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Donald Trump's Border Wall Would Cost Billions, Experts Say
NBC News ^ | July 23, 2015 | Elizabeth Chuck

Posted on 07/23/2015 4:33:18 AM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet

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)

(Excerpt) Read more at nbcnews.com ...


TOPICS: Crime/Corruption; Extended News; Foreign Affairs; Government; Politics/Elections
KEYWORDS: aliens; borders; illegalimmigration; immigration; trump
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Eric Olson’s opinion is on the wrong side of this argument. We want a wall, we want our immigration laws that are on the books enforced! Obama is a father of two daughters, doesn’t he care about protecting the daughters of American fathers against the rapists & murderers that are flooding across the border because of his policy? Because of the Democrat & GOPe establishment policy? Don’t these politicians care about our children?


21 posted on 07/23/2015 4:48:02 AM PDT by Lopeover (My vote is valuable, you must earn it.)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

I agree. It is chump change for the federal government and I don’t have a problem with it.


22 posted on 07/23/2015 4:48:30 AM PDT by hawkaw
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

So if it were 20 billion dollars, and if we have 12 million illegal immigrants, and taking into account that 40% are due to overstayed visas, you are looking at around $3,000 per person. The Obama administration spent $18 billion in 2012 alone on immigration enforcement. I’ve seen an estimate from FAIR of illegal immigration costing the country $100 billion a year.


23 posted on 07/23/2015 4:51:47 AM PDT by BlackAdderess ("Give me a but a firm spot on which to stand, and I shall move the earth". --Archimedes)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet
Neither of the Koreas had “tens of billions of dollars” in 1953, yet there sits the DMZ.

You don't need much of a fence when you have soldiers with orders to shoot anybody trying to cross.

24 posted on 07/23/2015 4:52:00 AM PDT by PapaBear3625 (You don't notice it's a police state until the police come for you.)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet
The "Wilson Center" is non-partisan?. . .yea, right

"if you want to understand the real Declaration of Independence, do not repeat the preface." (the part that declares that our natural rights are endowed by the Creator) Woodhead Wilson

25 posted on 07/23/2015 4:52:44 AM PDT by McBuff
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To: Mr. K

Shovel ready jobs....


26 posted on 07/23/2015 4:52:55 AM PDT by Paladin2 (Ive given up on aphostrophys and spell chek on my current device...)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Today we see one of our largest media organizations permitting itself to print “news” that is totally devoid of fact or logical continuity.


27 posted on 07/23/2015 4:52:58 AM PDT by ReaganGeneration2
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Extended 100 feet underground. 100 feet high. Gun platforms every 50 yards and set it back 500 feet from the border. Then shoot anyone who gets near it, and leave the bodies to bake in the sun.


28 posted on 07/23/2015 4:53:15 AM PDT by BigCinBigD (...Was that okay?)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Walls only work.......

.........WHEN THEY ARE BUILT.


29 posted on 07/23/2015 4:53:54 AM PDT by Flintlock (Our soapbox is gone, the ballot box stolen--we're left with the bullet box now.)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

I don’t care how much it costs - build it!


30 posted on 07/23/2015 4:55:46 AM PDT by austinaero
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To: 2ndDivisionVet
Where to begin…?

A fence need not be 100% perfect to be good. It is a specious argument that says because a solution is not the perfect solution it should not be employed even though it is a good solution.

A fence is to be regarded as a force multiplier, that is fewer people are required to defend a border, whether in war or border security, because the fence is there. The author implies that the fence will require more personnel when the opposite is the case.

If the terrain is too rough to build a wall, build a fence if the terrain is to rugged to build a fence, it is undoubtedly to rugged for the overwhelming majority of illegal immigrants pass through. Those rugged areas can be surveilled by drones which are efficient and cheap because they not require extensive manpower.

If a fence intrudes on private property, the federal government always has the power of eminent domain and federal government does not require a rancher to agree to give up his land, the federal government need only fairly compensate the owner for the very little that would be lost to the rancher of very sandy, very dry, very unproductive landscape.

The contention that, "a wall would stave the flow of undocumented (does the author mean illegal?) Immigrants is preposterous." Did the Berlin wall stop the flow?

The contention:

"There's a billion dollars a day in trade that's going back and forth between the United States and Mexico... Anything that blocks that hurts the United States."

Hurts whom? Does it hurt workers who have been displaced by jobs that have been shipped to Mexico? What is the balance of hurt and who should bear the pain?

The author insists that a wall is not feasible and the proof of that is that one has not yet been built. The fact that one has not yet been built is rather proof of a lack of will on the part of the Washington establishment and their fat cat Benefactors.

No one suggests that a wall along the Mexican border will stop "undocumented immigrants" from flying into American airports and jumping ship. Will the author tell us that not all remedies for this are perfect and therefore we should attempt none?


31 posted on 07/23/2015 4:55:58 AM PDT by nathanbedford ("Attack, repeat, attack!" Bull Halsey)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

We need to tell Mexico that if they don’t get a handle on THEIR people crossing the border illegally, we’ll build the wall ten miles inside THEIR side of the border. And bulldoze everything from the border to get there.


32 posted on 07/23/2015 4:58:05 AM PDT by PLMerite ("The issue is never the issue. The issue is the Revolution.")
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Use all convicted criminal illegal immigrants in prison as forced labor to build the wall....with “no work, no food” rule............


33 posted on 07/23/2015 4:58:48 AM PDT by Arlis ( A "Sacred Cow" Tipping Christian)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

The government pisses away billions just in waste, fraud, and abuse.

Suddenly, there’s a concern for the cost of something it’s supposed to be doing anyway (i.e., protecting US citizens)?


34 posted on 07/23/2015 4:59:34 AM PDT by Arm_Bears (Biology is biology. Everything else is imagination.)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Whenever a liberal opposes something on the basis of cost, they should be laughed out of the room.


35 posted on 07/23/2015 4:59:45 AM PDT by Erik Latranyi (Scott Walker - a more conservative governor than Ronald Reagan)
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To: BigCinBigD

Don’t forget the minefields. Anti personnel and anti tank in case of some kind of ram raid.


36 posted on 07/23/2015 5:00:21 AM PDT by wally_bert (There are no winners in a game of losers. I'm Tommy Joyce, welcome to the Oriental Lounge.)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet
Elizabeth Chuck is a social media and breaking news writer and editor on the news team. Previously, she was an NBC News web producer, creating web-exclusive supplements to various NBC News properties. Prior to joining msnbc.com in 2005, Chuck wrote for the Hartford Courant in Connecticut, concentrating on news, politics and features for the state desk. She holds a degree in French Studies from Wesleyan University.


37 posted on 07/23/2015 5:01:07 AM PDT by McGruff (Eat a snickers...)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Just divert the billions we waste on these illegal dirtbag invaders to build the wall. Save some of the money by arresting the illegals here and put them on chain gangs to build the wall before we chuck them over the wall.


38 posted on 07/23/2015 5:03:06 AM PDT by RJS1950 (The democrats are the "enemies foreign and domestic" cited in the federal oath)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

There are probably only so many places where it is practical to cross
Russians had no problem keeping people in


39 posted on 07/23/2015 5:03:28 AM PDT by uncbob
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

The correct comparison includes the losses attributable to those in the country illegally, and that isn’t just “entitlement” benefits, it includes death, destruction and mayhem.


40 posted on 07/23/2015 5:05:06 AM PDT by Cboldt
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