Human Rights Watch (HRW) branded Texas Governor Greg Abbott’s immigration policy on Monday as racist and abusive, and pointed out that the US Government should immediately suspend funds for Texas agencies involved in an operation that uses since 2021 National Guard soldiers for immigration matters.
“Operation Lone Star (Lone Star) is a discriminatory and abusive action that targets alleged migrants for arrest, prosecution and imprisonment for minor crimes,” said a statement from the group.
“The Department of Homeland Security should investigate the abuses and force Texas to change course, ending Lone Star,” said Alison Leal Parker, director of HRW.
The organization recalled that the governor’s office and many of the police and sheriff’s agencies in Texasinvolved in the operation, “regularly receive federal funding through a variety of programs, many of which date back to before Lone Star.”
Enforcement of immigration laws is the responsibility of the federal government, but Republican Abbott last week also authorized law enforcement agencies in his state to transfer migrants detained in the border region to the border.
White House stance
The White House maintains that Gov. Abbott’s order is causing chaos and confusion at the border and that states should stay out of immigration policy.
Republican Abbott, who has described the flow of migrants as an “invasion”, thus added weight to Operation Lone Star, which began in 2021, and for which he has mobilized thousands of soldiers from the National Guard of Texas.
Bob Libal, a consultant for HRW not Austin (Texas), said that “calling migration an ‘invasion’ to make the operation more militarized and abusive is unnecessary, racist and dangerous.”
“By using the word ‘invasion’, which connotes military attacks, Texan officials trivialize its meaning by applying it to people migrating to USAmany of them seeking asylum protected from violence and abuse.
The director of HRW He argued that “if the federal government ignores the escalation of extremism and continues to fund the agencies involved, it could become complicit in the abuses.”
(With information from EFE)
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