Showing posts sorted by relevance for query abbott national guard. Sort by date Show all posts
Showing posts sorted by relevance for query abbott national guard. Sort by date Show all posts

Friday, May 06, 2022

Is This Thing On?

Keilar then asked about Trump's plan to send hundreds of thousands of American troops to the U.S.-Mexico border.

"Trump did deploy troops to the U.S./Mexico border, which was nuts because legally they couldn't do anything there," she said. "Nonetheless, the actual plan is even more nuts."
When I tell you Abbott is working hard to out-Trump DeSantis, you should listen to me: Yes, that was a year ago. They're still there, and still as ineffective as U.S. troops were. And they're real happy to be there: They found his body a day later. So what did they do about it? Yup: "Stop saving migrants in the river!" That's all the leadership of the Guard could offer, because they don't have the flotation equipment to keep soldiers from drowning, too. Having accomplished nothing, Abbott just doubled down: He's not through with Plyler, either: Like I said: outlaw.
An outlaw was a man who had literally been put outside the protection of the law. Only men over 14 could be outlawed. Women were said to be ‘waived’ rather than outlawed although the practical outcome was the same. Outlawry normally occurred as a consequence of a criminal or civil action, although the process could occasionally begin with a petition in parliament. Criminal outlawries arose from indictments for treason, rebellion, conspiracy or other serious felonies. Civil outlawries were generally proclaimed in cases of debt.
In the words of Quentin Tarantino, Abbott wants to go medieval on their asses.  Literally.

Brown people! Booga-booga!
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Friday, July 08, 2022

The Other Problem With Authoritarianism

Authoritarianism doesn’t exist in a vacuum. Abbott took money from child services to fight the “enemy” on the border, but it earned him a federal investigation. Abbott finds, suddenly, there are limits to his authority. Or rather, to his ability to create useful “enemies.”

Despite the state's allocation of $4 billion for border security and the deployment of thousands of National Guard troops and state police to the border, Abbott has faced growing pressure from within his party to assert a stronger state role and invoke “invasion” powers under the U.S. Constitution. Such a declaration, some Texas Republicans contend, would give states solid legal ground to invoke war powers to allow the state’s National Guard to deport migrants. The idea has been widely derided by legal experts as a political ploy, and Abbott earlier this year expressed concern that it could expose state law enforcement to federal prosecution. 
But on Thursday, Abbott stopped just shy of fulfilling those requests. 
The executive order allows the Texas National Guard and Texas Department of Public Safety to apprehend “immigrants who cross the border between ports of entry or commit other violations of federal law, and to return” them to ports of entry. It is unclear from the executive order what state authorities would do with the migrants once they returned them to the ports of entry, which are manned by federal immigration authorities.

Immigrants are always a useful enemy, but this is also an election year. Beto is within 6 points of Abbott now.  And this stunt, too, will prompt federal investigations:

But if state authorities are authorized to return those migrants to the border after they are arrested, the order raises a question of whether those authorities are attempting to enforce immigration law, said Doris Meissner, a senior fellow at the Washington-based Migration Policy Institute. 
"In terms of transporting, that's exactly the question I'd have. Where would be the authority [come from] for state officials to transport people they suspect of being in violation of immigration law and having just recently crossed without arresting them for some reason?" said Meissner, who ran the U.S. Immigration and Nationalization Service from 1993 to 2000. "Were they to do that, I think that raises pretty basic civil rights violation questions." 
Aaron Reichlin-Melnik, policy director for the American Immigration Council, said Abbott's order deputizes state authorities to arrest migrants for federal immigration violations, which the U.S. Supreme Court has said is a federal responsibility. State authorities can only enforce immigration law if they've been permitted by the federal government. 
"Gov. Abbott is inviting a lawsuit from the Biden administration just as the Arizona legislature did over a decade ago ... which led to the Supreme Court laying out that the federal government alone has authority to do immigration enforcement," he said. 
Reichlin-Melnik said the order could also expose troopers and National Guard service members to a lawsuit from migrants. He noted that as recently as April, Abbott had expressed concern that issuing an "invasion" declaration could expose state authorities to federal prosecution. 
"Any National Guard troops or troopers deputized to do this could theoretically face civil liability from the immigrant if the person decided to sue," he said. "It is a really risky gambit and one who's most likely victims would be the law enforcement officers he orders to carry out the duty and not him."
Operation Lone Star, which is at the center of all this, is under federal investigation. Now he has two investigations, and can expect a third. So Abbott is simply creating more problems for the state. Doesn’t that make the state the enemy?

I don’t think that makes much of a campaign pledge; nor the basis for authoritarian government.
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Monday, October 26, 2020

Now, Wait A Minute....

Not exactly the headline at Raw Story, but this is the only tweet they have up on the article, so take it as reflecting the article's purpose.  It wasn't this claim that made me look into the backstory, but we'll take it as read for what follows.

I did some googling, and found:

There will be 806 polling places in Harris County (Houston) on Election Day. 

There will be over 150 polling places in Travis County (Austin) on Election Day. (By my count, which seems low.)

Bexar County (San Antonio) is, frankly, bewildering; the County Clerk's website on elections, I mean.  They have 726 precincts, with, I assume, at least one polling place per precinct on Election Day.

Let's just say the list of polling locations in Tarrant County (Fort Worth) runs to 12 pages, and leave it at that (they don't provide a total number, at least not readily).

Dallas County likewise doesn't provide a convenient tally of the number of polling places on Election Day 2020, but the list runs to 13 pages.

So if you sent on Guardsman to each polling place in Harris County, you'd have enough left over out of 1000 to cover all of Travis County, with a few left over for Bexar County, but that's it.  Or you could divide them evenly and scatter 200 Guardsman over five large urban counties.  Not exactly "storm troopers" being dispatched to affect the vote, in other words.  And then there's the matter of what the Texas National Guard has to say.

According to the Texas National Guard this deployment, if it ever happens, is for after November 3rd:

Maj. Gen. James K. “Red” Brown, chief of staff for the guard’s commander, said the activation of troops would be for “post election” support of local law enforcement and the Texas Department of Public Safety, “as we did previously to deter any civil disturbance at sites in various cities within Texas.”

Protecting polling stations “has not been on any mission request or in any conversation with the governor’s office,” he said.

That seems reasonable to me, as local county and city police and sheriffs are charged with maintaining the peace at polling places, and probably don't want the National Guard trying to play "cops" for a day.  The National Guard doesn't usually want to do that, either.

Is Abbott being authoritarian here?  Pretty weak showing, unless he wants to intimidate voters in certain areas of all 5 counties, and I've never seen Abbott try anything as subtle as that.  He may regret ordering voting to start a week earlier than usual, but he's shown no sign of it (it's too late anyway, we're into the statutory period for early voting).  It seems more likely Abbott recognizes Donald Trump has stirred up a (small) hornet's nest, and it's incumbent on him to protect the people of Texas.  Abbott has shown more interest in that responsibility than in his responsibility to Trump's GOP, I have to give him that.

Really don't need to jump to conclusions every time a GOP governor does something.

I was gonna leave it at that, but Joaquin Castro had to rush to Twitter (never a good look for anybody):

There are two SAExpress articles about this. Raw Story cited one, I cited the other (which is cited in the SAExpress article Raw Story started with). I admire both Mr. Castro and The Lincoln Project (the enemy of my enemy, in their case), but this ain't rocket science, people. Everybody take a deep breath and step away from the Twitter machine. Just because you saw it on Twitter, doesn't mean you know what you're talking about (and I NEVER take Raw Story articles at face value, even though I do read them almost religiously).

This is threatening to get ramshackle, but this thread by Juliette Kayem (who appears on CNN, she says, and appears to have reasonable credentials to opine on this stuff) is good context for what's going on:

What's going on is probably not what you think is going on, mostly because we don't widely recognize what's going on (threats of violence surrounding the election and its results, IOW).
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Wednesday, April 04, 2018

That's All You Got?


Rick Perry did this four years ago, when minors were trying to cross the Rio Grande to escape violence in El Salvador; minors sent north by their parents, who saw entry into the U.S., even illegally, as their children's last hope.

But now that the guardsmen have arrived, their exact role, besides keeping watch on the brush, is not entirely clear.

The soldiers have undergone training in recent weeks in air and ground surveillance. During their shifts, they stand watch, usually from stations peering out over the river, or while joining Border Patrol units driving around the dusty expanses outside McAllen.

In their off-hours they take in their new surroundings from the gangways of hotels with cigarettes or cold beers in hand.

These soldiers are only the latest armed force coming to a region that has been militarized for years.

Dramatic funding increases over the past decade for Border Patrol agents and other security measures long ago transformed the area into what can feel like a heavily fortified zone. Perry in June launched “Operation Strong Safety,” an $18 million-per-month effort to boost the law enforcement presence near the border.

The National Guard deployment is part of that broader buildup, adding to a scene where soldiers in camouflage shuttle to and fro in unmarked but easily recognizable white vans while state police cars sit idling at nearly every highway intersection — beneath an ever-present white federal government blimp monitoring activities below.

Meanwhile, the number of border crossers has been on the decline in recent weeks, with the flow of unaccompanied minors slowing considerably.

They sat on the border, away from work and home and their own families, and really didn't do that much.  It cost the state $18 million a month, and it probably cost Perry his job as governor.  It was, by the end, extremely unpopular and extremely unproductive.  The National Guard is subject to the Posse Comitatus Act just like the regular U.S military.  Along a 2000 mile border, they won't add much.

Texas will have to foot the bill this time, too.  With the Gulf Coast and Houston still recovering from Hurricane Harvey, and fighting still going on about the "rainy day fund" Texas has accumulated but Gov. Abbott won't spend on recovery (he's spent a paltry amount and think he done good), and the rising crisis of school funding (Texas school funding is so screwed up many wealthy districts will be declaring bankruptcy within two years), a new expense for the National Guard (the Lege won't be in session again until 2019, unless Abbott calls a special session.  Not sure they want to authorize funds for the Guard without doing anything about school finance or hurricane recovery.) is not going to be all that politically appealing.


So what are they going to do?  Ride around with Border Patrol and keep them company?

UPDATE:  John Burnett answered my question on NPR this morning:  in the past, the great value of the Guard has been to help with paperwork so Border Patrol agents can return to the field more quickly.  So can't Congress authorize the hiring of more clerical workers, and leave the National Guard alone for more important work like, say, helping Puerto Rico recover?
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Saturday, October 18, 2025

Deja Vu All Over Again

Gov. Greg Abbott has ordered state troopers and Texas National Guard members into Austin ahead of a planned protest this weekend, which the governor called an “antifa-linked demonstration.”

In a statement Thursday, the governor said the Texas Department of Public Safety and the Texas National Guard will deploy “all necessary” personnel and tactical resources to the state Capitol, where the Saturday afternoon protest will begin at 2 p.m.

“Violence and destruction will never be tolerated in Texas," Abbott said. “Texas will deter criminal mischief and work with local law enforcement to arrest anyone engaging in acts of violence or damaging property."

Thousands of people are expected to take part in “No Kings Day” protests across the country this weekend, including nearly 100 demonstrations in Texas alone. Organizers of the nationally coordinated protest say the effort is meant to push back against what they describe as authoritarian, anti-democratic ambitions linked to President Donald Trump.

Austin protesters will assemble at the Capitol for a short rally before marching to Auditorium Shores, where activists and community groups will set up. Organizers emphasized that the event is intended to be peaceful and nonviolent.
Yeah, this is familar:
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott said Thursday he has ordered the deployment of more than 5,000 Texas National Guard troops, along with more than 2,000 state police, to help local law enforcement manage protests against President Donald Trump and the ongoing federal immigration raids.

Abbott’s announcement did not detail where the troops were sent, but some were seen at a protest Wednesday night in downtown San Antonio near the Alamo. That protest drew hundreds of demonstrators but did not erupt into violence.

More protests are planned on Saturday in San Antonio and across Texas in cities such as Houston, Austin and Dallas as part of the national “No Kings” movement.

Protests earlier this week in Austin and Dallas led to brief clashes with police who used chemical irritants to disperse the crowds. About a dozen were arrested.
That was last June. Greg is still, like the mini-Trump he is, hoping for violence he can send his overweight NG soldiers to quell. Like Trump, he’s going to be disappointed, again.

Notice he promised 7000 state troopers and NG soldiers in June, and now all he promises is “ ‘all necessary’ personnel.” Is our children learning?
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Thursday, July 29, 2021

So How Does This Look?

So, let's blame the Messicans! How this relieves us of the worry of masking children in schools, or people in stores and restaurants, is not explained.  Apparently the only people with diseases are:  brown foreigners.

Yeah, no dog whistles here.  We don't need 'em anymore.

Honest to Pete, none dare call it racism (though it’s clearly a GOP talking point. Read the chyron.):

(And clearly somebody needs to explain Christianity to Kilmeade.)

Speaking of legally suspect orders:
“To respond to this disaster and secure the rule of law at our Southern border, more manpower is needed — in addition to the troopers from the Texas Department of Public Safety (DPS) and soldiers from the Texas National Guard I have already deployed there — and DPS needs help in arresting those who are violating state law,” Abbott said in a letter to Major Gen. Tracy R. Norris of the Texas Military Department. “I hereby order that the Texas National Guard assist DPS in enforcing Texas law by arresting lawbreakers at the border.”

We've been through this before.  The National Guard has no such training or authority.  It can't "arrest" anyone.  Any arrest Guardsmen do make will be so suspect as to be pointless.  Are they gonna Mirandize 'em in Spanish?  It's all for appearance, though, just like the border wall Abbott will never build one foot of.

And the minute DPS stops one car under this “order,”the driver can bring suit for violation of her/his 4th amendment (at least; 14th, too, again at least) rights and get the program shut down. Not that Abbott cares; he’s running on appearances.

If we’re lucky, somebody will point out how overtly and disgustingly racist this is. Early and often, preferably.* Rather than solve our problems, Abbott wants to blame “brown people.” He’s making Trump look like a squishy liberal. Even in Texas, that should be intolerable.


*It bothers me more than a little that even Vladeck doesn’t pick up on that. An unconstitutional action may be bad, but the law considers racism “pernicious.” That’s actually a legal term of art reserved for racism alone.

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Tuesday, February 08, 2022

FUBAR

I appreciate Judge Soifer's decision, but I'm not sure it goes very far. Not because of her opinion, but because who's going to appeal it and get it above the trial court level?

Though the ruling may be appealed and applies only to Jesús Guzmán Curipoma, a 36-year-old oil engineer, it opened the door to constitutional challenges from more of the thousands of migrants who have been imprisoned for allegedly trespassing since July, when the governor set his sights on mass trespassing arrests as a way to cut down on border crossings.

“Everybody who has a pending misdemeanor trespassing arrest under OLS will have the exact same challenge,” said Kristin Etter, an attorney with the Texas RioGrande Legal Aid who represents hundreds of migrants. “This sets a clear precedent in all of those cases both pending and future.”

Though far from the first court challenge to Abbott’s arrest initiative — which has been vexed with wrongful arrests, prosecutorial errors, court delays and ethics complaints — Soifer’s ruling is the first to rule against the constitutionality of a migrant’s trespassing arrest, according to Etter.

On Friday morning, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton vowed to appeal the ruling, though it's not yet clear how he will do so since his office was not a party in the lawsuit. A spokesperson for Abbott said Friday morning that "there is no doubt that this will be overturned."

"The district court did not have legal authority to enter this flawed and collusive judgment without hearing from the Office of the Attorney General," Nan Tolson said in a statement.

Actually, as we shall see, the Texas AG doesn’t have a dog in this fight (Paxton is still not recognizing the legitimacy of State v. Stephens. Not that he has any choice in the matter.).  So the court was not required to hear from the Office of the Attorney General.  Even if it was, the Office of the Attorney General has no standing to appeal the court's decision.  (This is a criminal matter; the Texas AG is still bound by the ruling of the Court of Criminal Appeals.)

Abbott has been using DPS officers and Texas Rangers to arrest migrants released into the country by ICE for "trespass." That isn’t working out well for him,  At best, thanks to the clogged docket in the one county where all the cases are brought, prisoners end up pleading for time served.  The maximum penalty is 30 days, anyway.  Abbott is not addressing the problem.  He's just being a dick, to stay as far to the right in the primaries as he can.

First, the judge is on solid ground:

The supremacy clause makes clear that federal law and the constitution trump state statutes. During the hearing before Soifer, lawyers often referred to the U.S. Supreme Court ruling against Arizona’s controversial law in 2010 that made it a state crime to be unlawfully present in the U.S. The high court largely held that federal law prohibited the state law, in part because it usurped the federal government’s authority to use discretion in the deportation process.

Yes, this case (or one like it) could get to the Supremes (which would probably overturn it's 2010 ruling, because, why not?) but, again, who is going to take it there?  Recall, if you will, that the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals has ruled decisively that the Texas Attorney General doesn't have any criminal prosecution authority unless asked by a relevant county prosecutor provide aid in the case.  Ah!, you say!  Loophole!

Hold your horses.

Abbott's campaign to imprison immigrants cleared to wait for hearings by ICE has been, to put it mildly, a joke. Wrongful arrests ("hell, he looked illegal!"), court delays (the reason this case came to Austin, hardly a border city), and general screw-ups.  Basically, a cluster-fuck; but the rubes like it because Abbott is "tough."  Paxton wants some of that action, not least because he's being challenged by Louie Gohmert, who doesn't seem to have a working brain cell left, but he’s to the right of Paxton.   However Paxton has no authority over these cases (criminal trespass), and can't get tagged in.  (Why would the county ask for Paxton’s help on a misdemeanor case?) The private attorney assigned as an acting misdemeanor prosecutor for McKinney County, where this case originated, tried to tag Paxton, but Judge Soifer wouldn't have it.  So while Paxton "vows" to appeal this case, he has absolutely no standing to do so.  Besides he'd have to appeal to the state appellate court, which will follow the ruling in State v. Stephens that Paxton has no criminal authority.  And unless some court outside McKinney County asks for the AG's help, the AG can't offer any.

So will this ever escape state court and get to the Supremes?  Doubtful.  It would have to go up the chain to the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals (again!) before it could even apply for a writ to the Supremes.  And I don't think McKinney County wants to buy a dog for that fight. Anyone else who can get a case transferred to Travis County (the race is on) will make the same arguments to keep Paxton at bay (although not necessarily to the same judge. Travis has an “open docket.” You get the judge available on the date of your hearing. You don’t get to choose.) If Paxton can’t get in, he can’t make an appeal. Even if he does, his track record with the Court of Criminal Appeals is not that good,

In related news:

Abbott already did that, too. His primary opponents are beating him up HARD for that clusterfuck.  Mistreating National Guard soldiers for no good god-damned reason (they can't arrest anyone; they really can't do anything but sit around.  The situation is a literal nightmare for them, and in this case the enemy of my enemy is my friend.) is not a winning “conservative” position. It was supposed to get Abbott out to the right of Huffines and Alan West.  Instead West is playing his former military career cred to speak up for the National Guardsmen who are going broke, attempting suicide, and even going AWOL because Abbott's orders are doing nothing and ruining the lives of the Guard. So sure, Ducey, send troops to the Arizona border.  What could go wrong that would blow-back on him?
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Friday, June 13, 2025

Trump’s Texas Mini-Me

Abbott is as useless as Trump.
The Austin American-Statesman reported Friday afternoon that internal memos showed military leaders were forced to scramble to find and train enough personnel for their new orders.

Of the 5,000, half were pulled off a border security mission. The memos illustrated what the report characterized as a "potentially rushed timeline for training on crowd control and de-escalation methods."

Two Guardsmen expressed serious concerns to the newspaper over the deployment, including an officer who said they should "never have been mobilized in the first place."

“I was shocked that they were mobilizing the amount of people that they were mobilizing,” the officer told the Statesman. “It doesn’t make any sense to me why we would be activated in such large numbers against the citizens we’re sworn to protect.”

The officer lamented, “Unless someone does something and grows a backbone in Congress or somewhere else, they’re going to continue to use us as political tools."

The second National Guard member told the outlet that despite some characterizations that Abbott is “being cautious,” the deployment “does strike me as a suppression of free speech ahead of time.”

“Did I swear an oath to the president? Did I swear an oath to the governor?” the member asked. “Or did I swear an oath to our basic, inalienable rights?”
Which sounds very familiar:
Three different advocacy organisations representing military families said they had heard from dozens of affected service members who expressed discomfort about being drawn into a domestic policing operation outside their normal field of operations. The groups said they have heard no countervailing opinions. “The sentiment across the board right now is that deploying military force against our own communities isn’t the kind of national security we signed up for,” said Sarah Streyder of the Secure Families Initiative, which represents the interests of military spouses, children and veterans.

“Families are scared not just for their loved ones’ safety, although that’s a big concern, but also for what their service is being used to justify.”

Chris Purdy of the Chamberlain Network, whose stated mission is to “mobilize and empower veterans to protect democracy”, said he had heard similar things from half a dozen national guard members. “Morale is not great, is the quote I keep hearing,” he said.
That’s California. Not Texas. Not selected personnel at Ft. Bragg applauding their superannuated frat brother in chief. So the National Guard in blue California and red Texas are of one mind: they serve the people, not a person.

Which is a very hopeful sign for democracy. We could use a few of those right now. 

We can also see what we’re up against. It’s boobs all the way down. Trump activated 4,000 soldiers? Abbott had to activate 5,000, to just as much purpose as Trump.

Our public leaders are adolescents.
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Thursday, November 17, 2022

“Invoke P!”

Yeah, it doesn’t work that way. A) Texas is not being invaded: B) The Constitution doesn’t work that way. C) It’s not even that. Abbott doesn’t want control of immigration policy. He wants to up the ante against Biden. His bus rides north have lost their PR punch. And now he’s going back to stunts he’s tried before, because he’s out of ideas. 

This is just an excuse to send DPS and National Guard members back to the border. Abbott tried this once before; it failed miserably. No one was caught. He had DPS stop traffic to inspect vehicles. That one clogged commercial traffic so badly he dropped it within 72 hours. The National Guard was on the border so long with so little to do members startedgoin AWOL or attempting suicide.
Abbott knows all this. He just wants the House GOP to take up the cause and raise his national profile in the process.

DeSantis isn’t the only one who wants to ride into the White House on the backs of immigrants.
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Monday, October 03, 2022

In A Manner Of Speaking

Where they will do what the Texas National Guard did under Abbott: not a goddamned thing.

Because they are not the Border Patrol and they are not law enforcement. They can report on incursions across the border, if they see them. They can report them to the Border Patrol. But the Texas Guard got so bored sitting on the border doing nothing that some deserted and suicide watch became an issue, 

This is not really any different than DeSantis’ stunt, except Sununu is using people who have even less choice in the matter, and are even less free in their movements when they reach journey’s end.

Not that anybody will see it that way. Because nobody thinks Sununu is a player in national politics. So what he does to people doesn’t really matter. In a manner of speaking.
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Monday, August 07, 2023

Everybody Has A Plan Until They Get Punched In The Face

Reality is a punch in the face.

When Magali Urbina and her husband, Hugo, bought a nearly 400-acre pecan farm along the Rio Grande in April 2021, it was supposed to be a fun retirement project. They planned to open a coffee shop, a restaurant and a glamping area on the riverbank.

Then they noticed groups of migrants walking through the orchard, some leaving trash behind. So when the Texas Department of Public Safety offered to install a chain-link fence near the riverbank last year, they welcomed the idea. The fence even had a gate with a lock so Hugo could continue fishing on the river.

But as Gov. Greg Abbott geared up his efforts to stem illegal immigration at the border, state troopers began patrolling the riverbank and National Guard members sped through their property to reach the river. Then came the rolls of concertina wire that cut off their access to the river altogether.

Urbina, a Republican who said she voted for Abbott for reelection, said the day it became too much came on a late-July afternoon when she spotted a pregnant woman cross the Rio Grande and push her way through the concertina wire. The woman’s arms were cut and bloodied. Urbina said she called nearby Border Patrol agents, who cut through the state’s fence to reach the woman.

When a few state troopers approached, the 52-year-old retired elementary school teacher sternly told them, “Back off. This is my property and she is going to get through.” An ambulance took the pregnant woman away.

They aren't the only ones concerned:

Eagle Pass Mayor Rolando Salinas Jr., who in June agreed — without the City Council’s approval — to declare Shelby Park private property so state troopers could arrest migrants for trespassing, has recently reversed his support, saying that since he signed the agreement with the state, “things have changed, things that obviously I don't like.”

Some of the critics include troopers that Abbott sent to the border: The Department of Public Safety recently opened an internal investigation into one trooper’s claims — made in an email to a superior — that troopers had been ordered to push migrants back into the river and deny them water, and that the razor wire had seriously injured migrants.

DPS spokesperson Travis Considine said that as part of the investigation, officials are looking into allegations made by five troopers.

Pause for a lawyerly aside or two.  Abbott has state troopers arresting immigrants for trespass on private property.  The state put up a barricade of shipping containers at Shelby Park in Eagle Pass, and got the city to declare the park private property so arrests for trespass could be made there. The city council recently reversed that decision.

Here's the other lawyerly aside:

The Urbinas said when they asked the DPS to remove the razor wire from their property, they were told that Abbott’s disaster declaration for the border — which Abbott signed in 2021 — allows the state to use private property to protect its borders.

Ericka Miller, a DPS spokesperson, referred questions about the Urbinas’ complaints to a news article quoting Victor Escalon, a DPS regional director for much of South Texas.

“We do everything we can to prevent crime, period,” he said. “And that’s the job.”

That sounds a lot like a "taking" to me, which the state cannot do without just compensation.

Magali Urbina, who said she’s consulted a lawyer about forcing DPS to remove the concertina wire, said no landowner likes migrants crossing through their property, but she also doesn’t support what Abbott is doing.

As there is concertina wire installed along the Urbina’s property, migrants are told to walk to the end of the property. Many make that walk which can be difficult to do through slippery rocks in the water, the current and the inclined river bank, while some find spots through the concertina wire and manage to get through.

“There’s a humane way to do it,” she said. The image of the pregnant woman bleeding near the river has stuck with her. She’s seen the bodies of drowned migrants floating in the river past their orchard. Last week, Mexican officials removed a body that had drifted into the floating barrier.

“We can’t help them all, but maybe we’re supposed to help some. Maybe that’s what God’s calling us to do,” she said on a recent afternoon as she drove her blue Cadillac Escalade near the river bank. She said she wants the Biden administration to make it safe for asylum seekers to enter the U.S. and she hopes the federal government changes immigration laws so migrants don’t have to risk their lives. 

Maybe that is what God's calling us to do.  What's that parable about the sheep and the goats, the ones who did something for the least among us, and who they really did it for? The farther you are from the border, the more these people are not...people.

It's a damned poor excuse.

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Saturday, April 09, 2022

Run For The Border

Time was the Texas Governor's position was a sinecure more than a real job. The Texas Governor was the only statewide elected official who lived in Austin (the Governor's Mansion) year-round.  The Lege only meets for 6 months every two years, and the real job of the Lite Guv (a/k/a Lt. Gov.) is to preside over the Senate.  Well, when it isn't in session, the Lite Guv has f*ck-all to do.  The Governor can't do much during sessions except veto or sign bills (most of which he does after the session is over), or call special sessions (which nobody likes.  They cost $$$.). The Governor can't even pardon people.  (Abbott made some noises about pardoning people recently, as if he were the POTUS.  Since the late 19th century, the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles alone can issue pardons.  The Governor can issue a stay of execution in a death penalty case; that's only good for 30 days.  Only the Board can commute a prison sentence.).  I remember an infamous Texas Monthly article from my youth, about then governor Dolph Briscoe (IIRC), a nice guy from West Texas who was a complete cipher, elected to office because he was a good Democratic party member (ah, dem was de days!).  The article featured a picture of the Governor in his Governor's chair (a plush office chair decked in brown leather with the state seal embossed in gold on the seat back cushion).  Successive photos of the same pose showed him vanishing before your eyes. 

You get the point.  Nobody minded, though.  Governors weren't expected to do anything.  Why do you think the Lege still only meets for 6 months every two years?  "That government governs best which governs least," and all that.

But Greg Abbott is running for re-election, and he needs all the outrage he can get to keep Beto from nipping at his heels.  So he's going to close the border by inspecting every truck that crosses from Mexico.
Sure he is.

But it is unclear how the directive will work. Federal authorities already inspect commercial trucks as they pass the ports of entry and state troopers would have no authority in federal jurisdictions. Troopers could do further inspections after the trucks get past the federal points, as they have done in the past and continue to do in some areas like Laredo. But increased inspections there could lead to substantial delays in the flow of northbound traffic.

DPS Director Steve McCraw said Wednesday the inspections wouldn’t be done on federal property or international bridges but that drivers would get plenty of warning that they would have to stop for an inspection.

So somewhere in the border cities of Texas, or on the highways leading into Texas from the border, Greg Abbott is going to direct DPS to create massive, week long traffic jams. No, I'm not exaggerating.  Look at that picture above, and then consider this:

“The governor underestimates how long it takes to inspect a single truck,” said Tony Payan, director of the Center for the United States and Mexico at the Baker Institute at Rice University.

Doing a full inspection of a truck could take hours to unload and reload, he said. And with thousands of trucks crossing the border every day, that could lead to significant delays in the movement of goods and commodities.

“You will affect many of these trucks and truck companies that expect to get their goods to a certain point at a certain time and in certain conditions,” Payan said. “That cannot but add to the already difficult conditions businesses are already operating in due to the pandemic. It’s certainly not going to make things better — it’s only going to make things worse.”

Making things worse is not only NOT what the Texas economy needs, it's not what the border economy needs, either.  Abbott is going to turn Laredo and McAllen and all the other border crossings into Ottawas, except the trucks will be stuck there because of, not in spite of, government action.  The news recently has been all about how the border counties which were staunchly Democratic (and frankly, taken for granted by the feckless Democratic party in Texas) are turning red.  Abbott may single-handedly stop that turn, for this election cycle, anyway.

It's not like he's doing any better with his other border initiative, the one he's not talking as much about but is actually pursuing: 

For the past year, thousands of Texas National Guard members and state troopers have been sweeping through brush along the Rio Grande and cruising border-town roadways. Their eyes scan the horizon for the cartel operatives and smugglers whom Gov. Greg Abbott vowed to hold at bay when he launched his multibillion-dollar campaign to secure the border. 

But more often, the troopers arrest men like Bartolo, a Mexican farmworker who came to the United States looking for work, according to his lawyers. They’ve also slapped cuffs on asylum-seekers like Gastón, a human rights attorney who said he fled Venezuela after being targeted by the Maduro regime for defending political opponents.

Though they don’t fit the specter of the hardened criminals that Abbott conjured when launching his border security initiative, men like Bartolo and Gastón are typical of the thousands arrested under Operation Lone Star, which is intended to combat drug and human smuggling.

In July, four months after the operation started, Abbott announced that, with the permission of landowners, the state for the first time would punish people suspected of illegally crossing the border by arresting them on suspicion of trespassing on private property. The unprecedented “catch-and-jail” system allowed the Republican governor to skirt constitutional restrictions that bar states from enforcing federal immigration law.

The misdemeanor charges quickly became a major piece of the governor’s border security crackdown. While Abbott has publicly focused on arrests of people accused of violence and drug trafficking, an investigation by The Texas Tribune, ProPublica and The Marshall Project found for the first time that trespassing cases represented the largest share of the operation’s arrests.

And of course we're in the land of "They said/he lied":

There is also little evidence that trespassing arrests have lowered the levels of illegal crossings, which remain at record highs along the southern U.S. border, including in the regions heavily targeted by the operation. The governor’s office, however, claims his approach deters potential caravans of people seeking entry to the U.S., and he measures success in arrests and drugs seized.

“Arrests and prosecutions both increase public safety and act as a deterrent to other potential law breakers,” Nan Tolson, an Abbott spokesperson, said in a statement. 

Which is back to the "Lock 'em up!" chant that both sides literally use.  You see why I don't favor that kind of "punishment = deterrence" language? Punishment doesn't deter so much as it harms the one doling out the punishment as much if not more than the person punished.  Is the problem in America seriously that we don't have enough people behind bars?

Chris Olivarez, a DPS lieutenant, said on Twitter last month that the county “continues to see an uptick in illegal immigrants trespassing on private ranches.” Abbott’s office said the mass trespassing arrests secure the border and protect local communities, even though they may not slow immigration. DPS did not respond to questions about the initiative’s effectiveness.

Hill, who hoped the arrest tactic was working when he began seeing fewer people he suspects had just crossed the border on his property at the end of last year, was disillusioned when activity picked up again shortly thereafter.

“I was thinking that Operation Lone Star in general had been slowing some of the traffic, but I think at this point it just seems a perpetual game of cat-and-mouse,” he said last month. 

Obviously not.

Yeah, people on the border are noticing.

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Friday, May 01, 2015

Texas, Our Texas, all hail the scaredy-cat state

I was going to stay away from this, simply because I'm trying to give up the stupid (it burns!), but this letter to our esteemed Governor deserves wider distribution (not that it will get it here!).

It seems that something called "Jade Helm" is going to be conducted by the U.S. military in states from Texas to California.

Now, you could take this Army Times article and decide there may be much ado about nothing in this, since Gov. Abbott's letter comes off as perfectly reasonable.  As the article says, the Texas Guard has the :

....standard responsibility of acting as a liaison when federal military deploys in Texas for any reason.

 "U.S. Special Operations Command (USSOCOM) has assured Texas that each location selected for training exercises will pose no risk to residents or property and that they will coordinate with local residents via verbal and written communication," Abbott wrote in his letter to Maj. Gen. Gerald Betty, commander of the Texas State Guard.
Maybe this is much ado about nothing.  But Gov. Abbott said in his letter that "During the training operation, it is important that Texans know their safety, constitutional rights, private property rights, and civil liberties will not be infringed."  That was a point Gov. Abbott made sure to underline on Twitter.  How the Texas Guard is going to do this by facilitating "communications between [the Governor's] office and the commanders of the Operation" is still a bit murky.

Which brings us to Todd Smith's letter.  Like Mr. Smith, I am "horrified that I have to choose between the possibility that my Governor actually believes this stuff and the possibility that my Governor doesn’t have the backbone to stand up to those who do."   Because what is the Texas Guard going to protect us from?  Wal-Mart closing any more stores for plumbing repair?  Maybe the General Betty needs to be in communication with Bentonville, too.

There are, by the way, 7 Air Force Bases in Texas, 10 Army bases (ranging from depots to 3 Forts), and 4 Naval bases in Texas  (San Antonio alone has six bases, a mix of Air Force and Army.)  It's no coincidence this kind of noise is coming out of Bastrop, Texas, a small town east of Austin that used to be a sleep rural community, but now is practically an Austin suburb.  Too much change too fast makes people hinkey.

That, and the majority of the reliable GOP vote is in rural Texas, or what used to be rural Texas.  As one Democrat noted, Abbott has yet to stop campaigning for the GOP primary.  Most Texans, indeed, aren't like this.

But our governors continue to embarrass us on the national stage.  Must be something in the water; or maybe that's why Wal-Mart closed those stores.


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Saturday, July 19, 2025

Groundbreaking

Abbott sent the National Guard to the Texas Border, a few years back. They got so bored some went AWOL (i.e., home), and some attempted suicide. I’m sure it was quite the recruiting mission. “Join the Guard! Go sit on the border!”
Six members of the Guard — including infantrymen, officers and two officials in leadership roles — spoke of low morale and deep concern that the deployment may hurt recruitment for the state-based military force for years to come," reported Shawn Hubler, shielding their identities to protect them against military rules prohibiting discussing active deployment. "All but one of the six expressed reservations about the deployment."

Many of the members "said they had raised objections themselves or knew someone who objected, either because they did not want to be involved in immigration crackdowns or felt the Trump administration had put them on the streets for what they described as a 'fake mission,'" the report continued.

“The moral injuries of this operation, I think, will be enduring. This is not what the military of our country was designed to do, at all,” one member of the Guard told The Times.

A number of Latino soldiers were uncomfortable with what they were being asked to do, the report continued.

"In one incident that several soldiers said occurred early in the deployment, 60 troops were awaiting transport to planned immigration raids in Ventura County when a Latino soldier approached officers in charge of the mission. He told them that he strongly objected, and he offered to be arrested rather than take part in the operation. Eventually, they said, he was reassigned to administrative tasks. Officials at the military’s Northern Command declined to comment about the incident."

Additionally, the report noted, many of the soldiers called up to the Joint Forces Training Base in Los Alamitos in Long Beach didn't end up doing much.

"Mostly, they said, they lounged in warehouse-sized tents, listening to music and playing games on their cell phones. Only about 400 of the 3,882 deployed Guard members had actually been sent on assignments away from the base, Guard figures showed."
You see, the problem with democracy is that it’s like the fabled mills of God: it grinds slowly. But it grinds exceedingly fine. Trump’s stunts with immigration have both failed spectacularly, and driven over 3/4’s of the country to think favorably of immigrants. Overcoming American xenophobia, by making Americans sympathize with the immigrants? Who but Trump and Miller could pull that off?

And wrecking morale from the DOJ to the DOD? I mean, I get it that ICE is 99% thugs, but I don’t think that’s changed.  What does seem to be changing is the ground Trump thought was underneath his feet.
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Wednesday, October 08, 2025

“Elite”?

🤦‍♂️ 
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Tuesday, April 14, 2020

To be fair


Lynne Cheney did:

And B)  nobody is in D.C. right now, thanks to the pandemic.

Sure, Senators could go on FoxNews or MSNBC or CNN and "push back" against what Trump said yesterday, but honestly, what would that do?  Trump is shooting his mouth off.  The fact is, he doesn't have the authority to "re-open" the country or to tells governors what to do, especially when it comes to public health and safety.  The President might be able to nationalize the National Guard, but the POTUS can't tell the governors how to respond to a public health crisis, and that weakness/strength cuts both ways.

Ron DeSantis in Florida endangered the entire country by not closing the beaches for Spring Break.  Trump couldn't do anything about that (not that he wanted to), but neither could Cuomo or Abbott or Gov. Edwards of Louisiana.  While perhaps the power of pandemic control needs to be nationalized, it isn't.  Period.  And while Trump can rant and rave all he wants, he's like Lear in the hurricane, or Canute at the seashore (except Canute knew what his worshippers/followers didn't):  he's absolutely powerless, and his rants about his power prove that.  Trump can't send the National Guard to take over the government of New York state, and he can't arrest Andrew Cuomo and replace him with Jared Kushner.  Trump literally can't do anything.

And the GOP officials who refuse to rebuke him, or worse yet who go along with him, will have to face the voters soon enough.

And C)  no, Trump would not 'of course' assert dictatorial powers.  That would make Trump responsible for what happened and besides, asserting them and having them followed are two different things.  Trump may claim he has authority over the nation's governors; when they don't recognize that authority, what does he do next?
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Monday, January 29, 2024

You And What Army?

Paranoia about federal entrapment is looming large over the “Take Our Border Back” convoy, which departed Virginia Beach Monday morning and plans to arrive in Texas later this week. 
By noon Monday, after a few hours on the road, the convoy had amassed just a few dozen participants—so far, predominantly men over the age of 60. The convoy’s promoters promised over 700,000 participants.
They go on to attribute low participation to paranoia and rumors of various types of entrapment/imminent arrest. This tells us a few things:

1) J6 arrests and trials were a deterrent.

2) Conspiracy theories breed conspiracy theories.

3) “Men over 60” means people with nothin’  better to do. Classic MAGA, nowadays.

But the likelier answer is, 700,000 trucks and drivers were never coming. Just like 25 GOP governors aren’t doing anything more than auto-signing a letter 
Small things lead to big things, but right now all Greg Abbott is doing is replacing barbed wire as the Border Patrol cuts it. The Supremes didn’t order Abbott to give Border Patrol access to the park at Eagle Pass, so there’s literally nowhere for 25 Governors to send National Guard soldiers to Texas to…protect barbed wire? To oppose Border Patrol agents in doing their lawful jobs?  This is not 1957. Those soldiers won’t be defending a school against the invasion of black students. They’ll be standing around mostly empty stretches of riverbank watching federal agents wield wire cutters. If they interfere they won’t be heroes, they’ll be arrested. Border Patrol is law enforcement, remember?

This is not a hill anybody is gonna die on. Or go to war on. I don’t know how it ends, but it won’t be in bloodshed and chaos and the fevered civil war dreams of idiot hosts on FoxNews. They can’t get 700,000 trucks to drive to the border (or a handful to drive anywhere). They won’t send soldiers from 25 states, unless they want them to do what the Texas soldiers are already doing: stand around, get bored, go AWOL. Mostly do not a damned thing. It’s all for show and Abbott had to up the spectacle to keep the show going. He’s hoping Biden provides him a new spectacle, just in time for November (since his spectacle of four consecutive special sessions laid a big egg which he has all over his face). That’s why even Dan Patrick is chiming in. Everybody wants to be responsible for the good they think is coming.

Biden is probably going to disappoint them. When the show can’t go on, attention goes elsewhere.
The GOP has reasons not to want attention to go elsewhere. Especially if Democrats can get enough GOP votes in the House to pass a border bill. And if the Republicans block it, attention needs to stay there anyway.

There are advantages to treating Abbott like small beer.🍻 
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Friday, June 04, 2021

Meanwhile, In The Second Largest (And Second Most Populous) State In The Union

But they did do this:

Lawmakers passed bills that, among other things, prohibit so-called vaccine passports, and ban the mandatory closure of churches and gun stores during an emergency declaration.

“Let freedom ring!” state Sen. Lois Kolkhorst, R-Brenham, tweeted Sunday after the Legislature approved bills that included the ban on government entities and businesses requiring proof of vaccination for products or services.

For the record, I have only been in one business since Abbott lifted the mask mandates where I was told I didn't need to wear a mask.  It was a high end jewelry store, and the guard had me lower my mask so the camera could get a picture of me ("Let Freedom Ring!").  Otherwise, I haven't been anywhere (except one restaurant) where the majority of people in the building were not wearing masks.

I've never been in or even seen a sign at a business suggesting it would want to see my vaccination card before I could come in.  Seriously, what business is gonna enforce that?  Costco has a greeter at the door, who basically tells you not to come in if you don't flash a membership card, because you can't buy anything in there without one.  I know they were enforcing the mask rule at one point, but that's the only business I've seen doing anything even that close to a "police" action.  But I'm sure we'll all sleep better knowing businesses, as of September 1 (the usual deadline when a bill becomes law after the Legislative session), can't demand something they never demanded in the first place.  All by the time even masks in public will probably be nothing more than a memory.

"Let freedom ring!"

Yeah, the freedom to be stupid cannot be reigned in, or wrung out:

Left in the ashes of the session, which ended Monday, were proposals that would have updated the state’s immunization registry, created an emergency mass vaccination and distribution plan, prioritized first responders in vaccine rollouts, and funded research into health equity issues to address racial inequities in the system that were exposed by the pandemic.

More than 150 bills and resolutions pertaining to the pandemic were filed by lawmakers, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. About 20 of them passed.

Of course, some real stupidity was avoided:

Quintero said lawmakers missed an opportunity to rein in both state and local executive authority, decriminalize violations of emergency health orders and instead impose fines for violations, and address some open-government issues that came up during the pandemic, including a measure that would have sped up public information requests during a quarantine, he said. 

During this last pandemic government agencies had skeleton staffs, at best.  Many were open by appointment only (my daughter had to make one months in advance in order to get a marriage certificate, something that in ordinary times just requires you to go to the relevant courthouse and wait for a clerk).  Local school districts sent everyone in administration home, and public information requests were suspended under the statutory provision that when the agency (i.e., a school district) was "closed," deadlines were suspended until it reopened.  Granted, that was written for school districts that close for Christmas or spring break, but that's because no one is in the office while the deadlines are running, or expiring.  During the pandemic, that period of "closure" extended for months.  Who would you force back into a building in order to obtain records of e-mails related to a school board decision on a bond election, or a non-discussion of "critical race theory" (the latest shibboleth among schools everywhere)?  Does the "public's right to know" trump an individual's right, or even the public's right, to be protected by quarantine orders?

These things that pass for knowledge I don't understand.

And if you think the regular session was bad enough, buckle up, buttercup:  it just gets worse.

To clarify a point, the Governor and Lt. Gov. are both "constitutional" positions in Texas, by which I mean publicly elected offices.  The Speaker of the Texas House, like the Speaker in Congress, is elected by the membership.  In that article Dan Patrick is quoted criticizing the way the Speaker runs the Texas House.  Patrick did this with the last speaker, who was essentially driven out of office by the Texas GOP, which censured him for not letting Patrick's "bathroom bill" pass the House.  Patrick doesn't answer to the Senators he rules over, because they didn't elect him.  He also has no authority over Abbott or the Speaker, but he likes to think he does.  This, as Donald Trump established on a national scale, is not a model for governance.  The last great Lt. Gov. Bill Hobby, made much of the office because he was a consummate politician who also knew where the bodies were buried.  He used his power to help Texas, sometimes against the wishes of the sitting Governor.  There's a Texas history museum in Austin named for him.

Dan Patrick won't get a latrine trench named for him.  And he isn't much good as Lt. Gov., either.  Mostly he bitches and moans about bills he can't get passed into law.  He never seems to understand what the problem is.  Hobby was a latter-day LBJ:  he never bitched, he just got it done.

Giants walked among us, once.  Alas, no more.  Case in point:  Gov. Absent:

In a Texas Tribune interview Tuesday, Abbott declined to discuss the timing of the special session, the agenda beyond the elections bill and another priority bill that died in the House, and whether the special session would be in addition to a fall special session that he has already committed to for redistricting and federal COVID-19 relief funding.

“Stay tuned,” Abbott said repeatedly, declining to even discuss what factors he is taking into account as he is planning for the special session.

Abbott clarified in a radio interview Thursday morning that he plans to call two special sessions. One will be in September or October on redistricting and COVID-19 funds, he said, while there will be another one beforehand on Senate Bill 7, the bail bill and other issues he will announce later.

Abbott has to veto or allow the budget in toto by June 20.  If he vetoes the budget, it's most likely the Dems (at least, probably more than a few Republicans, too) go to court to challenge his ability to do so.  What happens then is up to Abbott, but no result looks good for him, and as long as the money can't flow, I don't see the Lege doing anything about redistricting.  Abbott can veto, but he can't "un-veto."  It's a one way valve for him. If he turns it off, only the Lege can turn it back on; and they can't do it outside the regular session without Abbott putting it on the agenda of a special session.  And I suspect the Dems would rather go to court than to give the Governor that whip hand into the future.  So what's he gonna do?

"Stay tuned."

Isn't that cute?  He thinks he's all in charge, or something.  The best part is, he can’t cut off funding for the Lege: their pay is set by the Texas constitution, not state law. What he’s going to cut off is funding for the state agencies that research and draft bills. The very people you need for the massive task of redistricting. Remember what happens when the Feds run out of money? Why should Texas government be any different?

The House Speaker recommends chopping up the voting bill into smaller bills, so that some will pass.  Abbott and Patrick want all or nothing.  They could well end up with nothing.  They're actually pretty good at getting that from their efforts.

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Friday, March 11, 2022

This May Not Be The Winner…

...Abbott’s campaign thinks it is. In more ways than one:
“The recent attempt to criminalize a parent for helping their transgender child access medically necessary, age-appropriate healthcare in the state of Texas goes against the values of our companies,” the letter said. “This policy creates fear for employees and their families, especially those with transgender children, who might now be faced with choosing to provide the best possible medical care for their children but risk having those children removed by child protective services for doing so.”
Meanwhile: It's terribly cynical to say it now, in this context, but: if that caption isn't a campaign ad for Beto, it's political malpractice.  (The Lege specifically declined to legislate on this issue AT ALL in the last session.  For the AG to now declare it a criminal act is, once again, a bit beyond the reach of the AG's authority; to put it in terms the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals would recognize.) And it turns out Paxton is Trump, too: This is your reminder that Paxton is a lawyer, and should know better.  But winning his primary run-off is apparently all that really matters.  Also your reminder that's not the only thing going on in Texas: Mail-in ballots are now almost exclusively the province of those over 65, who presumably predominately vote Republican. "Election integrity" is going to bite the Texas GOP in the ass (this round was only primaries). Expect it to be completely overhauled in 2023. That's not going to be an unalloyed winner, either. Nobody ran on in it in the primaries, but I expect it to be an issue in the generals. Stack all this up and you've got some seriously ugly shit to throw at the GOP in Texas.  Does Abbott really want to be the governor of criminalizing families because of how they provide medical care to their children?  That argument worked when the idea was to keep government (schools, counties, cities) out of the decision of whether kids needed masks.  Now the government decides how children are offered medical care, and whether that decision is criminal?  Even people who wanted their kids to wear masks weren't investigated for child abuse.

Almost 12,000 people lost their votes because the new rules for mail-in ballots were too damned complicated?  (I'm a lawyer, I heard about the problems early on and tackled the new, complicated process just to request a mail-in ballot, then studied the new, complicated process for mailing it in correctly.  I can understand how 12,000 people screwed it up.  It was designed to create errors.)  That's gonna go over, as we used to say, like a flash flood in a Fizzies factory.  (Fizzies?  Think colored Alka-Seltzer without the salt, but with not much more flavor.  I dunno, we ate a lot of dumb things as kids.  It wasn't all worth being nostalgic over.)

I expect the judge to enter a state-wide temporary injunction, which gets turned into a permanent one if the courts don't overrule her.  I don't really imagine they will, despite the Texas Supreme Court ruling on SB8, because this one is based on Paxton's half-assed opinion that doesn't have a shred of credibility to back it up.  Which is the point of that hearing this morning.  Without strong factual grounds, Abbott's opinion gets tossed in the shredder.  If it takes his political career down with it, so much the better.
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