The southern border state of Texas has authorized “several hundred” of its National Guard soldiers to carry out immigration enforcement, a job that has long been reserved for law enforcement.

The federal U.S. Customs and Border Protection has deputized a wide array of state soldiers to do the job of Border Patrol agents as the Trump administration simultaneously expands its pool of federal police who can apprehend and remove illegal immigrants, the Texas Military Department told the Washington Examiner this week.

Republican vice presidential candidate J.D. Vance knocked presumptive Democratic vice presidential nominee and Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz’s “shameful” exit from the Army National Guard before his deployment to Iraq during a Wednesday press conference.

Veterans who served in the Army National Guard battalion with Walz accused him of abandoning them upon learning of their upcoming deployment to Iraq in 2005, according to a 2018 letter posted to Facebook. Vance said Walz should be ashamed of allegedly “lying” about his military career.

A National Guard soldier fired at a migrant who stabbed two individuals at the Texas-Mexico border, according to a document obtained by NewsNation.

The incident occurred on Sunday afternoon along the Rio Grande River in El Paso’s Lower Valley, NewsNation reported. A member of the Indiana National Guard — deployed to the area as part of Republican Texas Gov. Greg Abbott’s Operation Lone Star – witnessed an individual stab a fellow migrant and fired their weapon in response, according to the outlet.

State officials in the U.S. have begun making preparations for the total eclipse, with National Guardsmen already confirmed for deployment in Oklahoma, where hundreds of thousands of tourists are expected to visit on April 8.

The guard will provide first responders as well as units with hazmat response capabilities in case of an incident like an industrial fire.

The White House sought to shift the blame to Republicans on Friday when pressed on an incident at the U.S.–Mexico border one day earlier in which more than 100 migrants attempted to enter the country at once, including several men who attacked U.S. National Guard members amid the chaos.

Video of the incident published by the New York Post shows dozens of men breaking through razor-wire fencing that the state of Texas had installed before racing forward to overwhelm Texas National Guard members. However, the group was ultimately thwarted by a section of border wall.

A helicopter flying over the U.S.-Mexico border in Texas crashed Friday, killing two National Guard soldiers and a Border Patrol agent, the military said. Another soldier on board was injured.

The UH-72 Lakota helicopter was assigned to the federal government’s border security mission when it went down near Rio Grande City, according to a statement released by Joint Task Force North. The cause was under investigation.

The crash happened mid-afternoon Friday while the helicopter was conducting aviation operations, according to the statement. No other details were provided.