Biden reverses course, allows border wall construction to resume
In a stunning reversal on border security policy, the Biden administration plans to build about 20 miles of border wall in south Texas as the surge in illegal migration into the U.S. continued in September.
President Joe Biden, when he first took office in January 2021, ended all border wall construction initiated by the administration for former President Donald Trump.
Since then, illegal border crossings have skyrocketed to record levels, leading the state of Texas to launch its own multi-billion dollar border security effort known as Operation Lone Star and Democratic sanctuary cities across the country to declare states of emergency over the influx of foreign nationals being bused to their communities from the southern border.
Now, the Biden administration says it will build about 20 miles of border wall in Starr County, Texas, saying it will use funding allocated by Congress in 2019 to do so.
“There is presently an acute and immediate need to construct physical barriers and roads in the vicinity of the border of the United States in order to prevent unlawful entries into the United States in the project areas,” Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas said in an online statement late Wednesday.
Republicans in Congress have called for Mayorkas to either resign or be impeached over the border crisis.
In September, more than 255,000 foreign nationals were apprehended or reported evading capture after illegally entering the southwest border, a surge that began when the Biden administration changer immigration policy including ending construction of the wall.
Border agents have told The Center Square that Mexican drug cartels have exploited Biden’s border policies to illegally smuggle into the U.S. untold amounts of fentanyl and foreign nationals.
