A U.S. District Court judge temporarily halted President Biden’s 100-day freeze on deportations.
“In this case, Texas has presented evidence it would suffer injuries for various reasons if an injunction is not entered,” Judge Drew Tipton wrote in his decision. “First, Texas demonstrates that it pays millions of dollars annually to provide social services and uncompensated healthcare expenses and other state-provided benefits to illegal aliens such as the Emergency Medicaid program, the Family Violence Program, and the Texas Children’s Health Insurance Program.”
“Accordingly, the Court finds that, under the circumstances here, Defendants must be enjoined from executing the January 20 Memorandum’s 100-day pause on the removal of aliens in every place Defendants would have jurisdiction to implement it,” the decision continued.
Biden made freezing former President Donald Trump’s deportation policies one of this first moves as president, arguing that the 100-day freeze on deportations was necessary for the new administration to assess a strategy for border security and legal avenues for those who have illegally entered the country.
The move resulted in an immediate lawsuit from the state of Texas, which argued that the freeze was unconstitutional and would cause Texas “immediate and irreparable harm.”
“I told [the Department of Homeland Security] and [Biden] last night to rescind its deportation freeze, which is unconstitutional, illegal, and bad for Texas and the nation,” Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton said of the lawsuit on Twitter. “They didn’t budge.”
“A higher number of illegal aliens in Texas leads to budgetary harms, including higher education and healthcare costs,” the lawsuit says.
“This unlawful reversal will cause Texas immediate and irreparable harm if it is not enjoined.”
Tipton agreed, saying the Biden administration had failed “to provide any concrete, reasonable justification for a 100-day pause on deportations.”
