Republican Louisiana Attorney General Liz Murrill is suing Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas and various security agencies after an illegal immigrant entered the state with a rare, drug-resistant form of tuberculosis.
Governor Jeff Landry joined Murrill on Wednesday to allege U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officials shuttled the infected Chinese national around in detention, putting them in contact with at least 200 other detainees and staff.
The lawsuit specifically names Mayorkas and claims “through his official capacity” as security secretary he allegedly allowed the peripatetic detainee to be shared around ICE facilities.
The New York Post reports the lawsuit seeks to prevent federal immigration officials from releasing “potentially infected detainees” that came in contact with the Chinese national – who has a “rare, aggressive, and drug-resistant form of tuberculosis which carries high mortality rates” – while she was in the custody of immigration and Customs Enforcement.
“ICE has announced its intent to release potentially infected detainees from its two contract facilities [in Louisiana] — without being medically cleared by the Louisiana Department of Health — if an order requires release,” the complaint states.
“By ICE’s telling, its hands are tied once its immigration-based detention authority runs out,” the lawsuit continues, warning that migrants who may have contracted the disease will be released “onto Louisiana streets, its bus stations, and its airports.”
“This is utterly wrong,” Murrill argues, per the Post report. “The Surgeon General’s standing orders require detainees at the two facilities in question to be held unless and until they are medically cleared by the Louisiana Department of Health.”
“That is a quintessential exercise of the State’s sovereign prerogatives, the exercise of its police powers, and its obligation to protect the public health within its borders,” she adds, noting that the two facilities where the infected migrant was held are not owned by ICE.
The Chinese citizen crossed illegally into California through the southern border in July, the lawsuit states. She was later flown with 100 other detainees to Alexandria, Louisiana. She was then bussed to another facility with more detainees.
Murrill estimates over 200 detainees and “untold numbers of non-detainees” may have been exposed to the disease as the TB-infected migrant.
She added there was no indication the public was now in any immediate danger.
The lawsuit against Mayorkas is ongoing in federal court.
