From "What Happens to Trump’s Wall Now?" (New York Magazine).
February 14, 2021
"In his executive order, Biden said a wall spanning 'the entire southern border is not a serious policy solution.' But neither is a complete undoing..."
"... in July, Biden said he would not take down the wall, an endeavor that would cost billions as he fights for funding for pandemic relief. Installing a hodgepodge of 'smart security' technology paid for with reallocated wall cash, together with limited barrier removal in sensitive areas, appears to be the most likely outcome. But that half measure will be expensive, and will require maintenance costs for the steel that stays in the ground. Even doing nothing at all will hurt the purse thanks to contract cancellations. One Army Corps estimate from December suggests that if no more work is done and no panels are taken down, taxpayers will still eat another $700 million on 'demobilization' fees.... As of December 2020, only 40 new miles of steel barriers had been placed at the southern border during Trump’s time in office... [There are also] another 412 miles of so-called 'replacement fencing' that he managed to secure.... But short-term thinking has been a dominant trend in federal policy at the border for decades now — including the Obama administration’s decision to finish the work of the 2006 Secure Fence Act, despite campaign promises to review its environmental impacts. Due to the ingenuity and desperation of those crossing, border barriers were clearly a sloppy and incomplete fix for the nation’s bevy of immigration-policy problems years before Trump took office. Because of the steel he put in the ground, they will remain a mess through the Biden years, and almost certainly beyond."
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Let's see...New York is not on the Mexican border. They don't feel the impact of uncontrolled immigration so they need to STFU.
Trump's wall?
Hey Joe/NYT, what stopped the caravans?
What's triggering their return?
"... in July, Biden said he would not take down the wall, an endeavor that would cost billions ... "
Perfect is the enemy of good. How much would it cost to cut some doors in it?
Nobody is buying it.
Biden wants open borders.
mockturtle said...
Let's see...New York is not on the Mexican border. They don't feel the impact of uncontrolled immigration so they need to STFU.
New York is in the midst of uncontrolled emigration though thanks to Deblasio's policies.
It’s just so very reasonable to think that a country needs laws, and that a country is a place with citizens. The citizens get to decide, through the lawmakers making laws, who is a citizen.
People who are citizens of other countries, whose first act is to break our laws, don’t get to be citizens of our country if we so choose.
This is so basically fair, and so clear, that the longer the border is not reasonably enforced, the sooner it will become unreasonably.enforced.
The "smart security" is nice in theory, but it requires enforcement. We know that one and a half of the two parties have no interest in that. The nice thing about a wall is that it stays in place even when an administration with no interest in enforcement is in power.
Walls do not work - so why the walls and razor wire in DC? Why do people like Obama and Zuckerberg put walls around their houses?
Build walls on the southern border where reasonable, and patrol the entire thing with Reaper Drones that are allowed to fire at will in designated and posted free fire zones.
Or just bulld the wall and enforce our actual laws on immigration and STOP ENCOURAGING ILLEGALS TO COME HERE! (yelling intended).
"another 412 miles of so-called 'replacement fencing' that he managed to secure" Heh. Take a look at any picture of Before and After. They were "replacing" broken fences that no longer could work, with ones that did.
Amazing the spinning in the article!
This is a good example:
reforming an immigration system that his predecessor made as inhospitable as possible for the migrants navigating it
Biden*, the democrats the GOP and China want open borders.
I really wish Gov Abbott would declare a medical emergency on the border and force anyone who is trying to get in to have proof of Covid vaccine shots.
Smart security is a Trojan horse. Trumps wait in Mexico ( and an actual wall ) was the only policy that actually works. If you allow border jumpers to stay in the US while awaiting adjudication, they will be set free, PERIOD. We are seeing it now, we’ve seen it for decades.
What is the effect of being caught by the “smart” fence. A US based court date in 6+ months where you are released INTO the US to await, just how stupid is that??
Whereas a wall prevents them from being caught and adjudicated.
Biden*, the democrats and the GOP are open border proponents. Inner city poor people get the shaft again. Democrats get votes and the chamber of commerce gets slaves. Inner city poor people get shat on.
Another good one:
the wall could dampen the effectiveness of radar
Let them all in. Put them in buses and take them to Pacific Heights, Malibu, Alexandria, Martha's Vineyard, etc.
Put them up in section 8 housing paid for by local tax dollars.
No Covid testing for them ever.
I'm happy with that.
P.S. Walls don't work.
It is known
It is known
It is known
short-term thinking has been a dominant trend in federal policy at the border for decades now — including the Obama administration’s decision to finish the work of the 2006 Secure Fence Act, despite campaign promises to review its environmental impacts.
The smart people say that building a wall is "short-term thinking" and racist.
Biden and the Democrats wouldn’t be stupid enough to dismantle any walls or fencing. The immediate need for pandemic relief is a convenient excuse to keep the radical Left placated for the time being. The radical Left thinks walls are icky symbols of white supremacy or something and thus worth removing on that basis alone. Cost is hardly an object to them. Eventually the money will be there and Biden will have to choose what to do. Remove miles of wall to please his fringe base, while making himself seem unserious about immigration to everyone else, or blow off his fringe base and hope the issue goes away.
short-term thinking has been a dominant trend in federal policy at the border for decades now
The long-term thinkers recognize that the people walking across the borders now are future Democrat voters.
The wall is an amazing achievement of Trump.
Trump built it over the opposition of both parties.
Two actions that destroyed Paul Ryan and John McCains reputation was their opposition to the wall.
John McCains primary commercial still floors me with the hypocrisy:
“Finish The Dang Fence”
John McCain 2010
https://hughhewitt.com/losing-immigration-reform-by-refusing-to-as-senator-mccain-put-it-in-2010-finish-the-dang-fence/
... to finish the work of the 2006 Secure Fence Act, despite campaign promises to review its environmental impacts
What is the environmental impact of a million people settling illegally in the USA every year?
So what has been done will be left done. Color me unsurprised.
Nancy has tall walls around her house.
So do most of Hollywood's leftwing wealthy.
This actually sort of validates an argument for building a wall that I rejected for years, wrongly. The argument was that once you built the wall, they couldn’t easily take it away. Unlike the “virtual wall” ideas that I was more supportive of, like more and better sensors and cameras and so forth.
They are not opposing the wall because it doesn’t work. If it didn’t work they would not care about it..
Nancy Pelosi, tear down that fence!
"Nancy has tall walls around her house.
So do most of Hollywood's leftwing wealthy."
They also have the money to hire armed bodyguards.
In Pelosi's case, those scary guys (they're almost always guys) carrying scary guns are paid for on our dime.
And it's said there is no aristocracy in America...
There are a few spots along the border that are indeed environmentally significant and naturally beautiful. Patrol them.
There are hundreds of miles of border that is just open desert. Don't get me wrong, I am a fan of deserts, but putting up a fence doesn't really ruin the place.
The "environmental impact" dodge is just that--a stalling tactic--also a virtue signal for all those Manhattan/Hamptons/Greenwich folk who are so environmentally sensitive that they leave the Mercedes in the garage and drive the Tesla.
It's a relief that the existing barrier won't be taken down -- the erection of something semi-permanent that succeeding regimes would find difficult to remove was one of the chief advantages of a wall. And of course, the wall will do nothing whatsoever to deter legal entry to the US.
More troubling, it sounds like the new administration is trying to dismantle the agreements we reached with Central American countries to cooperate in discouraging illegal immigration. That is a pity.
This doesn't work and that doesn't work. This costs too much and that costs too much. So do nothing? That costs money too with cancelled contracts. But the larger cost to the country from illegal mass immigration does appear to enter the writer's calculations.
Walls save lives!
Put them in buses and take them to Pacific Heights, Malibu, Alexandria, Martha's Vineyard, etc.
Put them up in section 8 housing paid for by local tax dollars.
>>
There was a good article somewhere describing the graft associated with affordable housing. I mean it's obvious, but one of the points was that they actually are building some bum shelter/housing spot in... Venice Beach on some of the most expensive real estate in LA. Why? Cost +30% margins get kicked to the developer to then kicks back to the Mayor/development office.
I'm repeatedly informed that I need to pay more taxes to support welfare payments the poor and importantly, the working poor.
We had a 3 year experiment conducted that demonstrated yet again for the liars at the CoC, WSJ and Dems, that reducing illegal labor supply raises wages for the working poor. Sadly, Nancy might have to $1/hour more for her servants however.
I'd rather pay an American $1/hour more because labor supply is tighter than see my taxes raised to pay for his welfare check because an illegal got the job.
You don't need a wall. You need a cross-border worker program that allows in workers, heck, even their families, after IDing them all, without any hope of citizenship. No votes, no reason to stay if they make their money, no asylum claims just for drug cartel convenience back home. Give photos, fingerprints, DNA and family names at a consulate in Central America, get your worker ID, and come on over.
David UW: If you want to see graft in operation, here in Austin the ASSHAT mayor Adler is paying 2x to 3x the appraised price for rundown motels, to "refurbish" at additional cost, to house a small handful of homeless people for free, while providing city services to them. Count the steps I just listed, each one is an opportunity for millions of dollars to flow from taxpayers into preselected pockets. And it is being set up to continue forever.
"In his executive order, Biden said a wall spanning 'the entire southern border is not a serious policy solution.
Before we let this slide by, perhaps someone should put Biden on record as to what, exactly, the problem is at the border.
It might bring into focus what he believes is and is not a solution.
Mikee embrace the power of both. The policies that trump created CONTROLS immigration. Make those permanent and then let’s do your worker ID plan. But imo there is no incentive for anyone to do your plan. Democrats don’t buy more votes, republicans ( and increasingly democrats ) don’t have slaves to hire.
At the end of the day poor Americans get the shaft. Resources and jobs are diverted to the slaves.
Blogger walter said...
Trump's wall?
Hey Joe/NYT, what stopped the caravans?
What's triggering their return? 2/14/21, 11:11 AM
I agree with you 100%!
According to the Government Accountability Office (GAO), prior to 2005 only about 150 miles of the border was fenced. Over about eight years and with approximately $2.4 billion, the fencing was extended to approximately 650 miles. Trump’s predecessors George W. Bush and Barack Obama built miles of barriers on the southern border while eschewing Trump’s anti-immigrant rhetoric. These pro-immigration presidents put a great deal of money into securing the border because they believed that doing so would strengthen their case for passage of comprehensive immigration reform.
Construct the wall to control smuggling, human trafficking, and reduce excess deaths along the border, and to guide people to safe and legal crossings. Emigration reform to mitigate progress of [catastrophic] [anthropogenic] immigration reform (e.g. refugee crises, labor arbitrage) and collateral damage (e.g democratic gerrymandering, excess deaths) at both ends of the bridge and throughout. #HateLovesAbortion
I live near the AZ/MX border. Having served four months on a grand jury a few years ago, I was able to see the impact that illegal border crossings have on our crime rate, especially drug smuggling. And the number of people-smuggling arrests recently have included Iranians [just last week] and Chinese on several occasions. The wall has been a boon to the Border Patrol, virtually all Trump supporters, who can concentrate their efforts in the unwalled areas.
In short, if you don't live near the southern border I don't want to hear any crap about open borders and banning deportation of criminals.
biden's corrupt puppeteers will make sure we are flooded with covid and illegal entrants who will soon vote d.
because they care about the spread of covid, you see.
The smart people say that building a wall is "short-term thinking" and racist.
Yes, redistributive change to delay emigration reform; bray incitements to diversity [dogma] (i.e. color judgments), not limited to racism; and sustain an unprecedented normalization and cover-up of transhuman orientations, notably Planned Parent/hood (population) solutions. Also, democratic gerrymandering, labor arbitrage for profit, and environmental arbitrage for Green Deals.
It’s America’s wall, to protect our interests, not Trump’s wall to protect his.
Mikee suggests: You need a cross-border worker program that allows in workers
We have had that here for years--decades, even. Many agricultural workers come here to work and live--legally-but have no desire to become American citizens and they send most of their wages back to Mexico. The certainly have the option of becoming citizens after the obligatory five years if they choose. About half of my neighbors are Spanish speaking--over 2/3 in the county--and I don't know who are citizens and who are resident aliens. Or who are here illegally, for that matter. There is one young woman renting a house down the street who speaks no English but had a Biden-Harris sign in her yard. I wanted to ask her if she voted. ;-) Of course, speaking or understanding English is only optional here as Spanish is the dominant language.
It’s all about the money and the votes folks. Cutting off the flow of cheap Mexican and Central American labor was forcing employers of unskilled and semi skilled labor to pay more for their labor. And a ready supply of block votes for the Democrats. That and only that is why Trump had to go.
"In short, if you don't live near the southern border I don't want to hear any crap about open borders and banning deportation of criminals."
It's pretty bad where I live and I am nowhere near the border.
I will defer to the locals who know what's happening on the ground...
Glenn- agree. And also it was intolerable that deplorables were seeing bigger percent wage increases than gender studies majors from elite colleges so the immigration spigot had to be reopened massively
And fracking curtailed etc etc
The Piven and Cloward Plan is the sole reason for the Dems/Obama mass migration strategy. The Dems no longer need voters who actually vote. What they need is a failed State like California has recently become from an unsustainable culture caused by impossible demands of mass welfare.
It is already against federal law to employ illegal aliens, but the law simply is unenforced whenever Democrats are in charge of the executive branch, and mostly unenforced when Republicans are in charge of the executive branch. However, I expect the border to be completely open by this Summer- the Democrats have made it very, very clear that they no longer want to enforce the border at all. Additionally, I expect that they will either pass a mass amnesty through reconciliation, or simply by executive order. Sure, the Republicans can go to court in the latter case, but I think, in the end, any court orders staying the coming E.O.s will, in fact, be ignored by the Biden Administration. Biden can ignore court because the Democrats control the media. I expect by the time of the midterms that there will be at least 5 million newly minted citizens receiving mail in ballots, many of whom will reside in Florida where Marco Rubio will be lucky to win reelection.
NY journolistas will continue to pretend that QuidProJoe has some understanding of how to govern and the mental capacity to follow through knowing that their bubble people won’t know the difference.
Biden has Top Men working on this.
I remember reading a report from Interpol which defined these folks as economic refugees. Seems apt. Your children will be paying their welfare tab. Canada has tougher stance I hear.
Ann,
When you offer a left-leaning analysis like this one, may I respectfully ask that you look for a from-the-right counter opinion?
Thank you.
Yancey Ward: I expect the border to be completely open by this Summer
I'm not that pessimistic, but I do agree that the implicit goal of the Democrats is to open our borders. I'm in favor of immigration. I might even favor increasing quotas. But when you have no border enforcement you are no longer a sovereign nation.
Why do they even put on this charade of defending the border. Biden has all but invited all of central America to move in. It would be a lot easier if we just annexed central America.
It would be a lot easier if we just annexed central America.
I've always thought that would be a great idea. Get the Panama canal back.
Speaking of money and wages. A look at 1940 census shows an ancestor making $2400.00 a year before taxes as an electrician in San Francisco. That is $1.15 per hour.
Nice home, still existing, in Excelsior district, homemaker wife and four kids.
Amazing the spinning in the article!
This is a good example:
reforming an immigration system that his predecessor made as inhospitable as possible for the migrants navigating it
What irritates me about immigration discussions is the deliberate blurring of the line between legal and illegal immigration. We want our immigration system to be as inhospitable as possible for illegal migrants.
"In short, if you don't live near the southern border I don't want to hear any crap about open borders and banning deportation of criminals."
Try living in a Sanctuary state like New Jersey, where illegals have more rights than YOU do, and then tell me not to complain..
I don't even know who the people are who want almost open borders. I don't' know who the people (not politicians) are who were bothered by the "wait in Mexico" policy.
But yes. People who come here illegally don't get intimidated by walls. They don't get intimidated by immigration laws. They don't mind driving without licenses or using a fake social security number to get a job. But they do not vote! They would never.
wendybar,
Same situation in PA across the state. Lancaster, Berks, Adams, Lebanon, Chester counties are becoming more and more bi-lingual. Driving from Gettysburg to Carlisle on back roads, we've come upon many spanish bodegas in the middle of nowhere. Same going south from Gettysburg to Maryland.
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