Biden Administration Says It Has No Choice but to Build Wall

Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas insists the Biden administration's position against border walls hasn't changed, despite plans to build up to 20 miles of barriers in Texas. "From day one, this Administration has made clear that a border wall is not the answer," Mayorkas said in a statement Thursday. "That remains our position and our position has never wavered." Mayorkas said language in a notice waiving federal laws to expedite construction is being "taken out of context and it does not signify any change in policy whatsoever," CBS News reports. The notice described an "acute and immediate need" to build barriers and roads at the airport.

Mayorkas said Congress allocated money for the project under the Trump administration and the law requires the government use the funds as intended. "We have repeatedly asked Congress to rescind this money but it has not done so and we are compelled to follow the law," he said. CNN reports that President Biden made similar remarks Thursday. "They have to use the money for what it was appropriated. I can't stop that," said Biden, who pledged as a presidential candidate that "not another foot" of wall would be built. Asked Thursday whether he thinks the border wall works, he said, "No."

The decision was slammed by the ACLU, along with environmental and Indigenous groups who noted that the law didn't force the administration to waive environmental and cultural protections to speed up construction, the Guardian reports. "It's absolutely mystifying as to why they thought it was a good idea to issue these waivers," says Laiken Jordahl, a campaigner with the Center for Biological Diversity. "They could have moved forward with the Endangered Species Act still intact, so endangered wildlife and these areas would have had protections." He calls the move "a new low, a horrific step backwards for the borderlands."

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Donald Trump, meanwhile, posted on his Truth Social network that he is waiting for an apology from Biden "for taking so long to get moving, and allowing our country to be flooded with 15 million illegals immigrants." (More border wall stories.)