AUSTIN, Texas -- Texas Gov. Greg Abbott on Friday repealed his immigration order that backed up commercial trucks at the U.S.-Mexico border, after a week of intensifying backlash and fears of deepening economic losses.
The Republican governor dropped the new rules that had required all commercial trucks from Mexico to undergo extra inspections to curb the flow of migrants and drugs and had ratcheted up a dispute with the Biden administration over immigration policy.
Some truckers reported waiting more than 30 hours to cross the border. Others blocked one of the world's busiest trade bridges in protest.
Abbott, who is up for reelection in November and has made the border his top issue, fully lifted the inspections after reaching agreements with neighboring Mexican states that he says represent new commitments to border security. The last one was signed Friday with the governor of Tamaulipas, who this week said the inspections were overzealous and created havoc.
When Abbott first ordered the inspections, he did not say that lifting them was conditional on such arrangements with Mexico.
But pressure on Abbott was building as gridlock on the border worsened and frustration mounted. The American Trucking Association called the inspections "wholly flawed, redundant and adding considerable weight on an already strained supply chain."
The U.S.-Mexico border is crucial to the U.S. economy, and more of it is in Texas -- roughly 1,200 miles -- than any other state. The United States last year imported $390.7 billion worth of goods from Mexico, second only to China.
Abbott began the inspections after the Biden administration said pandemic-related restrictions on claiming asylum at the border would be lifted May 23.
The governor called the inspections a "zero tolerance policy for unsafe vehicles" smuggling migrants. He said Texas would take several steps in response to the end of the asylum restrictions, which is expected to lead to an increase in migrants coming to the border.
State troopers inspected more than 6,000 commercial vehicles over the past week, according to the Texas Department of Public Safety. Nearly 1 in 4 trucks was pulled off the road for what the agency described as serious violations that included defective tires and brakes.
The agency made no mention of the inspections turning up migrants or drugs.
The White House, the Mexican government, trade groups and businesses all bashed the extra inspections as redundant and a burden on a fragile supply chain.
A deal with Gov. Maria Campos Galvan of Chihuahua state, who joined Abbott for the announcement in the Texas Capitol on Thursday, set in motion the relief for traffic that has snarled the Texas-Mexico border and raised warnings of higher prices for U.S. shoppers and emptier grocery store shelves.
In an effort to ease the commercial traffic backlog, U.S. Customs and Border Protection in El Paso, in coordination with Mexican counterparts, planned to keep ports open later in the day on Good Friday, a day when they normally close at noon. Ports with commercial lanes were to remain open until midnight and will be open today on the holiday weekend when they are normally closed.
Some Mexican commentators and analysts have watched with "shock" as the Mexican governors fell in line with Abbott, said Javier Garza, a journalist and radio commentator in the state of Coahuila.
"Abbott is one of the main creators of the climate of fear of undocumented migrants for electoral gain," he said. "It's a shame he can affect the economies of both countries just to get votes. If a Mexican politician were doing this, he'd be on fire."
The agreements between Abbott and Mexico's governors have varied.
Nuevo Leon Gov. Samuel Garcia had told Abbott that his state would put in place checkpoints and policing. For Chihuahua, Galvan provided a security plan that she said was in the "implementation stage" and includes agreements to share intelligence captured by security cameras and other technology. Abbott also announced a similar agreement with the governor of Coahulia state.
Texas Agriculture Commissioner Sid Miller, a Republican who urged Abbott to walk back the inspections order, said Thursday that one major agricultural company told him that 100 trucks sent to Mexico for deliveries had been unable to come back across because of the congestion.
He questioned what the holdout achieved, and in the case of Abbott's agreement with Nuevo Leon, he said it did not appear substantive.
"They're just basically going to leave it up in good faith," Miller said. "There's no enforcement, no reckoning on that if they don't."
The economic fallout from border-crossing delays worsened late in the week, with some companies saying they weren't able to fulfill orders because trucks were stuck in multi-mile backups at a number of entry points.
Little Bear Produce is a Texas-based grower-packer-shipper, farming 6,000 acres in Texas and supplementing its inventory with Mexican-grown produce so it can be a year-round supplier to major grocery chains such as Wegmans, H-E-B, Publix, Albertsons and Kroger.
Bret Erickson, senior vice president of business affairs for Little Bear, said the added inspections have cost the company "hundreds of thousands of dollars" already, not to mention the reduced paychecks for many loaders who have had no work as trucks fail to show up.
"This has directly impacted our business since late last week. We would typically be receiving 10 to 12 loads of watermelon per day from Mexico, as well as different kinds of herbs and greens. Since the middle of last week, we have received zero of those shipments of watermelon," Erickson said. That means the company did not meet its business obligations with major retailers, which have in turn had to find Mexican melons from farther away, such as from Arizona. Added distance means added fuel costs.
"We all know the cost of fuel these days is outrageous. Ultimately, it means consumers will bear the brunt of that increased cost," Erickson said, adding that reduced supply also drives up prices.
"As a Texas business, we were really confused and disappointed by this decision by Gov. Abbott, in a state that touts itself as business-friendly," he said. "This was a direct hit to Texas businesses, businesses that are already facing increasing costs in fuel, fertilizer, labor and packaging."
The border inspections came at a time when U.S. supply chains are already overwhelmed. A surge in demand from customers -- the result of a surprisingly fast recovery from the coronavirus recession of 2020 -- caught businesses by surprise and led to bottlenecks at factories, ports and freight yards. It's also pushed up prices, contributing to the highest inflation in 40 years.
Covid-related factory shutdowns in China and the rocketing cost of shipping goods across the Pacific Ocean have many companies looking to Mexico, where there's no ocean to cross and there's relief from the political and trade disputes between Washington and Beijing.
"A lot of companies, right now, they're looking at Mexico as a way to bypass ocean dependency," said Bindiya Vakil, CEO of the supply chain consultancy Resilnc. "If I'm one of those companies, I'm looking at this new regulation on the Texas border and I'm really concerned because this means additional delays, and that was supposed to be my solution -- to go to Mexico and avoid the ocean altogether."
Meanwhile, as the inspections taper off in Texas, Abbott says he will continue a program to recruit volunteer migrants to take buses to Washington, D.C., calling it a message to President Joe Biden. "If he's not going to come to the border, we're going to take the border to him," Abbott said.
U.S. Customs and Border Protection Commissioner Chris Magnus said Thursday that Abbott was moving migrants without "adequately coordinating" with the federal government. The first bus arrived Wednesday, and Abbott said more are on the way.
Information for this article was contributed by Acacia Coronado, Paul J. Weber, Paul Wiseman, Maria Verza and Elliot Spagat of The Associated Press; by Laura Reiley and Kevin Sieff of The Washington Post; and by Alfredo Corchado, Allie Morris and Dianne Solis of the Dallas Morning News.