TRANS PECOS — Last Thursday, the United States Northern Command (USNORTHCOM) announced that a second “National Defense Area” — land transferred to the Department of Defense for the purpose of border law enforcement — had been established in Texas. The Texas Tribune reported that the area is about 53 miles long, stretching from the Texas-New Mexico state line near El Paso to Fort Hancock.
The administration had been teasing the program’s expansion into Texas for a few weeks after transferring the “Roosevelt Reservation,” a 60-foot-wide strip of federally-owned land along the border in California, Arizona and New Mexico to the Department of Defense. Some observers believe the move allows the government to push the boundaries of the Posse Comitatus Act, which prohibits the military from enforcing civilian law.
Eighty-two people have been arrested in New Mexico already under the new regulations, and the courts are having difficulty keeping up. One federal judge asked the Department of Justice for more information on how to prosecute the offenses, given “the scarcity of case law relating to these offenses, particularly given the unprecedented nature of prosecuting such offenses … leaves the Court unclear.”