The Supreme Court has cleared the way for construction of a border wall to resume through Texas's Big Bend region, pausing a lower court injunction that had halted the project while a legal challenge plays out.
The unsigned order, issued Monday, allows the government to continue building 30-foot steel barriers, patrol roads and surveillance infrastructure in the Big Bend sector while it seeks further review. The stay is temporary: if the government's forthcoming appeal is turned down, construction halts again; if the court agrees to hear the underlying case, the pause remains in effect until the case is resolved.
The challenge was brought by the Center for Biological Diversity, Friends of the Ruidosa Church and a river guide, who argue that Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin unlawfully waived environmental and conservation requirements to speed construction through the region. A federal judge in El Paso, Kathleen Cardone, had sided with the plaintiffs and issued the injunction the Supreme Court has now paused.
A costly delay, the government argued
In lifting the injunction, the court found that it "impedes the government from advancing its compelling interests in border security and integrity," and that federal law sharply limits judges' authority to intervene once the government has determined that expedited barrier construction is necessary. The administration had also pointed to the financial toll of the pause: a Customs and Border Protection official told the court the halt was costing roughly $500,000 a day in unrecoverable costs.
Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson was the lone member of the court to dissent from the order, though the court did not publish a detailed opinion explaining her objection. The Big Bend case is one of six separate lawsuits challenging border wall construction in the region, an area prized for its canyons, hot springs and status as one of the least light-polluted stretches of the lower 48 states; the order resolves none of the underlying claims, which will continue to be litigated in the lower courts.
For now, construction crews are expected to resume work on the barrier, which runs along stretches of the Rio Grande in and around Big Bend National Park, while the environmental groups press ahead with their underlying case.
