Politics & Finance Writer
Vanity Fair
https://apple.news/ArI8xX4mHT-CGSh_DnR78OQ
Bess writes:
Great Ideas
Jared Kushner’s New Big Boy Job: Building Trump’s Wall
First order of business: Seize all the private land.
When we last checked in about the progress of Donald Trump’s fantasy border wall, things were not going super well in that very little of it had actually been built. Plagued by logistical issues—not to mention opposition by the majority of Americans—as of last month the administration had reportedly acquired only 16% of the land it needs in Texas, where at least 100 landowners will have to give up valuable property for the project to happen. That news was presumably of little bother to the millions of people who think the border wall is a patently absurd, wildly racist, completely pointless monument to Trump’s ego, but for the president it was completely unacceptable. So, insistent that he will deliver the fence by the end of 2020 as a gift to his rabid base, he’s brought in the big guns: Jared Kushner.
Yes, in addition to his 387 other jobs at the White House, which include bringing peace to the Middle East, solving the opioid crisis, “fixing the government with business ideas,” reforming veteran care, and overhauling the entire immigration system, the first son-in-law is the “de facto project manager” for constructing the border wall, according to a new report from the Washington Post. What big ideas has he come up with so far? Well, where government officials have been resistant to the president’s “take the land” edict, wherein he thinks using eminent domain to seize private land will go over great both legally and politically, Jared is all for it. Once a slumlord, always a slumlord!
According to one person involved in the matter, Kushner has “annoyed” officials due to his total lack of knowledge of the government’s procurement process for obtaining land and the “realities” of the project. “So he took a much more hands-on role in figuring out, mile by mile, how to get more wall up,” this person told the Post. “It didn’t help put wall up faster and cheaper. His interventions actually just created more inefficiency in the process.”
While Kushner insists that everything is on target to meet the goal of 450 miles by the end of next year—a pace that means accelerating construction at least fourfold—to date just 83 miles of new barrier have been completed, with nearly all of that classified by CBP as “replacement wall,” a characterization the president does not appreciate:
Though Kushner has blamed his predecessors for not moving quickly enough to obtain necessary land, a former Department of Homeland Security official told the Post the reason for that was this little thing called the law. “We weren’t taking people’s land willy-nilly,” said the official.
The White House declined to comment; Kushner’s allies in the administration say he is bringing private sector know-how to the project, which is a bit worrisome given his track record in the private sector.
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Imagine what we could do if the time and money spent on these political gimmicks were redirected to humane, practical immigration enforcement that complied with laws and Due Process. Gee, we might actually solve problems instead of making them worse and unnecessarily creating new ones.
Also, remember that there was a time when the GOP claimed to stand for the “sanctity of private property.” But, that was then; this is now.
PWS
11-27-19