WACO, Texas (KWTX) – Texas Senate Bill 4 (SB 4) gives state authorities the power to arrest immigrants who, under the measure, are suspected of crossing from Mexico into Texas, and it opens the door for them to later be removed from the United States.<\/p>\n
SB 4, pushed by the state of Texas and introduced in 2023, \u201cbasically gave state officers the authority to arrest immigrants who crossed from Mexico into Texas and then be removed from the United States,\u201d an Laura Leon, immigration attorney said.<\/p>\n
She said that during President Joe Biden\u2019s administration \u2014 and amid lawsuits filed by pro-immigrant organizations \u2014 the measure was not enforced because it faced legal hurdles.<\/p>\n
However, she added that Texas or the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals has now determined that the plaintiffs who sued over the law \u201cdid not have the authority\u201d to bring the case. As a result, the lawsuit was dismissed and the law was again considered valid in Texas.<\/p>\n
The attorney said the people most vulnerable in this situation are those living along the border, and she stressed the importance of keeping families informed and having a plan in case of detention.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat we know is that this law creates a misdemeanor; it\u2019s not a felony. It\u2019s like crossing from one country into a state,\u201d she said. \u201cSo what this law basically does is create a type of criminal act that would be on an immigrant\u2019s criminal record.\u201d<\/p>\n
The attorney noted that regardless of immigration status, people have rights in the United States and she urged them to exercise those rights if they are detained.<\/p>\n
Copyright 2026 Telemundo Waco. Todos los derechos reservados.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"WACO, Texas (KWTX) – Texas Senate Bill 4 (SB 4) gives state authorities the power to arrest immigrants…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":275952,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[102134,102133,102132,57157,102135,27,29,28,102131],"class_list":["post-275951","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-texas","tag-attorney-urges-families-to-know-their-rights","tag-expanding-state-authority-to-arrest-immigrants","tag-expanding-state-authority-to-arrest-immigrants-attorney-urges-families-to-know-their-rights","tag-senate-bill-4","tag-senate-bill-4-in-texas","tag-texas","tag-texas-headlines","tag-texas-news","tag-texas-revives-sb-4"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/275951","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=275951"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/275951\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/275952"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=275951"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=275951"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=275951"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}