The head of U.S. Customs and Border Protection is defending the agency’s plan to build border vehicle barriers and new patrol roads across Big Bend National Park, despite growing public outcry from those who say any new border infrastructure will irreparably harm the pristine West Texas park.
“We are securing this park to protect its legacy,” CBP Commissioner Rodney Scott said in a statement Thursday. “Keeping it safe, secure, and pristine so American families can enjoy the beauty of our country, free from fear of cartel activity, for generations to come.”
The park draws more than 500,000 visitors per year, many of whom flock to campgrounds, hiking trails and a scenic hot spring pool that all lie right along the Rio Grande in areas with no physical border security infrastructure.
CBP has maintained it’s not planning to build a 30-foot steel border wall in the national park or nearby Big Bend Ranch State Park – though the agency is pursuing a 175-mile long, 30-foot tall steel wall in the broader Big Bend region from Hudspeth to Presidio counties. More than $3 billion in federal contracts have been awarded for that project. CBP said in early August “early construction activities” have begun on the project and that wall panels would begin being installed “in the coming weeks.”
In his statement, Scott indicated the agency would not back down from its infrastructure plan for the national park, which calls for more than 200 miles of “patrol road” construction and improvements in and around the park, along with 17 miles of smaller steel vehicle barriers and surveillance technology.
“These improvements will help our agents detect illegal crossings, respond faster, and assist visitors in danger,” Scott said. “As we strengthen the border across the Southwest, we will not leave Big Bend as an opening for cartels to exploit by shifting their routes and tactics.”
Images of bulldozers and other heavy machinery already operating inside the national park have sparked outrage in West Texas and across the state over the past week, even drawing the attention of some Texas Republicans.
Outgoing U.S. Senator John Cornyn on Tuesday released a letter he sent to Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin, in which Cornyn urged federal officials to meet with concerned West Texans before proceeding with any further construction.
Scott said in his statement Thursday that the work happening in the park was “survey and design work” and that CBP is “working to preserve the landscape and protect the access visitors and local businesses depend on.”
The Big Bend region has historically seen among the lowest numbers of illegal border crossings across the Southwest, and the national park is not known as a hotbed of illegal activity.
Apprehensions in the Border Patrol’s Big Bend Sector in 2025 fell by 74% from the year before and accounted for just 1.3% of apprehensions across the southern border, according to CBP data. Crossings in the national park are even rarer; the advocacy group Keep Big Bend Wild says apprehensions within the park averaged between 100 and 200 per year since 2023.
Conservation groups have maintained that the construction work underway in Big Bend is already impacting the park’s pristine landscape and threatening sensitive wildlife.
Bob Krumenaker – former Big Bend National Park superintendent and chair of the group Keep Big Bend Wild – told Marfa Public Radio on Wednesday the area near Santa Elena Canyon where bulldozers have been seen clearing vegetation is a riparian forest that’s home to the yellow-billed cuckoo, a thin and long-tailed bird the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has identified as a threatened species.
“It’s just the tip of the iceberg in terms of the damage they may or will do to the national park if this continues,” Krumenaker said.
Responding to Scott’s comments, the advocacy group No Big Bend Wall said in a statement that “Washington doesn’t get to contradict what we can see with our own eyes.”
“Here on the ground it’s a different story than the one they are spinning in DC,” the group wrote. “It’s an unprecedented 80 miles of new road cut through our National Park. It’s pointless clear-cutting alongside existing park roads. It’s closures of our public lands and roads.”
Scott’s statement Thursday came just days after a Republican sheriff and former Border Patrol agent in the Big Bend area who has opposed the agency’s plans invited Scott to come tour the region himself.
Terrell County Sheriff Thaddeus Cleveland, who has described Scott as a former colleague and personal friend, told Austin TV news station KXAN that he believes in barriers “where barriers work,” but not in the Big Bend region.
“Let me just show you this portion of the border, so you can see it with your own eyes,” Cleveland said.
The sheriff later followed up on the invite in a social media post.
“Rodney, you are my friend, and my invitation stands,” Cleveland wrote. “Come down to Big Bend. Let me show you what I’m seeing on the ground. I also want to hear your perspective.”
This reporting was made possible by generous donations from supporters like you. Please consider making a donation to Marfa Public Radio to fund the journalism you rely on.
