February, 29 2024, 11:25am EDT
Federal Court Blocks Extreme Texas Legislation That Would Overstep Federal Immigration Law
AUSTIN, Texas
The United States District Court for the Western District of Texas today granted a motion for preliminary injunction to block Texas Senate Bill 4 (88-4), which would permit local and state law enforcement to arrest, detain, and remove people they suspect to have entered Texas from another country without federal authorization. The legislation is one of the most extreme anti-immigrant laws ever passed by any state legislature in the country.
A lawsuit from civil rights groups argues that the S.B. 4 violates the supremacy clause of the U.S. Constitution and is preempted by federal law, as Texas judges would be required to order a person’s deportation regardless of whether a person is eligible to seek asylum or other humanitarian protections under federal law. Advocates have warned that the law will separate families and directly lead to racial profiling, subjecting thousands of Black and Brown Texans to the state prison system, which is rife with civil rights abuses.
The lawsuit was filed in December 2023 by the American Civil Liberties Union, the ACLU of Texas, and the Texas Civil Rights Project (TCRP) on behalf of El Paso County, American Gateways, and Las Americas Immigrant Advocacy Center. It was subsequently consolidated with a lawsuit by the Department of Justice.
The court’s decision will temporarily block the law from going into effect as the case is litigated. Without an injunction, the law would have gone into effect on March 5, 2024. This ruling is likely to be appealed by the state.
The following reactions are from:
Anand Balakrishnan (he/him), senior staff attorney at the ACLU’s Immigrants’ Rights Project, said:
“The federal court’s decision confirms over a century of Supreme Court precedent, affirming that immigration enforcement is squarely within the federal government’s authority. S.B. 4 is a blatantly unconstitutional attempt to bypass federal law. We applaud the court’s decision, but we must ensure this harmful law is struck down altogether.”
Edna Yang (she/her), co-executive director of American Gateways, said:
“This decision is a victory for all our communities as it stops a harmful, unconstitutional, and discriminatory state policy from taking effect and impacting the lives of millions of Texans. Local officials should not be federal immigration agents, and our state should not be creating its own laws that deny people their right to seek protection here in the U.S. While we are thankful for this court decision, we know that too many people fleeing persecution are being denied their legal rights to make their case and seek political asylum. The only way to fix our broken immigration system is through federal congressional action, not individual state action.”
Jennifer Babaie (she/her), Director of Advocacy and Legal Services with Las Americas Immigrant Advocacy Center, said:
“With today’s decision, the court sent a clear message to Texas: SB 4 is unconstitutional and criminalizing Black, brown, indigenous, and immigrant communities will not be tolerated. This crucial decision allows us to continue to focus our efforts on building a safe, legal, humane immigration system not contingent on abuses like racial profiling and harassment. We must continue to be vigilant against Texas’ politics of fear and hatred. But today, immigrants and Texans of color get to pursue living lives of hope, opportunity, and family. It’s a win worth celebrating.”
David Donatti (he/him), senior staff attorney at the ACLU of Texas, said:
“The court’s decision to block this anti-immigrant law from taking effect is an important win for Texas values, human rights, and the U.S. Constitution. Our current immigration system needs repair because it forces millions of Americans into the shadows and shuts the door on people in need of safety. S.B. 4 would only make things worse. Cruelty to migrants is not a policy solution.”
Aron Thorn (he/him), senior attorney, Beyond Borders Program at TCRP, said:
“We celebrate today’s win, blocking this extreme law from going into effect before it has the opportunity to harm Texas communities. This is a major step in showing the State of Texas and Governor Abbott that they do not have the power to enforce unconstitutional, state-run immigration policies. While this is only the first step in abolishing the law, people across the state can breathe a sigh of relief knowing they will not be needlessly arrested or deported by Texas under S.B. 4.”
Iliana Holguin (she/her), El Paso County Commissioner Precinct 3, said:
“El Paso County applauds the court’s clear confirmation today that immigration policies rest solely under Federal jurisdiction, and the state of Texas’ interference with the U.S. Constitution will not be tolerated. A piecemeal approach from individual states on federal matters such as immigration enforcement would put an undue burden on local taxpayers, while opening the door to potential civil rights violations for border residents and immigrants alike.”
The order granting a preliminary injunction is available here: https://www.aclu.org/documents/las-americas-v-mccraw-order-granting-preliminary-injunction
Access “Know Your Rights” under S.B. 4 materials in English here: https://www.aclutx.org/en/know-your-rights/know-your-rights-under-texas-deportation-scheme-sb4
Access “Know Your Rights” under S.B. 4 materials in Spanish here: https://www.aclutx.org/es/know-your-rights/conozca-sus-derechos-segun-el-plan-de-deportacion-sb4-de-texas
The American Civil Liberties Union was founded in 1920 and is our nation's guardian of liberty. The ACLU works in the courts, legislatures and communities to defend and preserve the individual rights and liberties guaranteed to all people in this country by the Constitution and laws of the United States.
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Amazon Won't Display Tariff Costs After Trump Whines to Bezos
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said all companies should be "displaying how much tariffs contribute to the total price of products."
Apr 29, 2025
Amazon said Tuesday that it would not display tariff costs next to products on its website after U.S. President Donald Trump called the e-commerce giant's billionaire founder, Jeff Bezos, to complain about the reported plan.
Citing an unnamed person familiar with Amazon's supposed plan, Punchbowl Newsreported that "the shopping site will display how much of an item's cost is derived from tariffs—right next to the product's total listed price."
Many Amazon products come from China. While U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent claimed Sunday that "there is a path" to a tariff deal with the Chinese government, Trump has recently caused global economic alarm by hitting the country with a 145% tax and imposing a 10% minimum for other nations.
According toCNN, which spoke with two senior White House officials on Tuesday, Trump's call to Bezos "came shortly after one of the senior officials phoned the president to inform him of the story" from Punchbowl.
"Of course he was pissed," one officials said of Trump. "Why should a multibillion-dollar company pass off costs to consumers?"
Asked about how the call with Bezos went, Trump told reporters: "Great. Jeff Bezos was very nice. He was terrific. He solved the problem very quickly, and he did the right thing, and he's a good guy."
Earlier Tuesday, during a briefing, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt called Amazon's reported plan "a hostile and political act," and said that "this is another reason why Americans should buy American."
Leavitt also asked why Amazon didn't have such displays during the Biden administration and held up a printed version of a 2021 Reutersreport about the company's "compliance with the Chinese government edict" to stop allowing customer ratings and reviews in China, allegedly prompted by negative feedback left on a collection President Xi Jinping's speeches and writings.
Asked whether Bezos is "still a Trump supporter," Leavitt said that she "will not speak to" the president's relationship with him.
As CNBCdetailed Tuesday:
Less than two hours after the press briefing, an Amazon spokesperson told CNBC that the company was only ever considering listing tariff charges on some products for Amazon Haul, its budget-focused shopping section.
"The team that runs our ultra low cost Amazon Haul store has considered listing import charges on certain products," the spokesperson said. "This was never a consideration for the main Amazon site and nothing has been implemented on any Amazon properties."
But in a follow-up statement an hour after that one, the spokesperson clarified that the plan to show tariff surcharges was "never approved" and is "not going to happen."
In response to Bloomberg also reporting on Amazon's claim that tariff displays were never under consideration for the company's main site, U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick wrote on social media Tuesday, "Good move."
Before Amazon publicly killed any plans for showing consumers the costs from Trump's import taxes, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) said on the chamber's floor Tuesday that companies should be "displaying how much tariffs contribute to the total price of products."
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Congressional Progressive Caucus Chair Greg Casar (D-Texas) on Tuesday framed the whole incident as an example of how "Trump has created a government by and for the billionaires," declaring: "If anyone ever doubted that Trump, and Musk, and Bezos, and the billionaires are all [on] one team, just look at what happened at Amazon today. Bezos immediately caved and walked back a plan to tell Americans how much Trump's tariffs are costing them."
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As the owner of
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On Tuesday, Independent Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont and Democratic Reps. Pramila Jayapal of Washington and Debbie Dingell of Michigan reintroduced the Medicare for All Act, re-upping the legislative quest to enact a single-payer healthcare system even as the bill faces little chance of advancing in the GOP-controlled House of Representatives or Senate.
Hundreds of nurses, healthcare providers, and workers from across the country joined the lawmakers for a press conference focused on the bill's reintroduction in front of the Capitol on Tuesday.
"We have the radical idea of putting healthcare dollars into healthcare, not into profiteering or bureaucracy," said Sanders during the press conference. "A simple healthcare system, which is what we are talking about, substantially reduces administrative costs, but it would also make life a lot easier, not just for patients, but for nurses" and other healthcare providers, he continued.
"So let us stand together," Sanders told the crowd. "Let us do what the American people want and let us transform this country. And when we pass Medicare for All, it's not only about improving healthcare for all our people—it's doing something else. It's telling the American people that, finally, the American government is listening to them."
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"It is a travesty when 85 million people are uninsured or underinsured and millions more are drowning in medical debt in the richest nation on Earth," said Jayapal in a statement on Tuesday.
In 2020, a study in the peer-reviewed medical journal The Lancet found that a single-payer program like Medicare for All would save Americans more than $450 billion and would likely prevent 68,000 deaths every year. That same year, the Congressional Budget Office found that a single-payer system that resembles Medicare for All would yield some $650 billion in savings in 2030.
Members of National Nurses United (NNU), the nation's largest union of registered nurses, were also at the press conference on Tuesday.
In a statement, the group highlighted that the bill comes at a critical time, given GOP-led threats to programs like Medicaid.
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"This is the boldest attempt we've seen in recent history to segregate higher education along racial and class lines," said the Debt Collective.
Apr 29, 2025
At a markup session held by a U.S. House committee on the Republican Party's recently unveiled higher education reform bill Tuesday, one Democratic lawmaker had a succinct description for the legislation.
"This bill is a dream-killer," said Rep. Suzanne Bonamici (D-Ore.) of the so-called Student Success and Taxpayer Savings Plan, which was introduced by Education and Workforce Committee Chairman Tim Walberg (R-Mich.) as part of an effort to find $330 billion in education programs to offset President Donald Trump's tax plan.
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David Baime, senior vice president for government relations for the American Association of Community Colleges, suggested the legislation doesn't account for the realities faced by many students who benefit from Pell Grants.
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At the markup session on Tuesday, Bonamici pointed to her own experience of paying for college and law school "through a combination of grants and loans and work study and food stamps," and noted that her Republican colleagues on the committee also "graduated from college."
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“In a time when higher ed is being attacked, this bill is another assault,” @RepBonamici calls out committee leaders for wanting to gut financial aid.
“With this bill, they will be taking that opportunity [of higher ed] away from others. This bill is a dream killer.” pic.twitter.com/UjTYvnOEKv
— Student Borrower Protection Center (@theSBPC) April 29, 2025
Democrats on the committee also spoke out against provisions that would cap loans a student can take out for graduate programs at $100,000; the Grad PLUS program has allowed students to borrow up to the cost of attendance.
The Parent PLUS program, which has been found to provide crucial help to Black families accessing higher education, would also be restricted.
"Black students, brown students, first-generation college students, first-generation Americans, will not have access to college," said Rep. Summer Lee (D-Pa.).
“We cannot take away access to loans, and not replace it with anything else, not make the system better. We know the outcome here—Black, brown, and poor students will not figure it out. Instead, only elite students from the 1% will continue to access education.”@RepSummerLee🙇 pic.twitter.com/oGbRH154Ed
— Student Borrower Protection Center (@theSBPC) April 29, 2025
As the Student Borrower Protection Center (SBPC) warned last week, eliminating the Grad PLUS program without also lowering the cost of graduate programs would "subject millions of future borrowers to an unregulated and predatory private student loan market, while doing little to reduce overall student debt and the need to borrow."
Aissa Canchola Bañez, policy director for SBPC, told The Hill that the draft bill is "an attack on students and working families with student loan debt."
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With the proposal, which Republicans hope to pass through reconciliation with a simple majority, the party would be "restructuring higher education for the worse," said the Debt Collective.
"It's the most dangerous higher ed bill in U.S. history," said the student loan borrowers union. "It strips the Department of Education of virtually every authority to cancel student debt. Eliminates every repayment program. Abolishes subsidized loans."
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