Border walls and their environmental consequences

More and more walls separate nations, with accompanying environmental degradation

Since Donald Trump reentered the White House, immigration headlines have been dominated by the administration’s efforts at enhanced enforcement and deportations. In stark contrast to 2017, when television cameras and reporters spread along southern Texas and Arizona, there hasn’t been as much press dedicated to Trump’s border wall. Extending the barrier between this country and Mexico nonetheless remains a priority for the Trump administration. And Congress is backing Trump, recently approving more than $350 billion in additional border funding.

While it is facile to think of the border wall as a partisan issue—GOP all in for the idea, Democrats all out—the border wall has been a bipartisan effort for the last 30 years. When I moved to San Diego in 1980, the only barrier, if there was one, between the U.S. and Mexico was an unkempt barbed wire fence. A dozen or so years later, rightwing radio and the new political partisanship of Newt Gingrich ginned up fears and anxieties over waves of young migrant Mexican men crossing the border, prompting Bill Clinton to commence construction of a wall.

About 35 miles of wall, a section east of the San Diego-Tijuana border crossing, went up during Clinton’s administration. Barack Obama completed 133 miles of border wall. George W. Bush did the most to construct an obstacle, almost 465 miles during his eight years in the White House. During his term, Joe Biden issued an executive order reversing Trump’s wall building at the southern border; he nonetheless allowed wall building to continue.

Border barriers are going up all over the world

The Berlin Wall gave border barriers a bad name, and construction of border walls and fencing slowed after that Cold War barrier fell to the pickaxes and hammers of the German people. But the attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon in the U.S. in 2001 ignited a security state mindset in the U.S. and much of the rest of the world, ushering in a time of greatly increased border barrier construction.

In response to climate refugees from Bangladesh, India has fenced more than 2,000 of its 2,600 miles of border between the two countries. Just recently, Thailand is considering erecting a wall over a portion of its 500 mile border with Cambodia to cut down on crossings. Poland seeks to fully fortify its border with Belarus. Throughout Europe, border fences and walls have been constructed in response to the movement of refugees. Estimates put the length of border walls through all of Eurasia at over 18,000 miles.

Effects of border walls and fences on wildlife and the environment

Border walls and fences disrupt wildlife. When they are confronted with a fence, larger animals will “patrol” the fence, looking for ways to go under or around the barrier. Others will “bounce” back, returning in the direction of their approach. Animals sometimes go back and forth along a short portion of the fence. All these behaviors waste the animals’ time and taxes their energy, sometimes exposing them to predators. Tragically, some animals get stuck in fences and die, with young being particularly susceptible.

In Europe, border fences between Russia and Belarus have fragmented habitat for decades and left their mark on populations of bears, wolves, lynx, and European bison. In Africa, over a one-year period along the length of a border fence in Namibia, five giraffes, five kudus, two elands, several antelopes, and one elephant were found dead. As one conservationist familiar with the Namibian fence noted, these animal mortalities are “just the tip of the iceberg.” The toll for wildlife is much greater.

The U.S.-Mexico border and the environment

Trump is presently assaulting environmental regulations mostly through executive orders. But those regulations have been in the crosshairs of the ultraconservative faction of the GOP for generations. Right-wing legislators have been chipping away at the laws at every available opportunity.

One of those opportunities opened while the nation was in shock over the 2001 attacks on the Twin Towers and Pentagon. In 2005, Congress passed the Real ID Act, which grants the Secretary of Homeland Security unprecedented powers to waive federal environmental and historic preservation laws, whenever he or she sees fit

The U.S. Mexico border wall can stretch through wilderness hundreds of miles from cities or roads.

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During the George W. Bush administration, Michael Chertoff, the second Secretary of Homeland Security, waived dozens of laws, including the Endangered Species Act, the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), the Clean Water Act, the Clean Air Act, the nearly century-old Migratory Bird Treaty Act, and the National Historic Preservation Act to expedite the construction of the triple barrier between Tijuana and San Diego. Some describe these waivers, which also violate international treaties and expand law enforcement powers as a militarization of the border.

For environmentalists and conservationists working along the border, this disregard for environmental regulations can be particularly galling. From San Diego to the Gulf of Mexico, the border region has some of the highest biodiversity in North America. Among the species that might be most affected by border wall are bighorn sheep, ocelots, bears, and roadrunners.

The southern border wall will probably severely affect black bears, which, after being extirpated, were reestablished in West Texas 30 years ago. Cutting the Texas bears off from the rest of the species south of the border could lead to their dying out in Texas again. The small population of U.S. jaguars are threatened by the wall as well. Only a few can be found in Arizona. A wall separating these individuals from the rest of their species would likely spell doom for the jaguar in the U.S., as they need large habitats for survival.

Besides the physical barrier, construction, maintenance, and patrolling border walls further disrupts ecosystems. Several years ago, on a tour of the U.S.-Mexico border through areas far from cities or roads, in the middle of nowhere, I saw erosion resulting from the unpaved roadway accompanying the border wall. As well, I saw invasive species, such as European mustard and nonnative grasses along the wall. Unless they are controlled, these species will most likely invade the chaparral and scrublands farther from the border wall in years to come.

I’ve also been along sections of the border at night. In some areas the border patrol sears the landscape with high-intensity lighting. This can disrupt bats and their feeding, disorient songbirds, and even interfere with bobcats and butterflies.

Here is a photo montage of my experience at the border wall:

Do you live near a section of border wall in the U.S. or elsewhere? What have you observed? Let me know in the comments.