Editor's note: This article was originally published on TheBlaze.com.
Texas is facing another Alamo. We're in a constitutional crisis.
Governor Greg Abbott (R) on Wednesday wrote a letter to the American people and Joe Biden, and he defined his authority and the authority of the United States.
But first, let me take you back to 1787.
The Constitutional Convention came down to this question: Where do states' rights end, and where do the federal government's begin? Many states didn't want to join the union because they didn't believe the federal government was going to hold up its end of the bargain. States had to give up a large portion of their sovereignty and authority to join the union. How could they be sure that the federal government would uphold their rights?
Where do states' rights end, and where do the federal government's begin?
They had just come out of the war with England, which violated their rights, and they paid a big price to get those rights back. When considering coming under a new authority, the federal government, they were afraid. What if you had a weak federal government that has the responsibility to protect the border? The states insisted on having the authority to be able to protect their own borders against invaders. The first step was to add the Bill of Rights because the states were pushing back, saying, "We don't believe the federal government will always hold up its end of the bargain."
Of course, they were thinking about an invasion of an army. But what is happening on our southern border is the textbook definition of invasion if you look at what China planned to do to Russia during the Sino-Soviet border conflict. The People's Republic of China thought that if there ever was a war with Russia, all China had to do was send a million people over the border and have them surrender. On day two, send another million. On day three, send another million. China predicted that by the end of the week, its invasion plan would collapse Russia.
That's exactly what's happening at our southern border.
Under the Biden administration, at least 6 million illegal aliens have crossed our border and are now in our communities and cities all across our country. Some estimates say there are as many as 10 million illegal migrants. Let's assume that the number is 6 million. That's still more than the population of 33 states in our country. The Biden administration has let in a whole new Colorado, a whole new Wisconsin, a whole new Oregon, and we don't even know who these people are.
But we know who some of them are. The Border Patrol has picked up cartel members, human traffickers, and even members of Hezbollah, Hamas, and other terrorist organizations. Cartels are making bank from Biden's open-border policies by enabling human trafficking and drug smuggling operations to flourish. U.S. citizens continue to die from fentanyl that has been smuggled in as a direct result of the Biden administration's policies.
The Biden administration has let in a whole new Colorado, a whole new Wisconsin, a whole new Oregon, and we don't even know who these people are.
This isn't a Trump problem. Trump had the border under control. Biden came in on day one and completely, through executive order, overturned everything that Trump had done. We saw it, and it's only getting worse now.
Our government, through NGOs and public-private partnerships, is intentionally moving people from South America, Central America, and Mexico into the United States. This is all part of the United Nations and the World Economic Forum, which Joe Biden is fundamentally signed on for.
That's why Abbott stated that "President Biden has refused to enforce those laws" that he, in his federal capacity, is obligated to enforce. Abbott goes so far as to say that Biden has violated the laws. Then, appealing to James Madison, Alexander Hamilton, and the framers of the Constitution, Abbott declared that Texas’s right to defend itself is the “supreme law of the land” and "supersedes any federal statutes to the contrary.”
So what does this mean? Well, it means we are in a constitutional crisis. We have a state declaring its constitutional right to protect itself and the federal government saying no, it can't.
Abbott is saying that Texas is upholding the law while Biden is flouting it.
Does Texas have the right to do this? Senator Ted Cruz says yes. Ron DeSantis has signed on. More and more states are signing on. They are arguing that the Constitution wouldn't have been ratified in the first place if it left states defenseless against an inept and corrupt government. Texas certainly wouldn't have signed on.
You have to understand we weren't a commonwealth. Texas was a republic. It's the only one in the union. Texas had no reason to join the United States. It wanted to. This is why Texas, the Lone Star State, exudes a different attitude. Texans said, "We'll join, but we're still Texas." They never would have joined the union if they didn’t have the right to supersede the government in protecting their borders when the government failed in its job. In light of this, Abbott is saying that Texas is upholding the law while Biden is flouting it.
As a state, you have a right to defend yourself if the federal government fails to do its constitutional duty, which we all know it has. The feds have failed to hold up their end of the bargain, just like the delegates at the Constitutional Convention predicted. This isn't just a "Texas issue." This impacts all of us, whether we as states, as citizens of the United States of America, have the right to defend ourselves. This is the time for the states to stand together.
