Florida Attorney General Ashley Moody was seeking a temporary restraining order to stop the mass release of migrants into the U.S. coinciding with the end of the Title 42 public health order — arguing that it is “materially identical” to a policy that was blocked by a federal judge earlier this year.
Then late Thursday, the news came down:
Siding with Florida and the administration of Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis, U.S. District Judge T. Kent Wetherell ordered the federal government to stand down from its proposed move to “parole” migrants crossing the southern border through Texas. The Biden administration has been preparing for a substantial influx of arrivals ahead of the Covid-era Title 42 rules expiring at midnight and now is locked in a legal saga.
Moody announced late Thursday night that the order had been granted:
The New York Post reported on the development:
Florida Attorney General Ashley Moody sued the Biden administration in federal court Thursday to block the mass release of migrants into the US after the expiration of the Title 42 public health order.
Moody is seeking a temporary restraining order to stem the expected influx, arguing that Biden’s current parole policy mirrors a similar order that was struck down by a federal judge last month.
Currently, vetted migrants who cannot be processed by overburdened border authorities will be allowed to enter the country.
Moody’s filing asserts that the approach echoes a prior policy that allowed undocumented migrants to be paroled into the nation’s interior if local officials could not accommodate them.
Asserting that the allowance turned the border into a “meaningless line in the sand,” a Florida federal judge struck down the policy as unconstitutional last month.
Moody argued that Biden’s latest strategy was “materially identical” to the prior policy and therefore invalid.
“The Biden Administration’s behavior, if left unchecked, makes a mockery of our system of justice and our Constitution,” the filing states.
Ken Paxton had released a statement on Wednesday, slamming Biden :
Paxton Issues Statement on Catastrophic Illegal Immigration Surge Orchestrated by Biden Administration as Title 42 is Set to Expire
The Biden Administration’s effort to maximize illegal immigration to the United States will crush Texas with the costs, crime, and upheaval from yet another surge of unvetted foreign aliens entering our country as Title 42 expires on May 11. Attorney General Paxton has issued the following statement:
“The brutal reality of Biden’s immigration agenda should shock the conscience of every American. His policies allow monstrous gang members, terrorists, human traffickers, drug dealers, and violent criminals into our country and demonstrate that the President is willing to sacrifice American lives for his open-borders agenda. Furthermore, our public services, including overburdened schools, hospitals, and law enforcement, are saddled by the federal government with unsustainable costs as billions of dollars are spent supporting illegal aliens residing in Texas.
Never in our history has a president worked so flagrantly against the interests of our nation and the safety of our citizens. Title 42 is set to expire on May 11, yet Biden has refused to implement the proven ‘Remain in Mexico’ policy or other sensible methods of deterring illegal immigration. Instead, he has introduced and continued destructive policies with the full expectation that the chaos will worsen. This includes his unlawful ‘parole’ program that pre-approves huge numbers of aliens to enter the country, his ‘prioritization’ guidance that directed ICE to shield criminal aliens from deportation, his new overseas processing facilities to fast-track so-called ‘asylum seekers’ to fly directly into the United States, his collaboration with NGOs to guide illegal immigrants to the border, his provision of taxpayer-funded airplane tickets and other services to aliens while our own citizens struggle financially, and his complicity in the trafficking of minors forced to toil as indentured servants in dangerous jobs.
While no amount of suffering appears to dissuade Biden from his open-borders agenda, his routine violations of the United States Constitution open him up to accountability through the courts. I will continue to use every resource available to end his unconstitutional assault on our borders and sovereignty.”
Title 42 is a provision of federal law which allows the rapid expulsion of aliens who pose a public health risk, first implemented by President Trump during the Covid-19 pandemic. Biden’s announcement that he will end the policy has led to a surge of border encounters this month, rapidly rising from their already-astonishing level of over 6 million since Biden took office. As even Biden’s Department of Homeland Security Secretary has admitted, “high encounters will place a strain on our entire system.” Yet President Biden refuses to acknowledge his own role in causing this crisis or take substantive action to stop it.
As staggering as the chaos at the border is, Attorney General Paxton’s legal challenges have successfully stopped several Biden policies that would have worsened the crisis. Because of President Biden’s shocking disregard for the U.S. Constitution and rule of law, Attorney General Paxton has been engaged in over 50 lawsuits with the Biden Administration, more than 15 of which are related to border security and immigration.