AUSTIN, Texas — In the border town of El Paso, migrants sit on the sidewalk with luggage and blankets.
“We came here by force because the gangs threatened to kill us, and they took our house away,” said Johnny Javier Cabrera, a migrant from Honduras. “My wife also lost her car. They stole everything from us.”
Cabrera recently crossed into El Paso illegally. He wishes he could work and get out of his current situation.
“We’re not doing anything wrong,” Cabrera said. “We are not doing harm. We are not harming anyone.”
But House Bill 20, filed by Rep. Matt Schaefer, R-Tyler, would task local law enforcement with arresting, detaining and deterring people from crossing the border illegally. The legislation would also establish a state-run Border Protection Unit, with a chief appointed by the governor.
“We want people to come here legally,” said Rep. Cody Harris, R-Palestine, who co-authored the bill. “We’re not anti-immigration. We want people to follow the process, become Americans, and do the process correctly.”
If the bill passes, migrants could also be charged with a third-degree felony for walking onto private property. Some worry this will squash a migrant’s chance at achieving the American dream before it even starts.
“I don’t fault anybody for pursuing the American dream, but they need to follow the correct process to do that,” Rep. Harris said. “And if there need to be reforms put in place at the federal level to make it easier for people to come here lawfully, then the federal government needs to have that debate. So with the current system that we have in place now, illegal immigration is such a massive crisis in our state that this action of creating a new felony is… The federal government has tied our hands, and this is one of our only responses.”
New numbers from Customs and Border Patrol show that in February, Border Patrol agents encountered nearly 100,000 individuals attempting to cross into Texas illegally.
One provision of the bill says law-abiding citizens without felony convictions could be allowed to participate in this effort, but would have no arresting authority. Because of this, the Mexican American Legislative Caucus labels the bill an “Extreme Vigilante Death Squads Policy.”
The caucus chair, Rep. Victoria Neave Criado, D-Dallas, wrote in a statement: “This dangerous, radical, and unconstitutional proposal which empowers border vigilantes to hunt migrants and racially profile Latinos is going to result in the death of innocent people.”
“It’s disappointing that they’ve used this kind of vitriolic language, when nothing like that exists in the legislation,” Rep. Harris said in response.
Despite opposing views, the bill is a priority for Republican Texas House Speaker Dade Phelan. He said addressing the state’s border and humanitarian crisis is a must-pass issue for the chamber this year.
Rep. Harris guesses this bill would cost the state billions of dollars. He said tax dollars must be spent on border security, even though he wishes that money could be allocated to public schools and property tax relief instead. Rep. Harris said the federal government should pay Texas back for what it’s put into securing the border.
“We’d rather not be spending the money on this — taxpayer’s money — but we’re in a position where we have to because the federal government won’t,” he said.
Gov. Abbott has already spent several billion dollars on his border security effort, Operation Lone Star. If the bill passes, Rep. Harris said the hope is that DPS officers and others who have been sent to the border to assist with the operation would be able to go home.
The legislation would also allocate money to building the border wall. And, there’s a provision to deport migrants who cross illegally into Texas if there’s ever another COVID-19 health emergency.
“It’s kind of a mirror of the federal government’s Title 42,” Rep. Harris said.
But all of the time, effort and money that Texas has allocated toward border security hasn’t stopped people from trying to cross into the state.
That includes Cabrera from Honduras, who said he doesn’t want people to be punished for accidentally crossing onto private land, while coming to Texas for a better life.
“We came to fight and get ahead. It would be very unfair,” he said.