A full decade after voting to construct a secure barrier along the U.S. border with Mexico, Congress continues to refuse to lay out the money required to build the damned wall.

This, even after the stunning upset in last year’s elections by the juggernaut presidential campaign of Donald J. Trump, who won the presidency on a clarion vow to voters that he would once and for all build a wall along the border. Mr. Trump’s historic upset came after years and years of both Democrat and Republican politicians talking tough about illegal immigration and promising to crack down on the porous border, yet refusing to actually fix the problem.

Because they are politicians. If you fix the problem, then you can no longer campaign on the problem.

This wall, Mr. Trump promised during the campaign, would finally halt not only illegal immigration but also the highly destructive drugs, gangs and slavery pouring over the southern border.

Despite the clear message from voters last year, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi dismisses the wall as “immoral, expensive and unwise.”

Her comment made history as the moment Nancy Pelosi finally discovered morality. Also noteworthy is that it was the first time Nancy Pelosi has every found anything to be too “expensive” to stick to the poor, innocent American taxpayer.

As for her mention of wisdom? Well, clearly, that was some kind of typo or another one of her random brain sizzles.

It wasn’t so long ago that Ms. Pelosi’s fellow Democrats were all for the immoral and expensive. Her party’s last two standard-bearers — former President Barack Obama and twice-failed presidential candidate Hillary Clinton — both voted in favor of the so-called “Secure Fence Act of 2006.”

After passing the construction of that barrier into law, Congress balked at actually paying for it and ultimately scrapped much of it in favor of — well, whatever the White House felt like doing.

Under former President Bush and then President Obama, that wasn’t much.

Since then, problems at the border have only grown worse.

Today, there are untold millions of illegal aliens in the United States, including many who are criminals. “Bad hombres,” Mr. Trump calls them.

Increasingly, we hear reports of staggering violence committed by the international gang MS-13, made up primarily of illegal aliens from Central America. These vicious thugs peddle the drugs across the border and import slavery in the form of human trafficking. The violence they are capable of is beyond the imagination of civilized people.

To be sure, these gangs got much stronger under Mr. Obama. Throughout his entire presidency, the U.S. border had a giant blinking neon “WELCOME” sign, encouraging men, women, children and criminals to storm across the border.

This beefed up the ranks of MS-13 and led to who knows how many crimes against Americans.

Everyone remembers Kate Steinle, the 32-year-old killed two years ago while walking along a pier with her family in San Francisco. Charged with her murder was an illegal from Mexico who had been deported five times.

It is a fair question: How many Kate Steinles are there? The answer is maddening: We have no idea.

That is because the federal government, which keeps records of how many toilets every citizen has in their homes, does not keep track of how many Americans are killed by illegal aliens who are supposed to be kept out of the country by said federal government.

Such information is scattered, and federal bureaucrats are shockingly incurious about compiling that information. Any information they do have is not shared with the public.

“During the Obama administration, it seemed to be very intentional. The numbers were hidden,” explained Timothy Lyng, president of The Remembrance Project, a group dedicated to giving voice to the victims killed by illegals.

But there is hope. President Trump says he remains committed to building the wall. Already, he has done more than the last five presidents and 40 years of Congresses to fix the problem.

Just since taking office, border crossings have plummeted by an unthinkable 70 percent or more.

Mr. Trump has earned the credibility to get the money he wants for the wall from a Congress that has proved itself utterly incompetent when it comes to fixing the border.

• Charles Hurt can be reached at churt@washingtontimes.com; follow him on Twitter via @charleshurt.