CBP says construction is running at about 12 miles a week
Customs and Border Protection has awarded five contracts worth more than $6bn for border security upgrades in Texas’s Big Bend region. The contracts include 30-ft steel fencing, vehicle barriers and surveillance technology, which the agency calls its “smart wall.” The administration plans more than 300 miles of six-foot-tall vehicle barriers and supporting roads. A photograph credited to John Locher/AP shows a portion of the border wall under construction near Sierra Blanca, Texas, in September 2026.
CBP commissioner Rodney Scott said the wall is being built out at about 12 miles a week and is expected to be completed by the end of Trump’s second term.
The US Supreme Court has allowed the Trump administration to continue building in the Big Bend region, including parts of Big Bend National Park. In an unsigned, five-page ruling, the nine-member court granted the administration’s emergency request to suspend a lower-court order that had temporarily stopped the project last month. Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson was the only member to dissent. The ruling did not resolve the underlying challenge to the construction.
The administration relies on a 1996 law that authorizes the homeland security secretary to “waive all legal requirements,” including environmental and conservation protections, in areas designated as having high levels of illegal border crossings.
The justices said the plaintiffs claim construction in the Big Bend sector will diminish their ability to use and enjoy the area. In explaining the ruling, they said Congress’s enactment of immigration law, which permits such waivers, “reflects a clear preference for expeditious border construction over the very harms respondents assert.” They added: “The government’s interest therefore outweighs any aesthetic, recreational, and environmental harm alleged by respondents.”
The plaintiffs include the Center for Biological Diversity, a Big Bend river guide and a church preservation group. They argue the project threatens wildlife and public lands, could destroy “iconic sections” of the Rio Grande’s protected river corridor, and would undermine the “carefully wrought web of laws meant to protect a vast universe of biological, historic, cultural, and other interests.”
The Guardian reported that the plans have also faced bipartisan opposition from local residents. Many residents warned that construction could threaten their livelihoods and disrupt their communities.
A CBP map shows plans for barriers and patrol roads across Big Bend National Park, including remote areas that would require extensive dynamite blasting. Separately, the Center for Biological Diversity said construction is also planned in isolated canyons where there have been no documented unauthorized vehicle crossings and where vehicles cannot reach the US-Mexico border.
The Center condemned the ruling. The group said: “This horrific decision clears the way for contractors to bulldoze pristine desert and dynamite canyon walls before the courts have even decided whether this destruction is legal. They’re signing off on the permanent destruction of the wildest place in Texas, and the theft of a great American river from all of us.”
The Center also said: “The destruction we’ve already seen in Big Bend unleashed a firestorm of outrage so severe that the administration was forced to pause its plans. If the bulldozers return now, public opposition will only grow … The damage done to Big Bend will be felt for future generations of Texans and Americans, and this administration will bear responsibility for the natural heritage we lose.”
After a federal judge’s ruling temporarily halted construction in October, CBP said at the time: “We stand by our assessment and remain confident in our legal authorities to secure the border while preserving the unique landscape of the Big Bend region.” The Guardian said it had reached out to CBP for comment on the Supreme Court’s latest ruling.