AP Photo Next Texas governor eager to sue Obama

Texas Gov.-elect Greg Abbott on Sunday reiterated his vow to sue President Barack Obama over his recent executive action to shield nearly 5 million immigrants from deportation, saying it will harm Texas unlike any other state.

“We think we have standing better than any other state to be able to assert this claim against the president,” Abbott said on “Fox News Sunday.”


Abbott, who’s still the Republican state attorney general, cited the 2012 Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals action, which allowed certain children of undocumented immigrants to stay in the U.S. And he said the state felt “direct consequences” from the policy, which he expects to repeat under Obama’s new executive action.

“We believe, also, that in the aftermath of this presidential order, we’re going to face the same challenges in Texas that we did after the 2012 DACA,” Abbott said.

Abbott dismissed the suggestion that the legal requirements of both DACA and Obama’s latest move will discourage other immigrants from coming to the U.S.

“Understand this: The people coming from Central America are typically not legal scholars who look into the depths of what the president is saying,” Abbott said.

It was Mexican cartels “who were selling” DACA to Central Americans, Abbott said, and “using them and exhorting from them the passageway towards Texas.”

Texas “will continue to come out of pocket,” Abbott said, adding the state spends $15 million a month just on law enforcement. “Texans are having to foot the bill” for thousands of children now in Texas schools, he added.

“We have a president who feels completely unconstrained by the Constitution,” Abbott said. “Attorneys general across the United States of America are the leaders in stepping up, holding this president accountable to the United States Constitution.”

If they don’t, he said, it “will lead to dire consequences in our future.”