Biden halts border wall building after Trump's final surge
San Diego (US): In the days before Joe Biden became US president, construction crews worked quickly to finish Donald Trump's wall at an iconic cross-border park overlooking the Pacific Ocean, which then-first lady Pat Nixon inaugurated in 1971 as a symbol of international friendship.
Biden on Wednesday ordered a pause on all wall construction within a week, one of 17 executive orders issued on his first day in office, including six dealing with immigration.
The order leaves billions of dollars of work unfinished - but still under contract - after Trump worked feverishly last year to build more than 450 miles (720 km), a goal he said he achieved eight days before leaving office.
As of January 15, the government spent 6.1 billion of the 10.8 billion in work it signed contracts to have done, according to a Senate Democratic aide with knowledge of the contracts who spoke on condition of anonymity because details have not been made public.
The full amount under contract would have extended Trump's wall to 664 miles (1,069 km). Biden, seeking to fulfil a pledge not to build another foot, gave his administration two months to determine how much it would cost to cancel contracts and whether money could be spent elsewhere.
The Senate aide said fees would be negotiated with contractors and the administration would seek to spend whatever's left on related uses on the border, such as roads, lights, sensors and other technology.
Publicly, the Trump administration said it secured 15 billion for the wall. The Senate aide said it was actually 16.45 billion as of Wednesday, 5.8 billion of which was appropriated by Congress and the rest diverted from the Defence and Treasury departments. The Trump administration notified the Senate aide on January 14 that it was moving ahead with a contract for 863 million, but it was not awarded.
The Army Corps of Engineers, which has awarded wall contracts with Defence Department money, said Thursday that it told crews not to install any additional barriers and to limit activity over the next few days to what is necessary to safely prepare each site for a suspension of work.
John Kurc, an activist who posts videos of dynamite blasts by wall construction crews, said he saw one dynamite charge being set Wednesday afternoon in Guadalupe Canyon in easternmost Arizona, even as the inauguration was playing out in Washington.
Heavy machines have been crawling over roadways gouged into rocky mountainsides, tapping open holes for posts on US Bureau of Land Management property. Advocates in Texas' Rio Grande Valley, the busiest area for illegal crossings, and near Nogales, Arizona, saw idle construction equipment Thursday.
But in San Diego, crews were out replacing a steel fence with imposing, tightly spaced poles topped with flat steel plates rising 30 feet (9 metres), said Dan Watman of Friends of Friendship Park, a group that promotes public access to the cross-border park overlooking the Pacific Ocean.
Contractors began last week, said Watman, who was informed of the project in a December conference call with Border Patrol agents but got no explanation for it.
The agency referred questions to the White House, which had no immediate comment. Trump said the border wall would be virtually impenetrable and paid for by Mexico, which never happened. While the wall is much more formidable than the barriers it replaced, it isn't uncommon for smugglers to guide people over or through it.
Portions can be sawed with power tools sold at home improvement stores. Despite Trump's bravado, Border Patrol officials have said the wall was never meant to stop everyone but rather to slow their advance.
Jose Edgar Zuleta, whose business selling religious jewelery in the Mexican city of Puebla dried up during the coronavirus pandemic, cleared two walls in Friendship Park in October with a special ladder.
He moved through brush in a heavily patrolled area for about half an hour before getting caught. His 21-year-old son, who went ahead of him, got picked up hours later. The cross-border park has hosted yoga classes, concerts and countless news conferences, including one in 2018 with then-Attorney General Jeff Sessions to announce a zero tolerance policy that caused thousands of children to be separated from their parents at the border.
Since 2012, after construction of a double wall at the park, the Border Patrol has opened a gate many weekends for up to 10 people at a time to exchange words with those in Mexico.
SLSCO Ltd. of Galveston, Texas, won contracts to build double walls blanketing 14 miles (22 km) in San Diego. Company spokeswoman Liz Rogers said work at Friendship Park is separate and done by another company.
The Supreme Court is scheduled to hear arguments next month on whether the government' illegally diverted billions of dollars from the Defence Department to build the wall after Congress denied money that Trump sought, triggering a 35-day government shutdown in 2017.
It is unclear if Biden will adopt Trump's position before the Supreme Court.
The government's brief is due February 11. Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador welcomed Biden's decision to stop wall construction but, in defence of Trump, noted that US presidents going back to 1990s built border barriers. He displayed a chart to prove his point.
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Bengal awaits May 4 results; TMC looks to retain power, BJP aims historic win after record turnout
Kolkata (PTI): West Bengal heads into verdict day on Monday after over a month of frenzied campaigning, as it waits with bated breath to see whether the TMC manages to hold on to power or the BJP makes a historic breakthrough and claims the state for the first time.
As the EVMs open at 8 am, the CPI(M) and the Congress will be watching with equal keenness, hoping to reclaim a foothold in the state's electoral map after five years in the wilderness, following their wipeout in the 2021 polls.
Counting of votes will take place across 77 centres in the state, with elaborate security arrangements and a charged political atmosphere setting the stage for the declaration of results in 293 of the 294-seat House.
The Election Commission countermanded polls in the entire Falta constituency in South 24 Parganas district, citing “severe electoral offences and subversion of democratic process during polling in a large number of polling stations”.
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The fresh poll in that seat and the counting will take place on May 21 and May 24, respectively.
The two-phase polls in the state ended on April 29, with what the election watchdog said was the state's highest-ever voter turnout of 92.47 per cent since Independence.
Repolling in 15 booths in South 24 Parganas concluded on Saturday, with around 87 per cent turnout recorded, officials said.
The state’s political climate bordered on the vicious, even after the conclusion of polls, leading to fervent anticipation ahead of the announcement of results, with both primary contenders TMC and BJP, claiming they were dead certain about their victory prospects.
Courtesy the tight security arrangements – with over 2.5 lakh central paramilitary personnel on the ground, besides the presence of a thoroughly reshuffled state police force – electoral violence remained at a minimum, and no deaths were reported for the first time in the state’s election history of recent decades.
This was also the first election held in the state in twenty years, conducted after an extensive, albeit controversial, SIR exercise that revised the electoral rolls, removing over 9 million voters.
The jury is out on the impact of the exercise on the electoral fortunes of all parties across the board, prompting pollsters to burn the midnight oil to make sense of the likely choice of voters and keeping the public greatly enthused about what verdict the result day would deliver.
The campaigns recorded the BJP unleashing its full might, with top leaders like Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Union Home Minister Amit Shah and Defence Minister Rajnath Singh launching all-out attacks on the TMC over corruption, law and order, infiltration, women’s safety and unemployment, while promising welfare measures.
The TMC’s retaliation, with the CM and party MP Abhishek Banerjee leading the charge, focused on SIR harassment, Bengali persecution and ‘outsider’ plank, accusing the BJP of failing to deliver on its national commitments and upholding TMC’s development report card.
Polling for the elections was held on April 23 and April 29, with a total electorate of over 3.21 crores.
The poll body has scaled down the number of counting centres this year to 77 from 87 announced earlier, and 108 in 2021, while putting in place a multi-layered security grid.
“Comprehensive security arrangements have been made to ensure that counting is conducted in a peaceful, transparent and orderly manner,” a senior EC official said.
The run-up to counting, however, has been marked by high political drama, with TMC leaders, helmed by CM Mamata Banerjee, rushing to strongrooms in Kolkata, apprehending counting malpractice and alleging attempts to tamper with the sealed EVMs.
The EC rejected those allegations, maintaining that all electronic voting machines are kept under strict surveillance with round-the-clock security and CCTV monitoring.
“Strongrooms are secured under a three-tier security system, and candidates or their representatives are allowed to keep watch as per protocol. There is no scope for any tampering,” another poll panel official said.
Closer to the counting date, security outside strongrooms has been further tightened, with the EC deploying 165 additional counting observers and 77 police observers to oversee the process and ensure adherence to norms.
In Kolkata, counting for 11 assembly constituencies will be conducted across five locations - Ballygunge Government High School, Baba Saheb Ambedkar Education University, Shakhawat Memorial School, Netaji Indoor Stadium and St Thomas Boys’ School.
Counting for the Bhabanipur seat, arguably carrying the highest symbolic weight where Mamata Banerjee is taking on senior BJP leader Suvendu Adhikari in a prestige fight on her home turf, will be held at the Sakhawat Memorial centre.
The EC has introduced stringent access control measures, mandating entry only through QR code-based photo identity cards issued via its ECINet system. Mobile phones have been barred inside counting halls, except for returning officers and observers.
The counting exercise will be conducted under a framework upheld by the Supreme Court, which on Saturday declined to pass further directions on a TMC plea challenging the deployment of central government personnel.
The elections saw the TMC contesting in 291 seats and its ally Bharatiya Gorkha Prajatantrik Morcha (BGPM), led by Anit Thapa, fielding candidates in three seats in the Darjeeling hills.
The BJP, Congress and the Left Front are gunning for all 294 segments, with parties like Humayun Kabir’s AJUP and Asaduddin Owasi’s AIMIM also trying their luck in some crucial pockets.
BJP leaders like Dilip Ghosh, Agnimitra Paul, Roopa Ganguly and Nishit Pramanik are in the fray, while prominent TMC candidates include Firhad Hakim, Kunal Ghosh, Madan Mitra and Udayan Guha.
