Texas unveiled its newly acquired border ranch – offered as the site of detention facilities to help the Trump administration with proposed mass deportations — and Texas Land Commissioner Dawn Buckingham said Tuesday the state is looking to identify additional land to aid the federal effort.
The General Land Office has more than 13 million acres of land under its jurisdiction, Buckingham said.
“If the Trump administration thinks it’ll be helpful, we want to be good partners with them,” she said.
The effort, known as the Jocelyn Initiative, is named for Jocelyn Nungaray, a 12-year-old Houston girl who was killed in June. Two Venezuelan immigrants who were in the country illegally have been charged with murder and sexual assault.
“We will continue to fight to ensure that our state remains a beacon of hope, justice and dignity for all who call Texas home,” Buckingham said.
In an interview with The Dallas Morning News, Buckingham said her agency is not looking to buy additional land and added she wants to be supportive of the incoming Trump administration.
Buckingham, a former state senator whose agency manages state land, introduced the news media to the 1,402-acre ranch purchased in October for $3.82 million, according to a purchasing agreement obtained by The News. She stood before a portion of border wall the state is building on the property.
Buckingham said her agency bought the ranch after the previous owner refused to let the state build its border wall on the property. Buckingham criticized the former landowner Tuesday, saying her decision to block the border wall contributed to drug trafficking and illegal crossings into Texas.
Andrea Kate Sheerin, who sold the ranch to the state, declined to comment when reached via text message Tuesday morning.
The Starr County ranch is on the outskirts of Rio Grande City, a town of about 15,000 people 40 miles west of McAllen.
About a dozen Texas House lawmakers – including Rep. Ryan Guillen, R-Rio Grande City – and U.S. Rep. Chip Roy of Austin joined Buckingham at the news conference.
Buckingham said the 1.5-mile section of wall, being built about one mile inland from the Rio Grande, is expected to be finished in the next week as part of Operation Lone Star, Abbott’s immigration crackdown.
Trump’s incoming border czar, Tom Homan, said on Laura Ingraham’s Fox News show last week that the administration “absolutely will” use the ranchland for detention facilities. He did not specify whether facilities to process migrants would be permanent or temporary, such as tents.
Tuesday afternoon, Homan and Abbott greeted and served Thanksgiving meals to Texas National Guard soldiers and DPS troopers stationed in Edinburg, about 50 miles east of Rio Grande City.
Abbott praised the soldiers and troopers for assisting with immigration operations, portraying the border situation under the Biden administration as an “unprecedented threat.”
“This mission that you’re on right now is on your homeland, a mission on your homeland to preserve the safety and sovereignty and security of your very own state, of your very own country, of a threat that’s not on some foreign land but a threat on your very own border,” Abbott said.
