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The Supreme Court has cleared the way for President Donald Trump's administration to build a border wall through one of America's most remote and celebrated landscapes. On Monday, the court voted 8-1 to lift a lower judge's order that had blocked construction of barriers and roads across the Big Bend region of West Texas, including Big Bend National Park. In an unsigned, five-page opinion, the justices said Congress has expressed a "clear preference for expeditious border construction" — and that this outweighs "any aesthetic, recreational, and environmental harm" the project might cause.
The ruling is a win for one of Trump's signature priorities, but it is not the final word. The court was deciding an emergency request, not the underlying lawsuit, which continues. What it decided is that construction can go ahead while that case is litigated. Only Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson indicated she would have denied the government's request; she gave no reasoning.
A wall through 500 miles of desert
The Big Bend sector spans more than 500 miles — over a quarter of the entire US-Mexico border — running through deserts, canyons and part of the Rio Grande. The administration wants to build more than 300 miles of barriers and roads there. Inside Big Bend National Park itself, the plan is a 17-mile noncontiguous vehicle barrier system, not the 30-foot pedestrian wall slated for other areas. Most of the construction would take place on privately owned land, according to the administration.
To move fast, the Department of Homeland Security issued a series of waivers under a 1996 federal law, allowing construction to proceed without applying a range of environmental and conservation laws. The waivers, issued between February and July by Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem and her successor Markwayne Mullin, were based on a finding that the region sees "high illegal entry". Solicitor General John Sauer told the court that gaps in the border there can be exploited by drug cartels entering the US from Mexico.
Why the lower court blocked it — and why the Supreme Court disagreed
The lawsuit was brought by the Center for Biological Diversity, a group seeking to preserve a historic adobe church in Ruidosa, Texas, and a local river guide. In October, US District Judge Kathleen Cardone in El Paso blocked the project, finding that the waivers lacked clear congressional authorisation and violated the major-questions doctrine — the principle that agencies need clear approval from Congress for decisions of vast significance. She also noted a striking fact: although the Big Bend sector covers more than 25 percent of the border, it accounts for only 0.3 to 2.2 percent of migrant apprehensions, the lowest of any Southwest border sector.
The Supreme Court was unmoved. It said the government was "exceedingly likely to prevail" on its argument that Judge Cardone lacked jurisdiction under the 1996 law, which limits lower courts' ability to rule on border barriers. And it rejected the constitutional version of the major-questions argument outright, writing that "there is no such thing as a 'constitutional' major-questions claim". The injunction, the court said, "impedes the Government from advancing its 'compelling interests' in border security and integrity".
What happens now
Construction had already begun on a 47-mile stretch in Hudspeth County in September, before the administration paused work inside the park in August after bipartisan criticism over the impact on the landscape and wildlife. With the injunction lifted, crews can resume. Environmental groups, who blasted the decision in a statement to Reuters, will now have to win the underlying case while the wall goes up around them — a much harder position than stopping it first. The political backdrop is familiar: border barriers remain central to Trump's immigration agenda, and the court's reasoning — that Congress itself wanted this built quickly — will be quoted in every border fight that follows. As with the midterm results that reshaped Washington last week, the practical effect is immediate, even while the legal argument is far from over.
Sources: Reuters; Al Jazeera. The ruling lifts a temporary injunction; the underlying lawsuit continues.