Construction crews have started blasting hills at Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument in Arizona to clear space for a new border wall system.
The Arizona Daily Star reports that crews are bulldozing through Monument Hill to construct a 30-foot steel wall along the border. U.S. Customs and Border Protection says the targeted blasting is expected to go on intermittently for the rest of the month. Environmental advocates, elected officials and Tohono O’odham Nation leaders have raised concerns about the project. They cite the destruction of saguaros, the potential impact on migrating animals and the destruction of land consider sacred by some Native Americans.
