The Department of Justice, on behalf of the Biden Administration, acknowledged in its briefs to the Supreme Court that the end of Title 42 will cause "disruption and a temporary increase in unlawful border crossings." Therefore, they asked the high court to grant them "more time" - at least one week - to deal with the transition. However, In the brief, Solicitor General Elizabeth Prelogar, lambasted the move to "indefinitely extend a public-health measure" as a solution to the immigration crisis and called on critics to "change the law" in Congress.
In the brief of arguments submitted to the Supreme Court, the Biden Administration asks that the appeal filed by Republican prosecutors not be accepted, believing that Title 42 is not the appropriate tool to address the immigration crisis. However, in the same document it recognizes that the problem exists and could be aggravated by the disappearance of the directive and requests more time to prepare for the changes.
Impossibility of assuming the end of the standard immediately
The Biden administration stressed that it does not currently have the capacity to finalize Title 42 policies by the scheduled day (today), even if the high court were to rule on the matter immediately. For the time being, Prelogar notes that as long as there is no stipulated date for the cancellation of the mandate, the government will continue to implement this policy and "is interrupting or reversing transition efforts."
Resuming those efforts will require a brief additional period of operations under Title 42. In addition, the necessary coordination within the government and with our foreign partners and non-governmental organizations would be especially challenging over the upcoming holiday weekend, a time when many of these partners are operating with reduced staffing. The government therefore respectfully requests that if this Court denies the application before December 23, it preserve the administrative stay until 11:59 p.m. on December 27. If the Court denies the application on or after December 23, the government respectfully requests that it preserve the administrative stay until 11:59 p.m. on the second business day following its order.
The Administration acknowledges that "the end of the Title 42 order is likely to cause a temporary increase in border crossings." However, "the government is prepared to address that serious problem within the framework of its Title 8 authorities, including the adoption of new policies to respond to the temporary disruption that will occur when the Title 42 orders end."
"Ask Congress to change the law."
In this sense, Pelogar was very hard on the defenders of the continuity of the directive as a migratory policy, perverting its original sense as a public health measure in the face of the pandemic. The solicitor general indicated that "If applicants are dissatisfied with the immigration system Congress has prescribed in Title 8, their remedy is to ask Congress to change the law — not to ask this Court to compel the government to continue relying on an extraordinary and now obsolete public-health measure as de facto immigration policy."
While the Supreme Court deliberates, immigrants continue to pile up at the southern border. Several caravans have been arriving through Mexico with thousands of migrants waiting for the end of the title to access the United States. According to Breitbart, some 14,000 people are currently waiting for their moment to cross in Tijuana alone. In El Paso, thousands of immigrants, especially Nicaraguans and Venezuelans, who are not affected by the rule, crowd the streets in the middle of a growing storm.
Abbott appeals to Biden for resources as polar vortex arrives
As a result, Texas Governor Greg Abbott has sent a letter to President Biden to demand that he deploy federal resources as a polar vortex approaches the border. Abbott accuses the government of "this terrible crisis for Texas border communities is a catastrophe of your own making." It also states that sheltering immigrants is a federal responsibility and warns of the risk of immigrants freezing to death.
This terrible crisis for border communities in Texas is a catastrophe of your own making. These communities and the state are ill-equipped to do the job assigned to the federal government—house the thousands of migrants flooding into the country every day. With perilous temperatures moving into the area, many of these migrants are at risk of freezing to death on city streets. The need to address this crisis is not the job of border states like Texas. Instead, the U.S. Constitution dictates that it is your job, Mr. President, to defend the borders of our country, regulate our nation’s immigration, and manage those who seek refuge here.
I sent a letter to President Biden demanding he deploy federal assets to our border as a polar vortex moves into Texas.
It is Biden’s constitutional duty to address this crisis. Texas will continue to step up in his absence.
Read my full letter: https://t.co/hBv7DYpmBl pic.twitter.com/MLTLf7G0se
— Gov. Greg Abbott (@GovAbbott) December 20, 2022
