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Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, front center, is flanked by State Sen. Jane Nelson and Rep. Greg Bonnen with others looking on as he signs a bill that provides additional funding for security at the U.S.-Mexico border Friday, Sept. 17, 2021, in Fort Worth. (AP)
In response to President Joe Biden's decision to lift a Trump-era policy that reduced the number of migrants entering the U.S., Gov. Greg Abbott recently launched new initiatives that he said would address border security.
The federal policy, Title 42, allows U.S. border agents to expel immigrants arriving at the border, including asylum seekers, to Mexico and other countries to slow the spread of coronavirus. It's set to end on May 23. But Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton filed a lawsuit Friday to challenge the plan to end Title 42.
From March 2020 to February 2022, 1.7 million expulsions have been carried out under Title 42, with 1.2 million of them occurring under the Biden administration, according to a Migration Policy Institute report on government data.
Abbott said in an April 6 press conference that county and city officials told him, "they are angry and upset about all of the catastrophes caused by the Biden open-border policies. And they are urgently asking for action obviously from the state of Texas, but they know that it's the Biden administration that caused this open-border problem."