WASHINGTON — A proposal to bar the Trump administration from building a border wall in Big Bend National Park died Wednesday in the U.S. House Appropriations Committee, after the GOP-controlled panel rejected the idea along party lines.
The measure, proposed by Rep. Henry Cuellar, D-Laredo, would have prevented the Department of Homeland Security’s budget from being used to construct barriers within the park, as the administration has laid the groundwork to do so after waffling over the idea for months. Local residents, ranchers and environmentalists in the Big Bend area and across the state have expressed fierce opposition, holding bipartisan rallies in Texas and Washington to press the case that the wild and remote landscape, beloved by Texans and rarely traversed by migrants, should not be sullied by metal bollards.
The condemnation has come from Republicans including Brandon Herrera, the Republican congressional candidate running to represent the area. Herrera spoke at an Austin rally against the wall proposal in April, ticking through the spectrum of opposition — from both parties to sheriffs to tourists — before concluding that “nobody wants this wall in Big Bend.”
Cuellar tried to attach the wall-banning language to the House bill that funds the Department of Homeland Security, which oversees border operations, for fiscal year 2027, which runs through September next year. The amendment would have also applied to the Secure America Act, Republicans’ just-passed party-line bill to fund U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Customs and Border Protection, the two main border and immigration agencies under the DHS umbrella, through 2029.
But all Republicans in attendance, including Texans John Carter, Michael Cloud and Jake Ellzey, stood against the amendment in Wednesday’s committee vote, which killed the proposal by a 26-34 margin. All present Democrats voted in support.
During debate, Cuellar noted the Trump administration has been able to push border crossings to historic lows without new border wall construction in those areas, and that the areas he was looking to protect from fencing have low traffic regardless. In fiscal year 2025, Border Patrol recorded 3,096 apprehensions in the Big Bend sector — accounting for just 1.3% of the 237,538 apprehensions recorded across the entire U.S.-Mexico border.
“Members, I would ask you to consider, out of the 1,200 miles of river that we have in Texas, that we just carve [out] a couple miles,” Cuellar said. “We can use any other technology except for the border wall.”
Big Bend is located in Texas’ 23rd Congressional District, which is currently vacant after the resignation of Rep. Tony Gonzales, R-San Antonio, in April. Gonzales, who was a member of the Appropriations Committee, would have been able to vote on the Big Bend amendment had he still been in Congress. He resigned amid a House Ethics investigation into an affair he had with a staffer who later died by suicide.
Democratic Rep. Veronica Escobar, whose El Paso district is directly west of Gonzales’ old seat, said during debate that the Trump administration has delivered inconsistent messaging on its plans for Big Bend, arguing the amendment would give assurance to the many opponents of fencing in the park.
“I want you to imagine putting a wall through the Grand Canyon,” Escobar said. “That is how we in Texas feel about building a wall through Big Bend. That not only does it not make sense, but it would destroy a national treasure.”
The El Paso Democrat’s office has received an influx of calls from constituents in the neighboring 23rd District concerned about the prospect of a wall in Big Bend, according to an aide.
The amendment would have banned the use of federal funds to construct fencing or waterborne barriers within Big Bend National Park and Big Bend State Park. In addition, that border wall equipment would have been banned in areas important to Cuellar’s hometown of Laredo — downtown Laredo, within the World Trade International Bridge and the Laredo-Colombia Solidarity International Bridge areas, and in Chacon Bat Park, the Father Charles M. McNaboe Park, Max A. Mandel Municipal Golf Course and Santa Rita Park.
The ban would have also applied to the San Ygnacio historic district in Zapata County and within Falcon Lake, a reservoir on the U.S.-Mexico border southeast of Laredo — both in Cuellar’s district.
Encounters in the Laredo sector made up 5% of apprehensions in the first half of fiscal year 2025.
Several public lands further south along the border in Texas have already been excluded from fencing by prior appropriations laws, including the Santa Ana Wildlife Refuge in Alamo and Bentsen-Rio Grande Valley State Park in Mission.
Rep. Mark Amodei, R-Nevada, said during debate that eliminating the department’s ability to put up a border wall in the exempted areas — which he said constituted 183 miles in total — represented a risk to border security in Texas.
“This doesn’t mean that the mission in terms of building the wall can’t evolve to whatever the terrain requires,” Amodei said. “But to basically take this option off the table, as a matter of law, is not a responsible way to proceed.”
While Homeland Security officials have moved forward with plans to construct border barriers in Big Bend, questions remain about what technology the department will use.
The department waived environmental laws Monday to authorize the construction of road and physical barrier infrastructure in the park, and has awarded a contract expressly for a border wall in Big Bend — compounding fears that the landscape will be irreparably damaged.
Still, those recent moves follow months of mixed signals from federal officials. Earlier this year, a Customs and Border Protection online map of the border wall was changed to reference a virtual barrier instead of a physical wall on public land, and CBP commissioner Rodney Scott wrote in a May letter to Rep. Lloyd Doggett, D-Austin, that the agency recognized the economic and scenic value of the landscape to Texans and would not use lighting or infrared illustrators on park land. Scott also has said there are no plans to construct 30-foot barriers within the national or state park.
The commissioner confirmed plans to pursue border security measures in the park in the letter to Doggett, saying his agency would adapt to the terrain by using camera and sensor technology and a limited number of low-profile vehicle barriers and patrol roads.
Meanwhile, Marfa Public Radio reported Sunday that construction of two segments of a thirty-foot high wall in the region, which would run to the edge of the state park, is set to begin this summer.
Cuellar said he presented the amendment as a way to codify Scott’s pledge about not constructing a wall in either Big Bend park.
“The administration already said they don’t want to put a fence there,” the Laredo Democrat said. “So, I’m just going along with the administration and saying we don’t need a border wall there at Big Bend National Park and the state park.”
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