DHS waives Endangered Species Act, Clean Air Act to speed border wall construction

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem waived some of the country’s most iconic environmental protection laws Monday as she sought to cut through delays and speed construction of President Trump’s border wall in California.

Parts of at least 29 laws were waived, including the Endangered Species Act, the Clean Water Act, the Clean Air Act, the Eagle Protection Act, and the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act.

“There is presently an acute and immediate need to construct additional physical barriers and roads in the vicinity of the border of the United States in order to prevent unlawful entries into the United States,” Ms. Noem said in a regulatory filing in the Federal Register.

The waiver applied to both barrier construction and to the roads that the Border Patrol builds alongside the wall to speed agents to where they detect incursions.

The decision to waive the laws was expected — the administration did it in Mr. Trump’s first term, and President Biden did it too during his term.

Still, it remains controversial.

“This waiver is another cynical attack by the Trump administration on border communities and wildlife, who deserve the same protections that prevail everywhere else in the country,” said Laiken Jordahl, southwest conservation advocate at the Center for Biological Diversity (CBD).

The waivers cover about 10 miles of border. Much of it would be replacing or adding extra layers of fencing where a barrier already exists. But one segment would go where there is no fence currently.

CBD said the barrier would block wildlife that currently migrates back and forth across the border.

Mr. Trump erected more than 450 miles of fencing during his first term.