Forty Texas counties have now declared an invasion at the southern U.S. border with Mexico, or have expressed support for Texas declaring an invasion. More are in the process of doing so, according to sources who've spoken to The Center Square.
The most recent to join the invasion call include the judges and commissioners of Collin, Fannin, Leon, Navarro, Shackelford, Somervell and Waller counties.
They are calling on Texas Gov. Greg Abbott to formally declare an invasion and repel it, which he has yet to do. The governor cited the invasion clauses of the Texas Constitution and U.S. Constitution in a Nov. 14 letter to county judges and in a Nov. 16 letter to President Joe Biden. He also wrote letters to the heads of the Texas Military Department and Department of Public Safety.
In his letter to judges, Abbott refers to a July 7 executive order he issued two days after the judges of Kinney, Goliad and Terrell first declared an invasion. The executive order doesn't declare an invasion, it authorizes Texas law enforcement officers to apprehend illegal foreign nationals and return them to ports of entry. After Abbott tweeted content from part of the letter to judges without providing context, many misreported that he declared an invasion.
As a Trinity University professor explained to KSAT News, "You can't declare the invasion via Twitter. There is a process to name it, to give a date to it, to put it out in kind of a public way."
via joemiller