Judge issues ruling that protects a migrant shelter that Texas sought to close

McALLEN, Texas -- A Texas justice ruled against the authorities lawyer wide connected Tuesday successful his effort to unopen down a migrant structure successful El Paso that helium claimed encourages amerciable migration.

Judge Francisco X. Dominguez successful El Paso ruled that Attorney General Ken Paxton's attempts to enforce a subpoena for records of migrants served astatine the Annunciation House violated the law rights of the shelter. His ruling prevents Paxton from seeking the records and protects the structure from what Dominguez “harassment and overreaching” by Paxton’s office.

Texas is expected to appeal.

State officials visited Annunciation House successful aboriginal February demanding contiguous entree to reappraisal records — including aesculapian and migration documents — of migrants who received services astatine the structure since 2022. Officials from Annunciation House, which oversees a web of shelters, said they were consenting to comply but needed clip to find what they could legally stock without violating their clients’ law rights.

Paxton alleged that that by providing structure to migrants careless of their ineligible status, Annunciation House was facilitating amerciable immigration, quality smuggling, and operating a stash house.

Investigators who sought to entree records the time aft requesting introduction were not allowed wrong the shelter. Jerry Wesevich, the lawyer representing Annunciation House, said that corporations nether the Constitution's Fourth Amendment are protected from unreasonable searches and seizures by the government.