That was the best we could do. Half an hour more of exploratory driving suggested that all access roads had either been closed or demolished. In the distance a cream-colored Border Patrol van raised a dust cloud, following a track near them; it was clearly not open to us, if we could even find it.
We headed back toward San Diego and the motel. Puzzled, I started googling local news reports about this. Why was the location so remote in the first place? Why was it then closed off, essentially hidden?
Turns out the administration was expecting all hell to break loose around them. Homeland Security sent a memo to local officials, warning them to expect huge, militant protests. In response, the San Diego Sheriff’s Department spent at east $50,000 on riot equipment, including lots of pepper spray and tear gas, then paid for 10,000 hours of overtime for deputies and staff to practice using it. Much more was spent on “securing the area” around the prototypes. (It certainly was too secure for us tourists.)
But there weren’t any meaningful protests. When the president came to visit last March, about a hundred veterans were assembled to wave MAGA flags and applaud. Nearby, 15 anti-wall protesters gathered to chant and wave posters; there was no trouble.
Local radicals told the press they had decided to ignore the whole thing. (Once, though, a few art grad students parked behind the prototypes on the Mexican side, and when it got dark, projected some anti-wall images on them; but no damage was reported.)
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