Republican Texas Gov. Greg Abbott’s floating border wall has to come down, according to a federal judge in the Western District of the state. Abbott immediately announced he will file an appeal of the ruling.
The order came from U.S. District Court Judge David Ezra. The state placed the floating dividers between the U.S. and Mexico in the Rio Grande in July. The judge, however, ordered that they be removed completely by Sept. 15.
Abbott confirmed his intention to take the matter to the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals.
🚨 BREAKING: A federal judge in Austin just ordered Texas to remove the floating buoys used to deter illegal aliens along the southern border.
This is OUTRAGEOUS!!!!https://t.co/4sOyDvtVDF
— Proud Elephant 🇺🇸🦅 (@ProudElephantUS) September 6, 2023
The defiant governor said, “Today’s court decision merely prolongs President Biden’s willful refusal to acknowledge that Texas is rightfully stepping up to do the job that he should have been doing all along.”
Abbott further predicted the “incorrect” ruling will be overturned on appeal.
Launched just in July, the large orange buoys float across the middle of the Rio Grande and submerge a foot below the water line. They are the size of wrecking balls, and anyone wanting to get by them would be forced to swim underneath.
Texas officials said the removal of the floating wall is due to a preliminary injunction and is not a final ruling. They also declared that strategic barriers will continue to be deployed along with Texas National Guard soldiers and Department of Public Safety troopers.
Biden’s Justice Department sued Abbott in July, allegedly on the grounds that he did not have the authority to place the buoys in the river. The agency told the New York Post that the governor did not seek permission from the International Boundary and Water Commission.
What it failed to add was that the permission would never have been granted and the crisis would continue unabated.
Prosecutors in the federal lawsuit also argued that the barrier was a “threat to human life.”
One critic, Carolina Canizales of the Immigrant Legal Resource Center, charged the buoys are “a symbol of the hate-filled and inhumane policies Gov. Abbott has embraced.”
There have been no deaths or injuries directly linked to the floating border wall. The body of one migrant who drowned upstream floated down the river and became entangled with the buoys.
