Federal Judge Blocks Border Wall Construction in Big Bend Region in Texas

A federal judge on Friday blocked border wall construction in the Big Bend region in Texas.

US District Judge Kathleen Cardone, a George W. Bush appointee, issued a preliminary injunction blocking border wall construction in Texas’s Big Bend region and Big Bend National Park.

The scope of Judge Cardone’s order includes patrol roads, border barriers or related infrastructure.

Environmental advocacy group Center for Biological Diversity filed the lawsuit in April and argued that the border wall construction lacked approval from Congress.

Judge Cardone sided with the plaintiffs on Friday and stopped the bulldozing and road-clearing by contractors while the lawsuit makes its way through the courts.

The Texas Tribune reported:

A judge on Friday blocked further border barrier construction in the Big Bend region, approving an environmental group’s motion for a preliminary injunction.

At the end of Friday’s hearing, U.S. District Judge Kathleen Cardone asked the courtroom to remain calm while she read her order aloud from the bench.

She ruled that the plaintiffs’ constitutional claims to halt the construction were likely to succeed and her preliminary injunction against “ground-distrurbing activities” would remain in effect while the suit continued to play out in court.

The legal team at the Center for Biological Diversity, an environmental advocacy group, filed the lawsuit against the Department of Homeland Security and its secretary in April on behalf of the Friends of the Ruidosa Church, a nonprofit dedicated to preserving a historic church in Presidio County, and Danny William Miller, a Rio Grande river guide and landowner who stands to lose his property in Redford to the wall.

The lawsuit argues that the five contracted border wall projects in the region are unconstitutional for a range of reasons, including violating the constitutional separation of powers and depriving citizens of their land.

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