Replies

Have you been on the Mexican border? I have. There are sections with simply Barbwire, sections with practically nothing, sections with some form of a fence or wall. Trump came in promising to build a wall, to get Mexico to pay for it he had opportunities to negotiate a deal with Congress, which we wouldn’t have liked, but he could’ve gotten the wall built. The end of his term saw less than 500 miles built most of it just fixing existing wall. Sorry that doesn’t work is 1500 miles that are in need of securing. The fact that he didn’t finish what he promised, made it easy for Biden to open the border which Trump left open. And the idea that Trump would do different in a second term with regards to the border is ludicrous. Whether DeSantis or someone else can accomplish something, we can only hope.

Standing on the border does not access the entirety of the border or the terrain. There are sites that show you each section in detail.
https://www.usnews.com/news/politics/articles/2022-02-07/how-much-of-president-donald-trumps-border-wall-was-built

https://www.cbp.gov/border-security/along-us-borders/border-wall-system

“Before Biden stopped new construction on the wall, the Trump administration had built 458 miles of what it dubbed “border wall system,” according to final figures compiled by U.S. Customs and Border Protection and provided to U.S. News.

The wall consists mostly of 18- to 30-foot steel bollards anchored in concrete. The barriers also feature sensors, lights, cameras and parallel roads in some places.

The vast majority of the 458 miles were constructed in places where some kind of barrier already existed, but most of the preexisting structures were far less imposing than the new wall and included fencing and rudimentary technical barriers. The total figure also includes what the agency calls “secondary border wall” or sections of wall built behind preexisting barriers that ultimately remained in place.”

Trump met with border patrol & they gave him their assessment of what was needed to make a major impact. Those miles were completed. As they were nearing completion the border patrol asked for another 50 miles. The materials were bought & readied. It would have taken 3 weeks into Biden’s term. Biden forbid those sections and left the materials to rust. States asked if they could take them and use them and Biden refused.
Neither Trump nor the border patrol envisioned or desired a Gulf of Mexico to sea border.

It’s all very well to be strident, dismissive & petulant. What did other Presidents do?

Mexico paid by keeping in Mexico people who wanted to cross and by posting soldiers on the border. They offered to keep aliens in Mexico. All those things cost money. Money Mexico spent on our behalf. Paid on our behalf.

How much money did Trump get from Congress to build what wall he did? How much money did he shift from the Defense budget to build what wall he could when he couldn’t get Congress to give him any? How much flack did he get for doing that? Trump shifted $3.8 billion from the Pentagon’s budget to use for building what wall he could, and then he was challenged in court for it. The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals agreed with a coalition of border states and environmental groups that contended the money transfer was unlawful. That decision was appealed, and the Supreme Court found in Trump’s favor. Everything the man did, they fought him tooth and nail on. Then when Biden took office, they shifted $2.2 billion in border wall funds back to the military, which was probably then sent to Ukraine.