Texas Governor Bolsters Border, and His Profile

AUSTIN, Tex. — Gov. Rick Perry of Texas on Monday ordered 1,000 National Guard troops to the border with Mexico, seizing on a get-tough immigration message that foreshadows the approach to the current crisis by his party in Congress and that could position him in another bid for the Republican presidential nomination.

Mr. Perry announced the move at the Texas Capitol, but many of the intended recipients were far away from here: members of Congress in Washington, including those who are fighting with President Obama; potential migrants in Central America who are contemplating a dangerous journey to the United States; and presidential caucus voters in Iowa, where Mr. Perry visited again over the weekend.

Tens of thousands of Central Americans fleeing violence in Guatemala, El Salvador and Honduras have tried to cross Texas’ 1,200-mile border with Mexico in recent months. The influx of immigrants entering the country illegally, many of them unaccompanied children and teenagers, has left federal officials scrambling to find emergency shelters to house them and to manage what President Obama has called a humanitarian crisis.

Mr. Perry and other state officials said Monday that the National Guard would begin mobilizing throughout the next 30 days, conduct ground and air operations once at the border, and partner with local and state law enforcement officials, acting as a so-called force multiplier.

He said criminal organizations were benefiting from the diversion of resources to deal with the wave of Central American immigration, and so more security was needed. The cost of deploying the National Guard was estimated at $12 million a month, a bill that he and other Texas Republicans vowed to send to the federal government.

“Drug cartels, human traffickers and individual criminals are exploiting this tragedy for their own criminal opportunities,” Mr. Perry said, adding, “I will not stand idly by while our citizens are under assault, and little children from Central America are detained in squalor.”

His action reflected a debate on Capitol Hill, where lawmakers are considering the president’s request for $3.7 billion to add resources along the border to respond to the arrival of the Central American migrants. Republicans have argued that the crisis was of Mr. Obama’s own making. They have also floated the idea that an increased National Guard presence at the border would be part of any legislation they approved.

Speaker John A. Boehner has repeatedly urged Mr. Obama to deploy the National Guard to the Texas-Mexico border. “The National Guard is uniquely qualified to respond to such humanitarian crises,” he wrote in a letter to the president last month.

Mr. Perry’s response to the crisis is also intended for the audience in Texas, where border issues have long been central to state politics.

Greg Abbott, the state attorney general and Republican candidate to replace Mr. Perry next year, appeared with the governor and said his office was prepared to fight the federal government in court to defend the governor’s activation of the National Guard.

Wendy Davis, the Democratic candidate for governor, on Monday repeated her call for Mr. Perry to open an emergency session of the State Legislature to consider sending additional sheriff’s deputies to the border instead of National Guard troops.

“If the federal government won’t act, Texas must and will,” Ms. Davis said in a statement.

After 13 years as governor, Mr. Perry is contemplating another run for the presidency in 2016, and he has sought to raise his national profile. His weekend trip to Iowa, the site of the nation’s first presidential contest, was his fourth in eight months. And he used a meeting nearly two weeks ago with Mr. Obama to demand more action from the federal government to confront the surge of migrants.

By seeking more military resources at the border, Mr. Perry may also be trying to repair his standing among some conservatives who had expressed doubts about his willingness to be tough on immigration. During a Republican presidential debate in 2012, the Texas governor defended in-state tuition for immigrants in the country illegally and said of those who disagreed: “I don’t think you have a heart.”

That comment earned Mr. Perry scorn among some Republican primary voters. But it also represented what might have turned into a strength in a general election contest for the White House: his ability to attract Hispanic voters. Many analysts argue that if Republicans do not figure out how to attract more Hispanic voters, the party will not recapture the Oval Office.