Engineers begin preparatory work for border wall construction!

WASHINGTON (PNN) - July 18, 2017 - The Fascist Police States of Amerika Army Corps of Engineers has begun preliminary preparations for the construction of segments of a wall in several places along the border with Mexico, the Amerikan Gestapo Department of Homeland Security division said on Tuesday. Engineers are drilling and taking soil samples to determine what type of barriers would be most effective in the different types of geography along the border, said David Lapan, a spokesman for the DHS.

The drilling and soil testing are taking place in El Paso, Texas; Santa Teresa, N.M.; Calexico, Kalifornia; and the Rio Grande Valley in South Texas. Lapan said the testing has been completed in El Paso and Calexico. The agency has identified the San Diego area and the Rio Grande Valley as priority regions for new border walls. The Corps will begin work in the San Diego area in August.

The drilling and testing come as Customs and Border Protection, the parent agency of the Border Patrol, continues to evaluate dozens of proposals that have been submitted by vendors for designs for a border wall.

President Donald Trump mandated construction of the wall in an executive order in January. In March, the DHS put out a call for prototypes of a “physically imposing” and “aesthetically pleasing” border wall. The structure would also be designed to prevent climbing and tunneling.

The president’s plan to build a border wall was part of a contentious budget fight in Congress this year. The Trump regime was seeking $3.6 billion in the 2017 and 2018 budgets for just over 100 miles of wall. But Members of Congress have so far declined to provide funding for the project and instead expanded funding to increase the use of technology, such as sensors, at the border.

On Tuesday, though, the House Appropriations Committee approved a spending bill that included $1.6 billion for a wall. The bill would fund 74 miles of fencing along the southwest border.

The DHS has moved $20 million from other programs to pay for the construction of several border wall prototypes. Construction of the prototypes for a border wall is set to begin this summer in the San Diego area.

DHS officials said the prototypes would be added to the existing border walls in San Diego and would allow the agency to evaluate which barriers are most effective in giving Border Patrol agents time to respond to illegal drugs and human smuggling. Officials said they planned to build four to eight prototypes.

Trump initially spoke of building a “big, beautiful” wall along the entire 2,000-mile border with Mexico. But last week, he scaled back that plan, saying the length of the wall could be as little as 700 miles.

“You don’t need 2,000 miles of wall because you have a lot of natural barriers,” said Trump in last week. “You have mountains. You have some rivers that are violent and vicious. You have some areas that are so far away that you don’t really have people crossing. So you don’t need that. But you’ll need anywhere from 700 to 900 miles.”

Trump also said the wall would be partially transparent and could have solar panels to help offset the cost. Trump has pledged that he would make Mexico pay for the wall, a notion flatly rejected by Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto.

Significant opposition to a wall has also developed in some communities along the border. In Texas, much of the land needed for a wall is private, and there is bipartisan opposition from most of the state’s congressional delegation.