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Hi everyone, and welcome to the show. It's me James today and I'm very lucky to be joined again by Eric Mesa, who's the Borderlands coordinator for the Sierra Club.
Eric.
How are you doing.
I'm doing okay, James, Thanks for much for the invitation.
Yeah, thank you for joining us. Sadly we don't have a lot of good stuff to talk about right now. It's a pretty difficult time in the borderlands. But maybe we could start off with something that I've reported on briefly in our weekly news show. The Border Patrol is currently soliciting comment for its plans to build border wall
through the Outi Mountain Wilderness and other areas west of Takati. Right, could you explain a little bit about what they're proposing and what the consequences of that will be.
Yeah, well, hi, everybody, so happy to be here and not so happy to be sharing these news, but so what the announcement was recently by the Border patron Role, especially on the San Diego area, is the announcement of the approximately nine point seven miles of new border barrier system and on top of that, over fifty one miles of what they call now system attributes, and this is
going to cabaccuge impact on the area. This is going to be about two point nine miles west of the the Cultil part of entry, going through an area that it is very remote mountain region, and some of people here in this are more familiar than I am. I've actually never been, but I've been talking to some of the local organizations, the do humanitarian eight in the region, and I know the Takaate Peak is in that area, and then you start going west into these beautiful mountains
that are also the birthplace of the Tijuana River. That's exactly with the area where it's going to go. So right now, CVPS accepting comments and asking people in the community what kind of concerns do they have concerns in regards of the environmental impacts of a project like this, what kind of social and economical impacts? So they open up this section on their website with an email address
where people can share some of these concerns. As you mentioned, and part of an environmental organization, but we also have all kinds of concerns for a project like this, including the border barrier and the system attributes which are very poorly described what they mean. Some of the things that they mentioned as system attributes is the increase of lighting, infrastructure, surveillance equipment, and new roads for access for border patrol vehicles.
So one of the things that we're going to expect that we have seen in other areas is more blasting through the mountain, especially on areas where the mountains is so uneven the terrain, there is a lot of heavy machinery it has to come into those places to start bulldozing to level the terrain so they can start building
this border wall. So we can expect some of that, and with that come a lot of issues because there's going to be the need to start drilling wells at the border to extract the water from mixing the concrete for the foundation. If there was any road out there, they're going to probably widen the road two or three times to allow this. Having machinery to access these remote areas. This is just going to be the beginning, just setting
up the panels. But whenever you go to these places and start disturbing the native soil, you can expect all kinds of consequences in regards of invasive species of plants. You can also expect so floating and removal of native vegetation. In some cases, there is some species that are rare on the area that having these impacts you know, can be long lasting for them to be able to recover
if they're able to do so. The area on the south side of the border there is also an area where animals need to be moving back on course, so species like the native meal deer a colony that lives there. There is a mountain lion and other species of mammals and pretty much everything that is four inches wide that it's not going to be able to make it through
that border. Well, so yeah, we're just raising these concerns and sharing with the community so they're able to also as well, and an email to CVP, Customs and Border patrow and express these concerns and also to remember that these areas have been sacred sized for the indigenous communities in Diamond Memorial, so we might lose some very sacred sides for the dribes forever.
Yeah, Like I know the topic Ta Kat Mountain has been sacred to Kumii people. I believe it's Chuma in Kumii, but it's been sacred to them for as you say, much longer than this has been the United States.
That's correct.
You and I have both seen it in different places.
Right.
The damage that the border will does not just to people. I've seen mule deer running along it like trying. They're clearly trying to find a way through, right, this is their habitual pathway. There are some areas near, very very near the border, like within one hundred yards of the border, where there are naturally occurring creeks and little ponds which will hold water at a time when water can be
very hard to come across here. And so I've seen deer kind of distraught almost trying to get to this place where they've obviously learned that they can get water, but now they can't. It's really heartbreaking on top of all the other cruelty that it does. I suppose we should address it, like I'm not sure how much we can accomplish by the comment period, right, but it has value nonetheless, like trying to do something I think has value. It shows that we didn't let this just happen.
Yeah, that's right. I honestly am not very hopeful from these common periods because this is not the first time they're asking the community to provide input and with past experiences that we have organized in other areas, other segments of the world, even in other states, we haven't got a response even or an acknowledgment of these concerns. So
Dalva itself is really concerning. But I think it is important that the communities around these areas are aware about this and they get involved, and that there is this community sentiment against this abuse of power that the administration continues to do and borderlands and using them as the sacrifice zone, as these testing grounds for what can potentially continue to happen or expand, not only on the border but in all our series, like we are seeing with the span of militarization nowadays.
Yeah, definitely, like all the stuff that is really bad in America right now, like it started at the border.
That's right.
People are seeing it in their communities now, but like we've been seeing it where we live for a long time. Can we talk a little bit about there's been some other construction right then, with San Diego is not the only place right now that there's a significant budgetary allocation to construction a border barrier, and there's more construction east of San Diego.
Right, Yeah, that's that's right. Most of the construction that is happening right now. It was with all funding there was from the twenty twenty one funds that were available think the first Rump administration, So we were hoping that that was going to be like the end of the funding.
But since the proposal and passing of the quote beautiful bill, we've got to remind ourselves that now the administration has allocated forty six point five billion dollars for border security, and that includes border barriers and system attributes, so pretty much anything related to border security right now they have the funding to do it. They pretty much have the funding to put a double wall across the whole US
Mexico border. Yeah, so that's that's huge. You know, in recent days, we got a new wave of contracts that were awarded. In October ten, we got this announcement that out of this funding, the forty six point five billion, they are located for a little bit over four billion, and this will fund them two hundred and thirty miles of new physical barriers and four hundred miles of surveillance technology across the US Mexico border from California New Texas.
That's and they put up a new section on their website where there is a map you can navigate. It's an interactive map that shows every single section of the border and what they're planning to do with it. And as surreal as it sounds, they are planning to double up the wall. So in some places, in remote areas in the desert, like in organ Pipe National Monument or Cavesaprieta in Arizona and those areas, there is plans to
build a secondary wall. So on top of the thirty food barrier that they have, they're planning to do a second one.
Yeah, we have that in Sanni Sedil, Right, we have a double thirty foot barrier.
Yeah.
The Pipe administration used it to corral people seeking asylum. Right that they kept them in between the two walls
and then denied that they were in detention. I don't know if we'll see that again, but like I guess just from my own experience, you know, participating in mutilid along the border, like those remote desert areas are where people go when we build wall in Otai, right, when we continue to detain and turn people back in less remote areas, they will take the risk of going to a more remote area and forcing people into those remote areas and then constructing barriers there too. It's just going
to cause more deaths. It's not going to stop people trying to come because there are things that they are leaving which are terrible, but it will mean that they get stuck out there in the heat without water for longer.
Right, that's correct, James, So exactly what you said people in San Diego, like the border in Otai, you don't really have the double wall, so you know, like having these hypermarketinglit area and how that is going to expand and the consequences of that is, as you mentioned, you push people out further more remote areas, and two things happen by doing that. First and most important, more people die.
But also remember that these areas, like these remote areas, were also like semi pristine wildlife environments that you never had humans moving through before. Now, as people have been pushed to these remote areas, you have this human traffic and not only migrants moving through, but you also have the border patrol chase and these migrants, and now you have border patrol wanting to build new roads to these wilderness areas, and all of these just gives building up
into what's already a very fragmented landscape. So by adding all these quote unquote system attributes, because you're pushing and pushing people further and building these double walls, it's just going and the laws of the remaining wildlife remote migration corridors as well. So the impacts that this is going to have are huge.
Yeah, yeah, for like all living creatures. As you said, let's take a break, Eric, we'll come back and talk about it some more. All right, we are back. Let's talk about like how people are organizing right like at this time when it does seem really bleak at the borderlands, Like the Trump administration didn't really construct very much war in its first iteration. It did construct a bit, but not as much as it wanted to. And you and I are both very familiar with the consequences that has had,
right like, it has caused more people to die. The Biden administration continued constructing and quote unquote repairing border back areas. They also pioneered outdoor attention, and like, it just seems like things with whoever gets elected, but more rapidly and Republicans get worse. What are people able to do? When we've talked about this a lot on this show, but I'd love to hear your perspective too.
It's been hard, honestly as a person working on environmental issues in the border because definitely, like the loses are much more than the wind sometimes, so that can be dishard paying. Yeah, but there has been some glimpses of hope. I think one of the things that we did here in Arizona that was definitely felt really good and gave us some hope is when the governor of Arizona decided to put some chipping containers and make its own makeshift war. Yeah.
So a bunch of people really came together on the community outrage because this was just some really dumb idea and one of the most remote, beautiful areas where there is not even people moving through and then it's just going to destroy the environment. And the governor went out there and spent two hundred million dollars of taxpayers money to buy these shipping containers and build this border wall.
So we were actually all the community came together. We showed up out there in desert and stop the machines and we said no, you're not going to move any further. And because what they were doing was actually illegal, we were able to get away with it, and those shipping containers are gone right now. Still Arizona taxpayer paid two hundred million dollars to destroy their own environment. Just let that thinking we can be using that money for much
better things. So I think that president and that movement, that sense of community that was built after that resistance, it has continued after that, Like there is a lot of self organized grassroots efforts going on for border resistance, you know, and that encompasses humanitarian groups, environmental groups, and we are also organizing nowadays here in Arizona to do some direct action and try to show up to the Central pel Valley which is where the border construction is going.
And it started raising some national attention to this issue, trying to invite our politicians, start invited our native communities to speak out and using different metals such as art performance, bring up some different strategies together. You know, now with the technology that we have availables, like how can we make these more mainstream and tell people across the nation
what's going on and built remote areas. You know a lot of people a lot of connection to this valley and this is the heavy waters of the Santa Cluz river lifeblood of many communities across the southern Arizona. And at the same time, on the other side of the coin, you know, there is all this oppression by the government to anything that is against their will, so a lot of people feel a little bit afraid of showing up
to direct action. Yeah, so it is it's just walking that fine line of how what can we get away with and still be able to make a bold statement and show opposition without putting people in danger.
Yeah. Yeah, I think there is something a lot of people are really worried about. But it is important within the realm of things that we can do to show our opposition to this and to stand in solidarity with the animals and the indigenous people whose sacred spaces are being defiled right and with migrants whose lives are being put in danger by this. I wonder, like, I find it so strange. I guess that like we're at a time when reporting on migration is becoming like like a
major growth industry. I guess, editors who I could not get to respond to an email or pick up the phone for the last four years and now commissioning pieces on migration, but there still seems to be like a blind spot about the border in the American news media. I don't know why that is. I don't know if you have ideas about why there is. But the Borderlands are such a special place for me anyway, you know,
I've spent nearly twenty years of my life here. Some of my favorite places in the world are near the border. I think people think of the border as like Sentaisgital, but it contains some wonderfully remote and special places. And I wonder if you have thoughts on why, Like, the border isn't something that gets talked about that much on a national level.
I think it does talk about, but unfortunately the narrative that is usually built around it is really negative. Yeah, that's fair, and of course that's with that intention, right, you know, continue to build up this militarized state or
sacrifice zone. And so whenever I talk with people that is here for the first time, you know, I do these group presentations for delegations that come from all over the country to experience the Borderlands region, and they're like, they have all these perspective, you know, for what they hear on the news about how horrible this is, and then they come here and they're like wow, people here is like really nice and we have a great experience, and I really inspire and it's like coming with these
prefabricated narrative on their minds of this wasteland sacrifice one, you know, and then going out after experience and yes, some of that of course, if you go out to the to the border and experience the wall and the rolls and rolls of concerts in a wired and make it look like you're in a war zone. Yeah, the plows what you already have in your mind, you know,
just keeps building up the intensity. And then you hear the stories from people, the struggle from migrants and stories from back in twenty twenty three when we have the search of migrants coming and all these things, you know, but at the end people leaves with glimps also like wow, this place is really beautiful and a lot of wonderful things are happening, a lot of movements of people trying to organize and make it a bit better place and
trying really hard to shift this narrative. You know. The Bordlands provide us a good opportunity, you know, because what we see today, like a friend of mine said, you can get worse, and it's going into that direction. Yeah, yeah, it's going into that direction. But at the same time, it gives us an opportunity as a society, you know, because whatever happens at the border is definitely going to have a ripple effect in the rest of the country.
So we are able to figure out a way to shift that narrative and look at the border like people that lives and experience the borderer and the culture of the beautiful things that the border has to offer. Then we hope that that's going to help change a lot of the things that are happening in this country, you know, but we need to start I think organizing from the bottom up. Yeah, a lot of grass exfore need to be happening, and I think a lot of media and
needs to cover this. You know, we usually don't cover the good stories, so yeah, yeah, you're right.
Like it's funny that the Right does cover the body or right or the the you know, the Fox News kind of Cardra does cover the border. Like I don't like the way they cover it. But like the only national network guy I will see down there is the
Fox guy. For the most part, I don't one thing I like to do with my friends, or like if someone comes to visit, you know, sometimes I have other independent journalists come visit, to walk down to the border wall, and it seems very bleak, right because there's this big wall and it's covered in Constantina way, as you say, and maybe they're Marines or National Guard or Border patrol or any other leg it's people with guns right in
different uniforms. But then if you turn around, you're in this really special place where you don't see the people. You just you can appreciate how beautiful it is. It's also very beautiful that, like you say, there's so much bottom up organizing, that there's so much people helping people
of all different kinds. And that's something we also are in twenty twenty three, when Title forty two ended and subsequently the Biden administration detained people outdoors, like we saw an incredible community response of all different kinds of people of different political persuasions, different faith groups, which was a really beautiful thing. Like it's a thing that a lot of the rest of America right now could learn from the government was brutalizing people, and people made that less bad.
They kept them safe, and they'd been a lot more people who didn't make it throughout all attention if it wasn't for community support, Like I want people to see that.
I wonder if people want to support, right, let's say they're not in the border lands, can you think of good ways for them to be in solidarity, for them to even to experience like I know a lot of people who listen to this have come, Like, it's really wonderful for me to meet people when I'm not working, when I'm just out there in my capacity with someone who cares about other people, right, doing water drops, doing
mutilate with migrants, or helping people at street release. To hear people who listen to this and then decided to come from wherever they were and spend some time here and help, Like, that's a really a special thing. But you have other ideas on how people can be in solidarity and can come and help.
Yeah, definitely, I get this question very often from different people that comes to bas here. Yeah. I usually recommend people to start where they are, you know, in their own communities, because there is recollection of the border issues in your own community. There are people that are migrating that are mind need some help. There are people that show theres and all this, or just kind of like
get involved with your local whatever you're passionate about. You know, it doesn't really have to be an environmental issue, but we are, remember and social justice and environmental justice is the same thing. Yeah, you know, we really like whatever you're passionate about, just getting involved. But I think the worst thing that we can do right now is just doing are the fact that we are in a bad spot.
You know. I think a lot of people just want to continue writing their comport song wave and it's that's gonna end, you know. And I think we need to not only think about ourselves, but we need to think about the generations coming ahead of us. And I think it's especially for the people that us already had the opportunity to somehow live a life, you know, but there are somes that are about to start the journey, and I think it's our responsibilit you do make it the
best as we can for them as well. So whatever you're passionate about, and if you really want to and you're passionate about order related issues and you're not able to come, try to support, you know, like financial help is you know, we like it or not, We are
in a capitalist society and we move with financial support. Yeah, So a lot of these events that we're creating, a lot of these outreach that we're doing a lot of the people like new generations that need jobs, that are wanting to join like let maybe a non profit work or create their own movement or doing something related that's going to help the community. Yeah, support those if you are able. Those are really good ways to get involved and make them change.
Yeah, definitely, Like there's a lot of things you can do, if you say, and I think it does help to build that networks of caring for people everywhere. Like we want to live in a world where people take care of one another. To do that, we have to start everywhere. It's not that the border is the any place where bad things are happening.
I know.
We draw a lot of strengths as people who live at the border from that solidarity, but also from seeing people do their own things wherever they're at. Like that is how we build a world where systems of oppression of let's able to oppress people.
So yeah, and one of the things we see here most of the decisions taken for the border are not taken by people from the border a lot of these big all these decisions, Like for example, Senator of Utah right now is putting up a bill for the border to sacrifice a lot of public lands for new roads and like new military installations.
So it's like people from Utah are not directly on the border, but yeah, they can also send letters and comments or both these senators out, you know, and somebody that really cares for the environment.
Yeah, if if you're in Utah, your senator has been advocating to sell off the public lands that you own that are said, I mean their native land. It's all native land and it should be returned to its original custodians. But in the meantime, you own it and at least all of us can access it until Mike Lee gets his chance to sell it all off to his buddies in real estate. And like, you could be an extremely conservative person and we could disagree on a lot of shit,
and I think we could find unity on that. Like, I do not understand how there is a constituency that wants to take land from the public domain and turn it into a military basis and oil fields and McMansions for rich people to have as their second home, like that should be. It's a thing that everyone agrees on and like he didn't stick the landing on it the first time in the reconciliation the quote unquote big beautiful bill.
But I think that's a really good area toween gage people, folks who might not be like, yeah, I will show up for migrants. I think a lot of people. They could be people who in where the outdoors, people who just care about the environment, the Hook and Bullet crowd, like, there are a lot of people even if they don't quote unquote use public lands, like we all benefit from being there and future generation to benefit from them remaining un developed in a substantial way.
That's right.
Sorry, I just went off, And when that guy really pissed me off. Shit makes me so mad. Coming from a country that is entirely private land, it is to see someone being like, yeah, that's a good idea. It's just fucking asenoine.
Eric.
I wonder if people want to keep up with the Sierra Club, keep up with like how they can submit opposition comments if they want to know more about this new border construction and the impact would have. Where can they follow along? Is there a website or social media.
Yeah, Sam's thanks to you. Yeah, we do have all of it. We've tried to engage people where they are, and we know social media is a powerful tool. We have a website Circle border Lands. People can look up some of the work that we do there. We are also active on social media. We are Fair Club Borderlands. However you look at it, you're going to find find us. We're based out of Arizona, but we do organize in different states, so we're in collaboration with all organizations as
part of a larger coalition. So even if you are in Texas or New Mexico, feel free to rech out and if you have any concerns, ideas, things that come up to your mind that you can make the border of airplace feel free for a feel free to reach out. Then we can collaborate work together on this or least connect you with some of the local people that are part of the network. Because we're always looking to make this network bigger. You know, I think there's strengthing numbers.
We're going to get more and more people to join this coalition. Yeah, in the different states. So even if you're on the border sites, if you're in d C and you're do a lobbying and you're into all these change but yeah, come come reach out and you can find us like a central website or we got an Instagram account. We also have like a grassroots middle air fort right now called Rally for the Valley, and that's what we're trying to do for the Sandra Fhile Valley
over there. You're going to be able to find updates. And we created a decentralized website right now there is called Border Wall Resistance. I invite everybody to take a look at it. It's full of beautiful pictures of the border. When James and I were talking about how beautiful this place is, go to that website and you understand what we're talking about because it's all girds. You know, the
border is so unique on each area. You know, the border it's not defined, but Juana San Diego or no Gallets, you know, it is just two thousand miles of wonderlands, so unfortunately separated by in many cases, but this huge metal food structure.
Yeah.
Anyways, so that's the website, the social media for Cerra Club Borderlands and Graduty for the Ballet and the Border Resistance.
Yeah, definitely reach out. You if you recently found out that you live within a border enforcement zone and weren't aware of that, Because I know a lot of people in Chicago and other places have very recently found out that as far as the state is concerned, that they too are in the borderlands. It would be good to build some solidarity there.
Traving two terms of the population of these country lives on the borderland sage and so because that includes coastlines and the Great Lakes Great Lakes, so we're talking about a lot of communities.
Well, thank you very much for your time, Eric, We really appreciate it. It was a good discussion.
Thank you, James, and hoping that continue to be in touch and continue organizing against all this. Thanks and thanks so much for the space, and thanks for all of you listener. Yeah, you're welcome. It Could Happen Here is a production of cool Zone Media. For more podcasts from cool Zone Media, visit our website Coolzonmedia dot com, or check us out on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or
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