The Trump administration is planning to divert an additional $7.2 billion in Pentagon funding to go toward the construction of the wall along the U.S.-Mexico border, The Washington Post reports. The figure is five times the amount that Congress authorized him to spend on the project in 2020, according to internal planning figures reviewed by the Post. The administration will take $3.5 billion from counter-drug programs and $3.7 billion from military construction funding, according to internal planning figures obtained by the Post. This would be the second year in a row that money is redirected to the border wall from military construction projects and counternarcotics funding. The funding would allow about 885 miles of new fencing to be built by spring 2022, which exceeds the 509 miles the administration currently has planned for the U.S. border with Mexico, according to the plans. A total of $18.4 billion in federal funding has gone to the border wall under the Trump administration.
