Sen. Joni Ernst (R-Iowa) is channeling good old-fashioned common sense from the heartland to propose the BUILD IT Act, which would turn over unused segments of Trump’s great wall to border states that have undertaken building walls of their own.
The BUILD IT Act— which stands for “Border’s Unused Idle and Lying Dormant Inventory Transfer Act” — would “turn over the unused materials purchased to construct the Southern border barrier to any state wishing to finish the job,” according to a statement Ernst posted on her website Tuesday.
When Joe Biden was sworn in as president, he capriciously reversed many of President Trump’s successful policies — with predictably disastrous results. He yanked the rug out from under the Keystone Pipeline project and other reliable fuel development, whacking oil futures and sending gas prices soaring, which they continue to do today. He ordered a precipitous, chaotic military flight from the United States mission in Afghanistan, causing needless deaths, collapsing the fragile government, and leaving behind seven billion dollars worth of military equipment, which landed in the hands of the Taliban. And he immediately halted construction of the great wall that President Trump had been erecting on the southern U.S. border.
Biden’s feckless halt of wall construction sent a blazing signal to would-be border-jumpers that they could stream on in — no need to bother with passing through a designated port-of-entry — unleashing an unprecedented wave of illegal immigration into the country. And it also set a match to billions of taxpayer dollars. Two billion had to be paid out to contractors in the form of cancellation fees. Somewhere in the neighborhood of a quarter billion dollars worth of already-paid-for wall sections and materials are unused. And the federal government pays contractors about $3 million every single day to watch over the unused steel, concrete, and other materials that are just lying around in the desert.
This wildly irresponsible waste of hard-earned money is reprehensible enough, before one even takes into account the millions of illegal aliens who have simply walked into our country and started soaking up benefits or the epidemic of fentanyl deaths traceable to the free flow of illegal drugs over the border.
Ernst stated that the BUILD IT Act “would require the federal government to transfer any material associated with the construction of the Southern border barrier to any state, upon request, for the materials’ original purpose. Both Arizona and Texas have initiated state action to continue construction on their sections of the border wall.”
Ernst’s Republican colleague from Iowa, Sen. Chuck Grassley, announced his support for the bill in a tweet, writing “2day I joined Sen Ernst in introducing the BUILD It Act to empower states to build a S border wall & save taxpayer $$ This will help fill the void of the Biden admin not enforcing our immigration laws”.
2day I joined Sen Ernst in introducing the BUILD It Act to empower states to build a S border wall & save taxpayer $$ This will help fill the void of the Biden admin not enforcing our immigration laws
— ChuckGrassley (@ChuckGrassley) May 24, 2022
“Pres Biden has made a laundry list of irresponsible policy decisions that hv led to complete chaos at our southern border incl his decision 2halt construction of border wall. This has not only cost taxpayers safety & security but it’s also costing them nearly $3 MILLION PER DAY,” Grassley said in a second tweet.
During his tenure in the White House, President Trump built 458 miles of his great wall on the 1,954-mile U.S.-Mexico border.
Texas stepped in months after Biden’s atrocious stop-work order to begin financing and building its own wall but has so far only managed to erect just over one-and-a-half miles of barrier. The Arizona legislature has been moving through construction proposals, and border state New Mexico would also qualify to receive the materials under the BUILD IT Act.
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Hopefully, this bill will move quickly and successfully through Congress and restart the crucial work started by President Trump to protect the United States from rampant, uncontrolled migration into our homeland.
BUILD THE WALL already!
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