On behalf of the General Land Office (GLO), Bush filed the 42-page suit in the McAllen Division of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Texas. Bush is seeking declaratory and injunctive relief but is not seeking monetary damages.
The land commissioner announced the lawsuit at a 3,099-acre farm that belongs to the GLO and “produces revenue for the Permanent School Fund — an important source of money to educate school children,” according to a GLO press statement.
Bush’s suit is part of the Texas Defense Task Force, which he instituted “to identify federal overreach and fend off threats to the Texas oil and gas economy,” according to the task force’s webpage.
“Today, on behalf of the people of Texas, I am suing President Biden on grounds that he is illegally preventing the border wall from being constructed. The issue here is simple — no man is above the law,” Bush said in a press conference near an unfinished section of the border wall.
“And that includes President Biden. For four years, Congress allocated more than $5 billion to construct fencing and walls around the Southern border.”
“This is wrong. This is illegal. And this will not hold up in court,” he later added.
Among other arguments, Bush contends in his lawsuit that the Biden administration was improper in stopping the border wall because Congress had already appropriated funds to the project. Bush also alleges that Biden and DHS are neglecting their constitutional duty to “take care that the Laws be faithfully executed.”
In June, Gov. Greg Abbott ordered state agencies including the Texas Facilities Commission to begin work on a state border wall project with a “down payment” of a quarter billion dollars. In support of Abbott’s border wall, Bush made an emergency authorization for border wall construction on state property.
Bush and former Texas Supreme Court Justice Eva Guzman are challenging incumbent Attorney General Ken Paxton in the Republican primary. Paxton has been among Biden’s most vocal critics, especially on illegal immigration, and has sued the president and his administration numerous times over the border crisis.
A copy of the lawsuit can be found below.
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- Alejandro Mayorkas
- border crisis
- border disaster
- Border Security
- border wall
- Donald Trump
- Eva Guzman
- General Land Office
- George P. Bush
- Greg Abbott
- Illegal Immigration
- Joe Biden
- Ken Paxton
- McAllen
- Permanent School Fund
- Texas Defense Task Force
- U.S. Department of Homeland Security
- U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Texas
Hayden Sparks
Hayden Sparks is a senior reporter for The Texan and a lifelong resident of the Lone Star State. He has coached competitive speech and debate and has been involved in politics since a young age. One of Hayden's favorite quotes is by Sam Houston: "Texas has yet to learn submission to any oppression, come from what source it may."
