1. United States
2. Letter

Today, your administration says it will not build a wall inside Big Bend National Park. You have said that before and then changed your mind. The maps changed. The plans changed. The terminology changed. Wall proposals disappeared and then returned in different forms. Texans have no reason to trust today’s announcement. A promise made today can be reversed tomorrow while contractors, equipment, supplies, and construction camps remain in place. If you truly intend to protect Big Bend, prove it: cancel the contracts, withdraw the environmental waivers, remove the contractors and equipment, and permanently prohibit destructive construction throughout the region. “No wall” does not mean Big Bend is protected if your administration is still planning barriers, roads, blasting, bulldozing, construction camps, and stadium-style lighting operating 24 hours a day. Stop playing word games. The project’s name is not the issue. The destruction is the issue. Protecting only the interior of Big Bend National Park is also inadequate. The national park, Big Bend Ranch State Park, the Rio Grande, Black Gap, private ranches, surrounding communities, and habitat in Mexico form one interconnected ecosystem. Wildlife, waterways, migration corridors, and pollinators do not stop at political boundaries. Saying animals can pass around or beneath a barrier means little if they will no longer approach the river because the area is flooded with artificial light. Big Bend’s darkness supports bats, insects, birds, other pollinators, astronomy, scientific research, tourism, and the people who live there. The proposed vehicle barriers make no practical sense. Much of Big Bend consists of river, desert, mountains, cliffs, and canyons where vehicles cannot simply cross. Building roads into inaccessible country to prevent vehicles from entering inaccessible country is absurd. It causes permanent damage while potentially making remote areas easier to reach. If you genuinely believe more enforcement is needed, use people. Assign more Border Patrol personnel. Use limited mobile surveillance or drones where genuinely necessary. Those options do not require permanently bulldozing, blasting, lighting, and industrializing this magnificent landscape. Cancel the barriers, destructive roads, and permanent lighting. Withdraw the environmental waivers. Terminate the contracts and remove the contractors and equipment. Do not announce that you saved Big Bend while leaving everything in place to reverse course tomorrow or destroy it under another name. Texans are watching. Get the contractors out. Leave Big Bend wild.