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GOP Rep. Roy urges Texas to ignore SCOTUS razor wire order

Roy on Tuesday fumed over the ruling and insisted that Texas should continue pursuing its own unilateral border enforcement activities and ignore the court decision.

Published: January 23, 2024 3:33pm

Texas Republican Rep. Chip Roy on Tuesday urged state authorities to disregard a Supreme Court order permitting federal border agents to cut a razor wire fence the state had placed along the frontier with Mexico.

The Supreme Court on Monday sided with the Biden administration and lifted an injunction against border agents cutting the razor wire fencing, upending an order from the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals restricting agents from cutting the fence except in the event of a medical emergency. The top court did not decide the matter on its merits and the case is still before the appeals court. 

The roughly 110-mile razor wire fence in question runs along the bank of the Rio Grande and passes through state and private property.

Roy on Tuesday fumed over the ruling and insisted that Texas should continue pursuing its own unilateral border enforcement activities and ignore the court decision.

"[I]f someone's breaking into your house, and the court says, 'Oh, sorry. You can’t defend yourself.' What do you tell the court?" he said to Fox News. "You tell the court to go to hell, you defend yourself and then figure it out later."

He further asserted that the government has an obligation to protects its citizens, without exception, and "if the Supreme Court wants to ignore that truth, which a slim majority did, Texas still had the duty, Texas leaders still have the duty, to defend their people."

Texas GOP Gov. Greg Abbott, for his part, has vowed to press forward with his own efforts to secure the border in the face of perceived federal apathy toward the surge in illegal crossings.

"This is not over. Texas' razor wire is an effective deterrent to the illegal crossings Biden encourages. I will continue to defend Texas' constitutional authority to secure the border and prevent the Biden Admin from destroying our property," he declared on X after the ruling.

Ben Whedon is an editor and reporter for Just the News. Follow him on X, formerly Twitter.

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