DHS reveals grand plan for border: 1,422 miles of wall along Mexico boundary

DHS reveals grand plan for border: 1,422 miles of wall along Mexico boundary



The Department of Homeland Security on Friday revealed its ambitious Smart Wall plans for the U.S.-Mexico border, with fences stretching 1,422 miles along the boundary, more than double the current length, with sensor technology to protect the remaining area too rugged for a wall.

Barriers will begin at the Pacific Ocean in San Diego, run largely uninterrupted until they reach the western edge of the Big Bend area of Texas, then pick up northwest of Laredo and run to the Gulf of America near Brownsville.

Customs and Border Protection, the agency that oversees the boundary, said it has just issued $4.5 billion in new contracts to get construction started.

That money — the first installment from tens of billions of dollars allocated in President Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill budget law — will pay for 230 miles of new fencing and 400 miles of new roads and technology.

And CBP revealed a rebrand from the old name, the wall system to the Smart Wall.

“For years, Washington talked about border security but failed to deliver. This president changed that,” CBP Commissioner Rodney Scott said. “The Smart Wall means more miles of barriers, more technology and more capability for our agents on the ground. This is how you take control of the border.”

To speed construction, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi issued waivers of environmental laws for sections of the wall to go up in Southern California and New Mexico.

The wall was the marquee promise from Mr. Trump’s 2016 campaign and one he made significant headway on in his first term, completing 458 miles of fence construction.

But his 2020 election defeat turned things over to President Biden, who shut down construction. That erased several hundred miles of wall already planned, and it left hundreds more miles where Mr. Trump had built the fencing but didn’t finish the roads and technology that were planned.

With his reelection last year, Mr. Trump vowed to finish the job, and the new numbers Friday reveal just what he has planned.

As of Jan. 20, just 702 miles of the 1,954-mile-long border with Mexico had some form of fencing or barrier — about 36%.

By the time Mr. Trump is done, that will be 1,422 miles, or nearly 73%.

The remaining 532 miles — largely matching the Big Bend area of western Texas — is too rugged or remote to need a wall and will instead be covered by detection technology, CBP said.



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