Texas prepares unique border strategy as Trump plans return to White House

Texas state officials dont wait for federal changes as they push forward with their own border-control ideas. The states $11-billion border program shows how local leadership wants to be first-in-line for upcoming policy shifts

Greg Abbott and his team built up quite a setup in past few years: state-funded border walls border patrols and migrant transport system to other states. Its a big change from old-school Texas GOP ways when they helped immigrants with college fees and refugee programs

During a pre-holiday meet-up at Eagle Pass military base Tom Homan (whos gonna be the next border chief) and Abbott talked about their plans. “Were already working with transition team on border stuff“ Abbott said to soldiers and cops who came for turkey dinner; some ideas are already in works

The state made some interesting moves like:

• Building 51 miles of texas-only border wall
• Setting up special courts for migrants
• Putting razor wire near Rio Grande
• Making buses to move 120‚000 people to other cities
• Using three state prisons for holding people

State land boss Dawn Buckingham showed up with her own idea — giving 1‚400 acres of state land to help with deportations (she named this plan after a kid from Houston). But nobody talks about how Texas needs workers: its booming building farms and services use lots of non-document workers

Local Eagle Pass folks see things different — their city park got taken over by state forces and turned into a base. “They just took our park; we didnt get any choice in this“ said Amerika Garcia Grewal who does monthly prayers for people who died crossing border

State rep Eddie Morales first liked the border program but now thinks its too much-money going to wrong places. The whole thing costs Texas people tons of cash — they want 2.88 billion more dollars when lawmakers meet up in winter