McALLEN, Texas (Border Report) — Presumptive President-elect Joe Biden has promised his administration would not build any more border wall, but terminating the contracts could cost “millions” of dollars U.S. Customs and Border Protection Acting Commissioner Mark Morgan said this week.


In anticipation of projects possible being curtailed, contractors across the Southwest appear to be speeding up construction, which all will factor into the settlements they could get. The Trump administration has completed over 430 miles of new border wall, Morgan said Monday on a media call, adding “I’m very confident that we’re going to meet our mark, our goal that we have set of 450 miles by the end of the calendar year.”


To meet this goal, construction crews are working all hours of the day, nights and weekends, too, especially in remote areas of Arizona where sections of border wall can cost as much as $41 million per mile. Entire sections of mountaintops are being blasted, Border Report has witnessed, with environmentalists complaining that there is no limit to the destruction the administration is wreaking on environmentally sensitive wilderness areas due to the massive amount of environmental waivers that have been issued.


Special movable border wall flood gates are seen being installed on Oct. 22, 2020, in the San Pedro River Valley in southeastern Arizona. (Border Report File Photo/Sandra Sanchez)


But to put a sudden halt to all of this construction would be costly and wasteful, Morgan said. How much money exactly is uncertain as each settlement would individually be negotiated under a termination for convenience clause that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers would determine based on miles so far completed, and materials purchased.


But Morgan speculated it “would probably be billions of dollars.” He said 270,000 tons of steel bollards that have already been built or are being built would go unused and possibly be destroyed. And he speculated there could even be added storage costs for the steel.


“Just more cost to the taxpayers for nothing,” he said Monday.


Border wall steel bollards are stored on a dirt lot in Mission, Texas. (Border Report Photo/Sandra Sanchez)

U.S. Rep. Henry Cuellar, a Democrat from South Texas who is vice chairman of the House Appropriations Homeland Security Subcommittee, said he doubts the efforts would be a complete waste, and he is advocating that if Biden halts border wall construction that the technology still be installed along the Southwest border. This includes infrared cameras, flood lights, and all-weather roads for Border Patrol agents to better traverse the borderlands.


Border Report recently obtained two border wall contract summaries for projects in Cuellar’s hometown of Laredo, Texas. Although the contracts are deemed a matter of national security and not privy to public release, Cuellar received summaries of the contracts from the Department of Homeland Security by making a legislative request for the information.