(Texas)—On May 29, 2026, the U.S. Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals allowed Texas’s SB 4 (2023) law, one of the most regressive and blatantly unconstitutional laws in the country, to go into effect. This law seizes immigration enforcement authority from the federal government outright and places it into the hands of state authorities to target, arrest and quickly deport immigrants.The Immigrant Legal Resource Center (ILRC) analyzes the draconian effects of this law in our latest brief Living with and Resisting Texas SB 4: An Unprecedented State Deportation Scheme.
The implications of SB 4 are significant and far reaching: all Texans and those suspected of being undocumented are now living under the permanent threat of immediate arrest, detention, and deportation by law enforcement, should they be suspected of illegal entry or reentry into Texas.
Advocates monitoring SB 4 implementation have detailed individuals being arrested and quickly transferred to U.S. Immigration Customs and Enforcement (ICE) custody rather than having an opportunity to defend themselves against state charges and assert their constitutional rights. Public information requests have also shockingly uncovered Texas law enforcement misusing their authority to arrest individuals under SB 4 in 2025, when the law was not even in effect. Nearly forty individuals were arrested by law enforcement in 2025, in localities throughout the state, including as far north as Tarrant County. Now that SB 4 is in full effect, advocates are concerned law enforcement will further misuse their authority to unjustly arrest individuals under the law.
SB 4 does the following:
- It creates three new state offenses of illegal entry, illegal reentry and failure to comply with a state judge’s removal order, that can only be committed by immigrants;
- It authorizes a broad range of so-called “peace officers” (ranging from a Sheriff to a park ranger) to make arrests based on mere suspicion;
- It creates new criminal procedures for state-ordered deportations by state judges (not immigration judges) to order a person deported to Mexico, regardless of their nationality. Individuals can be deported as quickly as within 48 hours of arrest; and
- It creates a mandatory state deportation provision that prevents state judges from setting aside (or “abating”) criminal prosecutions under the law because federal determination of a person’s immigration status is pending or will be initiated. This means a person with a pending immigration application (for example, asylum, Temporary Protected Status, or U visa applications) can still be deported if prosecuted under the state law.
This brief goes into detail on how SB 4 came to fruition in the roots of Operation Lone Star, the legal battle advocates waged that delayed the law’s implementation for several years, examines the tentacles of the law, and offers ways communities can prepare to keep all Texans safe.
To learn more about advocacy efforts please visit https://all4texans.org/.