Texas is making a $250 million “down payment” on a wall between the Texas-Mexico border, Gov. Greg Abbott said Wednesday, elaborating on last week’s announcement that the state would construct a barrier on its southern border.
“The Biden administration has abandoned its responsibility to apply federal law to secure the border and enforce the immigration laws, and Texans are suffering as a consequence of that neglect by the Biden administration,” Abbott said at a news conference announcing the plan. “In the federal government’s absence, Texas is stepping up to get the job done.”
Abbott was joined by more than two dozen Republican state lawmakers, including Sen. Jane Nelson, who chairs the Senate Finance Committee. Abbott said the funds will be used to hire a program manager and contractors to help start building the wall and that state is committed to adding more resources going forward.
Abbott, Lt. Governor Dan Patrick, Speaker Dade Phelan, Rep. Greg Bonnen and Nelson signed a letter allocating the $250 million in emergency funding for the wall. The money is in addition to more than $1 billion in the state budget recently passed by the Texas Legislature for purposes related to border security, according to Abbott’s office.
“We have to restore order and security,” Nelson said, of Flower Mounday, said in a statement. “I have seen the effects of an unsecured border firsthand, and this Administration’s policies are not compassionate. They are hurting people on both sides of the border.”
Abbott announced his plans to build a border wall on the Texas-Mexico border last week during a border security summit in Del Rio, but did not elaborate on the plans or how the barrier would be funded.
The wall was among several initiatives Abbott announced as part of a border security plan. Abbott said the Texas Department of Public Safety will work with local officials to “arrest anyone who enters our state illegally and is found trespassing, engaged in vandalism, criminal mischief or smuggling.”
He also announced plans to increase jail capacity, an interstate compact with Arizona and established the the Governor’s Task Force on Border and Homeland Security charged with advising on “strategies to stem the flow of unlawful immigrants and illegal contraband into Texas.”
In addition to the “down payment” for the wall, Abbott said Texans could donate to help fund the wall by visiting a website set up by the state where donations can be made. That process will be overseen by the Texas Division of Emergency Management and the governor’s office, Abbott said.
“We expect full transparency and accountability, so the public will know all the money coming in and how that money is being used,” Abbott said.
The League of United Latin American Citizens National President questioned the legality of the wall in a statement issued after Abbott’s announcement.
“Governor Abbott knows that using Texas taxpayers’ dollars to build a wall and have DPS troopers attempting to arrest children for trespassing is not only a waste of money, it’s also illegal and unconstitutional,” LULAC National President Domingo Garcia said. “Targeting children and families as political piñatas with our money for expensive political publicity stunts is fiscally reckless and morally reprehensible.”
Rodolfo Rosales, Jr., Texas LULAC State Director, also questioned the state’s jurisdiction.
“While taxpaying Texans are suffering from rolling blackouts due to the lack of infrastructure on our electrical grid, this man wants to focus on a border wall where he clearly has no jurisdiction. This is a federal issue,” he said. “We love Texas as much as any other American and we won’t stand quietly by and allow our state’s diverse history and cultural heritage to be squandered because it’s politically expedient for Governor Abbott’s ambitions.”
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We in the U.S. have a corrupt, demented puppet president, Betrayal Biden who will do anything his traitorous handlers want.
Biden and his handlers do not love or want to do what is good for our country.
The Dishonorable, Socialist Democrat Party game plan is to lie, cheat and steal elections in order to take total control of the American people, increase Taxes on everything and bring American commerce and economy to its knees.
Then access power and retain it by any means available –
no matter the costs to the people, the government or the nation.
The Texas Govenor using the States Money to build sections of the Border Wall is Something That I agree with and the Completion of The Bprder Should have never been Stopped Ny democrats In Washington under Joe Bidden’ s Presidency like it has been but the uncompleted walls have allowed many, many millions of ” Illegal immigrants to have entered the United States and so What the Texas Govenor is ” Locking the Barn doorafter the Horse was Stolen ” Its better finished( The Border Wall), than never, but that action was A Bit Too Late !
EVEN WHEN biden said to halt it, ABBOT should have said “Go to hell, WE ARE FINISHING IT!”
“The League of United Latin American Citizens National President questioned the legality of the wall”? If you do not want the United States to be protected from illegal aliens, crime, drugs, terrorists and sex traffickers, I suggest you people in “The League of United Latin American Citizens” go back to the Country where you or your ancestors came from. We do not need lawless people like you in our Country!
AND why i sit we have a “LATIN AMERICAN CITIZENS league, but no WHITE AMERICAN CITIZENS league!
Mr. Rosales, it may be a federal issue but it’s the citizens of Texas who are being imposed upon in many ways that they are not responsible for. The governor has an obligation to protect his citizens for all ENEMIES, illegal entry across the border makes one an enemy no matter how it’s equivocated, domestic, those already here, and foreign, those waiting to cross the border. Taxpayers are shelling out more to sustain this influx than they are to support their own families!
The feds have ABDIGATED THEIR RESPONSIBILITY.. ERGO the state is WELL IN THEIR rights to protect their OWN damn border…