PHOENIX — Arizona Governor Katie Hobbs is pushing for federal reimbursement of nearly $200 million the state spent on building and later dismantling a makeshift container wall along the U.S.-Mexico border — a project she once called a “publicity stunt.”
In 2022, then-Governor Doug Ducey directed around $100 million to construct a border barrier made of stacked storage containers. Hobbs, then secretary of state, criticized the move. After the Biden administration filed a lawsuit deeming the wall illegal, the state was forced to remove it — a process that cost an additional $70 million.
Now, Hobbs wants the federal government to cover the full expense through newly approved legislation that includes $10 billion in grants for states that have invested in border security measures since President Biden took office on January 20, 2021.
“I can’t imagine us not asking,” Hobbs said Thursday. “Arizonans paid nearly $200 million for putting up that container wall and taking it down and storing. I think we deserve some of those funds back.”
While the funding provision was primarily added to benefit Texas — which claims to have spent over $11 billion on border security — Hobbs believes Arizona is also entitled to a share. She emphasized that the container wall was a project led by her predecessor, not her administration.
“I believe I’ve said many times my predecessor misspent that money,” she said. “But that’s irrelevant to our next move. Hopefully the feds will reimburse us.”
Responding on Ducey’s behalf, his former chief of staff Daniel Scarpinato said, “Let’s hope she uses the funds for border security and public safety, as it was intended. But given her track record, we won’t be holding our breath.”
In 2022, Arizona’s Republican-controlled Legislature established a $335 million Border Security Fund, which required spending on physical barriers. Ducey used $95 million of that to contract AshBritt Management & Logistics to install the container wall, primarily in Cochise and Yuma counties.
However, the Biden administration argued the state was building on federal land, citing a 1907 proclamation by President Theodore Roosevelt that set aside a 60-foot-wide strip along the border for federal use. Arizona ultimately agreed to remove the containers, paid $2.1 million to the U.S. Forest Service to repair environmental damage, and the federal lawsuit was dropped.
But Hobbs says her reimbursement efforts won’t stop with the wall. In late 2023, she billed the Biden administration for $512.5 million to cover other border-related expenses, including migrant transportation, law enforcement, and drug interdiction.
“The total is a lot more now,” she said Thursday, though she didn’t specify a new amount.
Hobbs added that her administration is still reviewing the implications of the new federal law to determine whether it can cover all those costs — not just the container barrier.
“We’re still sorting through all of the implications of the bill,” she said. “I don’t know the answer to that yet.”
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