A federal judge on Thursday blocked a Texas law that would have empowered local and state law enforcement to arrest and deport illegal immigrants who cross the Southern border into the U.S.

The legislation, signed by Governor Greg Abbott in December, was set to take effect March 5. However, U.S. district judge David Ezra ruled that Senate Bill 4 violated the Constitution and prior legal precedent that gives the federal government the sole authority to enforce immigration laws and policies.

“To allow Texas to permanently supersede federal directives on the basis of an invasion would amount to nullification of federal law and authority — a notion that is antithetical to the Constitution and has been unequivocally rejected by federal courts since the Civil War,” the judge wrote in his order.

Ezra also rejected Texas’s claims that the record surge in immigration constitutes an “invasion” under Article IV of the Constitution.