The personal, financial, and environmental costs of a border wall in Big Bend, locals revive opposition after Trump's announcement of a refinery in Brownsville and the Rio Grande Valley fights back after ICE shooting and raids, plus The Border Chronicle is seeking new paid subscribers!
“We love Big Bend the way it is. It does not need to change. We do not feel any danger, and we don’t want it to look like other places. And nothing makes a person who lives out here more mad than the idea of looking at a damn fence.”
Environmental advocates and residents say the long-proposed refinery threatens air quality and public health in a region already ringed by heavy industry.
The U.S. government is doubling down on surveillance, but residents have little input or idea of how it impacts their privacy. Maass talks about EFF's new project to map the "virtual wall."
The U.S. government is doubling down and expanding its surveillance technology in border communities. But many residents don’t know the extent to which they’re being watched, given that the government rarely seeks their input.
This month, the nonprofit Electronic Frontier Foundation released new data and an interactive map of surveillance towers, which are part of the “virtual wall.” Melissa speaks with Dave Maass, EFF’s director of investigations, about his organization’s mapping and data project, which tracks the proliferation of surveillance tech at the southern border.
Contrary to public perception, the majority of these surveillance towers aren’t in the middle of nowhere, says Maass. “We hope to provide the evidence that really undermines that myth,” he says of the new project. “Many of [these towers] are in urban areas, residential communities and in the middle of public parks.”
From hidden license plate readers to AI-powered cameras, federal agents have built a vast monitoring network that stretches deep into Arizona.
Logan Phillips was born in Tombstone, Arizona—a town best known for Old West-themed gunfight tourism. In his new book, Reckon, Phillips explores his relationship to the unusual setting of his childhood through themes of masculinity, history, and land.
In the spirit of broadening the analysis beyond ICE, Border Chronicle cofounders Melissa del Bosque and Todd Miller discuss the
Rollbacks to the Clean Water Act may have affected the borderlands more than any other region. States are stepping up—but there’s still more to do.
Independent news, culture and context from the U.S.-Mexico border.
