The general perception around immigration through the southern border with Mexico in the U.S., is a stark contrast from the early 1900s. In fact, Mexican immigration was actively encouraged. Back in the year 1917, a letter written by a cotton company executive to then president Woodrow Wilson reads “Personally, I believe that the Mexican laborers are the solution to our common labor problem in this country. Many of their people are here, this was once part of their country, and they can and they will do the work” (Cromer). Years later, in 1924, Mexico was made exempt from the Immigration Act which put restrictions on to new immigrants. That same year, an official border patrol was launched to secure the U.S. and Mexico border (Garfield). This photo is of border patrol guards patting down, and checking the baggage of Mexicans who wish to enter America. (Garfield)
As time went on, policies and the mindset of the public changed. With the war on drugs starting up, President Nixon started Operation Intercept (Garfield) in 1969. Random …show more content…
After a certain point, the cost of the wall is not justifiable. The cost for a 1,000 mile wall, is about $27 billion, to $40 billion (Kakaes). There is a plethora of estimations for total cost of the wall. But this is the most realistic amount: using middle ranges of dimensions for the concrete portion of the wall, the concrete alone could roughly be $8.7 billion. Along with the concrete, steel rebar is needed to reinforce the wall. This rebar could take up to 3% of the total volume of concrete, which entailed a cost of around $4.6 billion. Moving on to the most costly factor, is the labor of building the wall (Kakaes). Structural engineers say that labor cost of megascale projects in the U.S., tend to be two to three times the cost of materials. Adding up the cost of the concrete, rebar, and labor, gives a total of $27 billion to $40