Greg Abbott will also face the same hurdles as Bush, Trump to build a border wall

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In 2006, President George W. Bush signed the Secure Fence Act that led to the construction of 654 miles of fence over nine years on the U.S.-Mexico border. President Donald Trump is even more ambitious, promising in campaign speeches that Mexico will pay for a wall along the 2,000-mile border.

Ultimately, the Trump administration built nearly 80 miles of new barriers before he left office, including 21 on the Texas-Mexico border, paid for by the U.S. government. Now, Gov. Greg Abbott, a Trump supporter who has heightened his immigration rhetoric in recent years, has taken the high ground of building a wall along the 1,200-mile Texas-Mexico border.

Currently, there are 111 miles of completed barrier on the Texas-Mexico border. Because border barriers are usually built some distance from the Rio Grande, which has many bends and curves, it is not clear how many miles of barrier is needed to cover the entire border.

Abbott did not detail how many miles of the barrier the state plans to build or exactly where. But to fulfill that promise, the governors ’first major hurdle was money. The state has set aside at least $ 250 million for the effort, Abbott said, and then solicited donations from the public. As of July 14, people had donated $ 829,000.

That would fund between 7 and 62 miles of barrier, based on the per-mile costs of contracts initiated by the Trump administration, according to an analysis in the Texas Tribune. The contracts, awaited by the Biden administration, range from $ 4 million to $ 34 million per mile for the construction of the wall.

Beyond the funding challenge, Abbott should expect long-standing legal challenges and opposition from private landowners, environmentists and border residents that could delay or derail his plan for a wall, he said. of experts, lawyers and advocates.

But the biggest hurdle he will face is the federal government, which is unlikely to give up any federal land or private land seized by the Trump administration in Texas for the construction of the wall. On his first day in office, President Biden issued an executive order calling the border wall a waste of money and saying it was not a serious policy solution. His order also halted 173 miles of border construction previously approved by the Trump administration.

I think Governor Abbott was serious about his intention to build a boundary wall. I don’t think they took the steps necessary to address the actual complexities involved, said David Donatti, a staff attorney for the American Civil Liberties Union of Texas.

For example, he added that a wall near the Rio Grande could exacerbate flooding in border communities.

I certainly don’t think they really thought about the destructive implications of what they were proposing, or the full extent of the consequences of building a boundary wall, he said.

Unlike the California, Arizona or New Mexico border, which is largely federal, or in some cases tribal, land, most of the Texas-Mexico border is privately owned, with some owners who with title in their possession since the 1760s. Texas owns some land, such as state parks and wildlife preserves.

Both the Bush and Trump administrations face legal and logistical challenges in building a border barrier in Texas.

According to the Government Accountability 2020 report, the Trump administration faced delays of 21 to 30 months to seize privately owned land in South Texas. The report said comparable land acquisitions in other parts of the country took a year.

If Texas seeks to build on private land, it will be a slow and painful process, said Csar Cuauhtmoc Garca Hernndez, an immigration lawyer and law professor at Ohio State University.

Another hurdle Abbott is likely to face is federal regulations aimed at protecting the environment, water quality and historic sites. The Trump administration has forgave many of those policies to speed up the construction of the wall, despite push from environmentists.

The Biden administration is unlikely to ignore those laws for the Abbotts wall project, said Scott Nicol, a McAllen-based environmental activist and author of a 2018 ACLU report analyzing the effect of a boundary wall.

Those are the laws that protect Native American graves, there are laws intended to protect family farms, Nicol said. Abbott had to abide by all of those laws. Trump is not. The right one there will cause [Abbott] big headache.

The Abbotts ’office did not respond to email questions about how the state plans to overcome barriers to building a wall.

Border problems are only exacerbated by President Biden’s inaction, Abbott said at a press conference in June announcing the state -funded wall. Property is destroyed, deadly drugs and illegal weapons are smuggled into communities across the state, law enforcement is required to redirect their resources and county judges and mayors are faced with an increase. of cost.

Abbott has declared a disaster along several border counties, which could allow him to circumvent certain state and local regulations. But it won’t extend to federal law, because federal law is supreme over Texas state laws, Donatti said.

Ronald Rael, a professor of architecture at the University of California, Berkeley, said it was logically possible for Texas to build a wall along some of the border lands, but it would cost destroying some of the cleanest and most fragile residence we have The united state.

Jenn Budd, a former Border Patrol agent, said barriers or walls make it harder for migrants to cross the border, forcing them to seek help from smugglers connected to drug cartels whose work is to find ways around obstacles.

Our avoidance policies, our fences, our walls, just make it harder to cross, but it won’t stop, he said. And more than anything, it expels migrants to places where [cartels] with more control.

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