Through it, the state has poured billions of dollars into its own immigration enforcement, including the recent addition of 1,000 feet of buoys placed in the Rio Grande to deter illegal crossings. This last action finally brought the threat of legal challenges from the Biden administration, which claims that buoys violate an 1899 law that prohibits the “creation of any obstruction not affirmatively authorized by Congress, to the navigable capacity of any of the waters of the United States.
The case had little directly to do with the justice of the new policy. Instead, it pertained to whether the Biden administration followed immigration law in creating the presumption against asylum based on where the applicant crossed the border. The judge ruled against the new policy, writing that it contradicted clear statutory language on the matter.
Both the national government in the federalism case and the judge in the separation of powers case have legitimate points about how our structures divide legitimate action between governments and governmental institutions. Yet these matters also point to the failures within the system to adequately address our immigration problems.