Gov. Greg Abbott announced that $38.4 million from his Public Safety Office will be awarded to Operation Lone Star, which will go to law enforcement, jail operations and court activity in Texas.
According to a release, the Public Safety Office has award $74.8 million to cities and counties near the Mexico border since it was created in 2021. Of the $38.4 million in additional funding, $19.5 million will go to purchasing and upgrading law enforcement equipment, $16 million will go toward the salaries of public servants and $1.9 million will improve emergency communication and jail facilities. There will also be $800,000 in travel costs associated with the non-border counties providing law enforcement assistance.
“From deterring illegal immigration, to preventing the smuggling of drugs and weapons, to curtailing human trafficking, the deployment of resources and personnel needed to arrest and jail criminals along the border is imperative to our comprehensive border security strategy under Operation Lone Star,” Abbott said. “This additional funding will strengthen our response to the border crisis and ensure our law enforcement and local partners have the resources they need to keep our communities safe in the federal government’s absence.”
The funding is part of Abbott’s directive to fund Operation Lone Star in a variety of ways. This includes 31 awards totaling $22.3 million for border prosecution projects as well as 12 awards of $14 million to enhance border security functions. One round of that funding was for border adjacent counties with local disaster declarations. There was also an award of $100,000 for training technical assistance and coordination for planning for border sheriffs.
The website for the governor’s office notes before approving new funding for Operation Lone Star, Abbott signed laws providing $3 billion in border security funding, deployed thousands of Public Safety Department troops and soldiers from the national guard and also signed nine separate laws specifically cracking down on human trafficking throughout Texas.
According to a 2016 report from the University of Texas at Austin, there are 78,996 minor and youth victims of human trafficking and 234,457 victims of labor trafficking in Texas at any given time, totaling 313,453 victims of human trafficking.
