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EL PASO, Texas — Top defense officials toured sections of the U.S.-Mexico border Saturday to see how the military could reinforce efforts to block drug smuggling and other illegal activity, as the Pentagon weighs diverting billions of dollars for President Donald Trump’s border wall.
Acting Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan, accompanied by the Joint Chiefs chairman, Gen. Joseph Dunford, was visiting a border site near El Paso, Texas, called Monument Site 3 where a stretch of 18-foot border wall stands atop a huge landfill.
The border mission for active-duty forces began on Oct. 30, 2018, as Trump asserted that caravans of Central American migrants posed an urgent national security threat. Critics dismissed his use of the military on the border as a political gimmick on the eve of midterm congressional elections. The active-duty mission has since been extended to Sept. 30.
Pentagon chief getting firsthand look at US-Mexico border
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