Free Republic

Republicans and Democrats in Congress have authorized more than $110 billion in American taxpayer money to be sent to Ukraine to support the nation’s fight against Russia since the war started. Meanwhile, most of the nearly 2,000-mile United States-Mexico border remains without any barrier. As part of a year-end $1.7 trillion spending package, 18 Senate Republicans and nine House Republicans voted with Democrats to throw another $45 billion in taxpayer money at Ukraine — bringing the total amount of taxpayer money sent to Ukraine, authorized by Congress, to more than $110 billion.

Arizona officials have decided that they are done waiting on the federal government to fill the gaps left in the unfinished border wall. On Friday, Arizona started placing shipping containers to block off the three remaining gaps along the border in Yuma. “The federal government has committed to doing this, but we cannot wait for their action,” said Katie Ratlief, Governor Doug Ducey’s deputy chief of staff. To block off the remaining border sections, Arizona is using shipping containers stacked on top of one another. The containers are 60 feet wide and 9 feet high. At the top of the...

GOP legislators must use Congress’ budget power to block President Joe Biden’s invited “invasion” if they win the 2022 election, former President Donald Trump told a political event on Saturday.“We must stop the invasion at our southern border,” Trump said to loud applause at a CPAC event in Texas. He then described the solution to Biden’s determined effort to spike migration above the annual limits set by Congress in 1990:Republicans in Congress musy make clear that on their watch not a single penny of taxpayer money will go to funding Joe Biden’s open border agenda. It’s a sick agenda. It’s...

"Not another foot." Those were the words Joe Biden used as a mantra throughout his 2020 presidential campaign regarding the construction of the U.S.-Mexico border wall. But on Thursday, the Biden administration approved a plan to complete a section of the border wall near Yuma, Arizona. The plan includes filling four major gaps in the wall that continue to allow the Yuma area to be one of the busiest corridors for illegal immigration crossings.

The Biden administration has approved a Trump-era project finishing a section of the southern border wall in the western-most point of the U.S. along the border with Mexico in California. Completion of this project will lead to the permanent closure of the U.S. side of Friendship Park, which is a binational spot between San Diego and Tijuana where separated families could meet and touch without a wall between them. [this is not an extensive addition to the wall] Please read more at the link...

EAGLE PASS, Texas — The State acquired a large quantity of 30-foot wall panels from the Biden Administration to utilize in the construction of a border wall. The materials came from federal contracts cancelled in January 2021. “Texas is the first state ever to build a border wall,” Governor Abbott began in an exclusive interview. “A lot of the border wall is being built by border wall material that there was a contract for, Texas bought it from contractors who built the wall for President Trump. We’re building the exact same wall.” “In addition, a lot of people saw on...

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott announced that the state has begun construction on a border wall, which it's working to build to counter what it views as the Biden administration’s lackluster enforcement of U.S. immigration laws.“Texas has officially started building its own border wall,” Abbott announced in a tweet Friday. “[President Joe] Biden allows open border policies and refuses to enforce laws passed by Congress to secure the border and enforce immigration laws. Texas is stepping up to do the federal government’s job.”Texas has officially started building its own border wall.Biden allows open border policies and refuses to enforce laws passed...

... For many in the congressional delegation — organized by the conservative Republican Study Committee (RSC) and its chairman, Rep. Jim Banks (R-Ind.) — this represented their first visit to the southern border. For some, it was a frustrating experience given how easy it was for the migrants to cross the Rio Grande and walk right across the border, but also one full of emotion as lawmakers inquired about the children’s names, ages and personal stories. One unaccompanied 8-year-old Honduran boy, sporting a blue shirt and black pants, was discovered on the side of the road by two teenage migrant...

'resident Biden alone caused this border crisis and he alone has the responsibility to stop it,' Minority Whip Rep. Steve Scalise of Louisiana told The FederalistLast Thursday, Republican Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds told WHO radio in Des Moines that she declined a request by the Biden administration to house illegally present foreign minors. Reynolds became the first GOP governor in the nation to refuse a temporary housing request for illegals trafficked by international drug cartels in league with Communist China to destabilize the United States. She models behavior more lawmakers would be prudent to heed. “This is not our problem,”...

The most harrowing story I’ve read in The Times in recent days was Miriam Jordan’s account of a car crash last month in Southern California involving a Ford Expedition that had come from Mexico, straight through a breach in the border wall. The Ford was crammed with 25 people when it hit a tractor-trailer rig on Route 115, 110 miles east of San Diego. “Few of the survivors have been able to describe what happened next,” Jordan writes. “The crunch of metal and glass, the bodies flung dozens of feet across the pavement. Twelve people died on the spot, a...

The White House on Tuesday said that "limited" additional wall construction has been funded, despite an overall pause in construction -- after a report that the head of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) had said "gaps" in the wall could still be filled. "Wall construction remains paused to the extent permitted by law. So some has already been funded through congressional authorization and funding allocation," White House press secretary Jen Psaki said Tuesday. Psaki was asked about a Washington Times report that DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas told Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) employees that while money for the wall...

During the month of February, the United States experienced a 28% increase in attempted crossings at the Southwest border. Of the more than 100,000 people who attempted to cross the border, nearly 30,000 were unaccompanied children. Newsweek got an inside look at the state of the U.S.-Mexico border through the eyes of Public Affairs Officers Justin Castrejon and Jacob MacIsaac of the U.S. Border Patrol... ....Despite tunneling efforts, the border wall's four-foot below-ground depth and 18 to 30 foot above-ground height have been effective in managing the border. Because, as MacIsaac puts it, "it's afforded us the luxury of time."...

The Biden administration says it will start gradually allowing into the US tens of thousands of asylum seekers currently forced to wait in Mexico. It says it will begin next week processing about 25,000 people with active cases. Asylum seekers will first be required to register and pass a Covid-19 test, before being allowed in via one of three border crossings. The move reverses the much-criticised policies of ex-President Donald Trump. The Migrant Protection Protocols programme was enacted in 2019, deterring would-be asylum seekers from coming to the US. It required migrants entering through the southern border to wait in...

265 miles completed, 316 miles under construction, 157 miles under pre-construction. (738 Total)

The Supreme Court has allowed President Trump to defy Congress and continue to spend more than $6 billion diverted from military funds to pay for the construction of a border wall in parts of Arizona, New Mexico, Texas and California.

The Trump administration doesn't have the authority to divert Pentagon funds to construct additional barriers on the US-Mexico border, a federal appeals court ruled Friday, days after President Donald Trump's visit to a section of the wall in Arizona. In a 2-1 ruling, the 9th US Circuit Court of Appeals said that the transfer of $2.5 billion circumvented Congress, which holds the authority to appropriate money.

A federal appeals court decided 2-1 Friday that the Trump administration violated the law when it used military funds to build a wall on the Mexican border. The U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals said the power of the purse belongs to Congress, and the administration lacked constitutional authority to transfer the military money. Two Democratic appointees were in the majority. A Trump appointee dissented.

U.S. President Donald Trump praised what he described as a “powerful and comprehensive” wall along the nation’s southern border Tuesday, highlighting one of the key promises from his successful election campaign four years ago to secure the U.S. borders. A day after ordering tighter restrictions on a variety of visa categories, Trump visited a new section of the border wall in the southwestern U.S. state of Arizona. After signing a plaque on the imposing slatted black wall at San Luis, the president, in response to a question from VOA described the new construction as “really foolproof.”  “You have everything you...

The Trump administration this week plans to set up a border camera to stream the construction of the wall President Trump promised in 2016 and that his administration is delivering on. Under consideration since top aide Jared Kushner first proposed it in November, the “wall cam” will go live some day this week, said an administration official. It will show the construction of the first 164 miles of the complicated border wall... The wall camera will be on the website of U.S. Customs and Border Protection... Key issues included making sure the camera did not show proprietary information, technology, and...

Another 74 miles of 30-foot tall wall is set to be built on the Arizona-Mexico border, federal officials said on Monday. Customs and Border Protection officials on Monday asked for public comment on new border wall projects in Cochise, Pima and Santa Cruz counties. These projects are in addition to 63 miles of wall being built in Cochise and Pima counties, as well as other wall projects in Yuma County. The new wall projects announced Monday will consist of 30-foot tall steel poles, known as bollards, that are 6 inches in diameter, according to CBP. This is the same design...