Plans for a barrier spanning the full length of the southern border — from the Pacific coast to the Gulf of Mexico at an estimated cost of $46 billion — are being advanced by the current administration. Property owners throughout the Big Bend area of Texas have voiced opposition to the administration's proposed plans, with several choosing not to cede portions of their land for a project they regard as an ineffective allocation of public money.
Opposition to the border wall project has placed President Donald Trump's administration in a position where it must decide how far it will push to see the southern barrier built. Billions of dollars in funding were allocated and a range of environmental and other regulatory requirements were set aside to advance the project, even as unauthorized border crossings in the area remained at low levels, the terrain itself posed natural obstacles, and opposition spanning both parties mounted in ways that unsettled longstanding assumptions about border policy.
Under federal law, the government holds broad jurisdiction to advance the project over objections. When a federal judge issued an order blocking construction across the region, landowners who had already been restricting surveyor access, attending county meetings to voice opposition, and building toward litigation found their position legally reinforced — among them David Keller, one of the plaintiffs in a lawsuit targeting the Big Bend border plans, who said those collective efforts had measurably slowed the project. He noted that the administration had not adequately anticipated the level of controversy its actions would generate, while construction of a barrier along the border between the United States and Mexico has remained a central pledge of Trump's political platform.
That funding — $46 billion allocated by Congress for border wall construction as part of a broad immigration enforcement measure the previous year — provided the basis on which the administration moved forward. Unauthorized border crossings have dropped notably in recent months, yet the administration contends that physical barriers, vehicle obstacles, monitoring equipment, and access roads remain necessary to sustain that trend.
According to figures released by Customs and Border Protection, construction of physical barriers along the border has been advancing at a pace of roughly 12 miles (about 20 kilometers) per week, with the total length of new fencing and walls completed under the current administration having crossed the 200-mile (320-kilometer) mark. Along the Big Bend corridor — a stretch of borderland running more than 500 miles (800 km) — the administration has allocated $7.5 billion toward barrier construction, with groundwork having got under way in September.
Figures from August show that 8,870 individuals were taken into custody by Border Patrol agents working the southern border. CBP Commissioner Rodney Scott, responding to a lawsuit brought by landowners against the Big Bend construction project, stated that the border segment — which accounts for approximately one quarter of the total U.S.-Mexico boundary and recorded 161 apprehensions — represented a gap that authorities were not prepared to leave open, adding that no region, Big Bend included, would be left without coverage, a position that reflects the agency's stated enforcement priorities rather than an established outcome. The area differs from other border zones in that much of the Texas land involved is held privately or by the state.
Where landowners withhold consent for surveying and construction, the government is required to seek authorisation through legal proceedings. Eminent domain — the legal mechanism through which a government acquires private property for public purposes in return for payment — is an area where judicial bodies have historically tended to side with governmental authority.
Dianna and Dan Burbach pressed on regardless. Paperwork arrived at the Burbach household in July, with the documents requesting access to survey their land and including a map that traced the project's intended path along the rear of their property. A letter dated in August conveyed that the government held a pressing need to gain access to the property, and that court proceedings remained available as a path forward within a 90-day window.
Over the quarter-century they had put down roots there, Dianna — 63 at the time of writing — and her husband, then 79, raised four children inside an orange adobe house whose property stretches to the banks of the Rio Grande. Now retired, the couple expressed concern that construction could worsen flooding on their property and leave 15 acres — roughly 6 hectares — of their land on the far side of the wall, with Dianna indicating they would allow the matter to proceed through eminent domain proceedings rather than reach a voluntary agreement. Separately, a Justice Department official noted that while CBP had reached land-access agreements with dozens of Big Bend-area property owners, the administration had already brought on eminent domain attorneys in Texas in preparation for cases where disputes were expected.
Of roughly 70 such matters forwarded to the department during the current presidential term, about 50 had been brought to a close without any of them proceeding as far as a trial, according to an official who spoke without attribution under conditions the government had established.
A legal challenge to halt construction was filed by the No Big Bend Wall Coalition, a group whose membership, by its own account, draws from a network of more than 200 landowners. In a court filing, the plaintiffs contend that Homeland Security has exceeded the boundaries of its mandate in an area where documented cross-border violations remain low. Court challenges aimed at halting or delaying construction of border wall sections have not, for the most part, prevailed.
A federal judge issued a temporary order halting wall construction in the Big Bend area. The plaintiffs contended that the administration had exceeded the limits of its congressional mandate by issuing broad regulatory waivers that sidestepped environmental protections and other statutory requirements. Keller described the ruling as a welcome development for the landowners, while noting that questions about its durability meant their legal efforts would press on.
The administration sought a judicial pause on the order during the appeals process, with court documents also contending that leaving portions of the border without adequate physical infrastructure could redirect unauthorized crossings and smuggling activity toward whichever stretch remained least reinforced — a concern the filing identified as particularly applicable to the Big Bend region.
Angell, a tourism operator who had been formally notified that the government was seeking access to his property for the border project, attended a string of county meetings spread across the region alongside his partner, Bibiana Gutierrez. Land and property owners, along with others holding business interests in the area, have organized demonstrations, kept watch over active construction zones for any potential rule-breaking, and posted notices at nearby hotels and restaurants indicating that contractors are unwelcome.
Terrell County residents brought their objections before officials over plans to lease airport land to a contractor working on border barrier construction, though the board moved ahead with the arrangement. A draft agreement that would let an outside contractor access a county road in Jeff Davis County has yet to receive approval. Addressing a room where attendees had gathered to voice opposition to the airport lease, Terrell County Judge Dale Lynn Carruthers noted that jurisdiction over the border wall did not rest with the county.
Angell and Gutierrez put forward the position that local opposition carried real force — with Gutierrez pointing out that the barrier would already be standing had area residents not pushed back — while the speaker before them took a different view, arguing that without a lease in place, the contractor would simply source land through another seller, and that Terrell County, as a small locality, had little room to negotiate.
Voluntary access agreements remain the avenue CBP is pursuing as design work on the project moves forward, though unresolved disputes may be handed to the Justice Department. Payment to landowners would follow regardless of the method used to gain entry, according to the agency's statement.
Border security and immigration policy ranked among the top concerns driving Republican support for Trump, polling conducted after a prolonged period of elevated crossing activity along the southern border has indicated. With unauthorized border crossings having dropped off noticeably, a number of Republicans — among them lawmakers who cited border security as their primary reason for supporting Trump — have started questioning whether the expenditure of billions on wall construction through the Big Bend area can be adequately justified.
Opposition from area sheriffs surfaced at the outset, while work underway at Big Bend National Park drew Sen. John Cornyn to seek answers from Homeland Security on behalf of residents across the state. Formal notices have been delivered to Laura Allen, a rancher who raised sheep and goats on land her family works, indicating that a vehicle barrier is planned to run across that property. Attributing a drop in border crossings to Trump's policies, she nonetheless argued that pouring billions of dollars into physical barriers along the Big Bend stretch would serve no purpose, adding that what she had wanted when casting her vote was a secured border, not a wall.
Thad Cleveland, the Republican sheriff of Terrell County who put in 26 years with the Border Patrol, has added his voice to those raising objections to the Big Bend project. Aerial drones and surveillance towers, he argued, offered a more practical fit for the terrain he oversees than a physical wall would, adding that the open landscape gave his officers a working advantage in both time and distance.
Along both banks, vertical limestone formations hem in the waterway, and the people who live throughout that surrounding territory must navigate long stretches of dry, unpaved terrain before any road or Border Patrol post comes into view. The mountain trails leading to Gary Grabowske's property are unpaved and strewn with rock, with gullies cut by flash floods interrupting the route at intervals. From the rim of a cliff that rises some 450 feet — around 137 meters — above the land below, the Rio Grande can be seen winding its course through the valley floor.
Grabowske maintained that the site has no electricity, running water, or internet connection, and he gestured toward the canyon floor to illustrate his position that the terrain below is too rugged for either a dirt bike or a mule to traverse — a circumstance he argued renders any vehicle approach from the Mexican side effectively out of the question.
Those opposed to the proposal argue that the dispute extends well past the question of whether a barrier would serve any practical purpose in the Big Bend region. At stake for Allen and others caught in the path of a government initiative is the question of how far federal authority reaches over private land — a boundary Allen addressed in his own terms, pointing out that ranchers on operations like his regard themselves as people who endure hardship, while asking what guarantee any landowner in the country could hold against forced acquisition when those already facing it had found none.
Land along the river's edge, stretching across thousands of acres of uneven ground, falls under the combined ownership and leasing arrangements held by two brothers, Bill and Patrick. Angora goats and Rambouillet sheep move across the property, pausing at scattered water troughs along the way. In February, a letter arrived for Bill that gave him five days to respond to a property-access request tied to a construction project, along with notice that eminent domain was a possibility the government was prepared to raise.
Worries about what the construction might bring are rooted in his animals and the water supply those animals rely on. Cattle passed through the road barriers without restriction, while Bill and the other hands managing the drive found no such opening available to them — a circumstance Bill pointed to when explaining that every acre of grazing ground, thin as some of it was, factored into what his operation could earn. No access to the land was granted for surveying or construction work, with entry having been withheld up to that point.
The ranch's long history and the efforts of those who came before them press on their minds, and Patrick put it plainly — whatever the outcome, they intend to be able to say they made the attempt.
