Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton will appeal an El Paso district judge’s ruling that blocked his efforts to close the Annunciation House networks of shelters for migrants crossing the border.
“For too long, Annunciation House has flouted the law and contributed to the worsening illegal immigration crisis at Texas’s border with Mexico,” Paxton said in a news release Monday. “I am appealing this case and will continue to vigorously enforce the law against any NGO engaging in criminal conduct.”
The appeal comes as Paxton has ramped up his efforts to stop Catholic organizations from providing services to migrants.
Ruben Garcia, the founder and executive director of Annunciation House, said the appeal was expected but still disappointing.
“It’s very, very difficult to believe that at the end of the day, this is not all the result of a political perspective,” Garcia told El Paso Matters.
El Paso Bishop Mark Seitz said the U.S. Catholic Church has expressed increasing concerns about efforts in Texas to use the immigration issue to restrict people from exercising their faith.
Francisco Dominguez, the judge of El Paso’s 205th District Court, issued a ruling July 2 rejecting what he called Paxton’s “outrageous and intolerable” efforts to shut down Annunciation House.
On Feb. 7, three representatives from the Attorney General’s Office served Annunciation House with a request to examine operational records. When Annunciation House representatives asked for time to have a judge review the request, Paxton’s office moved to strip the nearly 50-year-old nonprofit Catholic organization from its ability to do business in Texas. He said Texas laws on business regulation gave him that authority.
Garcia and Annunciation House supporters vehemently denied Paxton’s allegations that the organization was engaged in human smuggling and operating stash houses. No criminal charges have ever been brought against Annunciation House on such allegations.
Annunciation House filed a lawsuit in February seeking to block Paxton’s efforts, and Dominguez ruled in their favor after conducting two hearings and receiving a series of briefs.
In the notice to Dominguez’s court Tuesday, the Attorney General’s Office said it is seeking a direct appeal to the Texas Supreme Court. Ordinarily, a district court ruling in El Paso would first be appealed to the El Paso-based 8th Court of Appeals.
All nine justices on the Texas Supreme Court are Republicans, like Paxton. Dominguez is a Democrat, as are two of the three members of the 8th Court of Appeals.
Earlier this year, three Republican justices on the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals were ousted in the GOP primary after Paxton targeted them for ruling against his office in a 2021 case, where he asserted the power to unilaterally prosecute voter fraud cases.
The Court of Criminal Appeals is Texas’ highest court for criminal cases, while the Supreme Court oversees civil cases.
Garcia said he worries that Paxton’s actions against the Court of Criminal Appeals justices will be on the minds of the Supreme Court when they hear the Annunciation House case.
He said he has “just a lot of concerns to how, little by little, the structures themselves are being aligned to reflect a particular viewpoint.”
The Attorney General’s Office in June sued Catholic Charities of the Rio Grande Valley, the largest providers of migrant services on that part of the border. The suit seeks to depose leaders of Catholic Charities about its services to migrants.
In his El Paso ruling, Dominguez said such efforts are an end-run around constitutional protections requiring that law enforcement prove probable cause that a crime has occurred before attempting to compel evidence in a criminal investigation.
In a response to the lawsuit in the Rio Grande Valley, Catholic Charities’ lawyers made similar arguments.
“This petition represents a fishing expedition into a pond where no one has ever seen fish,” the response to the lawsuit stated.
This is a developing story and will be updated.
The post Ken Paxton seeks direct appeal of Annunciation House ruling to Texas Supreme Court appeared first on El Paso Matters.
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