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Reporting on science, technology and innovation in Arizona and the Southwest through a collaboration from Arizona NPR member stations. This project is funded in part by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.Additional stories from the Arizona Science Desk are posted at our collaborating station, KJZZ: http://kjzz.org/science

Congressman Grijalva Weighs in on Border Wall and Wildlife Issue

U.S. Congressman Raúl Grijalva"

Wildlife conservationists say the existing barriers along the U.S. Mexico border are already detrimental to wildlife.  U.S. Congressman Raúl Grijalva told Arizona Science Desk reporter Maya Springhawk Robnett President Donald Trump’s proposed uninterrupted wall would be worse...

Congressman Grijalva, a member of the House Committee on Natural Resources, says a border wall would cut off wildlife corridors for animals.  The Democratic Representative for Arizona’s District 3 sayid immigration reform is needed but border barriers represent an enforcement policy that doesn’t work and harms the environment:

The species that are in the Sonoran Desert and in those mountainous areas along our border—they have no understanding of what is a border line and what is not. So the wall then becomes a problem for access and quite frankly begins to imperil that species and that wildlife. —Congressman Raúl Grijalva

The Congressman also raised the issue of the sovereignty of Native American nations, noting that the wall would cut through the Tohono O'odham Nation reservation.  The Nation has publicly declared its opposition to the construction of a wall on its land.

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