As threatened, Donald Trump is grabbing money from 127 military projects to fund his border fence. But these projects aren’t new missiles or bombs—Trump isn’t touching those—these are improvements at bases in the U.S. and abroad. These are the homes, schools, and medical facilities for military families that are being clawed back to generate money for Trump’s continent-spanning ego monument.
From the moment Trump announced that he was going to misuse the National Emergency Act to steal the funds Congress would not approve, it was clear that the military would be the source of the funds. The NEA restricts the potential sources of emergency funding under the assumption that a reasonable executive wouldn’t be hitting that button unless there was a genuine threat to the nation. But, as with so many other areas of government, the assumption that any leader would behave in a way that put the nation ahead of his campaign for reelection was just that—an assumption. On this issue, and so many others, Trump has demonstrated that the idea that a law can be written with expectations of reasonable behavior, is expecting way too much.
According to Politico, Defense Secretary Mark Esper made it official on Tuesday by letting Congress know that Trump was coming to make life that much more miserable for those in the military. Senator Chuck Schumer called the move “a slap in the face to the members of the Armed Forces,” but just as Trump feels confident that he can rob farmers blind morning, noon, and night while still holding onto their votes, Trump isn’t swearing the loss of military votes. After all, what are they going to do, support the party that actually gave them improved pay, benefits, and health care, or stick with the man who keeps lying about it?
This fresh $3.6 billion theft comes on top of $2.5 billion in military funding that Trump already ripped from the Defense budget to slap some razor wire on existing fences and create a series of already-destroyed demo walls in the desert. Altogether, if everything goes according to plan, all of these funds will be used to create … 175 miles of ugly border fence. And that’s only if improvements to existing barriers is included in the total. Considering that the U.S./Mexico border is just under 2,000 miles long, all Trump has to do is steal another $90 billion … except the areas where fences already exist are among the easiest and most accessible areas on which a barrier could be placed.
While Trump has repeatedly insisted that miles and miles of new fence have gone up, that doesn’t appear to be true. Even the stretch of fence that Trump recently tweeted, showing a section of new barricade disrupting the wilderness of Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument, only replaces a lower, less intrusive barrier that was already in place.
Defense officials are now asking that Congress appropriate additional funds to replace what Trump has stolen—turning the DOD into a middleman in funding Trump’s horror and holding military families hostage to the use of the NEA to override congressional votes.
Some reports are indicating that Trump’s money grab did not include any funds that had been awarded for the construction of military housing. The keyword there is “awarded.” The NEA didn’t allow Trump to snatch back funds on projects where a contract had already been completed, but did allow taking funds where the project had been approved, but a contractor not yet selected.
