Texas must remove floating river barriers at US-Mexico border: Judge

By Darren Lyn

HOUSTON, US (AA) - A US federal judge ordered the state of Texas on Wednesday to remove floating river barriers in the Rio Grande, according to multiple news outlets.

US District Court Judge David Ezra issued a preliminary injunction for Texas to remove the river buoys by Sept. 15 at the state's expense.

“The Court also finds that Texas’s conduct irreparably harms the public safety, navigation, and the operations of federal agency officials in and around the Rio Grande,” Ezra wrote in his ruling.

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott ordered state agencies in July to deploy the floating barriers in the Rio Grande, which is the international boundary between the US and Mexico. Abbott said the buoys were set up at the border to protect the state from an illegal migrant "invasion."

However, the Biden administration filed a lawsuit arguing that the state did not get permission from the federal government to set up the barriers and that the structures impeded US Border Patrol agents from patrolling the area and endangered migrants crossing the river.

In his ruling, the judge also prohibited the state from setting up similar structures in the middle of the Rio Grande, which human rights activists have denounced as unsafe because they force migrants to swim across deeper parts of the river where the risk of drowning is greater.

"Texas will appeal," said Abbott in a statement posted on X. "Today's court decision merely prolongs President (Joe) Biden's willful refusal to acknowledge that Texas is rightfully stepping up to do the job that he should have been doing all along."

"This ruling is incorrect and will be overturned on appeal," Abbott continued. "We will continue to utilize every strategy to secure the border."​​​​​​​

"Texas is prepared to take this fight all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court."