Say what you will about whats legally required but if Biden didn’t want to catch criticism from his fellow democratic lawmakers, he shouldn’t have made a campaign promise saying he wouldn’t build ‘another foot’ of border wall. Its not like he’s unaware how these things work, he kind of brought this on his self.
You can delve into the definition of “another” in that context. It could mean “no more than what is currently built” or it could mean " no more than what’s already been determined/legally required will be built".
Though even with that, I will grant that using that wording could be considered deceptive. As much as people like to say “technically correct is the best correct”, I would disagree when it comes to politics. It’s Aes Sedai lying vs outright lying.
The funds for 20 miles of border wall were approved in 2019 before Biden took office. He urged Congress to reassign these funds for more intelligent and efficient enforcement purposes, but Republicans did not comply. Now, Biden has to fulfill his lawful obligations.
He waived environmental protections with executive powers to expedite the process. He isnt just passively letting this happen because his hands are tied.
Would those environmental protections have allowed the wall to simply not be built, or would they have just delayed it, costing even more money for environmental reviews, changed plans, etc., when a government shutdown is imminent?
That’s a real question, to be clear, and not one the article answered one way or the other.
Even if it were the case, as they said the budget is already allocated. Why not make them waste as much of it as possible paying for stuff that isn’t building the wall that everyone knows is useless? Making it look like even more of an expensive boondoggle seems like a better strategy than paving the way through federally protected lands.
And that’s setting aside the costs of maintaining what gets built or what it would cost to remove the wall at some point.
He has to do it at the end of the year to comply with the order.
The end of the year is in 3 months.
I feel like a more creative person would have built an 10 foot long section of wall (or better yet a really fancy gate) valued at whatever amount of money congress had allocated.
It needs to pass an audit. The wall is stupid, but building a monument instead of a wall should fail audits and is a type of corruption worthy of impeachment.
That would be like USPS getting $30million to replace a fleet of delivery trucks and instead buying a handful of monster trucks that can’t enter residential areas. No one’s gonna look at that and go, “whoops! You got me! We said buy 120 USPS trucks with the approved budget but instead you bought 5 monster trucks and a sweet set of ramps and said you followed the ‘spirit of the ask’ because they’re all trucks. Well, I see no reason to investigate this for misusing funds! As you were!”
And the GOP House 100% would have voted to start an impeachment trial if he didn’t follow through on it. They would draw a false equivalence between the extortion scheme against Ukraine that lead to Trump’s first impeachment trial, where one aspect of it was Trump unlawfully withholding congressionally mandated funds, and claim that this is the same thing. Actually, they’ll say this is worse because they’re completely shameless and untethered to reality.
That’s an excellent point. If he doesn’t comply in good faith, it would 100% be in conservative media that he’s sabotaging the borders, misappropriating funds, and haul him off to a real impeachment trial. It’d be the excuse for political theater that they want, and likely exactly why Congress wouldn’t reallocate the funds to something else.
It’s security theater, just like the TSA you see at the airport do nothing. The real protection is hidden both at the airport and at the border.
In general that’s not true.
Reinforced cockpit doors.
Isolation of runways/terminals (yes incursions happen)
Habit tracing, and Id scanning upon entry. Gait analysis and license plate reading.
Air Marshalls (yes not on every flight)
Lots of shit that comes together to do a ton behind the scenes.
All means shit if someone puts their mind to it. TSA misses the majority of treat items.
He tried to put it off as long as he could by getting Congress to reappropriate the funds. They refuses. He was ordered to build the wall.
So he’s using the funds to ensure the most dangerous parts are blocked to funnel the people into the designated channels so they can be processed humanely and securely.
What’s the problem.
He should had the money spent to redesign them as a welcome wall or something to help nesting birds and wild animals thrive. Instead of these shitty useless monstrosities.
