Texas Gov. Greg Abbott is encouraging citizens to report possible birth tourism to the Texas Health and Human Services department. Credit: Wikimedia Commons / Gage Skidmore

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott has pledged to crack down on “birth tourism” after a right-wing blog reported on a mysterious website advertising “birth packages” to foreigners wanting to have their children in the Lone Star State.

The Health and Human Services Commission has since referred the matter to Attorney General Ken Paxton’s Office.

“This conduct is detrimental to the public interest and may violate both state and federal law,” HHSC Chief Counsel Karen Ray wrote in a letter to Paxton, a Republican Abbott ally.

Despite a rise in right-wing pearl clutching about “birth tourism,” nonpartisan think tank the Migration Policy Institute noted in an April report that well below 1% of all births in the U.S. annually can be attributed to the practice. The issue has garnered “outsized public attention and legal scrutiny,” the group added.

Even so, following the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision to uphold birthright citizenship, conservative blog Current Revolt published a story about a website called “havemybabyintexas.com,” which purportedly ran billboards in Mexico advertising “birth packages in South Texas.”

Havemybabyintexas.com reportedly directed visitors to services at two South Texas hospitals where Mexican nationals could give birth, allowing their children to obtain U.S. citizenship.

The website has since been taken down, but that didn’t stop Abbott prompting HHSC to look into the right-wing media outlet’s report.

“Regardless of what the Supreme Court of the United States may have said, U.S. citizenship is not for sale in Texas,” Abbott said in a statement. “Texas will not tolerate the exploitation of our healthcare system as a pathway to skirt federal immigration laws.”

Paxton, who’s running a tight U.S. Senate race against State Rep. James Talarico, a Democrat, hasn’t yet said whether his office plans to investigate the matter.

Abbott’s office encourages people with information on possible birth tourism schemes to report it to the HHSC Office of the Inspector General.

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Michael Karlis is a multimedia journalist at the San Antonio Current, whose coverage in print and on social media focuses on local and state politics. He is a graduate of American University in Washington,...