Bill Text: TX HB1491 | 2025-2026 | 89th Legislature | Introduced

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Bill Title: Relating to agreements between counties and United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement to enforce federal immigration law.

Spectrum: Partisan Bill (Republican 1-0)

Status: (Introduced) 2024-12-03 - Filed [HB1491 Detail]

Download: Texas-2025-HB1491-Introduced.html

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89R5077 MP-D
By: Schatzline H.B. No. 1491

A BILL TO BE ENTITLED
AN ACT
relating to agreements between counties and United States
Immigration and Customs Enforcement to enforce federal immigration
law.
BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:
SECTION 1. Subchapter Z, Chapter 351, Local Government
Code, is amended by adding Section 351.905 to read as follows:
Sec. 351.905. IMMIGRATION LAW ENFORCEMENT AGREEMENTS;
INJUNCTION; DENIAL OF STATE GRANT FUNDS. (a) The commissioners
court of each county shall request and, as offered, enter into a
written agreement with United States Immigration and Customs
Enforcement under Section 287(g), Immigration and Nationality Act
(8 U.S.C. Section 1357(g)), to authorize officers and employees of
the county to enforce federal immigration law.
(b) An agreement entered into under this section must
include the scope, duration, and limitations of the authority.
(c) The attorney general may bring an action against a
county that fails to comply with Subsection (a) in a district court
in Travis County for appropriate injunctive relief.
(d) The attorney general may recover reasonable expenses
incurred in obtaining relief under Subsection (c), including court
costs, reasonable attorney's fees, investigative costs, witness
fees, and deposition costs.
(e) A county may not receive state grant funds, and state
grant funds for the county shall be denied, for the state fiscal
year following the year in which a final judicial determination in
an action brought under Subsection (c) is made that the county has
failed to comply with Subsection (a).
(f) The comptroller shall adopt rules to implement
Subsection (e) uniformly among the state agencies from which state
grant funds are distributed to a county.
SECTION 2. As soon as practicable after the effective date
of this Act, the commissioners court of each county shall comply
with Section 351.905, Local Government Code, as added by this Act.
SECTION 3. This Act takes effect immediately if it receives
a vote of two-thirds of all the members elected to each house, as
provided by Section 39, Article III, Texas Constitution. If this
Act does not receive the vote necessary for immediate effect, this
Act takes effect September 1, 2025.