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McALLEN — The Trump administration is moving forward with plans to build a border wall “along the entire southern border,” including in the city of Laredo, Mayor Victor D. Treviño announced Monday.
City officials were notified during a regular meeting with officials from U.S. Border Patrol and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. Treviño said DHS discussed a proposed timeline for border wall construction.
Construction will occur in four phases, the first of which will be a 15-mile segment that could begin construction next year, according to the mayor. Decisions on the design of the barriers have not been finalized.
The official notice to the city comes after DHS awarded $4.5 billion in contracts for the construction of 230 miles of a “smart wall,” which includes steel barriers, waterborne barriers, patrol roads, lights, cameras and detection technology.
A map of the proposed smart wall shows plans to construct a barrier in the Laredo area, though construction contracts there have not been awarded.
Miles of smart wall is planned along the Rio Grande where U.S. Customs and Border Protection confirmed they plan to deploy buoys as part of a waterborne barrier.
When asked if they had received notice of additional barriers, a spokesperson for the city of Mission said they had not received such notice. Rio Grande City Mayor Gilberto Falcon said in a text message, “We already have a border wall.”
In light of the plans, the City Council approved an invitation to President Donald Trump to play golf at their municipal golf course, which sits along the Rio Grande. The invitation was the subject of lengthy discussion among the council members, with some disagreeing on how to handle it.
“We have very limited options as a city,” said Council member David King. “When you have a federal government with $46 billion it has passed in the ‘One Big Beautiful Bill’ in July of this year, that’s $46 billion that the federal government has and then legally, they have eminent domain where they can come in and take property so at the end of the day, our legal options are limited.”
U.S. Rep. Henry Cuellar, a Democrat from Laredo, spoke out against plans for border wall construction.
“Border walls are a 14th-century solution to 21st-century problems,” Cuellar said in a statement. “Border crossings are already down, and Laredo continues to be one of the safest places to live in the United States. This was accomplished without additional border wall being added, but through enforcement of the law and investing in resources at our border.
Unlike his first term, most of Trump’s immigration agenda has been focused on deportation.
The Laredo City Council also voted to reaffirm its position in favor of border security but against a border wall within the city limits. However, the city intends to poll its residents on whether they support or oppose a border wall.
Earlier this year, Laredo residents strongly pushed back against a proposal to grant a blanket easement that would have granted access to the state to two city-owned parcels of land to construct a border barrier. The council unanimously rejected the proposal but authorized their city manager to negotiate with the state.
The council’s reassertion of their opposition to a border wall comes after they were pressured to remove a mural located in front of a federal courthouse that said “Defund the Wall.”
The artwork came down last month after the city received a letter from the Texas Department of Transportation requesting that the city remove the mural or risk losing up to $1.6 billion in funding for roads.
A spokesperson for U.S. Customs and Border Protection said the agency was not able to immediately comment.
Reporting in the Rio Grande Valley is supported in part by the Methodist Healthcare Ministries of South Texas, Inc.
