Texas sues Catholic NGO for "human trafficking"

THE ACCUSED | Father Rubén García, director of Annunciation House, has a 43-year history of caring for migrants in El Paso, Texas, a border city with Chihuahua. (Picture/Morgan Smith – El Comercio de Colorado)

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Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton filed a lawsuit against the Catholic NGO, Annunciation House, which operates a shelter on the U.S. southern border. The organization and its director were accused of “human trafficking” and promoting “illegal entry” into the country. In the lawsuit filed in a district court in the city of El Paso, the Texas Attorney General’s Office requested the revocation of Annunciation House’s license for allegedly “violating the law.”

“The chaos on the southern border has created an environment in which NGOs, funded with taxpayer money given to them by the Biden administration, facilitate incredible horrors, including human trafficking,” emphasized Prosecutor Paxton, an ultraconservative close to former President Trump. Specifically, the Texas Attorney General’s Office argues in the lawsuit that the organization provides shelter to people who irregularly crossed the border.

Paxton, in turn, accuses Annunciation House of promoting human trafficking by transporting people from one site in the city to another in vans, once or twice a week. The prosecutor alleges that Annunciation House did not provide the requested documents to the attorney general’s office for an inspection of the NGO’s operations and to find “possible legal violations.”

CASA DEL REFUGIADO (2019-2022)| It provided services for migrants recently released from ICE detention with permission to travel within the EEUU.

The priest speaks

The director’s director, Father Rubén García, described the lawsuit organization as “illegal and immoral.” García pointed out that the attempts by the Texas prosecutor to revoke the organization’s license “have no basis.” The prosecutor “has made it clear that he considers it a crime for a Catholic organization to shelter refugees,” emphasized the priest, explaining that his work is based on the religious principle of “welcoming the neighbor.”

“Our work is essential for the city of El Paso (…) we have provided shelter to hundreds of thousands of refugees passing through our city and have given them food,” García emphasized.

The priest also explained that the attorney general requested many documents overnight and “without explanation,” so his organization asked the court to decide exactly which material they can access and under what criteria.

García has a 43-year history leading humanitarian organizations. As the leader of Annunciation House, this priest oversaw the “Casa del Refugiado”, which operated between 2019 and 2022 and received 3,000 migrants weekly. This became the largest private shelter in the U.S. García managed to establish three other migrant facilities in El Paso, which are still operating. Another establishment led by him is in Juarez.