Texas governor puts $250 million down payment on a border wall

[Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin]

Source: Washington Post

AUSTIN — Texas Gov. Greg Abbott announced Wednesday he was putting a $250 million down payment on a state-led project to build "hundreds of miles" of border wall as part of a security plan he said was made necessary by the federal government's neglect of communities along the state's international river boundary with Mexico.

Flanked by Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick (R) and more than two dozen cheering Texas lawmakers, Abbott (R) signed documents authorizing several actions to address the “tidal wave” of immigration that is overwhelming border law enforcement and stoking acrimony in some communities.

Abbott, who is seeking a third term in 2022 and was recently endorsed by former president Donald Trump, opened his remarks by crediting the previous administration’s policies for slowing migration and tying his state’s perceived woes to the Biden administration’s dismantling of those programs. Trump announced Tuesday that he had accepted Abbott’s invitation to visit the border this month.

Abbott painted a bleak picture of border cities as victims of an “open border” policy he blames for the large numbers of migrants “wreaking havoc” and “carnage” on both populous and remote communities along the Rio Grande.



Read more: https://www.washingtonpost.com/immigration/texas-governor-puts-250-million-down-payment-on-a-border-wall/2021/06/16/da4dde0c-ceea-11eb-8cd2-4e95230cfac2_story.html

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Is that his money or the Texas taxpayers' money? Article doesn't say.

[bahboo]

1. are ya happy taxpayers....

jesus fucking christ....

[Budi]

5. Well, today Abbott signed ther permitless carry law.

I truly believe he'd prefer it if Tx had no people to worry about & he & his crime family could just go about the business of greasing palms without answering to anyone.

Closest thing to seccession they can get without actually doing so.

Everyone can open carry with no permit necessary, if the grid in the cold of winter or scorching heat of summer goes down (& it already is & its only June) and y'all didn't buy yourself a generator then you are just s.o.l.
Move. Leave. Die. Just don't get in their way of doing business.
They really don't give a shit.

[Snackshack]

15. This what the GOP

Nationwide wants. It is why they are such big fans of Putin and Russia. They want the USA to be an oligarchy with them as the oligarchs because they know what is best for us not voters.

[Bernardo de La Paz]

16. Who needs real electricity crisis when you can manufacture border one & look STRONG for election

$250,000,000 election stunt paid for by taxpayers.

California wants high speed trains and Texas wants gunz 'n' wallz, y'all.

[PatSeg]

31. Yes, it is all just a stunt,

a very expensive stunt that won't accomplish much at all on the border and it won't serve the people who are paying for it. Politics have run amok in this country, leaving reason and sanity behind. Well, republican politics that is. The crazier the right gets, the more rational Democrats become or at least appear anyway.

[OneCrazyDiamond]

36. We are getting closer to expanding the HSR

https://cal.streetsblog.org/2021/03/19/governor-newsom-recommits-to-cal-bullet-train/

Gov. Newsom is going to be President one day.

[twodogsbarking]

25. I found a golf ball with JFC on it.

I still wonder how God could lose his ball.

[Lonestarblue]

30. This Texas taxpayer isn't.

Republicans brag about no state income tax and then tax us to death on our properties. I moved from the Northeast, and my property taxes here were more than double what I had paid on a more expensive property there. So no I do not want my taxes to pay for a stupid wall.

What Republicans also fail to tell people is that the wall would have to be built as much as two miles from the river because the ground near the river is not stable enough for such a massive structure, which means that hundreds or perhaps thousands of US citizens who live along the river would have a wall separating their property from the rest of Texas. Imagine having to go a hundred miles for medical care when you’re having a heart attack or having to go through a border security checkpoint every time you go to the grocery store.

Former Representative Will Hurd offered a plan a few years ago for electronic surveillance. How novel. Let’s use inexpensive, up-to-date technology to assist with the problem instead of medieval technology of an ugly wall! Aargh! I hate Republicans. All they want to do is destroy.

We do need to do something about the migrants coming from Central America. In addition to overwhelming federal government resources, they suck up the charitable resources that would have gone into local communities for citizens, thus creating resentment among those citizens. I suspect that is why Trump won Hidalgo County in 2020 and why we just saw the election of a Republican mayor in a traditionally Democratic area. Democrats at both state and federal levels need to talk to people who live on the border and ask what they want and need. Abbott’s border wall is not the answer in my mind, but it might be supported just to stop the inflow of migrants.

[PortTack]

2. Open border my ass...jerk! Why didn't you use the 250 mil to fix your electric grid..JHC

[hamsterjill]

3. Some of it, no doubt, is the two months of U/I that he's stealing.

Legal? He doesn’t go by rules.

[OAITW r.2.0]

4. This is how Republicans govern.

Bullet proof their election and then do what they want. Texans are fucked. Some know it, most don't.

[Murphyb849]

6. Well if they aren't frozen to death or die of heatstroke or get shot then they will have the wall

[xxqqqzme]

18. Wonder if that wall

will keep them from freezing when the next frigid front moves through, or blocks the next heat wave from creating texas humidiity hell, Then there are the floods the wall will surely divert because that was a development disaster from the start.

Great wall of China; Hadrian's Wall; Hitler's Atlantic Wall; and the Berlin Wall. All excellent examples of useless, failed wannabe barriers. Abbott's Wall takes its place on the list

And the rethugs want to recall Newsom because he did his job during a pandemic.

[Justice matters.]

7. Do what? Most land owners along the border DON'T WANT

A FRIGIN UGLY WALL on THEIR property!

Republican "owners' rights" concept... Freedumb.

[Tactical Peek]

8. Is that guy stupid or what?

[Hugh_Lebowski]

14. Makes perfect sense once you realize the fact that it's the illegals fault, stealing all the power!

[oasis]

35. Abbott is dumber than former Texas Gov. "Oops" Perry.

[dalton99a]

9. $250 million in state funds

Gov. Greg Abbott on Wednesday announced some new details of his plan for Texas to build its own border wall, starting with the hiring process for a program manager and providing $250 million in state funds as a "down payment."

"Texas will build a border wall in our state to help secure our border," Abbott said.

The governor did not specify how long the wall would be, where it would be built or the total cost of the project, saying that those decisions will need to be determined by a program manager. On Wednesday, Abbott directed the Texas Facilities Commission to hire a program manager to begin that work.

https://www.texastribune.org/2021/06/16/texas-border-wall-greg-abbott/

[LastLiberal in PalmSprings]

13. The money could have been used to upgrade the state's energy infrastructure so it won't fail

during the next big snowstorm or heatwave.

But no, it's more important to use the money to build a wall that won't keep the Mexicans out. You can't take a political photo of yourself standing next to a roll of electrical wire and make it look like a significant accomplishment. A wall is bigger and more impressive.

[monkeyman1]

10. well shit , so much for utilities don't want to hear poor texas & that shit no more !!

[cstanleytech]

11. Hmmm I thought the federal government only had had jurisdiction when it came to border security?

Not to mention shouldn't any walls even inside the state itself and not on the border that are designed to be a check on people's movements be a violation of the Privileges and Immunities Clause within the Constitutions clause?

[Karma13612]

38. I was wondering the same thing.

Texas is not a country.

How can they just decide to build a wall with only State authority.

[wnylib]

12. Is it legal for a state to close down a federal border?

There are official points of entry. Is he going to close those down? Or is he putting the wall between entry points? People come and go across borders daily for work, shopping, and entertainment.

If he is using state funds that were raised within the state that would be stupid and wasteful, but acceptable, I guess. But if he is using federal funds that were allocated to Texas for something else, is that legal?

[Karma13612]

39. I was wondering the same thing.

How can a state do this? They don’t have federal authority to do anything along a border with another country. Do they?

And on a state level, could Kansas (for example) just build a wall around their entire state to keep some people out or in, and create check points to control traffic in and out? Not for the purposes of auto traffic per se; but instead to control and monitor people’s ‘actions’.

After the precedent is set, I wonder how long it would be before Alabama closed it’s borders so that women who wanted to go elsewhere to get an abortion would be prohibited. There could be border check points asking to know the purpose of visits out of the state, etc.

Once step closer to Gilead.

I know I’m jumping the gun, but this reeks of GOP overreach. And I can see it being used for bad. For controlling people’s movements for reasons that are NONE OF THE STATE’S BUSINESS.

[wnylib]

40. Regarding state borders.

Pennsylvania does not have sales tax on clothing. Their sales tax rate on taxed items is lower than in NY. I live near the NY-PA border. People used to drive to PA for back to school shopping in the fall and Chistmas shopping in December.

Then NY started putting state police on the NY side of the border to stop and check cars for items purchased in PA. NY tried to enforce NY tax rates on PA merchandise. They accused shoppers who went to PA of evading taxes. It failed in court.

That was several years ago. Now NY no longer has a sales tax on clothing. The sales tax rate on other items is still higher, of course, but no more highway check spots for PA purchases.

[Karma13612]

42. Whoa!!!!! Nt

[Cryptoad]

17. If I lived in TX,,,,

i would rather have an electric grid that didn't go out for weeks bc the weather was too cold..........

[ananda]

32. You got that right!

It was four days of hell here.

[modrepub]

19. A Gift That Will Keep On Giving

How many miles of wall will $250M build? Probably not that much. Once you build it, you have to maintain it. So TX has just committed itself to a structure that doesn't contribute to its tax base, like a road or even a park, and will continue to suck resources to keep it upright in perpetuity.

[Vinca]

20. Meanwhile, back along the power grid . . .

[gab13by13]

21. It's not a wall, it's a fence.

[bringthePaine]

22. and Texans wonder why they're a fucking laughingstock worldwide...

[Botany]

23. Good God in Butter.

Come on turn Texas blue twenty twenty two. We need an outreach to the Hispanic male voters.


The Lt. Governor or the Sec. of State has already admitted that if they hadn't stopped mail in voting TX would have gone to Biden.

[Scruffy1]

24. It is very nice here on the border.

I'm thinking that he gets away with this shit because most Texans live a long way from the border. Of course, the MSM helped in spreading the BS over the last few years. Border issues are the last refuge of the not so covert racists. They know that the "pro-life" cover isn't working to gin up votes the way it used to and he is upside down in popularity. This might shore up his support among the hard core base, but I don't think it will work in the general election. If border security is not an issue here on the border I don't think it will get much support in places like Dallas and Houston. The headline in the Juarez newspaper (El Diario) says that he is going to ask Mexico for help in building his "wall". Sounds familiar. The last gasps of a dead politician grasping to get reelected. I know it won't get any votes in the Rio Grand valley, but we are only a small and geographically remote area. In El Paso we are closer to Phoenix than Austin.

[OldBaldy1701E]

26. Oh yeah?

How are you going to build it without any power for your equipment? How are you going to secure it without the ability to illuminate the area? Most of all, how are you going to pay for it when your state is about to go bankrupt from the shaky power grid to the dicey roads? Don't worry Texas... your looney rethugs are going to destroy your state, just as they are destroying mine.

[The Jungle 1]

27. I wish texass would build that wall all the way around the state.

Alaska is bigger than texass and way nicer. Texass is just a big ugly desert. Just wait until the water runs out then they can eat their wall.
The trump wall is a failure. Americans dig under it, climb over it and cut through it. Complete failure.

Hey texass stay the F out of Pennsylvania's election business. Mind your own business.
Hey texass when is your Lt governor going to pay off his debt to Pa LT governor Fetterman. Texass can't even pay up when they lose.
John Fetterman is the next Democratic US Senator from Pa. Will you pay up then texass.

[ananda]

28. I guarantee you, it's not his personal money.

He said he was going to raise money to build that wall.

However, that down payment had to come from
somewhere....

I hope there's a lawsuit.

[IronLionZion]

29. The wall can keep out the heat in summer and cold in winter

because it's not like Texas needs to improve their electric grid or anything frivolous like that.

[Javaman]

33. the new texas repuke grift.

if asshole abbott has learned anything he has learned how to properly hide the graff and the grift. especially after steve bannon fucked up a good thing for the repukes.

nothing more than bullshit and mirrors. and we the tax payers will be on the hook for this horseshit.

[Martin68]

34. Not every Texan landowner on the border wants a wall built through their property.

[mahina]

37. Shovel: 24.99

Grifters gonna grift

[paleotn]

41. While Texans roast in the summer and freeze in the winter.

[Bucky]

43. First off, that's chump change compared to cost of building a wall

Second off, a wall still wouldn't work.

But most importantly, you could fully fund about 25 high schools for 5 years with that money.

I live in a state run by lunatics