Supreme Court lifts stay on Texas immigration law SB 4

SCOTUS allows Texas to enforce SB 4

The Supreme Court has given Texas the green light to begin enforcing a state immigration law that allows police to arrest undocumented migrants.

AUSTIN, Texas - The Supreme Court has given Texas the green light to begin enforcing a state immigration law that allows police to arrest undocumented migrants.

Officers can also detain people they suspect of being in the country illegally.

Democratic analyst Ed Espinoza and Travis County GOP Chairman Matt Mackowiak joined FOX 7 Austin's Mike Warren to discuss.

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SCOTUS extends block on SB 4

The U.S. Supreme Court has, once again, extended its temporary block on SB 4. The law would allow Texas police to arrest people they suspect of crossing the border illegally.

MIKE WARREN: Matt, beginning with you, the conservative majority of the court gave Texas what it wanted. What do you make of this ruling?

MATT MACKOWIAK: Yeah, it's important, but it's also temporary. This is not a final ruling saying that SB four is constitutional. It's a ruling that says that the federal government's emergency stay is denied. The Fifth Circuit allowed it to continue. They went to the Supreme Court to try to get it. Stayed basically, basically paused indefinitely until the full matter could be considered through the process. So this is now in effect. The state could begin making those arrests as soon as today. Certainly by tomorrow. Again, this is about the federal government refusing to secure the border, refusing to take it seriously and doing harm to the state of Texas. And the security responsibility the governor has for the state of Texas.

MIKE WARREN: Ed Espinoza, what do you make of today's decision?

ED ESPINOZA: I was agreeing with Matt all the way up until that last thing he had to say. I thought we're all on the same page. But look, it's true, this is a temporary ruling and this is something that still has to work its way through the courts. We don't know if it's going to be permanent, but it does pose problems in that this is an international situation that the court is essentially telling a state which has no jurisdiction in international matters, to be able to rule in this matter. And to give an example of how unprecedented this was, we have 100 years of Supreme Court precedent that goes in the opposite direction of this ruling. And yet the majority that ruled this way did not even provide an opinion to support the decision. Highly unusual, but it is also a highly politicized Supreme Court right now.

MIKE WARREN: Matt Mackowiak, talking about the ultimate decision about this law. What's the timeline going to be on that and how is that going to move?

MATT MACKOWIAK: Yeah, I mean, that was one of the interesting things about the ruling. It was that, that justice, Amy Coney Barrett said that the precedent actually here is that the Supreme Court does not issue stays in emergency circumstances. She could find no example of the Supreme Court overruling a court of appeals on a stay matter. But she said if this were to take a long time, that the federal government could come back and request an emergency, ruling again. So, look, I think the problem here for the, for the Biden administration is it's very hard with a straight face to say they care about securing the border when we know at least 15 million people have illegally entered the country since Biden has been in office, 200 of whom, who've been apprehended were on the terrorist watch list. We don't know how many got away. And we have thousands of Chinese nationals who've crossed the southern border, which the FBI director testified in open session six weeks ago, is presenting the greatest national security threat since 9/11. These are facts. They may be inconvenient to President Biden, but these are facts. And that's why Texas is doing everything it can to secure the southern border.

MIKE WARREN: And Espinoza, does this open the door for other states to pass laws similar to the Texas law?

ED ESPINOZA: Well, it's unclear. I think we have to wait to see how long this will make its way through the courts. I don't know that many legislatures could pass something that quickly, but I will remind Matt, if you want to talk about facts and such, and Republicans want to talk about the facts of the border, the fact is, there is a bipartisan border bill in the works since last year, both parties at the table. And the only reason that law is not in place today is because Donald Trump said it was bad for his political parospects to pass that bill. And that brings us where we are today in this ruling by the court, which the solicitor general said is flatly inconsistent with 100 years of Supreme Court law, is what has us in sort of a legislative limbo right now. So we don't have a resolution to this time soon, either at the legislative level or the legal level.

MIKE WARREN: All right. Well, we're not going to resolve it here because we are out of time. Matt, Ed, and thank you both very much.