PETITION TO ALL ELECTED LAREDO REPRESENTATIVES, LOCAL, STATE, AND FEDERAL TO THEIR RAISE VOICE AND CAST VOTE AGAINST FUNDING FOR BORDER WALL

We, as a group of organizations working in Laredo, and as people of Laredo whom you were elected to serve, have signed this petition calling on you to raise your voice and cast your vote against any proposed appropriations bill that funds border wall construction -- including funds for bollard fencing, levee wall, bulkhead wall, and the conversion of existing vehicle barriers to border walls

– not only in our Congressional district but on any part of the U.S. Mexico border.  

As our federal representatives and as members of select Congressional Committees charged with working out a Congressional appropriations deal that will avoid another government shutdown, your most important role is to ensure that the will of your constituents – that not a penny be spent on wall funding -  is carried out through your voice and vote while serving as a conferee and our Congressperson.

As our Mayor and City Council, you are the closest government representation to the ground in Laredo, and your charge should be to speak out and condemn divisive, wasteful, and racist projects such as a border wall. We call on you not to be complicit in this agenda by be forcefully outspoken in your rejection of it and to support groups the ground working to fight it.

We urge you to take a lead in persuading your fellow colleagues in Congress, at the State Legislature, and on City Council to reject any and all efforts to continue funding additional border wall construction that draws scarce resources away from already underfunded infrastructure, such as schools, roads, and health clinics, for structures that are widely opposed by border communities for being unnecessary, extremely costly, and not shown to be effective according to the Government Accountability Office. (GAO)

It is reprehensible that  border wall construction continues unabated by our nation’s  environmental protection laws since the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) may and does waive these laws to fast-track the building of a border wall.   We are dismayed that border communities located in your district, including highly sensitive environmental, historical, cultural and religious sites, such as the National Butterfly Center in Mission, Texas, are now on the verge of being devastated by wall construction unless stopped by Congress. Your own birthplace, Laredo, Texas, where many of us live, is now targeted for border wall construction too.  Recently Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) Border Patrol Laredo Sector unveiled a proposal to build a border wall covering 150 miles that would not only pierce the heart of Laredo’s downtown area and several urban barrios situated by the river but also tear through the communities of Rio Bravo, El Cenizo, Zapata, and a multitude of rural colonias, ranches and farms situated by the border. We must avoid the irreparable adverse environmental, cultural and economic impacts on our communities and our quality of life that would be caused by the construction of a border wall.   We exhort you to continue working vigorously as our representative to avoid even one more inch of, or a penny more spent on, wall construction in your birthplace, your district, and anywhere along the U.S. /Mexico border.

We reject the false narrative of a violent and insecure border region that continues to be used to justify a border wall and to advance anti-immigrant, anti-border, pro-criminalization, and anti-environmental legislation that has negative economic and civil rights impacts on border communities.  We continue to assert that the wall, the increased militarization of the southern border, the criminalization of immigrants and the destruction of wildlife habitat are actions that do not improve security of the border region, one of the safest regions in the country.  

We also call on you to join us in publicly rejecting twisted arguments at the federal level that our country has right and might both to declare migration and asylum seeking a “national emergency.”

We stand united with tens of thousands of people living in communities located in your Congressional districts, state districts, and local districts who are opposed to any wall construction.  At the same time, we also join the millions of voices throughout the U.S. Mexico border as well as throughout the land - led by a wide-array of state and national organizations that form the #NoBorderWall coalition, a coalition  representing civil rights, faith, wildlife and habitat protection, environmental, indigenous, LGBT, consumer, and border communities - opposed to a border wall anywhere on the U.S. Mexico border.

As our community confronts one of the most decisive fights of our time, we expect that you serve our community by amplifying our voice and genuinely representing our opposition to the wall before Congress, on the floor of the Texas State Legislature, and from your City Council seats.  As your constituents, we urge you to heed the calls from the people of your community and oppose any funding for any type of wall along the Rio Grande.”