Fisher Industries is a privately held construction company based in Dickinson, North Dakota, founded by Gene Fisher in 1952 and led in turn by sons David Fisher, Micheal Fisher, and Tommy Fisher. [1] [2] It is the parent company of Fisher Sand and Gravel, Arizona Drilling and Blasting, Southwest Asphalt, Southwest Asphalt Paving, Fisher Grading and Excavating, Fisher Ready Mix, and General Steel and Supply Co. [3]
President Donald Trump lobbied for the company to receive contracts on the US-Mexico Trump wall, to the Department of Homeland Security, to Todd T. Semonite of the Army Corps of Engineers, and promoted the company in an interview on Fox News with Sean Hannity. [4] Jared Kushner has also endorsed the company, as well as freshman North Dakota senator Kevin Cramer, to whose campaign the Fisher family contributed $50,000. [5] [6]
Tommy Fisher has appeared on local and conservative TV and radio and is a donor to several charities and the Republican Party. [6] [7] Senator Cramer suggested Fisher's Fox News appearances are what attracted Trump to the company. Tommy Fisher has spent $145,000 on lobbyists to discuss the border wall with lawmakers. [8]
The High Plains Reader has documented environmental violations and tax evasion by the company, including 169 citations and paying $1 million in air quality violation fines in Maricopa County, Arizona over the past 10 years. [9] By May 2019, the company had racked up 1,300 air-quality violations and a $500,000 fine in 2013 for breaking an earlier air quality agreement. [10] From 2002 to 2020, Fisher Sand & Gravel companies paid $697,000 in fines to the Environmental Protection Agency. [5] In 2009, Micheal Fisher, then-owner of Fisher, pled guilty to nine counts of felony tax fraud, [11] [12] [13] being sentenced to 37 months in prison and over $300,000 in restitution. Amiel Schaff, FSG's former chief financial officer, and Clyde Frank, FSG's former comptroller, also pled guilty to one count each of conspiracy to defraud the United States in 2009. The 2009 Department of Justice settlement required FSG to pay a total of $1.16 million in restitution, penalties and fines, implement measures to prevent future fraud at the company, and cooperate with the IRS in audits of its tax returns. [14] Another former head of the company, David William Fisher, pled guilty in 2005 to possession of child pornography of a 10 year old child and was sentenced to 10 years in prison. Although in exchange for his guilty plea, the charges of sexual exploitation of minors was dropped. [15] [9] He was released on April 30, 2010. [16]
A three-mile section of border wall constructed by Fisher Industries was found by the International Boundary and Water Commission (IBWC) to be in violation of the 1970 Boundary Treaty between the United States and Mexico, due to the wall potentially moving the centerline of the Rio Grande and thus the international border between the two countries. The IBWC in federal court asked Fisher Industries to address concerns with the Rio Grande centerline, flood damage, debris accumulation, and erosion due to the wall. The land the wall was built on was not subdivided before construction, and caused a $20 million increase in the taxable value of the farmland, increasing the tax bill by 7,500 percent. Fisher Industries had entered into a lease-purchase agreement strip of land the wall is built on, but did not complete the purchase in over a year, making it unclear who will pay the tax bill. [17] The IBWC completed its hydrology model in March 2020 and found one point where the wall was deflecting too much water, but that the wall's impacts overall were minor. ProPublica and The Texas Tribune provided photos of the wall to engineers and hydrologists, who said the wall was starting to suffer from runoff erosion and is at risk of falling into the river unless repairs are made. [18] The next hearing is scheduled for March 3, 2021.
In 2011, Fisher Sand & Gravel completed the Galena Creek Bridge in Washoe County, Nevada after work on it had been stopped by a previous contractor for being "too dangerous" due to high winds. [5]
In April 2019 Fisher Industries sued the Army Corps for using an inconsistent contract acceptance policy in two wall contracts. [7] [4] The Corps agreed and sided with Fisher. They had previously built a concrete-based prototype of the border wall in 2017. The concrete wall was late, over budget, and more expensive than a steel wall, and Fisher's later steel design did not meet the Army Corps requirements. [4]
The company built sections of a border wall on private property in Sunland Park, New Mexico owned by the American Eagle Brick Company. Sunland Park is adjacent to El Paso, Texas and Ciudad Juárez in the Mexican state of Chihuahua. Some of the construction money was raised by We Build the Wall, which began as a GoFundMe campaign by Internet fundraiser Brian Kolfage. [6] Despite construction having been started, building permits for the wall had not been approved by Sunland Park whose mayor issued a cease and desist letter to Fisher. [19] [20] Construction resumed on May 30, 2019, after research on zoning showed the structure was within code. [21]
Trump advisor and former Kansas Secretary of State, Kris Kobach, visited Coolidge, Arizona with disabled United States Air Force veteran Brian Kolfage and other border wall proponents to observe Fisher's demonstration of how it would build a border fence. Fisher maintained it could erect 218 miles of the barrier for $3.3 billion and be able to complete it in 13 months. Spin cameras positioned atop the fence would use facial recognition technology. Fiber optic cables buried in the ground could detect and differentiate between human activity, vehicles, tunneling, and animals as distant as 40 feet away. The Arizona barrier would be constructed with 42 miles near Yuma and 91 miles near Tucson, Arizona, plus 69 miles near El Paso, Texas, and 15 more miles near El Centro, California. It would reportedly cost $12.5 million per mile. Louisiana Republican U.S. Senator Bill Cassidy said he traveled with the group of politicians over the 2019 Easter recess to Coolidge, which is 120 miles north of the Mexico border, because he felt that not enough barrier and border enhancements had been erected since Donald Trump became president 27 months previously. [22] Cramer was there to promote Fisher, which demonstrated its ability by constructing a 56-foot fence in Coolidge, located 120 miles north of the Mexican border. [23] However, Arizona's freshman U.S. Senator, Republican Martha McSally said that a barrier will not resolve the border crisis. [24]
On December 2, 2019, Fisher Sand and Gravel Company was awarded nearly $400 million by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to construct border infrastructure alongside the Cabeza Prieta National Wildlife Refuge. [25] The estimated 31 miles of new barrier would cost $12.9 million per mile. [26] The Department of Defense's inspector general launched an audit of the contract two weeks later. [8]
On May 6, 2020, the US Army Corps of Engineers awarded a $1.28 billion contract to Fisher Sand and Gravel to build 42 miles of border wall near Nogales, Arizona, at a cost of $30.4 million per mile. [8] [5]
In late 2018, Kobach had joined with other right-wing political operatives, including billionaire Erik Prince, Trump adviser and former Breitbart editor Steve Bannon, Breitbart manager Brandon Darby, former Milwaukee County, Wisconsin Sheriff David Clarke, former Congressman Tom Tancredo and Kolfage to form an organization to raise funds facilitating construction of a barrier. [27] [28] Kolfage had raised tens of millions of donated dollars and asserted the organization would raise such private funds to construct hundreds of miles of their proposed border wall on private lands in Arizona, New Mexico, and Texas. As its prime organizer, in December 2018, Kolfage launched what he represented as an attempt to raise $1 billion via GoFundMe for the wall's construction, but changed the structure of the organization to become a 501(c)4, that allows it to make unlimited political contributions. [29] [30] [31] Kolfage stated that the target figure was achievable, adding "This won't be easy, but it's our duty as citizens". [32] [27] [31] In June 2019, Tommy Fisher took part in We Build the Wall's three-day "Wall-A-Thon" fundraiser, which raised $25 million by mid-2020. The organization had difficulty giving the money to the US government, and instead formed a nonprofit organization to spend the money. [5] On August 20, 2020, a federal grand jury indictment was unsealed against Bannon, Kolfage and two others, charging them with conspiracy to commit wire fraud and money laundering. [33] [34] [35] Federal prosecutors of the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York allege that Bannon, Kolfage, and the two other defendants used funds received from the We Build the Wall fundraising campaign, marketed to support the building of a border wall between the U.S. and Mexico, in a way which was "inconsistent" with how they were advertised for use to the public. [36] [37]
Sunland Park is a city in southeastern Doña Ana County, New Mexico, United States, on the borders of Texas and the Mexican state of Chihuahua, with Ciudad Juárez adjoining it on the south and El Paso, Texas, on the east. The community of Santa Teresa adjoins it on the northwest. The population of Sunland Park was 14,106 at the 2010 census and was estimated at 17,978 by the United States Census Bureau in 2019. Though it lies adjacent to El Paso, being in Doña Ana County makes it a part of the Las Cruces metropolitan statistical area. Las Cruces is 42 miles (68 km) to the north.
The Mexico–United States border wall is a series of vertical barriers along the Mexico–United States border intended to reduce illegal immigration to the United States from Mexico. The barrier is not a continuous structure but a series of obstructions variously classified as "fences" or "walls".
Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument is a U.S. national monument and UNESCO biosphere reserve located in extreme southern Arizona that shares a border with the Mexican state of Sonora. The park is the only place in the United States where the senita and organ pipe cactus grow wild. Along with this species, many other types of cacti and other desert flora native to the Yuma Desert section of the Sonoran Desert region grow in the park. Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument is 517 sq mi (1,340 km2) in size. In 1976 the monument was declared a Biosphere Reserve by UNESCO, and in 1977 95% of Organ Pipe Cactus was declared a wilderness area.
The Mexico–United States border is an international border separating Mexico and the United States, extending from the Pacific Ocean in the west to the Gulf of Mexico in the east. The border traverses a variety of terrains, ranging from urban areas to deserts. It is the most frequently crossed border in the world with approximately 350 million documented crossings annually. Illegal crossing of the border to enter the United States has caused the Mexico–United States border crisis. It is one of two international borders that the United States has, the other being the northern Canada–United States border; Mexico has two other borders: with Belize and with Guatemala.
Kris William Kobach is an American lawyer and politician who has served as the attorney general of Kansas since 2023. He previously served as the 31st secretary of state of Kansas from 2011 to 2019.
The Secure Fence Act of 2006, also labelled H.R. 6061, is an act of the United States Congress which authorized and partially funded the construction of 700 miles (1,125 km) of fencing along the Mexican border. The Act was signed into law on October 26, 2006, by U.S. President George W. Bush, who stated at the time that the Act would "help protect the American people", would "make our borders more secure", and was "an important step toward immigration reform".
Kevin John Cramer is an American politician who has served as the junior United States senator for North Dakota since 2019. A member of the Republican Party, he represented North Dakota's at-large congressional district in the United States House of Representatives from 2013 to 2019.
The Roosevelt Reservation is the 60-foot (18 m)-wide strip of land owned by the United States Federal Government along the United States side of the United States–Mexico Border in three of the four border states. Federal and tribal lands make up 632 miles (1,017 km), or approximately 33 percent, of the nearly 2,000 miles (3,200 km) total. Private and state-owned lands constitute the remaining 67 percent of the border, most of which is located in Texas.
The American Dam, or American Diversion Dam, is a diversion dam on the Rio Grande in El Paso, Texas, that divides the river water between Mexico and the U.S. It is about 140 feet (43 m) north of the point where the west bank of the river enters Mexico, 3.5 miles (5.6 km) from the business center. The dam is operated by the International Boundary and Water Commission. It started operation in 1938.
Stephen Kevin Bannon is an American media executive, political strategist, and former investment banker. He served as the White House's chief strategist for the first seven months of U.S. president Donald Trump's first administration, before Trump discharged him. He is a former executive chairman of Breitbart News and previously served on the board of the now-defunct data-analytics firm Cambridge Analytica.
The Trump wall, commonly referred to as "The Wall", is an expansion of the Mexico–United States barrier that started during the U.S. first presidency of Donald Trump and was a critical part of Trump's 2016 presidential campaign platform leading up to the year's election. Throughout his campaign, Trump called for the construction of a border wall to combat illegal immigration. He promised that Mexico would pay for the wall's construction, by a 20% tariff on Mexican goods, a claim rejected by then-Mexican president Enrique Peña Nieto; all construction relied exclusively on U.S. funding.
The environmental impacts of the Mexico–United States border are numerous, including the disposal of hazardous waste, increase of air pollution, threats to essential water resources, and ecosystem fragmentation.
Executive Order 13767, titled Border Security and Immigration Enforcement Improvements, was issued by United States President Donald Trump on January 25, 2017. The order directs a wall, colloquially called the "Trump wall", to be built along the Mexico–United States border. On December 22, 2018, the federal government went into a shutdown due to Trump's demand for $5.6 billion in federal funds to begin work on the wall. By January 12, 2019, the shutdown became the longest budget shutdown in U.S. history.
Brian Kolfage is an American far-right political activist, former United States Air Force airman, and convicted fraudster. He co-founded We Build the Wall, a private organization that purportedly aimed to construct a privately funded barrier on the Mexico–United States border; he pleaded guilty in 2022 to federal fraud and tax crimes for defrauding donors to the group.
La Lomita Chapel is a historic Catholic chapel in Mission, Texas. It was once an important site for the Cavalry of Christ, a group of priests who traveled long distances on horseback to minister to Catholics living on isolated ranches along the Rio Grande.
We Build the Wall is an organization that solicited donations to build private sections of the wall along the Mexico–U.S. border. It started as a GoFundMe campaign by United States Air Force veteran Brian Kolfage in December 2018. Kolfage announced the formation of a 501(c)(4) non-profit organization in January 2019. By mid-2020, over $25 million had been raised and a 3-mile (4.8 km) section of fence had been built. The organization was involved in the construction of walls along the border in Sunland Park, New Mexico and Mission, Texas.
Biden v. Sierra Club was a United States Supreme Court case involving the appropriation of funds used to expand the Mexico–United States barrier under the presidency of Donald Trump, colloquially known as the Trump wall. Congress did not grant direct appropriations to fund expansion of the wall, leading Trump to sign the National Emergency Concerning the Southern Border of the United States in February 2019 which, citing his powers under the National Emergency Act, took approximately US$8 billion of funds appropriated to military spending towards construction of the wall. Numerous states and non-governmental organizations filed suit shortly after the order, resulting in a Ninth Circuit ruling that deemed the transfer of funds inappropriate under the Appropriations Clause and leading to the Supreme Court challenge.
Citizens of the American Republic (COAR) was an American 501(c)(4) non-profit organization founded by Steve Bannon in 2017.
GTV Media Group, Inc. is a media company formed in April 2020 by Steve Bannon and Guo Wengui. The company operates GTV, a Chinese media platform.
Several Indigenous peoples who live on the United States–Mexico border have objected to the construction of a border wall on their territories and the militarization of the border by the United States government. The US–Mexico border crosses several Indigenous territories and divides these communities. The barrier erected between the United States and Mexico cuts through and/or affects at least 29 Indigenous tribes, which include Kumeyaay Nation and Tohono O'odham.
And the Dickinson-based company has a long history of criminal tax evasion, pollution citations, environmental fines, litigiousness, heavy campaign contributions, and one previous CEO, David Fischer, with a conviction for child pornography.
According to court documents and testimony, Micheal Fisher caused FSG employees to pay for personal expenses such as construction expenses and furnishings for his personal residence and a recreation building, construction expenses for improvements to Tiger Discount, a gas station owned and controlled by Fisher, as well as household and utility bills, vacations, credit card bills and legal expenses for him and other Fisher family members. The agreement requires FSG to pay a total of $1.16 million in restitution, penalties and fines, implement measures to prevent future fraud at the company and cooperate with the IRS in audits of its tax returns.
Since the international boundary between the two nations is defined by the centerline of the river, all development within the floodplain of the Rio Grande must be approved by the IBWC and its Mexican counterpart, La Comisión Internacional de Límites y Agua (CILA). Development cannot cause a change in the course or flow of the river.
"The city has not provided any permits, it has not approved of the construction that has gone up already," city spokesperson Peter Ibardo told The Texas Tribune on Tuesday. "They built the structure without authority or any building permits from the city."
The mayor of Sunland Park, New Mexico, has issued a cease-and-desist order to a private group that raised millions to build a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border.
Fisher Sand and Gravel Co., Dickinson, North Dakota, was awarded a $399,962,000 firm-fixed-price contract to design-build border infrastructure along the southern perimeter of the Cabeza Prieta National Wildlife Refuge in Yuma County, Arizona. Five bids were solicited with three bids received. Work will be performed in Yuma, Arizona, with an estimated completion date of Dec. 30, 2020. Fiscal 2018 military construction, defense-wide funds in the amount of $268,072,900 were obligated at the time of the award. U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Portland District, Portland, Oregon, is the contracting activity (W912PL-20-C-0004).
In a statement, Cramer said the company plans to build 31 miles of new barrier.