The Washington Post - 28.08.2019

A4 EZ SU THE WASHINGTON POST.WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 28 , 2019

can tweet about it, aides said.

Administration officials in-

volved in the project also defend-

ed the president’s use of eminent

domain laws to speed the process.

“There is no more constitution-

ally permissible public purpose

for eminent domain than national

defense,” said a current adminis-

tration official who was not au-

thorized to speak on the record

about the contracting process.

“Our intention is to negotiate

with every property owner, and

every property owner will receive

fair market value for the land,” the

official said. “But the land that is

needed is not replaceable land.

This is not like building a hospital

or even a school. There is no

alternative land to the border.”

CBP and Pentagon officials in-

sist they remain on track to com-

plete about 450 miles of fencing

by the election. Of that, about 110

miles will be added to areas where

there is currently no barrier.

The Border Patrol’s strategic

planning and analysis office has

not made a final decision on the

black paint or other White House

design requests.

“Ultimately, we’ll do our assess-

ment and determine what is the

best for us operationally,” said

Brian Martin, the office’s chief,

adding that the agency is waiting

to get border agents’ feedback on

whether the coating would be

beneficial.

Trump has recently urged the

Army Corps to award a contract to

a company he favors, North Dako-

ta-based Fisher Industries,

though the firm has not been

selected. Fisher has been aggres-

sively pushed by Trump ally Sen.

Kevin Cramer (R-N.D.), who brief-

ly held up the confirmation of a

Trump budget office nominee last

month in an attempt to put pres-

sure on the Army Corps.

Cramer demanded to see the

contracts awarded to Fisher’s

competitors, lashing out at the

“arrogance” of the Army Corps in

emails to military officials after he

was told the bidding process in-

volved proprietary information

that could not be shared. The CEO

of Fisher Industries is a major

backer of Cramer and has donated

to his campaigns.

Cramer said he shared the pres-

ident’s “frustration” with the pace

of progress.

Several administration officials

who confirmed the White House’s

urgency said they expect to be

able to deliver on Trump’s de-

mands because the actual con-

struction of the barriers is typical-

ly the last step in the process.

“There is a long lead time to

acquiring land, getting permits

and identifying funding,” the offi-

cial said. “I think you will see a

dramatic increase in wall con-

struction next year because all of

the work over the past two years

has primed the pump.”

[email protected]

[email protected]

bollards to a sharpened point.

Trump had told aides this spring

he thought the barrier should be

spiked to instill a fear of injury.

The change in the bollard de-

sign is likely to reduce the overall

length of the barrier by two to

three miles, according to the ad-

ministration’s cost assessments.

CBP has used a pointed design

in the past, according to agency

officials, either by installing a pyr-

amid-shaped cap or making what

the agency refers to as a “miter

cut” in the metal.

Trump remains keen to tout

incremental progress toward his

wall-building commitments, and

in recent weeks, top Homeland

Security officials have taken to

Twitter to promote the advances.

In recent days, DHS leaders

including acting CBP chief Mark

Morgan and the top official at U.S.

Citizenship and Immigration Ser-

vices, Ken Cuccinelli, have tweet-

ed photos of border fence con-

struction, echoing promises that

450 miles of new barrier will be

completed by next year. Another

senior administration official

credited both men with injecting

urgency, saying that “things are

starting to crank away,” even

though Cuccinelli’s agency is not

involved in the project.

Dan Scavino Jr., the White

House social media director, has

asked for video footage and pho-

tos of equipment digging up the

desert and planting the barriers

so that administration officials

Corps will be able to install by four

to seven miles.

In June, teams of U.S. soldiers

painted a one-mile section of

fence in Calexico, Calif., at a cost of

$1 million. The coating, known as

“matte black” or “flat black,” ab-

sorbs heat, making the fence hot

to the touch, more slippery and

therefore tougher to climb, ac-

cording to border agents.

At Trump’s behest, the Army

Corps also is preparing to instruct

contractors to remove from the

upper part of the fence the smooth

metal plates that are used to

thwart climbers. The president

considered that design feature

unsightly, according to officials

familiar with his directives.

Instead, contractors have been

asked to cut the tips of the steel

money is spent, whether land-

owners’ rights are violated,

whether the environment is dam-

aged, the law, the regs or even

prudent business practices,” the

senior official said.

CBP has suggested no longer

writing risk-assessment memos

“related to the fact that we don’t

have real estate rights and how

this will impact construction,” the

official said.

While Trump has insisted that

the barriers be painted, the cost of

painting them will reduce the

length of the fence the govern-

ment will be able to build. Accord-

ing to the internal analysis, paint-

ing or coating 175 miles of barriers

“will add between $70 million and

$133 million in cost,” trimming

the amount of fencing the Army

feasible or legally sound, accord-

ing to current and former aides.

During a conference call last

week, officials at U.S. Customs

and Border Protection told Army

Corps engineers that the hun-

dreds of miles of fencing must be

completed before the next presi-

dential election, according to ad-

ministration officials with knowl-

edge of the call who spoke on the

condition of anonymity to de-

scribe internal communications.

“Border Patrol insists on com-

pressed acquisition timelines,

and we consent. Their goal is to

get contracts awarded, not for us

to get a quality contract with a

thoroughly vetted contractor,”

said one senior official who is

concerned the agency has been

hurried to hand out contracts as

quickly as possible.

Military officials expect more

contract protests because the ar-

rangements have been rushed,

the official added. The Army

Corps already has had to take

corrective actions for two pro-

curement contracts, after compa-

nies protested.

The companies building the

fencing and access roads have

been taking heavy earth-moving

equipment into environmentally

sensitive border areas adjacent to

U.S. national parks and wildlife

preserves, but the administration

has waived procedural safeguards

and impact studies, citing nation-

al security concerns.

“They don’t care how much

that the president is protecting
the country with the addition of
new border barriers.
“Donald Trump promised to se-
cure our border with sane, ra-
tional immigration policies to
make American communities saf-
er, and that’s happening every-
where the wall is being built,”
Gidley said. He said internal criti-
cisms of Trump “are just more
fabrications by people who hate
the fact the status quo, that has
crippled this country for decades,
is finally changing as President
Trump is moving quicker than
anyone in history to build the
wall, secure the border and enact
the very immigration policies the
American people voted for.”
“President Trump is fighting
aggressively for the American
people where other leaders in the
past have rolled over, sold out, and
done absolutely nothing,” he said.
Defense Secretary Mark T. Es-
per is expected to approve a White
House request to divert $3.6 bil-
lion in Pentagon funds to the bar-
rier project in coming weeks,
money that Trump sought after
lawmakers refused to allocate
$5 billion. The funds will be
pulled from Defense Department
projects in 26 states, according to
administration officials who, like
others, spoke on the condition of
anonymity to describe the matter.
Trump’s determination to build
the barriers as quickly as possible
has not diminished his interest in
the aesthetic aspects of the proj-
ect, particularly the requirement
that the looming steel barriers be
painted black and topped with
sharpened tips.
In a meeting at the White
House on May 23, Trump ordered
the Army Corps and the Depart-
ment of Homeland Security to
paint the structure black, accord-
ing to internal communications
reviewed by The Washington Post.
Administration officials have
stopped trying to talk him out of
the demands, and the U.S. Army
Corps of Engineers is preparing to
instruct contractors to apply
black paint or coating to all new
barrier fencing, the communica-
tions show.
Trump conceded last year in an
immigration meeting with law-
makers that a wall or barrier is not
the most effective mechanism to
curb illegal immigration, recog-
nizing it would accomplish less
than a major expansion of U.S.
enforcement powers and deporta-
tion authority. But he told law-
makers that his supporters want a
wall and that he has to deliver it.
Trump talked about the loud
cheers the wall brought at rallies,
according to one person with di-
rect knowledge of the meeting.
Former White House chief of
staff John F. Kelly would often tell
administration officials to disre-
gard the president’s demands if
Kelly did not think they were

WALL FROM A

BY ARELIS R. HERNÁNDEZ

peñitas, panama — A Guatema-
lan official thumbed through the
soft soiled pages of a ragged Paki-
stani passport for a man who had
just emerged from the jungle.
The disheveled migrant stared
ahead as the nation’s interior min-
ister and acting U.S. homeland
security secretary Kevin McAleen-
an reviewed the visa stamps inside
the worn document: Yemen, Dji-
bouti, Turkey and Saudi Arabia.
The man had traveled all over a
distant hemisphere but had found
his way to a humanitarian camp
on the edge of one of the most
dangerous corridors in Latin
America.
“We got to take a look at this
cat,” McAleenan said as he
watched an agent take finger-
prints, retinal scans and other bio-
metrics, destined for an informa-
tion-sharing program that checks
the data against U.S. and interna-
tional criminal databases.
The relationship between the
Panamanian and U.S. govern-
ments is one of enduring coopera-
tion since the early days of the
Panama Canal, but the explosion
of migrants from outside Latin
America traversing the isthmus to
journey north to the United States
has triggered a new conversation
about border security. This group
of migrants — known as extracon-
tinentals — immigrate to South
American countries to work and,
after some time, continue north.
The 100 miles of dense tropical
rainforest, marshland and treach-
erous rivers known as the Darien
Gap has been a natural barrier to
intercontinental migration for
years because there is no road
linking South America and North
America. U.S. officials estimate
that about a decade ago, fewer
than 100 people per year attempt-
ed to travel through the remote
wilderness, home to paramilitary
guerrillas, traffickers and indig-

enous tribes. This year, more than

17,000 migrants, primarily from

Haiti and Cuba — and from as far

away as Nepal, Burkina Faso and

Congo — have paid smugglers to

lead them along foot paths next to

swollen waterways or used Whats-

App to follow a trafficker’s direc-

tions. They face dangers from

wildlife, criminals and disease.

Those who survive continue on

their way to the United States, and

some arrive with plans to harm

the country, DHS officials said.

Panama, in conjunction with U.S.

authorities, has repatriated two

people from the Middle East who

came through the Darien this year

and were on lists of potential ter-

rorists or those with possible links

to terrorism.

“There is shared concern about

movements of extracontinentals,

especially from outside the hemi-

sphere, that could present secu-

rity risks,” McAleenan said. “The

goal was to engage partner gov-

ernments that have that first op-

portunity, when someone is enter-

ing the hemisphere and who is

clearly intending to migrate.”

McAleenan traveled last week

to the 100-mile-long Panama-Co-

lombia border as part of meetings

with leaders from seven Central

American countries and Colom-

bia to discuss stronger security

collaborations.

The acting secretary said he

didn’t come to negotiate a specific

agreement but the meetings are

part of a broader DHS effort to

help countries rework their asy-

lum and immigration institu-

tions. Together with its partners,

DHS says it not only wants to stop

lucrative trafficking networks but

also prepare those governments

to potentially take in U.S.-bound

migrants who officials say are

overwhelming the U.S. immigra-

tion system.

Under threat of U.S. tariffs, the

Guatemalan president signed one

such deal that could prevent thou-

sands of Central Americans des-

tined for the United States from

reaching the border with Mexico.

But the widely unpopular deal is

on hold after Guatemala’s Consti-

tutional Court ruled that any “safe

third country” agreement would

require legislative approval.

Interior Minister Enrique De-

genhart said his government is

waiting on clarification from the

courts, but he is confident Guate-

mala has the means and right

implementation plans to grant

asylum to Honduran and Salva-

doran migrants within their bor-

ders.

There is no such deal in the

works for Panama, the Panamani-

an president said. During his trip,

McAleenan talked to and toured

the Peñitas humanitarian camp

with Security Minister Rolando

Mirones.

“What we need are regional so-

lutions, not bilateral ones,”

Mirones told reporters before the

summit. “It’s not a problem that

can be solved bilaterally.”

But there were other areas

where bilateral negotiations are

necessary, McAleenan said. U.S.

law enforcement officials have

deep ties in Panama, where local

agents are embedded in the coun-

try’s sea and airports and help

support local drug-trafficking in-

vestigations.

U.S. Customs and Border Pro-

tection bought the giant screening

machines that take X-ray images

of suspicious shipping containers

at four of the country’s marine

ports. And at the Panamanian bor-

der in the Darien, U.S. officials

supplied Panama’s border secu-

rity force, SENAFRONT, with the

devices that capture fingerprints,

photographs and iris scans to

process the influx of migrants

showing up at the Peñitas camp.

The migrants often arrive ema-

ciated, sick and dangerously dehy-

drated after seven to 10 days of

traveling the jungle, officials said.

Humanitarian groups provide

food, medical attention for mala-

dies such as dysentery and dengue

fever, and filtered water from a

muddy river to quench their

thirst.

Agents, meanwhile, register bi-

ometric information from 50 to 60

migrants a day into BITMAP, or

the Biometric Identification

Transnational Migration Alert

Program, inside a guard shack.

But the migrants can bypass the

authorities at the camp to avoid

detection.

The migrants come to recover,

living in concrete block shelters

and wooden shacks with tin roof-

tops that stand on stilts, the way

the local indigenous communities

build their homes, to evade wild-

life and flooding, but the migrants

are not in detention, security offi-

cials said.

Any given day, there are 300 to

500 migrants — including a small

number of children — in the camp

making phone calls to relatives

and recuperating for the next leg

of their journey. Panamanian bor-

der officials said they do not stop

most migrants from continuing.

While McAleenan asked Pana-

manian border agents what more

they needed to do their work, he

noticed one agent manually input-

ting information from the Paki-

stani migrant’s passport into the

biometric database. The Panama-

nian agent explained they had

only two agents to do all the

screening work for migrants in

the camp each day.

He called for the local DHS

attache to come over.

“Why don’t they have a pass-

port scanner?” McAleenan leaned

in and whispered. “Let’s get them

one. We can do that.”

[email protected]

U.S., Panama work together to screen migrants who are moving north

ARNULFO FRANCO/ASSOCIATED PRESS

Acting U.S. homeland security secretary Kevin McAleenan, center, shakes hands with Panamanian

Border Police officers during a visit to the Peñitas humanitarian camp on Friday.

Pacific

Ocean

Gulf of

Mexico

Darien Gap

PANAMA

COLOMBIA

VEN.

MEXICO

CUBA

NICARAGUA

GUATEMALA

HONDURAS

U.S.

Equator

NORTH

THE WASHINGTON POST

With eye on election, Trump pushing aides to take steps to deliver part of wall

CAROLYN VAN HOUTEN/THE WASHINGTON POST

A U.S. Border Patrol agent stands Friday in Calexico, Calif., next to a part of the fence on the U.S.-Mexico border that is to be rebuilt.

As the 2020 election campaign gathers momentum, the border is said to be an increasingly urgent concern to President Trump.

CAROLYN VAN HOUTEN/THE WASHINGTON POST

President Trump has directed that new sections of border barrier

be painted black. This existing barrier in Calexico was repainted.