Physical barriers that have been erected in the past 10 years along select stretches of the United States’ border with Mexico have helped stem the flow of illegal activity, Department of Homeland Security (DHS) officials said on Tuesday ahead of a visit by President Donald Trump to the border in Arizona.
In the Yuma, Ariz., sector of the border, which Trump was slated to visit, the U.S. went from five miles of fencing in 2005 to 63 miles a few years later and essentially “within a couple of years the bottom fell out as it relates to the number of arrests that were being made in that location,” one department official said during a White House background briefing with media via a conference call. The same was true in the Rio Grande Valley with Mexico where no physical barrier existed and then nearly 70 miles of were built, the official said, resulting in “dramatic changes and shifts in the way traffic works” there.
One of Trump’s campaign themes was the need for a security wall stretching the entire length of the U.S. southern border, about 2,000 miles. However, John Kelly, who was Trump’s Homeland Security secretary before becoming the president’s chief of staff in late July, has said a wall only makes sense in certain areas although the department has yet to define exactly where it wants all new infrastructure to go.
Currently there are about 650 miles of border fencing, vehicle barriers, and other barriers along the U.S. southern border. There is also a range of sensor technology to help Border Patrol agents attain situational awareness along portions of the border and to intercept illegal activity.
“A wall in and of itself will not give the agents the protection that they need to work safely in that space and it won’t necessarily protect the border any better,” the DHS official said. The official said “sensors and equipment that cues agents to activity at the border [and] … a physical barrier to slow down and impede and deny people [and vehicles] entry into the United States,” combined with access roads, intelligence and tactics all help to patrol and safely make arrests along the border.
The Trump administration says that through the first seven months of 2017, apprehensions along the southern border have declined 46 percent to 126,472 people versus the same period in 2016, a sign of the president’s tough actions on border security and interior enforcement.
Some of the equipment that Trump was expected to view during his visit to the Yuma sector was the MQ-9 Predator B unmanned aircraft system, a UH-60 Black Hawk helicopter, and Super King Air 350 ER aircraft. Trump was also scheduled to receive a briefing from DHS officials on the department’s border security efforts.