A group of House Democrats on Thursday urged Defense Secretary Jim Mattis to reject a request that he spend $450 million to build a section of President Trump’s border wall along a military base in Arizona.
[Related: Trump ‘willing to do anything’ to secure border wall funds]
The request from the Department of Homeland Security would drain Pentagon funds needed to rebuild the military services and fix aging military facilities, according to a letter to Mattis from Rep. Adam Smith, D-Wash., the ranking member on the House Armed Services Committee, and fellow Democrats on the House Appropriations Committee.
“It is utterly irresponsible and appalling that President Trump wants to take away funding for military readiness and infrastructure in order to spend it on his border wall,” Smith said in a statement. “We are trying to ensure that our men and women in uniform have the facilities and training they need to face serious dangers while defending our country. If Secretary Mattis follows through on this request, it would undermine those efforts.”
The funding would be used to build a 31-mile section of wall along the Air Force’s Barry M. Goldwater range, which is near Yuma and abuts the U.S.-Mexico border.
Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen announced in April that the agency was looking into ways the military could help complete Trump’s wall, which has been stymied by lack of funding from Capitol Hill.
“We’re going to have our wall, and we’re going to get it very strongly. The military’s going to be building some of it,” Trump said at the time.
