How much border wall would up to $2.2 billion in steel buy you? It’s uncertain, but a Tennessee company recently won a contract for up to that amount for “bulk steel for southwest border barrier construction projects,” according to federal spending records.
The Southwest Border Project is the $46.5 billion Department of Homeland Security initiative to build “smart walls,” which as defined by CBP, could include a mix of steel bollard walls, sensors, lights, cameras and patrol roads. That mix could be used anywhere from the lower Rio Grande Valley to San Diego, so it’s not clear how much of this steel would be used in the Big Bend, where recently Customs and Border Protection documents show some 287 miles of smart walls being planned.
Last week, AMI Metals, Inc.—a subsidiary of Reliance, Inc.—won the DHS contract that is set from $1.5 billion to $2.2 billion to provide bulk steel. It’s unclear if the steel will be fabricated for the specifications for the bollards. What is clear is that physical walls are going up somewhere. A DHS map indicating “primary walls” makes that possible in the Big Bend.