(The Center Square) – Texas Gov. Greg Abbott on Thursday called on Congress to reimburse Texas for its border security operation, Operation Lone Star.
Abbott sent letters to the leaders of the U.S. House and Senate and entire Texas congressional delegation requesting the federal government reimburse Texas for more than $11.1 billion spent on border security measures paid for by Texas taxpayers during the Biden administration.
Texas allocated more than $11.6 billion to border security efforts over a four-year period, the most in the state’s history, under the Biden administration. It totals more than multiple state fiscal year budgets and more than what the Trump administration allocated to federal border security efforts in Texas, The Center Square reported.
This year, Texas Senate and House budget proposals allocate more than $6 billion to border security efforts over a two-year period, The Center Square reported.
As Congress allocated billions of dollars to secure other countries’ borders, and as Democratic governors and mayors called on the Biden administration to provide financial assistance to deal with an influx of illegal foreign nationals, Texas taxpayers have solely funded Operation Lone Star – with no reimbursement from the federal government.
“Even though the federal government has a duty to secure our nation’s borders, from day one former President Joe Biden refused to enforce federal immigration law and pursued reckless open-border policies that invited record-breaking illegal immigration,” Abbott said.
Examples of the administration’s “reckless open-border policies,” Abbott says, include halting border wall and barrier construction, releasing illegal border crossers into the country through mass parole programs, loosening asylum standards, dismissing removal proceedings and eliminating critical vetting requirements, among others.
These policies were terminated and rescinded by President Donald Trump on his first day in office through multiple executive orders, The Center Square reported.
“President Biden’s policies left Texas and the rest of America defenseless against an unprecedented infiltration by violent criminals, known terrorists, and other hostile foreign actors, like the dangerous Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua. Weapons and deadly drugs like fentanyl poured into our country; women and children were abducted, raped, and murdered in Texas; and property was destroyed all along the southern border,” Abbott said.
After launching OLS in March 2021, OLS officers alone have apprehended more than 530,000 illegal border crossers, repelled over 140,000 attempted illegal entries, made more than 50,000 criminal arrests, with more than 43,000 felony charges reported, and seized enough lethal doses of fentanyl to kill everyone in the U.S., Mexico and Canada combined.
Texas has also built more than 240 miles of border barriers and constructed the only National Guard base along Texas’ border with Mexico.
After Texas’ first Border Czar Mike Banks expanded OLS efforts, a 51% drop in federal border apprehensions was reported in one year in Texas, The Center Square exclusively reported.
“In short, Texas stepped up where the federal government refused and in doing so, protected all Americans from President Biden’s dangerous policies,” Abbott said.
Texas’ success “came at a cost, which fell squarely on the shoulders of Texas taxpayers but should have been the federal government’s responsibility,” Abbott said.
Costs to Texas taxpayers to construct 100 miles of border wall and install marine buoy barriers totaled over $3 billion.
Installing and fortifying 200 miles of concertina wire barriers cost $58 million.
Deploying more than 10,000 Texas National Guard troops and surging Texas Department of Public Safety troopers to the border region cost nearly $6 billion.
Abbott’s letter formally requests Congress to reimburse Texas for these costs in full.
“The burden that our State has borne is a direct result of a refusal by the federal government to do its job. The work that Texas has done through Operation Lone Star has protected and will continue to benefit the entire country,” Abbott said.
His formal request follows a proposal made last year by U.S. Rep. Roger Williams, a Republican from north Texas. Williams’ Operation Lone Star Reimbursement Act would require the federal government to reimburse Texas for its OLS costs, which at the time were more than $8 billion, The Center Square reported.