Unless you live inside an unlit cave deep below the Ural Mountains, you know about the confrontation now between our lawless federal government and the state of Texas over the border. The federal branch of government under Biden has been simply refusing for three years to enforce our binding, democratically enacted immigration laws. Let that sink in for a moment.

Imagine if for four years Donald Trump had simply refused to enforce our civil rights laws. Or declined to prosecute financial fraud. Or arbitrarily suspended the enforcement of any other key federal function, for blatantly political reasons.

Our Lawless Executive Branch

Make no mistake, Biden is refusing to control immigration as our laws require him to. He has directed federal authorities to pretend that every “refugee” claim, however far-fetched, must be taken at face value, and illegal immigrants released on their own recognizance. And flown at taxpayer expense wherever they like in the U.S. And allowed on those planes without any ID.

Democrat governors and mayors are closing schools, renting out luxury hotels, and even asking citizens to welcome this wave of mostly unvetted military-age young men into their homes. The governor of California is providing these invaders free healthcare — in a state where millions of citizens scramble for coverage or go without.

Most recently, the Biden regime has taken to cutting the razor wire that the Texas National Guard is using to try to control the massive influx of foreigners, organized in caravans by malevolent human traffickers ranging from cartels and Soros non-profits to “Catholic Charities.”

The Globalists on Our Court

The U.S. Supreme Court, with the vote of two GOP appointees, John Roberts and Amy Barrett, just voted to back up Biden. I have to wonder whether these two judges, whose sterling Catholic credentials were a big part of what got them picked, are channeling Pope Francis’ open borders globalism. As I wrote before Trump picked her, Barrett actually said in a legal paper that Catholic judges should obey the pope rather than the Constitution. I asked whether she’d obey Pope Francis on immigration. I hope this isn’t her final answer. Barrett deserves to get an earful from all those conservatives who fought to get her confirmed. Or at least explain herself. 

Texas Governor Greg Abbott has perhaps redeemed himself in the eyes of Texas conservatives — after years of seeming more like a weathervane than a lighthouse — by standing up to Biden in a bold, uncompromising fashion. For the first time since Pat Buchanan’s 2000 run for president, a politician has written something which I find I couldn’t improve on. Abbott’s response to the Supreme Court’s lawless decision will end up in history books. I beg you to read it below.

Thank You, Ken Paxton

In the wake of this statement, as Joseph Farah noted:

Rep. Chip Roy, R-Tex, called on Texas officials to ignore the Supreme Court ruling.

“They have a duty under the Constitution … and every other norm of leadership of any sovereign state, to protect your citizens, period, full stop. There is no exception to that,” Roy told Fox News Digital on Tuesday. “And if the Supreme Court wants to ignore that truth, which a slim majority did, Texas still had the duty, Texas leaders still have the duty, to defend their people.”

I congratulate Gov. Abbott for having the courage to issue this statement. It’s eloquent, principled, and constitutionally correct. To my eyes, it has Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton’s fingerprints all over it. It has the same rigorous logic, the same stark eloquence, as his brief challenging the 2020 election fraud. And that brings back home to me how important it was to defeat the Bush machine, which tried every means to keep him out of office, and then kick him out office once he’d been overwhelmingly elected via a politicized and baseless impeachment effort.

Can you imagine where Texas would be right now, in the face of this current invasion enabled by the lawless feds, if our AG were the hapless dilettante George P. Bush, who challenged Paxton in the primaries? Or if it were the functionary picked as his replacement by the RINOs in the Texas legislature who engineered Paxton’s discredited impeachment?

You Only Need One Joan of Arc

History turns sometimes on the aim of a single marksman, the wakefulness of one sentry standing at the gate, or the courage of a single person who loves his country more than convenience. Those Texans who stood up for Ken Paxton deserve some of the credit for what’s happening right now: One state is defying the anti-American crooks who schemed their way into power, who now are dissolving our country. And I couldn’t be prouder now to be no longer a New Yorker, but a Texan.

We need to reject the surrender proposed by a different Texan, squish Establishment Senator John Cornyn. For his whole term in office, he has opposed real border control, and right now he’s backing an appalling “bipartisan” immigration deal in the Senate that would essentially baptize Biden’s open-borders policy, and give it the backing of law. It would also give Biden a way out of the confrontation he chose between the federal government and our state.

Here’s what Texas’ worthwhile senator, Ted Cruz, has to say about that deal:

Fiery remarks from @tedcruz on the Senate border deal:

“As bad as we think the bill is, I promise you, it’s worse”

“[This bill] is a kamikaze plane in a box canyon with no exits headed for a train wreck”

“…represents Senate GOP leadership waging war on House GOP leadership” pic.twitter.com/S8UO5BrIqM

— Adam Shaw (@AdamShawNY) January 24, 2024

Speaker Mike Johnson could win back all the goodwill he lost in his budgetary surrenders by doing one simple thing: Refusing to put that craven surrender up for a vote. Let it die in the obscurity it deserves, and may God bless the great State of Texas!

John Zmirak is a senior editor at The Stream and author or co-author of ten books, including The Politically Incorrect Guide to Immigration and The Politically Incorrect Guide to Catholicism. His upcoming book is No Second Amendment, No First.