by Arizona’s outgoing Governor Doug Ducey (right) defied the federal government and spent months getting his work crews to erect shipping containers along the state’s southern border with Mexico.
Ducey, who will leave office in January due to tenure limitations, first led teams in August to close loopholes in former President Donald Trump’s border wall, the Associated Press reported on Sunday. Ducey issued an executive order to begin construction, and the state initially spent $6 million to erect a double-height container barrier in Yuma, Arizona, filling nearly 3,800 feet of the border.
His office has expanded the project in recent months, placing thousands of additional containers stretching for miles along the Coronado National Forest near Tucson. This effort could eventually stretch 10 miles at a cost of $95 million, causing concern from environmentalists, tribal governments and the federal government.
AP Photo/Ross D. Franklin
AP Photo/Ross D. Franklin
The U.S. Forest Service ordered Arizona to stop building on its national forest land, but Ducey filed suit in October, saying the state has jurisdiction over the land to protect Arizonans.
“Arizona will do what Joe Biden refused to do – secure the border in any way we can.” Ducey was talking about the team at the time. “We’re not backing down.”
Reporters who have seen the wall say the container barrier is far from perfect. Its parts are covered with razor wire, with pieces of metal inserted between the cavities or welded. But there are regular gaps where the terrain is too steep to place them, and the wall is relatively climbable despite being 17 feet high.
Work on parts of the container wall has been halted in recent days amid protests and threats from some local law enforcement that anyone planting the containers will be arrested for illegal dumping.
Governor-elect Katie Hobbs (D) said she is exploring “all options” when it comes to the container barrier, including reusing them to house homeless or low-income people.
Hobbs said the container strategy was “a political gimmick” while running the campaign.
“I am very concerned about liability to the state of Arizona for shipping containers they put on federal land,” he said at the time. “There are pictures of people climbing on them. I think it’s a huge responsibility and risk.”
Trump’s border wall became a political flashpoint during his tenure, and GOP lawmakers continued to support its construction, scolding Biden for the continued surge of immigrants trying to cross the southern border with Mexico.
A record number of immigrants have been stopped there this year. Border officials said law enforcement stopped people 2.38 million times in the 12-month period ending September, a 37% increase from the previous year.
