The White House is poised to request billions of dollars less for southern border wall construction projects in this year’s budget compared to previous years, a senior Department of Homeland Security official confirmed.
President Trump will request Congress include $2 billion in its 2021 fiscal budget for an undisclosed amount of steel fence on the U.S.-Mexico border, down 60% from the $5 billion the White House sought ahead of fiscal 2020, the Wall Street Journal first reported. Trump also asked for $3.6 billion to repay the Pentagon for money taken from its accounts for the wall. When Congress only allocated $1.375 billion last year, Trump diverted a total of $6.7 billion in military and treasury funds to its border projects.
The White House will copy its 2019 playbook again this year and divert $7.2 billion in Defense Department funding for border wall construction. The difference this year is the White House will not ask Congress to replenish the military funding, roughly 1% of its $700 billion proposed budget.
Trump said, in January 2018, his administration needed $18 billion to put up 970 miles of barrier by 2027. As of this new request, the Trump administration will have been given or seized $18.4 billion for the wall. It is enough to put up 885 miles of fence at various parts of the 2,000-mile border that do not have a barrier, that have dilapidated or insufficient fences, or need a “secondary” wall to go behind the first as a duplicate layer.
Another change this year is that the White House is proposing less funding for technology on the southern border, according to an official who spoke with the Washington Examiner. The move could upset Democrats who may demand the Trump administration’s physical security projects include more nonphysical measures.
“In an election year, this budget proposal is even more dead than a normal one,” the official said in a phone call.
The proposed budget asks for $182 million to hire 750 Border Patrol agents and 300 staff for Border Patrol detainee processing centers on the southern border, as well as $83 million for 600 Customs and Border Protection port of entry officers; . In addition, Immigration and Customs Enforcement wants $544 million to hire more than 4,600 officers, prosecuting attorneys, and critical support staff.
The White House also asked for a record-high $3.1 billion to cover 60,000 federal detention center beds for illegal immigrants.
