The Biden administration may proceed with a lawsuit alleging that Republican-led Texas violated a U.S. environmental law by installing a 1,000-foot-long floating barrier in the Rio Grande river to deter illegal border crossings from Mexico, a federal judge ruled on Friday.
U.S. District Judge David Ezra in Austin said that the U.S. Department of Justice’s claim, asserting that the string of buoys is covered by a law requiring states to obtain federal approval before obstructing navigable waterways, was plausible enough to allow the lawsuit to proceed.
Ezra last year ordered Texas to remove the barrier pending the outcome of the case, stating that it likely violated the federal law. A 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals panel upheld Ezra’s ruling, but the full court is now reviewing that decision, with arguments slated for May 15.
Ezra on Friday reaffirmed his earlier ruling, stating that the Justice Department had provided photographs and other evidence to support its claim that the large, stationary barrier could block vessels from passing.
“This inherently diminishes the navigability of the waterway,” wrote Ezra, an appointee of Republican former President George W. Bush. Ezra dismissed a separate claim in the Biden administration’s lawsuit that the buoys violated an 1848 treaty between the U.S. and Mexico requiring both countries to agree before building obstructions in the Rio Grande.
No comments from Texas AG
The offices of Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton and Governor Greg Abbott, Republicans who have sharply criticized the Biden administration’s border policies, did not respond to requests for comment.
Former National Enquirer publisher David, the first witness in Donald Trump’s New York hush money trial, concluded his testimony on Friday in the first criminal trial of a former president in U.S. history.
The floating barrier is one in a series of steps Texas officials have taken in response to a record increase last year of migrants illegally crossing the border and what they say has been Democratic President Joe Biden’s failure to address the issue.
The state has also bussed migrants to Democratic-led states, installed razor-wire fencing along the border, and passed a law allowing for the prosecution of people who are present in the state illegally.
Those moves have all spawned legal battles with the Biden administration and advocacy groups, who claim Texas is interfering with the federal government’s power to enforce immigration laws and migrants’ rights to apply for humanitarian aid.
