Thanks, Joe! Texas received border wall supplies worth $6M despite Biden's halt to its construction

Katie Pavlich/Townhall

Joe Biden put a halt to border wall construction in the first days of his presidency. Texas Governor Greg Abbott made the decision that Texas would continue to build a wall on its border with Mexico using Texas taxpayers’ dollars. Texans have to do the job that Biden refuses to do – protect Texas and America from the continuing flood of illegal migrants coming across the southern border.

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It is painfully obvious that the Biden administration’s idea of transforming America includes an open border with Mexico. There is no end in sight to the constant daily stream of people demanding to enter the United States, legally or illegally. DHS Secretary Mayorkas refuses to acknowledge the gravity of the Biden border crisis. It has been only in recent weeks, with Biden’s polling numbers on issues like illegal immigration way underwater, that Mayorkas has bothered to meet with Border Patrol officers to hear them out. Morale is at all-time lows and border law enforcement personnel are overwhelmed. Border communities have limited resources and they, too, are unable to keep up with the increase of people entering their towns.

Biden promised to bring back normalcy to America, whatever that means. Apparently he thinks that controlling America’s borders goes against American values. That’s the excuse he uses when he puts a stop to any of the actions Trump took to secure the border. So, here we are. When Biden stopped construction on the border wall, there were millions of dollars worth of supplies left on the ground being wasted. Taxpayer money being wasted. Texas officials found a way to get those supplies and put them to good use.

An article published in The Texan brought this to my attention. The Texas Facilities Commission (TFC) received the supplies from the U.S. government’s surplus federal property donation program. An update released from the Texas Facilities Commission confirms the acquisition.

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Texas Facility Commission’s Federal Surplus Program acquired prefabricated Federal border panels through the General Service Administration (GSA) in late November 2021. As of Monday, February 7, 2022, we have the panels in our possession for use in the near term. Posillico Civil, Inc. provided logistical support transporting the panels.

TFC on Monday, February 7, 2022, received the final shipment of approximately 1,700 metal surplus panels, acquired through the General Service Administration (GSA), Federal Surplus Program (FSP). TFC applied and qualified through the FSP to receive the donated panels. TFC was responsible for the costs of transporting the panels to Texas. Posillico Civil, Inc. provided logistical support transporting the panels from California to Texas for approximately $2 million for the 246 truckloads of panels.

The panels are secured temporarily in Maverick County, Texas, for logistical efficiency and are under the control of the Texas National Guard and for use in the near term.

TFC continues its progress in acquiring the right of way of property through easement agreements. TFC continues to accomplish our mission directed by Governor Greg Abbott to construct the Border Wall.

According to the Department of Defense, there was an estimated $265M in border wall materials left near the border when Biden canceled the Trump administration project. Most of the supplies are being stored at Davis-Monthan Air Force Base in Tucson and in locations in California.

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Lt. Col. Chris Mitchell, a spokesperson for the U.S. Department of Defense (DOD), indicated that an estimated $6 million worth of supplies, including 1,757 bollard panels, had been transferred to the State of Texas, the Arizona Daily Star reported on Sunday.

According to the Star, the amount of property donated to Texas is the most so far and Mitchell stated that hundreds of truckloads of supplies have been sent to Davis-Monthan.

Other federal agencies will reportedly receive some of the materials as well, including for border wall “remediation” efforts by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.

The state didn’t have to disclose its intention for the materials to be used in continuing to build the wall. Lt. Col. Mitchell said that the 32-foot-tall steel bollard panels acquired by Texas were at a storage site in San Diego. Francoise Luca, a spokesperson for the Facilities Commission, said the state followed the surplus program’s rules. So, Biden was going to allow millions of dollars of building material already paid for with taxpayer dollars to be stored instead of allowing it to be used as appropriated. The building material ended up in a federal surplus program and is now being “donated” back to Texas where it was intended to be used from the start. Good Lord. Do not underestimate the ability of Joe Biden to screw things up. He is so Trump-deranged that he’ll allow the border to remain porous out of spite.

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The building material is temporarily stored in Maverick County, Texas. The Texas National Guard is in charge of securing the location, according to Luca.

Since Biden’s bone-headed move to shut down border wall construction, his administration has walked a little bit back about a border wall.

Despite canceling the U.S. border wall, the federal government announced plans in December to begin “closing small gaps that remain open from prior construction activities and remediating incomplete gates.”

In addition, Chris Magnus, the recently appointed commissioner of U.S. Customs and Border Protection, stated at his confirmation hearing in October that he was open to continuing border wall construction under certain circumstances.

Now Biden is coming under criticism by environmental activists who oppose the border wall.

Scott Nicol, a McAllen-based environmental activist, said Biden has broken his pledge not to use taxpayer money to build a wall, pointing to one project in the Rio Grande Valley where crews erected 15-foot concrete panels near the border that the federal government calls levees.

And now “the Biden administration is saying, ‘We won’t build these border walls, but if Abbott wants to build them, we will give him free bollards,’” he said. “The problem with border walls isn’t who is building them, it is the devastation that comes when they are built.”

Nicol said regardless of who is building border barriers, the wall will block the movement of endangered species like ocelots and could cause dangerous flooding.

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Somehow I think the ocelots will figure it out. I’m more concerned about the survival of Texas and other border states who are under siege from more than two million illegal migrants over the course of the last year up to now. This story is yet another one of Biden’s ineptness and inability to govern. Protecting the homeland is his number one duty and he is failing miserably.

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Ed Morrissey 10:00 PM | November 22, 2024
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