A coalition of GOP-led states pleaded with the Supreme Court to keep the Title 42 border policy in place, asking Monday for an emergency ruling to head off what experts fear would be a total breakdown at the U.S.-Mexico border.
The desperation move came a little more than a day before Title 42 is slated to end, and the states face an uphill battle after a circuit court rejected their request on Friday, saying they waited too long to try to intervene in the case.
But the states, led by Arizona Attorney General Mark Brnovich, said there’s too much at stake for the courts to duck a ruling.
“Getting rid of Title 42 will recklessly and needlessly endanger more Americans and migrants by exacerbating the catastrophe that is occurring at our southern border,” Mr. Brnovich said in announcing the request to stay the lower court rulings.
Title 42, put in place by the Trump administration and continued by the Biden administration, albeit at times reluctantly, allows illegal immigrants to be expelled at the border because of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Unless the courts intervene or the Biden administration finds another solution, Title 42 will expire at midnight Tuesday, and experts say an already unprecedented level of border chaos will get much worse.
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Current levels of between 6,000 and 7,000 migrants a day — already a record sustained pace — could quickly double.
Democratic lawmakers have become increasingly worried about those sorts of numbers.
New York Mayor Eric Adams over the weekend warned his city could see as many as 1,000 new illegal immigrants each week, stressing the city’s already overloaded housing and other services.
“Our shelter system is full, and we are nearly out of money, staff, and space,” the mayor said. “Truth be told, if corrective measures are not taken soon, we may very well be forced to cut or curtail programs New Yorkers rely on, and the pathway to house thousands more is uncertain.”
He begged the feds to send money.
In El Paso, Texas, Mayor Oscar Leeser on Saturday declared a state of emergency, saying it was needed to tap state funds to open more shelters and bring in more food for thousands of migrants camped out on city streets.
Mr. Leeser had resisted the emergency declaration. He worried what GOP state leaders might do, but he said he was left with no choice after temperatures dipped below freezing and threatened the migrants living on the streets.
The El Paso Times reported that the city expects up to 6,000 illegal immigrants a day once Title 42 ends. By contrast, during some months of the Trump administration, the Border Patrol caught just 12,000 migrants nationwide in an entire month.
“We want to make sure we’re prepared for that and we can react to that, so this is just the next step to make sure we’re prepared,” Deputy City Manager Mario D’Agostino said, according to the newspaper.
The Biden administration has said its hands are tied by the courts after a federal judge in Washington last month ruled against Title 42. The judge reluctantly agreed to the Biden administration’s five-week delay in winding down the policy, but that grace period expires this week.
Immigrant-rights activists say it can’t come fast enough. They say Title 42 is cruel to migrants, preventing them from making claims of protection such as requests for asylum.
With the Biden administration putting up only token resistance to the judge, Mr. Brnovich and the other GOP-led states tried to intervene and asked an appeals court to put the whole issue on ice until matters are settled.
The appeals court on Friday rejected the request, leaving the states with only the option of going to the justices.
The states said the Biden administration, despite protestations to the contrary, is working hand in glove with the activists to end Title 42.
Evidence for that includes the Justice Department agreeing to accept legal remedies such as a nationwide injunction in this case, even as the department argues against such injunctions in other cases where it would mean a get-tough policy would be imposed on the administration.
Mr. Brnovich and his fellow attorneys general said that amounted to the government saying, “It’s legal when we say it’s legal.”
• Stephen Dinan can be reached at sdinan@washingtontimes.com.
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