Photos show the hundreds of shipping containers stacked to form a haphazard 'border wall' between Arizona and Mexico that has sparked a federal feud

Activists sit on newly installed shipping containers along the border creating a wall between the United States and Mexico in Arizona’s San Rafael Valley on Thursday, Dec. 8, 2022.AP Photo/Ross D. Franklin

Outgoing Arizona GOP Governor Doug Ducey’s makeshift border wall has sparked a federal feud.
The kilometre-long wall consists of empty shipping containers lined up along the southern border of the United States.
The container wall crosses federal lands and protected areas and is expected to cost nearly $100 million.

This makeshift border wall made of hundreds of shipping containers has sparked a federal feud between the US government and the administration of Arizona’s outgoing Republican governor.

GOP Governor Doug Ducey — who is leaving office due to term limits — ordered his state’s Department of Emergencies and Military Affairs in August to begin building a haphazard wall along the state line using crates shipping boxes.

“Arizona has had enough,” he said at the time of his inquiry. The Arizona crews began stacking the shipping crates on top of each other and lining the top with barbed wire. The wall — expected to reach 3,000 containers and cost $95 million — crosses federal land and protected areas and is about a third complete.

Federal officials from the U.S. Forest Service and the Bureau of Reclamation asked Ducey in October to stop building the makeshift wall. But Ducey instead sued both agencies and said in a complaint that he was taking actions to “defend” the state and fill gaps along the border.

NBC News reported that in recent weeks, Arizona residents and environmentalists have protested Ducey’s decision to wall and plan to stay until the containers are removed.

Meanwhile, the government sued Ducey and the state Wednesday for placing the wall on federal land, according to the Associated Press.

Ducey previously said he was ready to remove the crates, the AP said, but he wants the government to plug gaps along the border.

Ducey will be replaced in early January by Arizona Secretary of State Katie Hobbs, a Democrat. She told Arizona PBS earlier this month that the shipping crates were a “political gimmick” and “aren’t effective as a barrier,” but that she is “examining all options” about how to address the problem.

“I think what we need to do is see how we can cooperate with the federal government on border security issues,” he said in the interview.