A federal court in Arizona has ruled to allow the Trump administration to sidestep a host of environmental protection laws to fast track border wall construction in southern Arizona.
It's the final ruling in a case that began last year, when the Trump administration announced plans to build a 30-foot steel bollard wall along some 27-miles of San Rafael Valley. The site is a celebrated biodiversity hotspot south of Tucson where conservation groups have tracked endangered species like ocelots and jaguars crossing back and forth between habitat in the U.S. and Mexico.
A law from the 1990s allows the Department of Homeland Security to waive the Endangered Species Act, Clean Water Act and other environmental and cultural protection laws normally required to be taken into account before building on federal land.
A pair of environmental groups filed suit against the project, arguing the waiver authority was unconstitutional.
Russ McSpadden is the southwest conservation advocate for the Center for Biological Diversity, one of the groups behind the suit.
“This decision leaves the unelected secretary of Homeland Security with sweeping and essentially unchecked power to waive dozens of bedrock laws in the name of border wall construction,” McSpadden said.
Late Friday, U.S. District Judge Angela Martinez sided with the government — ruling the waiver authority was legal and moving to close the case.
Meanwhile, the border wall itself has been moving forward, even as the court case proceeded. McSpadden says more than five miles have been built in the San Rafael Valley so far, and construction crews are using dynamite to blow through rugged mountainous terrain surrounding the valley. He says the ruling comes as the Trump administration seeks to build a wall across the entire U.S.-Mexico border, and in some cases, even construct double walls.
“Again and again I think we’re seeing, you know, dangerous authority concentrated in this agency,” he said. “Across the landscapes of Arizona, and all the way to Minneapolis, these consequences are incredible.”
The Department of Justice did not respond to a request for comment about the ruling.
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