The Defense Department announced its first contracts, totaling $976 million, to build a wall on the border with Mexico.

SLSCO Ltd., headquartered in Texas, received a $789 million contract for wall construction in Santa Teresa, N.M., regarded as part of the El Paso sector of the border. Montana-based Barnard Construction Co. was also awarded a $187 million contract for primary pedestrian wall replacement at Yuma, Ariz. Both contracts were announced by the Pentagon on Tuesday.

Work on the two contracts, likely to start in the next couple of months, is expected to be completed in fall 2020, with Barnard finishing in September and SLSCO expected to be done in October.

Pentagon spokesman Lt. Col. Jamie Davis said the contract will provide the El Paso sector with 46 miles of "30-foot bollard fencing and a five-foot anti-climb plate." He added that 11 miles of "18-foot bollard fencing and a five-foot anti-climb plate" will be built at the Yuma sector.

Funding for each contract comes from nearly $1 billion allocated to the Army to supplement a counter-drug account authorizing military barriers. The funds were redirected from Army personnel accounts.

Funds for the two contracts are also separate from $3.6 billion in military construction funding also redirected for building the border wall.

Seeking to reassure members of Congress, Acting Defense Secretary Acting Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan told the Senate Armed Services Committee on March 13 that "military construction on the border will not come at the expense of our people, our readiness, or our modernization."

The following day, the Senate voted by 59 to 41 to overturn President Donald Trump's declaration of a national emergency at the southern border, arguing that the president had exceeded his powers in trying to build a border wall over Congress's objections. The vote, on a measure already approved by the House, prompted the first veto of Trump's presidency.

"Never before has a president asked for funding, Congress has not provided it, and the president then has used the National Emergencies Act of 1976 to spend the money anyway," Sen. Lamar Alexander, R-Tenn., commented after the Senate vote.

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in Albuquerque, N.M., was the contracting agent for the SLSCO contract. The Army Corps of Engineers in Los Angeles was the contracting agent for the Barnard contract.

Pentagon foresees more border assignment work
Washington (AFP) April 10, 2019 - The Pentagon is expecting a request from the White House to do more to help prevent illegal migration across the US border with Mexico, the acting defense secretary said Wednesday.

Some 6,000 troops are now posted along the border, and the armed forces have been tasked with arranging military accommodation for 5,000 unaccompanied minors.

Trump, who made stemming arrivals of undocumented migrants a plank of his 2016 election campaign, declared a national emergency on the border in February as a way to sidestep Congress for money to build a wall along the frontier.

"I'm going to work very closely with the acting secretary," acting Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan said Wednesday.

He was referring to Kevin McAleenan, the replacement for Kirstjen Nielsen, who resigned over the weekend as director of homeland security.

"What I would say is, as the situation there deteriorates, it's pretty elastic in terms of demand on us so I would expect shortly here to have another request for assistance," he told reporters.

Shanahan has already released almost $1 billion to build a section of Trump's wall, cash diverted from the Pentagon budget for combating the drug trade.

The Pentagon announced Tuesday it had awarded two contracts worth $976 million for work on the proposed new wall and repairs to existing barriers in New Mexico and Arizona.

Shanahan said he did not rule out more military funds being assigned soon to wall construction.

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