Trump to Divert $7.2B in Federal Funds to Border Wall

This week, The Washington Post, The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal have all reported on internal plans by President Donald Trump’s administration to use an additional $7.2 billion in funds from the Pentagon for construction on the United States-Mexican border wall.

According to the plans, the administration would use money from military construction project spending ($3.7 billion) and counternarcotics funding ($3.5 billion) to build approximately 885 miles of new fencing by 2022. The administration had originally planned for 509 miles for the border wall project.  

The number is five times what U.S. Congress authorized the Trump administration to spend in the government’s 2020 budget. If the administration goes through with the funding move, the total for federal funding allocated to border wall construction amounts to $18.4 billion. 

Construction of the border wall has been rife with complications and slow going due to a number of factors. Earlier this month, lawmakers in Arizona introduced new legislation that would amend state regulations to make border wall projects where private land was concerned exempt from having to acquire a building permit to start construction.