SAN DIEGO (AP) – In the days before Joe Biden became president, construction teams quickly worked to finish off Donald Trump’s wall in an iconic cross-border park overlooking the Pacific Ocean, which then-First Lady Pat Nixon inaugurated in 1971 as a symbol of international friendship.
Biden on Wednesday ordered a “pause” on all wall construction in a week, one of 17 executive orders issued on his first day in office, including six on immigration.
The order it leaves billions of dollars of work unfinished, but still under contract, after Trump worked feverishly last year to build more than 720 miles, a goal he said he achieved eight days before leaving office.
As of Jan. 15, the government spent $ 6.1 billion of the $ 10.8 billion on jobs it signed contracts, according to a Democratic Senate aide with knowledge of the contracts who spoke on condition of anonymity because the details did not have been made public. The total amount contracted would have widened the Trump wall to 1,069 kilometers (664 miles).
Biden, who wanted to fulfill his commitment not to build “another foot,” gave his administration two months to determine how much it would cost to cancel the contracts and whether money could be spent elsewhere. The Senate councilor said the fees would be negotiated with contractors and the administration would try to spend whatever is left on border-related uses, such as roads, lights, sensors and other technologies.
Publicly, the Trump administration said it raised $ 15 billion for the wall. The Senate councilor said it was actually $ 16.45 million as of Wednesday, $ 5.8 million of which was appropriated by Congress and the rest diverted from the Defense and Finance departments.
On Jan. 14, the Trump administration notified the Senate aide that he was moving forward with a $ 863 million contract, but he was not awarded.
The Army Corps of Engineers, which has awarded wall contracts with money from the Department of Defense, said Thursday that it told crews not to install additional barriers and to limit activity over the next few days. “needed to safely prepare each site for a work suspension.”
John Kurc, an activist who posts videos of dynamite blasts by wall construction teams, said he saw a charge of dynamite set up Wednesday afternoon in the Guadalupe Canyon, east of Arizona, even when the inauguration was played out in Washington.
Heavy machinery has been dragging along the paved roads to the rocky slopes of the mountain, making open holes for sites owned by the U.S. Office of Land Management.
Proponents of Texas’ Rio Grande Valley, the busiest area for illegal crossings, and near Nogales, Arizona, saw idle construction equipment on Thursday.
But in San Diego, crews were replacing a steel fence with imposing narrow poles topped with flat steel plates that rose to 9 feet (30 feet), said Dan Watman of Friends of Friendship Park, a group that promotes public access to the cross. border park overlooking the Pacific Ocean.
Contractors began last week, said Watman, who was briefed on the project at a December conference call with border patrol officers, but got no explanation. The agency referred questions to the White House, which made no immediate comment.
Trump said the border wall would be “virtually impenetrable” and paid for by Mexico, which never happened. While the wall is far more formidable than the barriers it replaced, it’s not uncommon for smugglers to guide people over or through it. Portions can be sawed with power tools sold in home improvement stores.
Despite Trump’s bravery, Border Patrol officials have said the wall was never intended to stop everyone, but rather to slow their advance.
Jose Edgar Zuleta, whose business sold religious jewelry in the Mexican city of Puebla, dried up during the coronavirus pandemic, cleaned two walls in the Friendship Park in October with a special scale. He moved through brushes in a heavily patrolled area for about half an hour before being caught. His 21-year-old son, who overtook him, was picked up hours later.
The cross-border park has hosted yoga classes, concerts and countless press conferences, including one in 2018 with then-Attorney General Jeff Sessions to announce a “zero tolerance” policy that caused thousands of children to separate from their parents. at the border.
An old bullring and restaurants with sea views surround the Mexican side; the wetland scrub extends into the United States.
Years ago, people would pass bakery products, kiss and shake hands through a chain link fence. Watman remembers passing back and forth tools in 2007 to plant a cross-border garden that is still maintained.
Since 2012, after the construction of a double wall in the park, the Border Patrol has opened a door for many weekends for up to ten people at a time to exchange words with those in Mexico.
SLSCO Ltd. of Galveston, Texas, won contracts to build double walls covering 22 miles in San Diego. Company spokeswoman Liz Rogers said the work at Friendship Park is separate and done by another company.
The Supreme Court plans to hear arguments next month about whether the government illegally diverted billions of dollars from the Department of Defense to build the wall after Congress denied the money Trump was seeking, leading to a government shutdown of 35 days in 2017.
It is unclear whether Biden will take Trump’s position before the Supreme Court. The government submission is due on February 11th.
Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador praised Biden’s decision to stop building walls, but in Trump’s defense noted that U.S. presidents dating back to the 1990s built border barriers. . He showed a graph to prove his point.
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Associated Press writers Nomaan Merchant in Houston, Anita Snow in Phoenix, and Christopher Sherman in Mexico City collaborated.
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This story has been corrected to show that the border wall contractor SLSCO Ltd. says another company is doing the work at Friendship Park in San Diego.