Earlier this month, presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden stated, during an interview, that while he would not tear down the elements of the border wall system updated or constructed under President Trump, he would not build “another foot of wall.” While this is a major concession to the open-borders left, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) wants to go even further.
That’s because the organization – which filed almost 400 lawsuits or legal actions against the Trump administration, almost half of which (174) were related to immigration – would like to see every foot of border wall built under Trump completely demolished.
Following the ACLU’s recent defeat in the Supreme Court – which ruled, in a 5-4 decision, that border wall construction may continue – ACLU attorney Dror Ladin declared that his organization will “seek the removal of every mile of unlawful wall built.”
Keep in mind that, as of August 10, the Trump administration has completed 275 miles of the Border Wall System (with 463 miles under construction or in “pre-construction”). Admittedly, what has been “built” consists overwhelmingly of upgrades to dilapidated or insufficient border barriers erected under previous administrations – and authorized by congressional legislation in 1996 and 2006.
We do not know – because Mr. Ladin has not clarified – whether the ACLU plans to tear down the updated fencing and bring back the dilapidated or insufficient barriers that were there before the upgrades. Or will the demolished updates simply be replaced by nothing?
The Biden approach (stopping all construction while not tearing anything down) is likely an attempt by the Democratic candidate to walk the tightrope, i.e. simultaneously trying to appease the radical pro-illegal-alien base (and associated ethnic advocacy activists on the left), while hoping to placate mainstream Americans who think border security is a common-sense idea.
The ACLU’s extreme position is no doubt closer to how the Democratic party’s leftist base feels about the wall (and this is not the first time someone on the left has called for its demolishing). For the Democrats, opposition to the wall – Donald Trump’s signature campaign promise – is about resisting Trump and denying him a victory on the border security front (many top Democrats once supported a border fence).
For the radical left, the wall is not only a “monument to hate,” but also an allegedly racist attempt by the descendants of European colonizers to protect their ill-gotten wealth and territories by keeping out the poor descendants of the natives. As the extreme leftists see it, the United States was illegitimately founded in sin and evil, and therefore has no moral right to enforce its borders and laws.
But regardless of which option one chooses – be it Biden’s promise to retain what has been built but not build “another foot of the wall,” or the ACLU/radical left desire to see the wall torn down – the practical consequences will be the essentially similar. Tearing down the wall would send an obvious and clear invitation to would-be illegal border crossers to rush our southwestern border. And if a potential Biden administration halts all border wall construction upon coming to power, the message south of the border would also be loud and clear, that the “new guy” in America is soft on border security and immigration.
