EL PASO, Texas (Border Report) – Activists say they plan to turn up the heat so that Texas dials down its Operation Lone Star border safety initiative.
Groups like the Border Network for Human Rights and others say the three-year, $11.2 billion deployment of thousands of National Guard troops to discourage illegal immigration at the border has led to numerous civil rights violations.
In a Tuesday online conference under the umbrella of Frontera Texas Organizing Project, the groups alleged Texas is spending money that could be used for health care, education and infrastructure instead of militarizing the border and installing razor wire on the banks of the Rio Grande, instead.
Medical staff “are seeing clients who’ve been cut by the razor wire,” said Aly Boyd, team member at Border Servant Corps, which runs migrant shelters in El Paso and Las Cruces, New Mexico. “They are reporting they’re being pushed into the razor wire. They’re also being shot with pepper balls, which embed in the skin and irritate the skin, and they’re having tear gas fired on them.”
Boyd said the group has developed a “documentation tool” to record complaints as migrants check in to the shelters. “We are really the first stop for guests after their release from custody so we are able to see directly the impact of Operation Lone Star on asylum-seekers,” she said.
Border Report reached out to the Texas Military Department for comment on Tuesday and is awaiting a response.
Adolfo Telles, chair of the El Paso County Republican Party, said the only abuse he has seen on videos shared by national news outlets is the migrants overrunning Texas Army National Guard troops last March. “The National Guard, the Border Patrol were doing their job and their job was to protect us as citizens. The other people were attacking them physically, they were harming some of them. Every one of those people should be in jail today,” Telles said.
Dozens of migrants were charged with state riot charges, but a judge in El Paso dismissed those charges.
Taking the facts to government agencies, the courts
Danny Woodward, a legal fellow with the Beyond Borders Program, said many of the alleged abuses are taking place on federal land, where Texas military personnel have installed the razor wire and maintain a permanent armed presence to deter migrants from crossing between U.S. ports of entry.
“The first thing we need to do is document the abuse. We need to get clear testimony on what’s happening and find a way to tell these stories,” Woodward said. “In January, we’ll see a new session of the Texas Legislature (it’s) a new opportunity to advocate with state officials, both by talking to legislators and at hearings (on border security).
Documenting cases and filing complaints with government agencies forces them to initiate an inquiry process and possibly bring about accountability, he said.
“There are also opportunities for individual victims to file lawsuits based on what has happened, to try to hold the Guard accountable and potentially get some compensation for physical and emotional harm that is inflicted on them,” Woodward said.
BNHR Executive Director Fernando Garcia said civil rights organizations are not only trying to stop Operation Lone Star but also to change the political narrative regarding the U.S.-Mexico border.
“Many are using the border as a political tool, presenting a distorted narrative of what really happens at the border,” Garcia said. “It is leading not only to hate speech, white supremacy rhetoric and xenophobic statements. When you have a distorted narrative, it’s very likely you’re going to have distorted policies. That is precisely the case in the state of Texas.”
But Telles said he backs Operation Lone Star and says Texas Gov. Greg Abbott is only trying to protect state residents and uphold the law.
“The immigrants that enter illegally broke the law and they deserve to be treated like people who broke the law. They should pay the price for what they are doing,” the Republican official said. “There is no abuse. I don’t know where these people are coming from. Until something happens to their families personally, they’re going to keep this rhetoric that is wrong.”
