A federal appeals court late Thursday reinstated a Texas law that prohibits 'harboring of illegal immigrants,' News Radio 1200 WOAI reports.
The law was passed by the 2015 session of the Legislature, in an effort to allow prosecutors to have more leverage to fight the dangerous immigrant smuggling gangs who are responsible for the vast majority of the illegal immigration into the U.S.
The smugglers would be liable for prosecution under the law for holding, housing, abd transporting illegal immigrants.
A State District Judge threw out the law after advocates for illegal immigrants argued that it could be used against, for example, landlords who rented property to illegal immigrants, and even to prosecute churches and social services agencies which helped unaccompanied minor immigrants by allowing them to stay in homes.
But the Appeals Court ruled there is 'no reasonable interpretation by which merely renting housing or providing social services to an illegal alien constitutes harboring that person from detection, we reverse the injunction.'
The law was passed as part of the $800 million border security bill approved by lawmakers in 2015.
"This ruling by the 5th Circuit will allow the state to fight the smuggling of humans and illegal contraband by transnational gangs and perpetrators of organized crime, not just on the border, but throughout Texas," Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton said.
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