The Trump administration on Wednesday asked the Supreme Court to allow construction on border walls and other barriers across the Big Bend region of West Texas to continue amid an ongoing legal fight.
The administration’s emergency request to the nation’s highest court comes just weeks after U.S. District Judge Kathleen Cardone issued an injunction blocking border barrier construction — and the use of federal regulatory waivers expediting the project — for the entire Big Bend region. The area, known for its rugged canyon lands and desert vistas, makes up nearly a quarter of the U.S.-Mexico border but has historically seen among the lowest numbers of border crossings in the Southwest.
The Center for Biological Diversity, a church preservation group and a local river guide are suing the Department of Homeland Security and U.S. Customs and Border Protection over its border barrier plans for the region.
In the emergency application filed Wednesday, the government called the injunction “baseless” and argued that its border security and operation interests “vastly outweigh any aesthetic, recreational, or cultural injuries” suffered by the plaintiffs.
The administration is asking for both a stay of the lower court injunction, which would allow construction to continue, and for the court to “summarily” take up the case and reverse the original injunction order.
For now, the judge’s block on construction remains in effect, after Judge Cardone on Tuesday rejected the government’s separate request in the lower court for construction to continue.
The Trump administration claims the construction pause is costing over $460,000 a day due to the “scale” of the project.
“Workers there had already constructed about three quarters of a mile of border barrier, and temporary field offices, supply yards, a water delivery system, and a temporary concrete batch plant had been installed,” the emergency application read.
The government also argues in the application that there will be a “funneling” effect if walls are built along other parts of the border, but not in the Big Bend region.
“DHS has further determined that leaving an open segment of the border without barriers in the Big Bend region would create a funnel point for illegal-alien crossings and smugglers,” the government said in its filing Wednesday.
Lawyers with the Texas Civil Rights Project and Center for Biological Diversity representing the plaintiffs said in statements to Marfa Public Radio that the region’s natural barriers have, and will continue to, prevent illegal border crossings.
“We’re deeply disappointed that the Trump administration is asking the Supreme Court for a green light to bulldoze one of America’s wildest, most extraordinary landscapes,” said Zeynep Graves, a senior attorney at the Center for Biological Diversity. “Once Big Bend's canyons, cultural treasures and wild ecosystems are destroyed, they’ll be lost forever. We’re confident the law is on our side and that only Congress can authorize something as consequential as walling off the entire U.S.-Mexico border. We won’t stop fighting for Big Bend until it’s protected forever.”
In its application, the government noted that border walls are not currently planned for Big Bend National Park or Big Bend Ranch State Park. Private property in the area, however, is set to receive 30-foot-high steel bollard walls and parks will see the installation of patrol roads, vehicle barriers and other border security infrastructure.
The Supreme Court did not immediately indicate when it might respond to the emergency application.
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