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For nearly a decade, Texas has battled New Mexico over its share of the waters of the Rio Grande. On October 25, the two states announced that they reached a long-awaited settlement in the lawsuit, Texas v. New Mexico and Colorado, No. 141 Original.

Though the settlement details are confidential, El Paso Matters reported that it was a “carve-out decree.” That means it resolves only the dispute between Texas and New Mexico, according to Jeffrey Wechsler, special assistant to the New Mexico Attorney General, not federal claims against New Mexico.

The Rio Grande flows nearly 2,000 miles from its headwaters in Colorado’s San Juan Mountains to its mouth near the border cities of Brownsville, Texas, and Matamoros, Tamaulipas, in Mexico. Over the last century, diversions for agriculture and cities such as Albuquerque and El Paso have strained the river. It regularly dries up for a stretch along the U.S.-Mexico border, and this year ran dry in Albuquerque as well.

The No. 141 Original lawsuit—which went directly to the Supreme Court, because it is a conflict between states—pertains to the 1938 Rio Grande Compact, which divided the waters between Texas, New Mexico and Colorado. It requires Colorado to deliver a proportion of the river’s flow, as determined by a system of stream gauges, to New Mexico. New Mexico then must deliver part of its portion to Elephant Butte Reservoir in the southern part of the state, where it is stored for use by the local Elephant Butte Irrigation District, by the city of Las Cruces, New Mexico, and by Texas and Mexico.

Texas initiated the lawsuit in 2013, when it accused New Mexico farmers downstream of the reservoir of depleting the river’s flow with groundwater pumping, thereby preventing Texas from receiving its fair share. But the case’s origins go even further back, to conflicts between local irrigation districts in southern New Mexico and West Texas that began in the 2000s.

The conflict is one of a long chain of water-related lawsuits involving the two states. In 2020, the U.S. Supreme Court sided with New Mexico in a separate lawsuit over the Pecos River. And New Mexico continues to battle with Texas over a pipeline rupture in El Paso that resulted in 1.1 billion gallons of sewage flowing into the Rio Grande.

These conflicts are likely to become even more common in the near future. Like the Colorado River, the Mississippi River and others, the Rio Grande is in dire straits; Elephant Butte Reservoir is currently at just 7% of capacity. Eugene White, a Montana water official who penned a 2020 article about Texas v. New Mexico, said in an email that the case signals a shift “in the court’s willingness to address some of the novel questions posed by interstate water compacts.” The fact that the Supreme Court is taking seriously conflict over a nearly 90-year-old water agreement may open the door for other reconsiderations.

Climate change is a major factor in these new conflicts. A 2013 study drawing on simulations of the Upper Rio Grande showed that decreasing water availability would make it impossible for New Mexico to meet its obligations to the Rio Grande Compact without water cutbacks. On the table in the lawsuit, then, was the question of who had to make sacrifices.

While Texas and New Mexico have come to an agreement over that question, the case isn’t over yet. The United States Bureau of Reclamation — which joined the lawsuit because the region’s irrigation infrastructure was constructed by the agency and because the case relates to federal treaties with Mexico — opposed the settlement because it doesn’t address the agency’s concerns, only the dispute between the states. The federal government must sign off on the agreement, however, so a hearing is scheduled for January 2023 to determine whether the settlement will go through.

The following timeline untangles the case’s confusing twists and turns:

2008: To resolve lawsuits between the Elephant Butte Irrigation District (in New Mexico) and the El Paso County Water Improvement District (in Texas), the two irrigation agencies and the Bureau of Reclamation signed an “Operating Agreement.” The agreement explained how to split water in Elephant Butte Reservoir, and the protocol for carrying over any excess year to year. Neither Texas nor New Mexico were included in the lawsuit.

2011-2012: New Mexico sued the U.S. and the Elephant Butte Irrigation District over the operating agreement which they said was based on “skewed” baseline numbers. They argued that the agreement shortchanged New Mexico and would result in less surface water for the Elephant Butte irrigation district, forcing farmers to rely on groundwater pumping. The lawsuit was put on hold when Texas sued New Mexico.

January 2013: Texas initiated its lawsuit against New Mexico. The case went directly to the U.S. Supreme Court, rather than being heard in lower courts first, because it involves water and a dispute between states. In January 2014, the court granted Texas’ motion to sue.

February 2014: The Bureau of Reclamation joined the case, siding with Texas. The agency claimed New Mexico’s groundwater pumping threatened both the inter-state Rio Grande Compact and the 1906 Rio Grande Convention with Mexico, which requires that the U.S. deliver 60,000 acre-feet of Rio Grande water to Mexico each year. The Elephant Butte Irrigation District and El Paso County Water Improvement District also tried to join the case, but the U.S. Supreme Court rejected those requests.

April 2014: New Mexico filed a motion to dismiss both Texas’ and the United States’ complaints, arguing that under the Rio Grande Compact, New Mexico’s only responsibility is to deliver water to the Elephant Butte Reservoir, not to ensure that it reaches Texas.

November 2014: The U.S. Supreme Court appointed a Special Master, a judge who oversees fact-finding and a trial in water cases to make recommendations to the court. (Only the Supreme Court can make the final decision in the case.) In 2018, the court dismissed this original judge and appointed and a new Special Master, Judge Michael Melloy.

May 2018: New Mexico filed counterclaims against Texas and the Bureau of Reclamation, stating that the state’s groundwater pumping was a result of poor accounting by the federal government that resulted in unfair allocations of the Rio Grande’s water.

October 2021: Farmers, irrigation districts, and federal, state and city agencies gave testimony. A scheduled second phase of hearings that would have included hydrologists’ testimony was postponed when the parties announced plans to settle the case.

July 2022: The U.S. 8th Circuit Court of Appeals postponed the planned October 2022 trial because a “settlement in principle“ had been reached.

September 2022: Because the parties had not reached a settlement by Sept. 23, the court set a trial date for January 2023.

October 2022: Texas and New Mexico announced that they had reached a settlement. However, the U.S. stated that the proposal violated the Rio Grande Compact and didn’t resolve the U.S.’ claims. The El Paso and Elephant Butte Irrigation Districts also opposed the settlement.

January 2023: A hearing is scheduled to determine whether the proposed settlement is legal.

Caroline Tracey is the Climate Justice Fellow at High Country News. Email her at[email protected] or submit aletter to the editor. See ourletters to the editor policy.

McALLEN, Texas (Border Report) — Migrant aid groups are concerned by reports that the Biden administration plans to expel to Mexico additional nationalities of asylum seekers under Title 42.

Reuters on Wednesday reported that Cubans, Nicaraguans and Haitians could be among migrants sent back to Mexico under Title 42, the public health policy that immediately expels asylum seekers who cross the border to prevent the spread of coronavirus.

Earlier this week, the U.S. Supreme Court decided not to lift Title 42 as courts consider a case brought by 19 states — including Texas — that want the Trump-era policy to remain.

In October, the Department of Homeland Security added Venezuelans to the list of asylum seekers who can be turned back under Title 42 — sending thousands south of the border to Mexico and creating camps of refugees living in tents and boxes up and down the Rio Grande.

That caused a significant drop in the number of asylum seekers legally released into migrant shelters in South Texas, where many Venezuelans typically had been helped.

Now migrant advocates fear that if these additional three nationalities are added to the expulsion list it will add to what they are calling “chaos” created by Title 42, and will result in more migrants waiting south of the border.

Over 3,000 migrants, many from Venezuela, currently are in a makeshift camp in Matamoros, Mexico, just south of Brownsville, Texas, hoping to cross the border to claim asylum if Title 42 lifts.

“Title 42 is an aberration in terms of border policy,” said Robyn Barnard, associate director for refugee advocacy for the nonprofit organization Human Rights First. “It’s done nothing but create chaos in terms of actual border management.”

Barnard was part of a video-conferencing call Thursday with a couple dozen migrant advocacy organizations from across the United States that are part of the Welcome With Dignity Campaign that want Title 42 to end. Many are legal aid groups that say refugees are being illegally denied their right by U.S. and international laws to cross the border and claim asylum.

“Asylum is for people who are fleeing harm and persecution. And so any program that requires a person to stay in their country past a certain date or a certain time free presumes they can stay in their country for several weeks — or months while that petition is pending in the U.S. — fundamentally fails to understand what asylum seekers are facing. They are fleeing harm and they cannot stay,” said Chelsea Sachau, an attorney for Florence Immigration and Refugee Rights Project, which helps asylum seekers in Arizona.

“Title 42 has forced desperate people to take extreme measures,” said Margaret Cargiolo of the Center for Gender and Refugee Studies.

Adding additional nationalities to those expelled under Title 42 would further compound the situation on the Southwest border, they say.

“It’s incredibly disturbing that the Biden administration is considering doubling down using Title 42 against other nationalities including Haitians, Cubans and Nicaraguans,” Barnard said.

“In the wake of this week’s Supreme Court decision, the Biden administration should be redoubling its efforts to end Title 42, not expanding the policy,” said Melissa Crow, director of litigation at the Center for Gender and Refugee Studies. “This move would go far beyond what any court has required, dispelling any pretense that this administration is interested in turning the page.”

This move would go far beyond what any court has required.”

Melissa Crow, Center for Gender and Refugee Studies

Border Report has asked the Department of Homeland Security if they plan to add these three groups to those expelled under Title 42, and if so, when. This story will be updated if the agency responds.

Over 163,000 Nicaraguans were encountered at the border in Fiscal Year 2022, according to data from U.S. Customs and Border Protection. Nicaraguans were the sixth-most group to be encountered on the border, just below Venezuelans, which topped 187,000 encounters.

Cubans were the third-largest group to arrive at the border and over 220,000 were encountered in Fiscal Year 2022, CBP reports.

A white paper published last week by the National Immigration Forum reiterated the “push and pull factors” driving migrants north, which include a history of acceptance by the United States for refugees.

“The U.S. is one of the safest countries in the hemisphere and has the most robust asylum system — it stands to reason those who simply cannot find protection elsewhere would attempt the journey to the U.S. southwest border,” according to the Forum’s report, “Alternative Pathways for Arrivals at the Border: A Holistic Response to Increasing Migration in the Western Hemisphere.”

The paper suggests the Biden administration add programs to increase the number of work visas available to asylum seekers, as well as special parole programs to legally allow more migrants to enter the United States.

Fourteen students at Algodones Elementary School were evaluated by hospital medical staff Monday after officials learned they had consumed cannabis-infused candy, Bernalillo Public Schools announced in a statement on its website.

Parents were notified about the incident, and all of the students were “stable,” the statement said.

The incident comes just three days after the state launched legal sales of recreational cannabis for adults 21 and older.

The school district, which oversees the elementary in nearby Algodones — a community of about 700 that lies 40 miles southwest of Santa Fe just off Interstate 25 — said in its statement one student brought THC-laden edibles to the school and shared them with others.

Superintendent Matthew Montaño said the district is investigating how the student obtained the “THC-infused candies” and if the student knew they were not meant for children.

He wasn’t sure of the ages or grade levels of the students who ingested the cannabis candy, he said.

“I think this is something that all schools in New Mexico are going to have to grapple with with,” Montaño said.

A student reported feeling ill around 1 p.m., which led to the discovery of the cannabis edibles, Montaño said, adding the kids were taken to a local hospital, where they were examined and then released.

A woman who answered the phone at Algodones Elementary School around 2:30 p.m. declined to comment.

Montaño shared an image of the candy discovered by school officials, which mimicked a colorful sour gummy roll commonly sold at candy shops.

“It is very clearly not meant to dissuade a child from thinking it is candy,” he said.

Kids ingesting cannabis edibles has become a more common occurrence as more states have legalized recreational cannabis. New Mexico was the 18th state to approve legalization last year.

The American Association of Poison Control Centers reported more than 3,100 children, the majority 5 and younger, were exposed to a THC-infused edible in 2020, compared to just 187 in 2016.

The number is likely to be higher, considering many people might not report such an incident.

States also have taken steps to deter children from accessing edibles, putting rules in place barring packaging that mimics popular candy brands and requiring explicit labeling.

A similar incident occurred in New Mexico in 2018, when a fifth grader at the Albuquerque School of Excellence accidentally shared a box of edible gummy candies with four other students. At that time, cannabis products were only legally sold to patients in the state’s Medical Cannabis Program.

Only one of the students reported feeling ill, while some said they were fine and others were “giggly,” according to an Albuquerque Journal report on the incident.

Montaño said his district already had planned to hold town hall events with residents on a variety of subjects and now intends to include a discussion on cannabis.

“We have to deal with this from a straightforward position,” Montaño said. “We have to be transparent.”

SAN DIEGO (Border Report) — Most Americans have probably never heard of Los Algodones, Mexico, which sits across the border just southwest of Yuma, Ariz.

But when it comes to dental care, a lot of people seem to know exactly where it is.

A recent survey conducted by Healthcare.com shows Los Algodones is one of the most popular foreign destinations for Americans seeking work on their teeth.

The same study suggests dental and medical care in Mexico could be a good alternative for people living in the U.S.

“It’s likely less costly, most of the time the quality of care is going to be as good and it’s a way to stretch your budget,” said Jeff Smedsrud, Co-founder of Healthcare.com. “There are significant savings opportunities, 20 to 50 to 70 percent, it’s absolutely to the benefit of consumers to consider traveling to a different country for different kinds of procedures.”

Smedsrud said many of the doctors providing care to Americans in Mexico were actually trained in the United States and apply the same medical standards found north of the border.

“It is important, too, to look at those credentials just in the same way you would if you had with any provider here at home,” he said.

Smedsrud says more and more Americans are heading south and numbers have picked up a lot since the beginning of the pandemic.

“Our mission is to help consumers make better choices about health care and better choices about health care financing and insurance plans, ignoring the rest of the world is not a good decision, we need to push the U.S. healthcare industry to say it’s not a monopoly, people have choices.”

And Smedsrud stated people who live along the southern border enjoy an advantage over people in the rest of the country, especially if their healthcare provider or Medicare are willing to pay for medical and dental procedures.

“Although Medicare typically doesn’t cover across the border, if the most appropriate and nearest facility is across the border, Medicare will make an exception and pay for those services. So in the middle of Minnesota, that’s probably not the nearest facility, in El Paso Texas, could be,” he said. “You have to look at what is the cost analysis; you’re saving $1,000 on a procedure, but may be incurring $500 in travel expenses and you may need to recuperate for a day or two outside the country, all that has to be balanced in order to make the right decision, but certainly worth exploring for consumers.”

Here are some of the findings in the study:

For a cost comparison of procedures between Mexico and the U.S., click here.

Sitting in a dentist's chair hardly rates as a vacation. But every year, tens of thousands of people go to a tiny border town near Yuma, Ariz., that has proclaimed itself the dental capital of Mexico.

Los Algodones is a virtual dental factory. Some 350 dentists work within a few blocks of downtown. Because of the low prices and fast service, most patients come for major work.

"Oh, boy, I had 22 crowns done, four root canals," says Brian Quade. He is still numb from the Novocain. His mouth is bloody. "Nine hours straight yesterday, and then today they did a deep-cleaning scaling, and tomorrow they're installing all the crowns."

What could possibly make those three jaw-dropping days appealing to this cabinetmaker from Seattle?

"It's $50,000 up there, about $5,000 down here," he says.

It's inexpensive; it averages two-thirds less than in the U.S. And it's quick. There are so many dental labs in town, it only takes a day or two to make a crown, a bridge, even dentures.

A long line of patients sit in the hallway of the Sani Dental Group clinic opposite a long line of exam rooms. Miguel Ibarreche — known to patients as Dr. Mike — runs the clinic's diagnostic department. He looks in patients' mouths, tells them what they need to have done and how much it will cost. The most common procedures patients get done here are implants and crowns, Ibarreche says.

He says dentistry is cheap here for some obvious reasons — inexpensive labor and real estate. He also says dentists in Mexico don't need to charge as much because they don't graduate with a lot of student debt. The government subsidizes many dentists' education.

"When we go out of school, we have to pay the government, but we do it by one year of free service, and that's it," Ibarreche says.

There's also no high-priced mandatory malpractice insurance as there is in the U.S.

Edmond Hewlett, a spokesman for the American Dental Association and a professor at UCLA, says Mexico has good dentists. But he warns potential patients to make sure they're getting a good one.

"My best advice is to plan very carefully ... and know what you are signing up for. What are the standards that are in place, say for regulation of the dentists in that country? What sort of safety guidelines are in place in the offices?" he says.

There are still some hawkers in the street as you enter Los Algodones who try to lure patients in, but not like decades ago when dentists began marketing to U.S. and Canadian patients. These days there are companies online that arrange trips.

That's how Ron Colvin came to Los Algodones. "Somebody told me about dental travel, and then research on the Internet and more research on the Internet and then more research on the Internet," Colvin says.

Colvin picked his dentist based on hundreds of online reviews. He came from Indiana for dentures. He just had his teeth pulled, and he's happy with how it went.

Most people who travel to Los Algodones need a lot of dental work. That makes the town both a destination for dental tourism — and a reminder to floss and brush so you can avoid the place.