Lawless, like their leader

The construction of a private border wall partially funded by rightwing allies of Donald Trump continued with vigor in south Texas this week, seemingly in blatant violation of a court injunction ordering work to be suspended.

On Thursday and Friday, within three days of a temporary restraining order being issued, the Guardian found construction crews with at least 10 heavy machinery vehicles moving soil, digging trenches and positioning tall metal posts along the US bank of the Rio Grande in Hidalgo county, which forms the border with Mexico. A 3.5-mile, privately-funded [$25 million in donations] concrete barrier is planned on the site, near Mission, Texas.

The state court order was served to We Build the Wall (WBTW), an anti-migrant group founded by military veteran Brian Kolfage, and the landowners, Neuhaus and Sons LLC, whose land is situated between Trump’s proposed wall and the Mexican border.

WBTW is a not-for-profit group that has crowd-funded millions of dollars by tapping into anti-migrant fervor and is led by the former White House advisor Steve Bannon as chairman of its advisory board.

[...]

On Wednesday, Kolfage said that construction work continued as neither he, or the group, had been physically served with the order.

  Guardian

So, who was it served on?

An employee of the construction company Fisher Industries, who identified himself as Sean, confirmed that work had continued uninterrupted – despite the injunction.

“They [the construction workers] have told us they are not going to stop,” Sam Pena from the local sheriff’s office said on Thursday. The sheriff’s deputies filed reports documenting the ongoing construction work that appeared to be in violation of the court order.

And, on 5 December, the federal government launched separate legal action to stop the construction, on the grounds that it violated binational treaty obligations with Mexico. A temporary injunction was granted by the US district judge Randy Crane.

[...]

But, in a twist, judge Crane agreed to dismiss WBTW as a defendant after its lawyer and prominent conservative, Kris Kobach, the former Kansas secretary of state, claimed the group mostly handled “social media cheerleading” for the project and was nothing more than a passive investor, providing only 5% of the funding.

“We don’t have any control over the project or the machinery or what’s going on,” Kobach said in court in the southern district of Texas.

[...]

“Where is the money?” said Javier Peña, a lawyer acting for the National Butterfly Center. “They use fear and anger to divide people and convince them to give money for a wall which they now say they are not funding. We Build the Wall is either misleading its donors, which is fraud, or lying to a federal judge.”

[...]

Thursday’s federal injunction prevents Neuhaus and Sons, the landowners, Fisher Industries and its parent company, Fisher Sand and Gravel, from excavating and clearing more land, or constructing any permanent structures until the IBWC determines whether it could cause flooding or redirect the water flow in violation of the 1970 binational treaty.

Well, obviously, it hasn't prevented them.

Earlier this week, Fisher Sand and Gravel was awarded a $400m Pentagon contract to build 31 miles of wall in Arizona – despite a history of environmental and tax violations

So if they get stymied with the private wall building, they'll still get government money.

The chair of the House committee on homeland security, Bennie Thompson, has called for an investigation to determine whether Trump unduly influenced the military’s decision to award the contract to Fisher.

[...]

The Trump administration has suspended 28 laws relating to clean water, public lands, endangered species and the rights of Native Americans in order to speed up construction of the border wall.

But such waivers only apply to the official government wall; rogue private projects must obey all laws and treaties.

Or not.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

UPDATE 12/12:  The Pentagon's IG is going to "review" this.