Body found caught on Texas floating border barrier

Two bodies believed to be migrants trying to illegally cross into the US were found in the Rio Grande river in Texas Wednesday — one caught in the recently installed floating border barrier.

The gruesome discovery of the body caught in the buoy barrier in the middle of the river was made by the Texas Department of Public Safety Wednesday around 2:30 p.m. near Eagle Pass, Texas, according to the Mexican government.

Mexican officials said they were were working to retrieve the body and identify the person Thursday.

A second body was also found about three miles upstream away from the buoys, according to the Coahuila state prosecutor’s office in Mexico.

The controversial in-river barrier was erected by Republican governor Greg Abbott who claims it is a necessary measure to to secure the Southern Border and deter people from crossing into the US between established points of entry.

Others have criticzied the measure, claiming it is was placed on federal property without a permit, leading to a lawsuit filed to compel its removal.

“A disaster for Texas, an unmitigated disaster, and there will be more lawsuits. The question is — does Texas even have the right to have this barrier there?” A former Department of Justice official, speaking on condition of anonymity, told The Post, adding: “It’s game over for the state of Texas.”

The federal government sued the Lone Star State in July, trying to force Gov. Abbott to remove the barrier from the Rio Grande, which serves as the international boundary between Mexico and the US. Both the Mexican and US governments share control of the river.

“I will do whatever I have to do to defend our state from the invasion of the Mexican drug cartels and others who have tried to come into our country illegally, and I will protect our sovereignty,” the Republican Governor said after the lawsuit was filed.

The three-term governor insisted he has the legal right to defend Texas‘ borders.

The buoy barrier, installed in July, has been the target of criticism by human rights’ organizations who predicted migrants would die while attempting to cross the river because of it.

Anyone trying to go over it would either have to swim a foot underneath the water and through the barrier, which is tied to the riverbed to get underneath it or attempt to scale over its rounded and slippery structure, Texas DPS previously told The Post.

“Most [migrants], they don’t want to go under water, they’re trying to scale over, like a wall,” spokesman Lt. Chris Olivarez explained.

“Especially with children, I think it’s going to be most effective with families who are trying to come across. Across the board, we want to prevent people from crossing the river in the first place.”

However, the federal lawsuit is largely based on a technicality since the state of Texas never went to the International Boundary and Water Commission, the federal agency in charge of the US half of the Rio Grande, to get a permit for the barrier.

“It’s very much a straight-forward permitting compliant; you need a permit from the federal government and that wasn’t obtained here,” explained George Washington Legal Expert Cori Alonso-Yoder. “It’s really kind of a vanilla complaint.”

The former DOJ official said boiling it down to a permitting issue is “classic lawyering” by the federal government in an effort to easily win the case, instead of making it about immigration or state versus federal authority.

The lawsuit, which was filed in the liberal city of Austin, not on the border in the federal court closest to the barrier, is also a tactic designed to favor the federal government, according to legal experts.

“The case almost will inevitably go to (Federal Judge) Robert Pittman,” said the former DOJ official. “He was appointed by Obama and has smacked the State of Texas down numerous times on border and culture-war types of issues.”

“File in the place you’re going to win. Anyone who says that judges don’t make decisions on politics on their own personal view of the world and only follows the law is lying.”

After the discovery of the two bodies, the federal government could now request an emergency order, asking the Austin judge to have the barrier removed more quickly, the DOJ official predicted.

Neither the Texas Department of Public Safety or the governor’s office immediately responded to The Post’s request for comment.