The construction of triple-amputee Air Force veteran Brian Kolfage’s wall along the southern U.S. border in New Mexico has triggered a groundswell of emotion in those Americans most slated to be affected by its construction — the Angel Families who’ve lost loved ones to illegal alien crime.

Take Michelle Root, whose daughter Sarah was murdered on the night of her university graduation in January 2016 by an underage illegal alien street racer.

“She was rear-ended by Edwin Mejia, who was street racing; a 19-year-old illegal alien that came over unaccompanied at age 16 in 2013,” she said in an interview with The Epoch Times.

“His blood alcohol was 0.241, he was going 70-plus miles an hour, plowed into the back of my daughter’s SUV, severed her spine, caused her to be brain dead, and therefore took her life.”

Root was one of the dozens of Angel Family members who showed up last week for a ribbon-cutting ceremony in honor of the wall being built near El Paso by “We Build the Wall,” a group formed by Kolfage to assist President Donald Trump in his mission to secure the border.

“This wall means the world to me,” she said. “It makes it like my daughter didn’t die in vain. It reignites the fire within me to see what can be done. And to see that private citizens, American citizens, donated to this, and we have wonderful people working on it. Things our government couldn’t do, us American people could come together and do.”

Listen to her full statement below:

She’s not alone in feeling like this.

Kiyan and Bobby Michael’s son, Brandon Randolph Michael, died in 2007 after being struck by a twice-deported illegal alien who’d been driving without a license or registration. His killer received only two years in prison and was deported afterward.

“We’re here as Angel parents, because losing a child to illegal immigration is a loss that’s totally preventable,” Kiyan said. “And for us to be able to come and witness this wall going up, knowing that it will save lives, knowing that it will save other parents from experiencing what we’ve experienced — it means a lot to us, it means everything to us.”

“It makes our fight that we do everyday, day in and day out … it makes it have meaning. This is America’s wall built by Americans, for Americans, to keep Americans safe.”

The beauty of Kolfage’s campaign is that it isn’t reliant on a single federal dollar. Instead, the Air Force veteran and his partners — including former Trump administration adviser Steve Bannon, former Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach and retired Milwaukee County Sheriff David Clarke — have been funding their wall-building efforts via private donations.

Michelle Balogh, the sister of murdered U.S. Border Patrol agent Brian Terry, who was killed in 2010 while trying to arrest five illegal aliens, shares the Michael family’s joy. She told the Times that Kolfage’s wall symbolizes “security for our country, for our agents, for us Americans.”

“It’s bittersweet,” she said of the wall’s construction. “It’ll be protecting his brothers in green.”

Listen:

It’ll be protecting Terry’s brothers and sisters in green despite attempts by left-wing politicians to halt the project altogether. After Kolfage and his team began building the wall near El Paso two weeks ago, local Democrat officials issued a cease-and-desist order.

New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham, who only days earlier had traveled to Washington, D.C., to beg the Trump administration to pay for her to take care of the hordes of illegal aliens who’ve been flooding her state, involved herself in the affair as well by issuing a statement.

“A multi-faceted and strategic approach is required for establishing and enhancing border security as well as dealing with the humanitarian crisis on our southern border,” she said.

“No president, no federal administration has done enough on these fronts in recent decades, and certainly not in recent months. But to act as though throwing up a small section of wall on private land does anything to effectively secure our southern border from human- and drug-trafficking or address the humanitarian needs of the asylum seekers and local communities receiving them — that’s nonsense. It takes us farther away from where we all need to be.”

It appears that the Angel Families who’ve actually been affected by the illegal alien crisis disagree. Thankfully, local officials were eventually forced to back down:

Watch last Thursday’s ribbon-cutting ceremony below:

Luckily for Angel Families and those who support them, Kolfage isn’t even close to being done.

“We have made a list of every single landowner on the U.S. border, and we have constantly been going down the list and making contact with each one, networking and figuring out who fits the mold for what we want to do,” he said. “Currently, we have about 10 properties in the pipeline after this.”

HERE’S WHAT YOU’RE MISSING …

As for the wall near El Paso in particular, it was reportedly completed Monday.

“A foreman onsite, Mike Furey, told KTSM the project took about 17 days total to complete from reviewing the property to installing the last piece of bollard fencing. Furey said the only thing remaining is installing lighting and concrete pours for roadway pavement, as well as chain link fencing around the property,” El Paso station KTSM has confirmed.

Kolfage’s group reportedly plans to sell the wall to the U.S. government for $1. The sale will reportedly include a completely free maintenance plan.

“We have a 25-year plan in place to keep the maintenance up and that’s part of the ‘We Build the Wall’ process,” Furey said.

Listen to more of him below:

HERE’S WHAT YOU’RE MISSING …