows the state to use private property to protect its borders.

Magali Urbina also has seen bodies of drowned migrants floating by their pecan farm by the river.

She said no landowner likes migrants crossing through their property, but she can't support what the governor is doing.

"There's a humane way to do it," she said to the Tribune. "How many people have lost their lives? And how many will continue to lose their lives?"

Abbott has instructed law enforcement to arrest migrants for trespassing on private property. He is being sued by four Mexican migrants who said they were held in jail for as long as six weeks after they served their sentences or had their trespassing charges dropped.

Abbott is also busing migrants to Los Angeles, and did so during Hurricane Hilary. A group of 37 migrants were put on a bus on Sunday and arrived in Los Angeles on Monday evening.