A rather interesting report surfaced this week that will likely be just one more nudge against the Biden administration by Donald Trump.
Some of the border wall materials that were reportedly sold by the Biden administration are coming back to the federal government.
If you recall, Biden ended the border wall construction after taking office, then reportedly sold off remaining supplies at auction.
Virtually as soon as Biden took his oath of office, he halted the construction of the border wall project that Trump had started during his first term.
The work had been contracted, with the supplies purchased and the majority of the work already paid for by the Trump administration.
Rather than allowing it to continue, Biden halted the contracts and reportedly sold off the remaining supplies, costing taxpayers billions in the process.
But Biden got to claim he fulfilled a campaign promise of not allowing “another foot” of the wall to be built under his watch.
After Trump won, it was made clear that he would pick up the construction of the wall.
He then accused Biden of continuing to sell off supplies at pennies on the dollar.
Trump posted, “They're selling it for five cents on the dollar, knowing we're going to need it.
“It's very expensive now – double what it was six years ago. If we don't have it, we'll have to rebuild, costing taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars.”
According to GovPlanet, a global government-supply auction house, there is about $350 million in supplies from the Biden administration that will be returned to the government, much of that reported as being border wall supplies.
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton had initially filed a suit to block the sale of the goods, and it would appear a deal has been reached to return the supplies, with the company stating, "GovPlanet has reached an agreement, working with the Office of the Border Czar, to return border wall materials that were previously deemed surplus and sourced by the federal government to GovPlanet via existing contracts.
"A third-party firm that has been contracted for construction of the border wall will take receipt of the materials over the next 90 days.”
This is a big deal for Trump, who was going to have to start writing checks to begin the construction again. If Trump’s estimates are correct, and if that material is still usable, that probably just saved taxpayers at least $1 billion in extra fees. While I am all for cutting back on spending, the one expense I don’t mind is getting that border wall up. Build, build, build!
