UNDER SCRUTINY

Texas Border Initiative Probed Over Alleged Civil Rights Violations

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott has spent millions on Operation Lone Star. Now the Justice Department is investigating it.

The Justice Department is probing whether a multimillion-dollar Texas military operation violated the civil rights of people arrested near the U.S.-Mexico border, emails obtained by the Texas Tribune and ProPublica show. Operation Lone Star was established by Texas Gov. Greg Abbott to detain people smuggling drugs and humans into the U.S. Now the DOJ is investigating whether it “violated Title VI prohibitions [of the 1964 Civil Rights Act] on the basis of race, color, or national origin,” especially with “a particular emphasis on the criminal trespass arrests aspect of the initiative,” one email from an attorney to Texas Department of Safety officials reads. The Justice Department requested all documents related to the initiative’s implementation plan, operational procedures, trainings, and agreements with states and landowners. A Justice Department spokesperson said she was unable to “comment on the existence or lack thereof of any potential investigation or case on any matter not otherwise a part of the public court record.”