Opinion

Trump’s wall defies reality on the ground

Much of the border is already fenced, including this area in Nogales, Arizona. And migrants find a way to beat them, border residents tell reporters. Much of the border is already fenced, including this area in Nogales, Arizona. And migrants find a way to beat them, border residents tell reporters. Photo: AFP / Getty Images / File Photo Photo: AFP / Getty Images / File Photo Image 1 of / 1 Caption Close Trump’s wall defies reality on the ground 1 / 1 Back to Gallery

Donald Trump’s border wall in three words: Impractical. Illogical. Unnecessary.

Yet, that “big, beautiful” wall is arguably the reason Trump is the GOP presidential nominee. He has ridden “Build that wall!” through the primaries to a one-on-one showdown for the presidency with the other major-party candidate.

Many with personal or professional familiarity with the U.S.-Mexico border have long cited the impossible logistics and even worse optics inherent in building such a Pacific-to-the-Gulf barrier.

Earlier this month, an Express-News article by Jason Buch and Aaron Nelsen looked at the issue firsthand. They reported that most of the nearly 2,000-mile border with Mexico is already walled, fenced, saturated with devices that make it a “virtual” wall, and extensively patrolled by air and land. This is done by 21,400 Border Patrol agents and 23,900 field officers at a cost of more than $11 billion a year for border operations and $30 billion more for homeland security.

Unmindful of its own budget challenges and the resources the federal government already expends, Texas has additionally deployed 600 state troopers and Texas Rangers, and 2,700 surveillance cameras at a cost estimated at $1 billion or so by the end of the next biennium.

And — oh, yes — the article reported that “claims that a flood of immigrants is inundating the border are long outdated.” Unauthorized immigration reached its high point in 2000 and has declined since. There is net or minus migration from Mexico, though the number of Central Americans has surged.

This makes Trump’s border wall — and Texas’ piling on with border security — simply unnecessary. And illogical.

Here’s the impractical part. As existing fences and walls demonstrate — 650 miles or so of them already on the border — devising routes that don’t cut ranchers from water, property owners from their own property, and endanger the environment and natural habitat is exceedingly problematic. Moreover, fences and walls that actually accomplish what is intended — impenetrability — is impossible.

Even if immigration numbers are declining, existing walls and fences stand in testament to a border wisdom — build a wall or fence and watch migrants climb over. Texas is not walled or fenced as much as California, Arizona and New Mexico. Yet where walls or fences exist, so do migrants who find a way to beat them, border residents told the reporters. And where they aren’t climbing over them, they are taking more dangerous routes that have claimed lives.

Aside from being impractical, illogical and unnecessary, Trump’s border wall — including his call to make Mexico pay for it — is an affront to one of this country’s most valuable trading partners. And Trump’s accompanying call to deport 11.2 million undocumented immigrants sows division, not just with Mexico but with Latinos whose forebears were immigrants recently or over the generations.

There is indeed a need to address unauthorized immigration, but a wall isn’t the solution. Comprehensive immigration reform is.

Such reform would be bilateral — Mexico would be a partner in it — and build bridges, not walls. It would regularize what now occurs, recognize what is needed to bolster the U.S. economy, include a path to legal residency for the undocumented immigrants already here, and look factually at any possible lapse in border security.

In calling for a wall, Trump has seized on fears that have little basis to them. He has nurtured these fears for political ambition, growing them into near hysteria. And he hasn’t cared.

The rationale for his wall also has little basis to it. As with so many issues, Trump is simply fact-averse.

Reject the wall, reject Trump, and move on to immigration reform.