The Trump administration is making a renewed push to secure funding for a border wall. There are some obstacles few people are aware of that could pose some problems.
The final versions of the US-Mexico border wall are expected to be revealed early this year, as the Trump Administration looks for ways to get Congress to foot the bill that would cost an estimated $20 plus billion.
Some potential roadblocks are ahead, put up by those opposed to the barrier.
Notably, the creators of the popular adult card game Cards Against Humanity who say they've purchased several acres of land on the US-Mexico border and are dividing it among 150,000 of their members.
Also, the National Butterfly Center located in Mission, Texas filed a lawsuit in December against the US Department of Homeland Security after government contractors were found trespassing on their property near the border.
“Due process has been ignored in this case and the fact that our private property rights have been trampled,” Executive Director Mariana Trevino-Wright said.
The Butterfly Center, according to Trevino-Wright, would be in the path of the border wall. However, the first place the wall would be built is 18 miles east of the center at a wildlife refuge in Alamo, Texas.
“The planning, not funded yet, is 60 miles of border wall/fence combination,” US Border Patrol RGV sector chief Manuel Padilla Jr. said, “If that funding comes to fruition our starting point will likely be in the Santa Ana refuge.”
One of the ways President Trump has recently suggested to make good on this promise of a wall is to use the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program as a bargaining chip. A program that granted deferred action to those brought illegally to the U.S. as children. These protections are set to expire in March.
"Our priorities on what we hope to have in any immigration bill, in any DACA deal, haven't changed,” said the White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders. “They would include securing the border with a wall, ensuring interior enforcement, eliminating the visa lottery program and eliminating chain migration."
As for the plan to have Mexico pay for the wall, that is yet to be revealed.