Protesters block border wall assembly site
COOLIDGE – Nearly a dozen tribal members from several O’odham communities in Arizona blocked partial access to an assembly site for 30-foot steel barriers that are transported and erected at the Arizona-Mexico border by the federal government for several hours Wednesday.
The small group comprised of members from Akimel, Hia-ced and Tohono O’odham communities was protesting what they called the ongoing desecration of sacred sites by construction crews building border walls in the tribes’ ancestral lands along the U.S.Mexico border.
President Donald Trump’s administration has completed or is in the process of replacing nearly 250 miles of older fencing with new 30-foot bollards along Arizona’s 372-mile-long border with Mexico, according to U.S. Customs and Border Protection.
That includes the sites immediately adjacent to the Tohono O’odham Nation in southern Arizona, which includes many sites of cultural and historical significance to the O’odham.
“We did not give you permission to enter our land, to desecrate our sacred sites. ... You do not have permission to disturb our ancestors’ bones. You don’t have permission to take our water,” one of the O’Odham women leading the protest said. N
one of the participants would disclose their names to members of the media present at the protest.
The tribal members spoke at length about the need for greater solidarity among the various O’odham communities in Arizona and the need to take “responsibility” to protect common heritage sites at risk from border wall construction.
The O’odham belong to various recognized and unrecognized tribes around the state: the Akimel O’odham reside largely in the Salt River and Gila River Indian communities in the Phoenix metropolitan area, while the Tohono and Hia-Ced O’Odham reside in southern Arizona along both sides of the border.
Protesters carried signs Wednesday morning with messages such as “do not enter sacred land” and “no wall, 4 gain.”
The protest shut down the southern entrance to the assembly site for Stinger Bridge and Iron for approximately two
hours.
Protesters said they targeted the company because Stinger assembles at its Coolidge facility the 30-foot panels of steel bollards used for border wall construction and transports the products to work sites at the border.
Stinger is owned by Fisher Industries which has received two contracts worth nearly $1.7 billion from the Trump administration to replace more than 73 miles of border fencing in Arizona.
The company, whose CEO frequently has touted his close relationship with President Donald Trump, has started to replace the older barriers with the 30foot bollards at their two project locations.
The largest project, valued at $1.3 billion — the single largest border wall contract the federal government has awarded — will replace 42.5 miles of barriers immediately east of the Tohono O’odham Nation, between the border cities of Sasabe and Nogales.
Over the weekend, the Border Patrol’s Tucson Sector Chief Roy Villareal published a tweet with a timelapse video of construction in the area. The 15-second clip shows a bulldozer installing the bollard panels at the international boundary line near Sasabe.
The second Fisher project, valued at $415 million, will replace vehicle barriers with the bollard fence at the Cabeza Prieta National Wildlife Refuge, several
miles west of the Nation’s western boundary.
The area, federally protected land, includes sites of significant cultural importance to the O’odham, including several intaglios — carved rock formations likely used as ceremonial spaces by O’odham ancestors — and a burial site that is located immediately next to the border fence, among others.
Customs and Border Protection waived more than three dozen federal laws to speed up border wall construction in Arizona. Among them are several cultural and archaeological laws meant to preserve Native American sites and artifacts.
“We have our sacred laws that have been violated,” said another protester who declined to be identified.
Customs and Border Protection told The Arizona Republic that the agency consults with local stakeholders, including tribal nations, “to obtain information about the known or possible presence of sensitive environmental resources and biological, cultural and historical sites that may be present within a planned project area to avoid these resources or develop measures to offset or mitigate potential impacts, to the greatest extent possible.”
CBP also said it conducts surveys at each project area and has a monitor on site during construction to stop any work if crews come across any cultural artifacts.
However, tribal leaders have complained in the past that CBP does not consult with them or even take their concerns into consideration. One example they’ve pointed to is the blasting at Monument Hill, west of the Lukeville port of entry.
The site is regarded by the O’odham as sacred because it was used by the Hia-Ced for religious ceremonies and houses the remains of warriors killed in Apache raids, according to O’odham historians.
CBP said its surveys found no cultural or historical sites in the area. In February, blasting began on the hill to make way for the bollard fencing. The border agency said the blasting would only impact areas that had already been disturbed during the construction of the vehicle barriers that the bollards replaced.
Stinger Bridge and Iron did not respond to a request for comment about Wednesday morning’s protest.
Several police cruisers from the Coolidge Police Department and the Pinal County Sheriff’s Office were at the protest but left after more than an hour.
Lauren Reimer, the sheriff’s office spokesperson, said they were called to the protest.
“When it was determined the location fell within the Coolidge PD’s jurisdiction, and no assistance was needed, deputies cleared the scene and turned it over to Coolidge PD,” she said in an email.
Rick Miller, the Coolidge city manager and police department spokesperson, said police responded believing that the protest was blocking State Route 87.
When officers arrived on scene, they saw that protesters were “very peaceful and very quiet” and had blocked the south entrance to the assembly site on a smaller city street, he added.
“I talked to the Stinger representative, and he said they had access to other parts of that facility ... so they didn’t have a problem,” Miller said. “They said there was nothing being done that would preclude them from continuing their operations, so I directed our city law enforcement to go ahead and disperse.”