A West Texas conservation group, landowners and the mayor of Presidio have sued the federal government in an effort to halt construction of a 30-foot border wall across the Big Bend region, arguing the government unlawfully classified the nation’s least-crossed Border Patrol sector as an area of “high illegal entry.”
The lawsuit was filed Sunday in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia by Conserve Big Bend, Presidio Mayor John Ferguson and landowners Charles L. Cecil IV, David Keller, Nadine Pineda Mata, Joe Pineda and Leo Nunez Pineda.
The plaintiffs sued the Department of Homeland Security, U.S. Customs and Border Protection, Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin and CBP Commissioner Rodney Scott. The officials were sued in their official capacities.
The 37-page complaint asks the court to declare the government’s Big Bend border wall plans unlawful, set aside the federal determinations authorizing the project and issue preliminary and permanent injunctions stopping construction.
The lawsuit alleges DHS exceeded the authority granted by Congress when it designated all 517 miles of the Big Bend Sector as an area of “high illegal entry.” That designation allowed the government to expedite construction, pursue property acquisition and waive numerous environmental, historic-preservation and procedural requirements.
“The unsupported and sweeping high-illegal-entry finding by the secretary under Section 102(a) violates the plain text” of federal immigration law, the lawsuit states.
According to statistics cited in the complaint, the Big Bend Sector recorded 3,096 apprehensions during fiscal year 2025 — the fewest of any of the nine Border Patrol sectors along the Southwest border. The sector accounted for 1.3% of apprehensions despite covering 517 miles, roughly one-quarter of the U.S.-Mexico border.
The lawsuit says Big Bend has recorded the fewest apprehensions of any Southwest border sector for 53 consecutive years. Its 2025 total was the lowest recorded by any sector since 1967 and the lowest in the Big Bend Sector since 1963, according to the complaint.
By comparison, the San Diego Sector recorded 49,902 apprehensions along 60 border miles in fiscal year 2025. Big Bend recorded about six apprehensions per mile, compared with nearly 832 per mile in San Diego.
The government’s own data contradict its characterization of Big Bend as an area of high illegal entry, the plaintiffs argue. CBP announced in December that apprehensions in the sector had fallen 74% between fiscal years 2023 and 2025, contributing to what the agency described as improved operational control.
Former Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem first issued the Big Bend designation in October 2025, citing more than 88,000 apprehensions and drug seizures recorded throughout the sector over a period of nearly five years. Noem issued a second determination in February, and Mullin issued four more between May and July.
The lawsuit argues those determinations offered only two sentences of justification, improperly combined multiple years of data and failed to explain how the lowest number of crossings along the Southwest border could qualify as “high.”
It also contends that drug-seizure figures do not establish where migrants are entering the country and include drugs intercepted across the sector’s approximately 165,000 square miles, including at interior checkpoints.
The wall project has been divided into five components stretching from Hudspeth County through Presidio and Brewster counties and east toward Lake Amistad.
Contracts awarded in March call for 47 miles of barrier under Big Bend 1, 61 miles under Big Bend 2 and 56 miles under Big Bend 3. Those projects include 30-foot steel-bollard pedestrian barriers, patrol roads, cameras, lights, sensors and other detection equipment. A separate contract awarded in June calls for 160 miles of vehicle barriers under Big Bend 5.
Fieldwork has begun on Big Bend 1 and Big Bend 3, according to a CBP declaration cited in the lawsuit. Work on Big Bend 2 was expected to begin within weeks of an Aug. 24 court filing.
Several plaintiffs say the government has already contacted them about entering or acquiring their land.
Mata, Pineda and Nunez Pineda own interests in about 270 acres near Redford that have remained in their family since the 1870s. The property includes farmland, a pecan orchard, archaeological sites and burial grounds, including a cemetery for Indigenous people who previously inhabited the area.
CBP sent the family notices in February seeking access to the property for surveys, appraisals and environmental assessments, according to the lawsuit. The agency later informed family members that it had determined federal condemnation proceedings would be necessary within 90 days if they refused access.
The family argues a wall would block access to Rio Grande water needed for crops and livestock while creating a damming effect that could cause severe flooding.
Cecil owns approximately 1,200 acres where Alamito Creek meets the Rio Grande. He operates a short-term rental and hosts public events on the property, where members of his family are buried. Cecil says the wall, associated lighting and damage to wildlife habitat would diminish tourism, hunting and the region’s dark skies.
Keller owns a 10-acre farm near Redford and has worked for decades as an archaeologist and river guide. He alleges the wall would cut across his field, interfere with irrigation, restrict access to the Rio Grande and threaten archaeological sites along the river corridor.
Ferguson joined the lawsuit individually, citing the project’s expected effects on Presidio’s tourism economy, flood-control infrastructure and relationship with neighboring Ojinaga, Chihuahua. Ferguson and his wife own a short-term rental property in Presidio that they purchased as a retirement investment.
Conserve Big Bend said its Landowner Coalition has more than 200 members, including ranchers, river outfitters, tour guides, scientists, artists, business owners and conservationists. Members in Hudspeth, Brewster, Presidio and Val Verde counties have received notices identifying their properties as potentially needed for construction, roads, lighting, cameras, sensors and other infrastructure, according to the complaint.
The lawsuit raises five claims, alleging violations of the Administrative Procedure Act and the Fifth Amendment’s due-process protections, actions beyond the government’s statutory authority and a violation of the Constitution’s requirement that the executive branch faithfully execute federal law.
The plaintiffs contend federal law permits expedited barriers only in areas of high illegal entry and requires the government to determine that fencing is the most practical and effective means of achieving operational control. The complaint alleges DHS made no such assessment for Big Bend.
The government has not yet filed its response to the allegations. A complaint represents one side’s claims at the opening of a lawsuit, and the plaintiffs must prove those claims in court.
