Since his 2016 campaign, Donald Trump has been promising a wall on the U.S./Mexico border that would run through four different states.
"Two hours from the closest stoplight," Chandler explains in an article published on February 27, "the Rio Grande runs through rugged canyons under the darkest skies in the Lower 48 states, carving cliffs that drop 1500 feet below the desert floor of the beautifully desolate Big Bend National Park. The few who call the region home feel a unique bond to the land. In their eyes, it's the kind of natural barrier that steel cannot supplement. It's one reason why the Big Bend has so far been spared from the bulldozer crews that come with new stretches of border wall."
Both Democrats and Republicans in Texas, according to Chandler, "are condemning" the U.S. Department of Homeland Security's (DHS) "newly revealed plans to build a border wall through Big Bend National Park and its neighboring state park."
"They are warning it will cut off access to popular destinations, choke off tourist dollars and disrupt one of the nation's most pristine regions, while doing little to stop illegal immigration," Chandler reports.
Terrell County Sheriff Thaddeus Cleveland, a Republican who lives in that area of Southern Texas, told NBC News, "We've got a God-made barrier."
Meanwhile, Brewster County Sheriff Ronny Dodson, a Democrat, fears that a wall could hurt tourism
Dodson told NBC News, "It'll ruin this county. If it's a real wall, it will devastate us. We don't have oil and gas, we have tourism."
