If You Like Your Border Wall, Can't You Keep It?

The last time U.S. officials built a barrier along the border with Mexico, they left an opening at the small road leading south to Pamela Taylor's home on the banks of the Rio Grande.

Taylor hadn't been told where the fence would be built, and she doesn't know now whether officials are coming back to complete it.

"How would we get out?" asked Taylor, 88, sitting in the living room of the home she built with her husband half a century ago. "Do they realize that they're penalizing people that live along this river on the American side?"

With court fights also expected over Trump's wall, the Texas Civil Rights Project has begun signing up landowners and identifying people who might be affected.


Under the U.S. Constitution, the government must prove it wants to seize land for public use and must offer a landowner "just compensation." While challenging the wall's "public use" would be difficult, those who believe they're not getting the full value of their land could take the case to court, setting up trials that could take years.


Antonio Reyes said he's seen people scale the border fence that bisects his backyard and jump down in seconds. Sometimes they carry bales of what appear to be drugs.


A higher wall is "still not going to stop them," he said. "They'll shotput it or whatever they have to do."


In Roma, a town of 10,000 people, a visitor standing on the bluffs overlooking the Rio Grande can see traffic moving across a tiny bridge and hear chickens clucking on the Mexican side. The Border Patrol occasionally uses blimps to monitor traffic, with agents stationed nearby.


Juan Moreno, a 64-year-old retiree, recalls surveyors measuring his neighborhood several years ago for a fence, although it was never built in Roma.


He credits Border Patrol agents for monitoring the border and providing much-needed business for stores in Roma. But he chuckled when asked about the wall.


"I don't know if I'm going to be in the U.S. or Mexico," he said. "It's up to Trump."