Texas Republican Gov. Greg Abbott joined "America's Newsroom" on Thursday to explain how President Biden's approach at the border increases national security risks for his state and the country as a whole.
GOV. GREG ABBOTT: Well, let's be clear. The administration is doing nothing to stop terrorists from coming across the border. They are knowingly allowing them in. And there's two categories here. There are the terrorists who were actually apprehended. The terrorists apprehended are an all-time record. Many multiples of those who came across the border under the Trump administration…
Second… the terrorist will pay extra not to be caught. What that means is the number that we've caught — which is extraordinary — there's far more than that have gotten across the border. Also last month, the FBI director talked about a potential 9/11-type terrorist attack because of the terrorists who are coming across our border. The chief job of the President of the United States is national security. President Biden is failing at national security. We are extraordinarily concerned about a terrorist attack occurring in Texas or elsewhere in the United States because the terrorists who are crossing our border at will go unstopped by the bottom.
Texas on Wednesday defended its anti-illegal immigration law in oral arguments before a federal appeals court panel as the law remains on hold due to a legal challenge from the Biden administration.
Abbott signed the legislation, SB 4, in December, which allows local police to arrest illegal immigrants and for judges to order them deported.
However, the law has been on hold due to a challenge from the Biden administration, which says the law is unconstitutional, hurts international relations and impedes the federal government’s enforcement of immigration law.
Texas has argued that the law is necessary due to the Biden administration’s alleged failure to secure the southern border and enforce immigration law, and on Wednesday it argued before the three-judge panel that the ongoing crisis at the border is unprecedented.
The court had previously blocked the law from going into effect, but it was then briefly allowed to go into effect by the U.S. Supreme Court before being kicked back down and blocked again by the Fifth Circuit.
It is one of a number of such measures being passed or moved forward by states across the U.S. Louisiana, Iowa and Tennessee are all states that have bills under consideration that would do either the same or similar to what Texas is seeking to do.
Fox News' Adam Shaw and Jake Gibson contributed to this report.
