Tennessee National Guard troops will, once again, be sent to the Texas border on orders of Tennessee Governor Bill Lee.
Lee sent 300 troops to the Texas border in early July “in quelling the most severe border crisis we’ve seen in 20 years.” It was unclear even after the visit what the Tennessee troops actually did. At the time, Lee said they aided law enforcement officials there to “evaluate needs in securing the border.”
Critics called that trip political theater to reinforce a crisis narrative on the border. Lee and other Republican governors sent the troops at the behest of Texas Governor Greg Abbott who claimed, “open-border policies have led to a humanitarian crisis at our southern border as record levels of illegal immigrants, drugs, and contraband pour into Texas.”
This time, Lee is ordering about 50 guard members to the border to curb “a surging drug crisis.” But the crisis can wait until the holidays are over, apparently. The troops won’t be sent to the border until early 2022.
“An open border has far-reaching consequences that are fueling a drug crisis impacting both our national security and the safety of our state,” Lee said in a statement. “I have authorized additional Tennessee Guard support at our Southern border as we look to address drug trafficking at the source.”
For the move, Lee made a connection between border drugs and Tennessee overdose deaths. In the statement, he called fentanyl and methamphetamine the “leading drivers of drug overdose.” So far this year, U.S. Customs and Border Protection have seized more than 200,000 pounds of the drugs. Lee said Tennessee recorded over 3,000 drug overdose deaths in 2020, which was a 45 percent increase from the previous year.
Danny Day