Donald Trump's Border Wall Would Cost Billions, Experts Say

NBC News ^ | July 23, 2015 | Elizabeth Chuck

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Constructing an impassable wall along the U.S.-Mexico border would be a tall order — even for master real estate developer and 2016 GOP presidential candidate Donald Trump.

"From a security standpoint, it really is not an intelligent solution," said Eric Olson, associate director of the Latin American program at the non-partisan Wilson Center.

In fact, "it's ludicrous," Olson said of the idea, which has become a hallmark of Trump's campaign.

Experts estimate that building and maintaining such a wall on the 1,954-mile border, which snakes along four huge states, would cost tens of billions of dollars. And the 21,000 border patrol agents currently on duty would be "nowhere near sufficient" to keep close surveillance on all of it, said Wayne Cornelius, director of University of California San Diego's Mexican migration field research program.

"Any kind of border barrier can be climbed over, and to prevent that type of activity, we would have to have not just drones in the sky, but a lot of boots on the ground," he said.

As of now, fences or other physical obstacles cover about one third of the border, areas that can be accessed easily by foot or by car, Cornelius said. Trump wants to wall in the entire border to keep out undocumented Mexican immigrants, who he has called "rapists" and "criminals."(continued)

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[onyx]

SO WHAT!

[BunnySlippers]

It would have SAVED us billions we have lost adding half of Mexico to the US.

[Califreak]

Here’s an idea.

Nullify the Iran deal that Iran already violated and use the billions set aside of our money to defend their nukes and build the wall with it.

Too expensive to protect our country but money’s no object when we’re talking about enemy WMD.

A whole lot of folks here need to hang!

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