By Bob Christie
Capitol Media Services
PHOENIX – Gov. Katie Hobbs wants the federal government to reimburse Arizona for nearly $760 million it has spent since 2021 on border security, including about $100 million former Gov. Doug Ducey spent in his last months in office to stack hundreds of shipping containers along the border for an ersatz border wall.
The Democratic governor formally asked Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem for the money in a letter sent Thursday. She is asking Noem to use part of a $12 billion appropriation the secretary has said is dedicated to reimbursing states for their border costs contained in President Trump’s big tax and spending law dubbed the “Big Beautiful Bill.”
Although a fact sheet released by the secretary after President Donald Trump signed the law on July 4 includes the $12 billion figure and the governor’s office used that figure on Thursday, the actual bill dedicated $10 billion to Homeland Security to reimburse states for immigration costs. There’s another $3.5 billion appropriated to the U.S. Department of Justice for grants to states for similar reimbursements.
The two-high shipping containers put up at Ducey’s direction in late 2022 were quickly taken down after the Biden Administration sued, alleging they were on federal land along the border in Yuma and Cochise counties. That added an additional cost of about $70 million. All-in-all, the former Republican governor’s showy effort to boost border security cost state taxpayers about $200 million.
Hobbs now wants that money back, along with another $559 million the state has spent on other border security since Biden took office.
In her letter to Noem, Hobbs said the state is committed to securing the border with Mexico and combating drug and human trafficking. And she touted actions she has taken to boost border security since taking office in January 2023.
“As Governor, I’ve been proud to partner with local, state, and federal law enforcement officials on Task Force SAFE, which is stopping millions of fentanyl pills and thousands of pounds of drugs from flowing into our country,” Hobbs said in the letter. “Additionally, your partnership on Operation Desert Guardian has been essential in our efforts to combat cartel operations in the State of Arizona.”
Hobbs created Desert Guardian through an executive order she signed this past January. In the order, she directed the state emergency and military affairs, public safety, and homeland security departments to create a joint task force to expand border security operations in the four counties along the border with Mexico. The costs were covered by using some of the $28 million available in the state Border Security Fund for the 2025 fiscal year.
The goal was to combat border crimes committed by Mexican cartels by working to dismantle their networks.
She created the SAFE task force as a joint operation between the state National Guard and U.S. Customs and Border protection in November. Soldiers were assigned to work to interdict drugs at ports of entry along the border.
But Hobbs has also drawn sharp criticism from Republicans for not being tough enough on illegal immigration.
At the top of their list of criticisms is her April veto of a bill dubbed the Arizona ICE Act, which would have required state and local law enforcement agencies to cooperate with federal immigration authorities. And it barred any of those agencies from adopting policies barring that cooperation.
It also required law enforcement agencies to hold someone they arrested for up to 48 hours if federal immigration agents place a “detainer” on them. That would have made it easier for someone to be turned over for possible deportation.
Sponsored by Senate President Warren Petersen, R-Gilbert, the bill Hobbs vetoed also allowed any lawmaker or citizen to file a complaint with the attorney general over any violation and sue if the AG failed to act.
Petersen called the veto “another slap in the face to Arizonans who have suffered greatly from the consequences of an open border under the Biden Administration.”
Petersen didn’t immediately return messages seeking comment on Thursday.
The detailed bill the governor sent to Noem covers state spending in the 2021 through 2025 fiscal years and so far this budget year -- $ 759 million in all. The yearly totals have swung wildly over the years, hitting a low point last year at $22 million as the state faced a cash crunch. The Legislature and Ducey agreed to spend the most on border security in his last year in office when the fiscal 2023 budget appropriated $589 million to spend on border security.
Ducey tapped part of that money to put up his shipping container wall.
The new federal money was put into the “Big Beautiful Bill’ mainly at the request of Republican members of Congress from Texas, which has spent about $11 billion on border security efforts in the past several years.
Rep. Jodey Arrington, R-Texas, has blamed former President Joe Biden for the need for state border security spending and was among those who pushed to include the reimbursement in the tax and spending bill.
Homeland Security did not respond to a request from Capitol Media Services for information about how and when they planned to distribute the reimbursement money or whether other states have also applied for the cash. Texas is widely expected to seek a lion’s share of the available money.
Arizona governors have been asking the federal government to reimburse its taxpayers for border security spending for two decades, starting with Democratic former Gov. Janet Napolitano in the mid-2000s.
In late 2023, Hobbs billed the Biden administration $512.5 million to cover what she said the state had spent on border security "including migrant transportation, drug interdiction, and law enforcement.
The state never got any of that money, but now that there is specific federal cash set aside to reimburse states for their border spending, Hobbs is hopeful.
Hobbs said on July 10 that she believes Arizona is entitled to a share of the money.
"I can't imagine us not asking,'' the governor said.
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