The White House is planning to livestream construction of President Trump’s border wall beginning next year to boost support for the barrier.
“There will be a wall cam, and it’ll launch early next year,” a senior White House official told the Washington Post.
Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner, a White House adviser, pitched the idea during meetings in July as a way to defend the president against criticism that he has failed to deliver on his 2016 campaign promise. The wall along the U.S.-Mexico border is behind schedule, and the Trump administration still needs to acquire miles of privately owned land in Texas where barriers are planned to be built.
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and senior U.S. Customs and Border Protection officials have opposed the livestream idea, telling Kushner that contractors building the wall worry their proprietary techniques will be exposed to competitors. The officials also worried the cameras would show U.S. work crews violating Mexican sovereignty because they sometimes cross the border with their vehicles and heavy equipment.
Kushner has pushed for the cameras regardless of opposition.
“It’s understood that Kushner is so aggressive because the president has been asking him about it all the time,” a senior White House official said.
It’s not clear how much the 24-hour webcam initiative will cost.
The Trump administration has completed less than 100 miles of the barrier so far and most of that is the replacement of older fencing.
