New Big Bend Group Proposes a $2 Billion Border Trust Instead of a Wall
Let Texans Do Texas asks Congress to halt Big Bend wall construction, cancel the contracts and endow a permanent trust for roads, equipment, communications and emergency services across seven border counties.
A newly launched nonprofit is asking state and federal leaders to create a $2 billion border security fund for the Big Bend region as an alternative to the Trump administration's border wall plans, Marfa Public Radio reported Monday morning. The group, Let Texans Do Texas, shared a letter it plans to send to elected officials, including Gov. Greg Abbott and members of the U.S. House from Texas.
The proposal, as reported, calls for Congress to halt construction of the Big Bend border wall, cancel the awarded contracts and allocate $2 billion to endow a new Permanent Trust for Big Bend Region Border Security. The group's draft federal legislation would have the trust overseen by a board headed by the Secretary of State and including former politicians, landowners and county officials, with the governor, lieutenant governor and House speaker holding appointment power — a structure former Texas Land Commissioner Jerry Patterson, a board member, said is meant to give Austin confidence the effort is not a renegade outfit.
The group argues the region needs a different, more collaborative approach than a one-size-fits-all federal construction program, and says a number of county judges and sheriffs back the proposal. It points to the federal government looking to spend more than $7 billion on border barriers in a region that accounted for just 1.3% of apprehensions along the entire southwest border last year. Patterson told Marfa Public Radio that 200,000 to 700,000 acres of Texas land could effectively be ceded to Mexico if the wall were built along the Rio Grande, and argued that private property rights and state sovereignty do not need to be sacrificed to obtain a secure border.
Instead of wall funding, the group asks that money be reallocated to road improvements, equipment, communications, emergency medical services, vehicles, drones and aircraft. The participating counties named in the reporting are Hudspeth, Culberson, Jeff Davis, Presidio, Brewster, Terrell and Val Verde. The draft legislation also bars the trust from funding any initiative involving the seizure of private property, and requests additional congressional protections for Big Bend National Park after bulldozing by wall contractors near Santa Elena Canyon and Mariscal Mountain earlier this year.
The proposal is an ask, not an enacted program: Congress would have to act on the draft legislation, and the group's letter is still to be sent. For San Antonio readers, the Big Bend question lands in the same border-policy debate the Texas Desk has followed all session — who decides how border money is spent, and whether local communities get a say in a system built for their counties.
