Political debates about the U.S. border wall usually center on immigration policy and national security. But the construction can also have major impacts on the environment.
A new wall expansion planned by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) would result in construction within two Arizona wilderness areas: Cabeza Prieta National Wildlife Refuge and Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument.
White House officials said the projects are necessary to “take control of the border.” But the plans have sparked backlash from conservation and parks advocacy groups concerned about negative impacts to wildlife on these federally protected lands.
They question why it’s necessary to build a “secondary” wall just a few hundred feet inland from the existing Arizona border wall.
Wall Expansion in Arizona
This effort dates all the way back to 2019. During the first Trump administration, DHS issued three waivers to expedite border wall construction in these areas of Arizona. The department waived 41 environmental, historic preservation, and Native American protection laws, including the Endangered Species Act, American Indian Religious Freedom Act, Clean Air Act, and Clean Water Act.
The public notices cited concerns that these were “areas of high illegal entry” with “large numbers of individuals and narcotics being smuggled into the country illegally.”
Construction proceeded quickly. By October 2019, the government had built 371 miles of barriers along the border states of California, Arizona, New Mexico, and Texas, with an average of two new miles a day.
Those efforts have now been renewed during Trump’s second term. A map of planned construction for the “Smart Wall” on Customs and Border Protection’s (CBP) website shows that the agency has awarded a contract to build and modify structures, primarily in Cabeza Prieta National Wildlife Refuge and Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument.
In Dec. 2025, DHS awarded a $1.5 billion contract to Fisher Sand & Gravel Co. for 19 miles of new barriers and 136 miles of detection technology along existing barriers in the Tucson sector.
In these areas, DHS plans to build about 42 miles of an additional 30-foot-high wall. That would put it about 150-200 feet inland from the existing border wall, according to CBP documents. The agency also aims to install 222 miles of “lighting poles, artificial lights, power cables, surveillance cameras, access and patrol roads, and utility shelters” along the border.
“For years, Washington talked about border security but failed to deliver. This president changed that,” CBP Commissioner Rodney Scott said in a press release. “The Smart Wall means more miles of barriers, more technology, and more capability for our agents on the ground. This is how you take control of the border.”
History of Organ Pipe & Cabeza Prieta
The new wall would cut through both Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument and Cabeza Prieta National Wildlife Refuge. Organ Pipe Cactus is about 130 miles west of Tucson. It borders Mexico and is close to the Tohono O’odham Nation Reservation.
Once an area popular for silver mining, President Franklin Roosevelt made the area a national monument in 1937. The area is very remote, and 95% of its roughly 330,000 acres are federally protected wilderness. The refuge is home to over 270 kinds of birds, and its eponymous species: the Organ Pipe cactus, a rare plant.
It’s a popular area for camping, hiking, birding, horseback riding, and night sky viewing. It saw about 174,000 and 182,000 visitors in 2025 and 2024, respectively.
The park shares 33 miles with the U.S.-Mexico border. Vehicle barriers have existed in these areas since the early 2000s. That helped not only to prevent vehicles from crossing illegally, but also protected delicate desert ecosystems.
Cabeza Prieta also traces its history back to FDR, who founded it as a game range in 1939. In 1975, it became a National Wildlife Refuge, and management passed to U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS). About 93% of the land is designated as wilderness. Wildlife highlights include the desert tortoise, gila monster, and endangered Sonoran pronghorn.
The Controversy
Objections to the plan center on its impacts to the environment, wildlife, and sacred Native American sites.
Resistance Rangers, an advocacy group of off-duty National Park Service employees, objected to early plans, which suggested building the wall through Quitobaquito Springs, an important water source in the desert and a sacred site for the Hia-Ced O’Odham people. The pond is also home to two endangered species: the Sonoyta mud turtle and Quitobaquito pupfish.
On Instagram, Resistance Rangers denounced the plan. “A secondary border wall will be an ecological disaster, destroy sacred Indigenous sites, is completely unnecessary for national security, and is a waste of taxpayer dollars,” the group said.
In Cabeza Prieta, there’s a possibility the wall would pass through a Native American grave site and a historic 1,000-year-old ground etching.
GearJunkie reached out to U.S. Fish & Wildlife for comment. An agency spokesperson sent a link to CBP’s website and provided no other information. When asked for comment, CBP pointed GearJunkie to press releases on its site.
In a statement to GearJunkie, Sanober Mirza, Arizona program manager for the National Parks Conservation Association, criticized the construction: “Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument is an incredible national park site and pushing construction of a second layer of border wall through its fragile landscapes and sacred cultural sites is unwarranted and dangerously irresponsible.”
“This place holds tens of thousands of years of human history and is one of the most biodiverse landscapes in the Southwest,” Mirza said. “This reckless project would devastate the monument and cause irreversible destruction.” GJ also reached out to the Tohono O’odham Nation for comment, but did not hear back as of this writing.
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