[LI] Besides already reducing the number of illegal border crossings, the new construction is also environmentally protective.This week, the U.S. Senate voted to uphold President Donald Trump’s veto of Democrat-sponsored legislation reversing his use of military base project money to pay for the U.S.-Mexico border wall.
The 53-36 vote was well short of the two-thirds required to overturn the veto. The vote mirrored ones last month and in March in which a number of Republicans broke with Trump in defending lawmakers’ power of the purse. The military projects in question included base schools and target ranges.
In February, Trump declared the security situation along the border a national emergency. That decision enabled him to take up to $3.6 billion from such projects to finance wall construction beyond the miles that lawmakers have been willing to fund.
The funding is being well-used. The Pentagon reports that about one mile of construction is completed daily at the border between the U.S. and Mexico.