Selling Off American Security: Biden Auctions Off Border Wall Materials

In December, Americans learned that the lame duck Biden-Harris administration has started selling off unused pieces of the unfinished border wall that taxpayers had already paid for. It quickly became evident that the sections were junk or unusable. However, this does not mean that Biden-Harris administration actions were harmless or no big deal. Rather, the damaged sections were deliberately allowed to fall into disrepair due to the outgoing administration’s negligent and irresponsible open-borders policies.
Building a border wall was Donald Trump’s signature promise to voters in 2016, and, just as in 2024, border security and immigration were key issues that helped Trump secure the White House. President Trump found ways to fund and start building the wall in the second half of his first term. By January 2021, the entirety of the wall had not been completed, but a significant chunk – 452 miles – had been newly constructed or replaced.
Halting the building of the border wall was one of Joe Biden’s very first decisions as president. FAIR predicted that due to this executive action, along with other open-borders policies being rolled out at the same time, “Mr. Biden will likely face an epic border crisis of his own making.” That is exactly what happened.
Consequently, pieces of the border wall that were ready for installation were left exposed to the elements. The materials were allowed to rust and go to waste as unprecedented numbers of illegal aliens flooded the country. In some cases, piles of unused steel beams were lying in the desert only hundreds of feet away from gaps (sometimes less than a mile long) in the border fence. In 2023, the Biden-Harris administration auctioned off unused parts of the wall for pennies on the dollar. With the 2024 elections looming, and the president’s border policies becoming increasingly unpopular, the Biden administration did undertake small scale additions to the border wall that fell far short of what was urgently needed.
More recently, on December 12, 2024, the Daily Wire news site broke the story that the administration was quietly moving large amounts of unused border wall materials away from the U.S.-Mexico border on flatbed trucks to be sold at a government auction site. An anonymous CBP agent who tipped off the Daily Wire revealed that sections from three parts of the border were moved away before Christmas. President-elect Trump did not mince words, calling the sale an “almost criminal act.”
The state of Texas, which was rocked by the scale and speed of illegal alien encounters during the last four years, offered to buy the materials and donate them to the incoming second Trump administration to resume border wall construction. However, Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick revealed shortly thereafter that “[t]he Texas Facilities Commission told us today that the material for sale was mostly junk, with most panels covered in concrete and rust.”
Of course, the fact that sold-off border wall materials were deemed “mostly junk” does not lessen the severity of the problem. Throughout the past four years, the White House has consistently prioritized open-borders at the expense of the security of our citizens and borders. That unused border wall materials were carelessly allowed to fall into a “mostly junk” condition is not a mere accident, but completely the fault of the Biden-Harris administration. Regrettably, American taxpayers will have to pay twice for the materials needed to build the wall. Nevertheless, it is important to resume and complete border wall construction, combined with other common-sense policies that secure our borders and deter mass illegal migration. In the long-term, this will save American taxpayers money.
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