{"id":5635,"date":"2026-08-17T18:58:41","date_gmt":"2026-08-17T18:58:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/silvybrand.com\/?p=5635"},"modified":"2026-08-17T18:58:41","modified_gmt":"2026-08-17T18:58:41","slug":"trump-border-wall-big-bend-arizona-cottonwood-tree-sit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/silvybrand.com\/?p=5635","title":{"rendered":"Trump\u2019s border wall push is back \u2014 and it\u2019s destroying national parks and 200-year-old trees"},"content":{"rendered":"


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About 22 miles south of the former mining town of Patagonia, Arizona, down a winding, unpaved mountain road that passes cows grazing on open range, stands a cottonwood tree believed to be at least 200 years old. The \u201cgrandmother\u201d tree, as some locals call it, is imperiled and already showing signs of stress, almost as if it knows its fate. The leaves are yellowing prematurely, falling to the ground at the height of summer. On July 27th, a construction crew felled three neighboring trees to build an extension of President Donald Trump\u2019s wall along the US-Mexico border.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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An activist climbed up the last tree standing two days later and ever since, someone has sat on a platform hoisted onto the tree\u2019s branches. They say they\u2019ll sit there as long as it takes, because as long as someone is in the tree, it can\u2019t be cut down.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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The protest is about more than one cottonwood. \u201cThis tree represents a literal line in the sand against border militarization in general,\u201d said Russ McSpadden, the Southwest conservation advocate for the Center for Biological Diversity.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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In recent weeks, the Department of Homeland Security has revived its effort to wall off the border, dispatching construction crews to remote parts of Texas, Arizona, and the Tohono O\u2019odham Nation\u2019s reservation lands to finish Trump\u2019s wall \u2014 and has waived environmental laws to get it built, causing backlash from the tiny desert town of Ajo to the even tinier ghost town of Terlingua.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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This latest construction push is happening despite record-low encounters<\/a> along the southwestern border. In fact, encounters at the southwest border dropped almost immediately after Trump took office \u2014 not because of any new infrastructure, but because he effectively shut down asylum. Despite the steep decline in migrant crossings, the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, which passed along party lines in 2025, gave Trump an additional $46.5 billion to finish building the wall.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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The border wall is more than just a wall; it\u2019s a vast surveillance network of interconnected drones, towers, and cameras. Even in areas where there\u2019s no visible barrier separating the United States and Mexico, CBP relies on this \u201cvirtual wall<\/a>\u201d to track migrants. This vast surveillance apparatus is far more effective than a wall, and it\u2019s already largely in place.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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In the ghost town of Lochiel, Arizona, activists from surrounding communities have set up an encampment on private property near the cottonwood tree to support the protest. They take turns cooking meals and use a pulley system to transport food and water to the person sitting in the tree. They know they\u2019re being watched. Trucks from Vision Quest Solutions, a private security firm that advertises itself as veteran- and Native American-owned, roll up and down the fresh dirt road just south of the tree. The activists track the various contractors that are building the road: Fisher Sand & Gravel, BJ Drilling, Stinger Bridge & Iron, and others.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\"Homeland<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Homeland Security contractors drive past an ancient cottonwood tree in Lochiel, Arizona. Activists have been occupying the tree since July 29th.<\/em><\/figcaption>Photo: Gaby Del Valle \/ The Verge<\/cite><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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Henry, a community organizer from Tucson who is participating in the encampment, said that a DHS helicopter flew \u201cdangerously close\u201d to the tree on August 10th.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cThis movement was started and held down for a long time by local environmentalists who care really deeply about these ancient cottonwood trees,\u201d said Henry, who asked to be referred to by a pseudonym. He is among a newer group of activists \u201cwho see it as an opportunity to physically stop border wall construction.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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The planned construction projects differ by region. In Arizona\u2019s San Rafael Valley, where an older fence already divides Mexico and the United States, DHS is building a wall featuring 30-foot-tall steel bollards. The plan is to have a \u201cdouble wall\u201d<\/a> throughout the Arizona-Mexico border \u2014 one that runs through the Tohono O\u2019odham reservation, Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument, and the San Rafael Valley. To achieve this, DHS contractors are tearing down the old fence, replacing it with the new bollards, and building an entirely new wall a few dozen feet away. The cottonwood tree sits directly in the path of the second wall.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cThey\u2019re approaching the tree from both sides with their work crews,\u201d Henry said. \u201cI don\u2019t really know what their plan is once they don\u2019t have anything else to do.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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In Big Bend National Park, Customs and Border Protection is building what it calls a \u201cTechnology & Patrol Road,\u201d or a \u201csmart wall\u201d system of sensors, cameras, and surveillance towers accessible via a new road \u2014 even though there\u2019s an existing road that cuts through the park.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Responding to mass outcry about recent construction in Big Bend, CBP chief Rodney Scott said that DHS isn\u2019t building a wall. \u201cCBP is building one new access road, improving existing roads, installing detection technology, and placing vehicle barriers in limited, strategic locations,\u201d Scott said in an emailed statement. \u201cWhat people are seeing right now is survey and design work\u2014NOT construction of a wall through the park.\u201d (The statement was also posted near-verbatim<\/a> on DHS\u2019s X account. )<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Unlike in other areas along the border, Scott said, CBP isn\u2019t building a 30-foot wall or installing stadium lighting in Big Bend National Park, Big Bend Ranch State Park, or the Black Gap Wildlife Management Area.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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On August 17th, Scott announced that CBP is pausing all construction in Big Bend National Park while he conducts a \u201cpersonal, on-the-ground evaluation.\u201d Reporters with Marfa Public Radio who flew over the park this morning saw staged construction vehicles, but noted that the crews weren\u2019t working, according to<\/a> station manager Travis Bubenik.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Outraged locals, joined by environmentalists from across the country, charge that CBP doesn\u2019t need to build a 30-foot wall to destroy local ecosystems. Over the weekend, contractors started digging into Mariscal Mountain, a massive limestone ridge, ostensibly as part of the survey and design work needed to build its patrol road.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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You can call it what you want. You\u2019re destroying what we\u2019re trying to protect.<\/p>\n

\u2014 Billy Miller, a river guide and landowner in Terlingua, Texas.<\/cite><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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CBP maintains that its goal is to ensure Big Bend remains open to the public. According to agency spokesperson John Mennell, the \u201csmart wall\u201d CBP plans on installing in the area is proactive, not reactive. Though the national park and Border Patrol\u2019s greater Big Bend sector<\/a> \u2014 which encompasses 165,154 square miles \u2014 has historically seen fewer crossings than other parts of the border, Mennell said that the buildup of security elsewhere could push migrants into Big Bend.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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The Center for Biological Diversity sued the Trump administration last year, arguing that waiving environmental laws to build Trump\u2019s wall \u201cviolates the foundational principle of the separation of powers rooted in the US Constitution.\u201d But a federal judge effectively closed the case<\/a> in March, citing two laws that let DHS disregard nearly three dozen federal laws \u2014 including the Endangered Species Act, the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act, and the Clean Air Act \u2014 to \u201censure expeditious construction of the barriers and roads\u201d along the border. A separate lawsuit<\/a>, filed by the Center for Biological Diversity, a local church, and Billy Miller, a river guide and landowner in Terlingua, Texas, is ongoing.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cTheir lawyers \u2014 the contractor\u2019s lawyers, the federal government\u2019s lawyers \u2014 told us they would give us 30 days\u2019 advance notice before any ground disturbance,\u201d Miller, who has been a river guide in the area for 22 years, told The Verge<\/em>. \u201cBut they just started destroying the river corridor this past week without telling us anything.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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The government\u2019s attorneys, he said, countered that there hasn\u2019t been any ground disturbance, since what they\u2019re doing is \u201cgrubbing and pioneering to create access roads to the river.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cYou can call it what you want,\u201d Miller said. \u201cYou\u2019re destroying what we\u2019re trying to protect. Y\u2019all were supposed to tell us about it.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Miller said that he and other locals have been told that the new CBP roads won\u2019t be open to the public; only Border Patrol will be able to use them. \u201cThat\u2019s heartbreaking. You\u2019re going to destroy our national park, or take away private landowners\u2019 property, and create roads nobody can use?\u201d he said. According to Mennell, the CBP spokesperson, the National Park Service will decide whether the roads will be open to the public.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cYou\u2019re taking a wilderness area that\u2019s really hard to get through, really hard to walk through on foot, and now you\u2019re creating a brand-new road? They\u2019re creating roads that smugglers could use, if there were smugglers out here in the first place.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\"People<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

People protest the plans by US President Donald Trump\u2019s administration to build a section of the border wall at the Big Bend National Park in Study Butte, Texas, on August 15, 2026. <\/em><\/figcaption>Photo: Ronald Schemidt \/ AFP via Getty Images<\/cite><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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CBP also plans on installing vehicle barriers that locals say will block their access to the Rio Grande, which would threaten Miller and other river guides\u2019 livelihood. In addition to destroying landscapes, jeopardizing livelihoods, and endangering migrants, the border wall threatens migratory species across the Southwest, including Sonoran pronghorns and Mexican gray wolves.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Over the last two weeks, the small, tight-knit community has been invaded by hundreds of construction workers. \u201cSome businesses, like the Starlight Theatre, which is the most popular restaurant in town, have put up a sign that says they refuse to serve border wall workers or border barrier construction workers,\u201d said Miller.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Though Trump received 55.6 percent of the vote in Texas\u2019 Brewster County, the community is almost universally opposed to the wall. Miller has friends and relatives who \u201cvoted for Trump without really thinking that he would ever try to build a wall out here,\u201d he said. \u201cAnd now they are kicking themselves in the ass for voting for him.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Locals share the opinion that the wall isn\u2019t about border security or immigration. It\u2019s about money. Some of the contractors, they point out, are run by major Trump donors. Fisher Sand & Gravel, one of the contractors working on the wall in Arizona, reportedly lobbied Trump directly, and was awarded a nearly $1.3 billion contract during his first term.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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On Wednesday, over 100 people attended a protest in Big Bend National Park\u2019s Santa Elena Canyon. Their chants of \u201cno road, no wall, no wire, no way\u201d echoed off<\/a> the surrounding cliffs.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Michael Ryan, a retired National Park Service river ranger who attended the rally, said some people he talked to drove more than 100 miles to be there. \u201cWe never thought we would see anything like this,\u201d said Ryan, who has lived in the Big Bend region for 35 years. \u201cWe used to think more Airbnbs in the area was about the worst thing that could ever happen to us, and now the scope and scale of this construction is mind-boggling.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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In Arizona and Texas alike, locals see the wall as not only wasteful but destructive.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cThey could spend this money on more agents if they wanted to, more infrared cameras, more motion sensors, more drones,\u201d said Miller, the Big Bend river guide. \u201cEven though that\u2019s, to everybody out here, a complete waste of money, that would be more effective than what they\u2019re planning.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Update, August 17th: <\/strong>After publication, CBP announced it would pause construction in Big Bend National Park. The piece has been updated to reflect the announcement.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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