Federal judge blocks Texas SB 4 reentry and deportation provisions

U.S. District Judge David Ezra issued a 78-page preliminary injunction on May 14, 2026, blocking two central provisions of Texas Senate Bill 4 one day before the law took effect. Ezra, a Reagan appointee who has served on the District of Hawaii since 1988, has been designated to the Western District of Texas since 2013.

The blocked provisions include the state reentry crime and the authority for state magistrates to issue deportation orders. The illegal entry provision, which lets police arrest anyone suspected of crossing the border without authorization for the first time, wasn't part of the challenge and took effect May 15.

Ezra grounded the ruling in the Supremacy Clause, writing that SB 4 conflicts with federal immigration law because it gives state officials power to enforce federal law without federal supervision. He wrote that Congress created a statutory scheme to ensure federal immigration law operates under federal officials' watch uniformly across all 50 states.

The judge compared SB 4 to Arizona's SB 1070, struck down by the Supreme Court in Arizona v. United States (2012). That 5-4 ruling held that states can't create their own parallel immigration enforcement systems, even when those systems mirror federal law.

The Texas Legislature passed SB 4 in November 2023 during a special session called by Gov. Greg Abbott. The law created four provisions: a state misdemeanor for illegal entry (up to 180 days, $2,000 fine), a state crime for illegal reentry (up to one year, $4,000 fine), authority for state magistrates to order deportations, and a crime for refusing to comply with a state deportation order (2 to 20 years).

Abbott signed the law arguing Texas had the right to defend itself from what he called an invasion at the southern border. The reentry provision applied even to people who had since obtained lawful immigration status, including green card holders.

The ACLU of Texas, ACLU, and Texas Civil Rights Project filed the class-action lawsuit on May 4, 2026, just 10 days after the Fifth Circuit cleared the way for enforcement. Two anonymous Honduran immigrants serve as lead plaintiffs.

One plaintiff is a 59-year-old father with a green card who faces prosecution under the reentry provision because he previously reentered after being deported. The second plaintiff holds a U Visa, obtained after becoming a crime victim and helping law enforcement. Both face criminal charges under SB 4 despite their current lawful status.

The class action represents all noncitizens who entered, tried to enter, or are present in Texas after previously being denied admission or deported. The ACLU called SB 4 one of the most extreme anti-immigrant laws ever passed by any state legislature.

Civil rights groups argued the law would cause widespread racial profiling. Four out of 10 Texans are Latino, and enforcement critics said SB 4 places a cloud of suspicion on nearly half the state's population.

The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals set the stage for this ruling on April 24, 2026, when it voted 10-7 en banc to vacate a prior preliminary injunction that had blocked SB 4 for years. The appeals court didn't rule on the law's constitutionality. Instead, it held that the original plaintiffs lacked Article III standing under the Supreme Court's 2024 ruling in FDA v. Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine.

The original lawsuit, Las Americas Immigrant Advocacy Center et al v. Steven C. McCraw, involved nonprofit organizations and El Paso County. The Fifth Circuit's July 2025 three-judge panel had found standing and held SB 4 preempted by federal law, but the en banc court reversed that finding.

Attorney General Ken Paxton claimed the Fifth Circuit's April 24 decision as a major victory. He had petitioned for en banc rehearing to defend what his office called Texas's ability to arrest and punish people in the country illegally.

Gov. Abbott responded to Ezra's May 14 ruling by vowing to appeal immediately, calling it a fight to protect the state from what he characterized as a border crisis. The appeal will return the case to the Fifth Circuit, where the law's constitutionality could finally be decided on the merits.

The Congressional Research Service analyzed SB 4's four provisions in report LSB11330, finding preemption concerns under both field preemption and conflict preemption doctrines. Field preemption applies when a pervasive federal regulatory scheme implicitly bars supplementary state regulation. Conflict preemption applies when state law poses an obstacle to federal goals.

The CRS report noted that SB 4's removal provisions intrude into a sensitive area of foreign affairs. Mexico's government filed concerns that the law would lead to discriminatory enforcement and improper harassment, detention, and criminalization of Mexican citizens.

During the May 13 hearing, Ezra signaled his view that the challenged provisions were unconstitutional. He noted that state magistrates, who don't know the intricacies of immigration law, would be issuing deportation orders under SB 4. The law required magistrates to continue prosecutions even when defendants had pending federal immigration cases.

Ezra's ruling creates a split between the preliminary injunction in the Western District and the Fifth Circuit's standing analysis. The case could eventually reach the Supreme Court, which hasn't ruled on whether states can create their own deportation systems since Arizona v. United States in 2012.

The Texas Police Chiefs Association opposed SB 4 when it moved through the Legislature, warning it creates a dangerous environment by requiring officers to racially profile residents. El Paso County officials argued the law would divert local law enforcement from focusing on actual crimes to performing federal immigration duties.

The El Paso Matters investigation found that SB 4 would burden border communities most, where resources are already stretched thin. The law's financial impact falls on county and municipal governments that would bear prosecution, incarceration, and defense costs without federal funding.