At Big Bend National Park, bulldozers begin clearing land for border barrier work

NPR | By Carlos Morales

Published August 14, 2026 at 4:45 AM EDT

Out in the Big Bend area of West Texas, contractors are beginning to set the stage for construction of the Trump administration's planned border wall and barriers: crews are clearing ecologically sensitive land within the sprawling Big Bend National Park; worker housing is being built across the region; and heavy machinery, steel panels and construction materials are being hauled down rural, two-lane roads. As one landowner has put it, the fuse has been lit – and despite bipartisan opposition to the administration's border security plans in the Big Bend, some people here feel that the "Last Frontier of Texas" as they know it, will soon be a memory.

Carlos Morales

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