'We're not going to remove anything': Ducey sues feds over shipping containers at Arizona border

Republican Gov. Doug Ducey has filed a lawsuit pushing back against federal agencies seeking to force removal of 130 shipping containers used as a makeshift wall at Arizona's border with Mexico.

The lawsuit, filed in federal court on Friday, asks a judge to allow the state to continue placing shipping containers at the border and to stop the federal government from intervening. It presents a more broad question, too, about state authority when it comes to border issues.

In the past two weeks, Ducey's administration and the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation have sparred over whether Arizona had the legal authority to put the containers in gaps where the federal government, though having plans to build a barrier, had not yet done so.

"We're not going to remove anything," Ducey told The Arizona Republic in a Thursday interview.

Ducey's administration has no plans to remove the containers until a permanent solution is in place. U.S. Customs and Border Protection officials have said construction is to begin in January on the gaps near Yuma, using "temporary mesh fencing" and vehicle gates.

"Why replace temporary barriers with more temporary barriers?" Ducey said in a statement Friday, calling it "just another example of the federal government bureaucracy and out-of-control spending. The border barrier works and we’re not going to delay the safety of our citizens any longer.”

The U.S. Bureau of Reclamation sent a letter to state officials last week, claiming Ducey's containers violated federal law. This week, Allen Clark, director of the Arizona Division of Emergency Management with the state Department of Emergency and Military Affairs, rejected that claim in a letter of his own.

“This is the Bureau of Reclamation, some bureaucrat, who writes a letter," Ducey said. "That's not going to slow down what we're doing to protect the people of Arizona. We're gonna plug ahead every day as long as I am governor.”

The lawsuit escalates that back-and-forth, citing the influx of migrants and drugs at the border as evidence the federal government has not done enough, forcing Arizona to step in.

"The citizens of Arizona are experiencing an unprecedented crisis at the state’s southern border, caused in large part by the federal government’s complete abdication of responsibility with respect to immigration and national security policy," the lawsuit states.

The lawsuit names the U.S. Forest Service and its chief, Randy Moore; the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation and its commissioner, Camille Calimlim Touton; and Secretary of Agriculture Thomas Vilsack as defendants. The Forest Service and Bureau of Reclamation have joint jurisdiction over the land on which containers were placed. The agencies did not comment on Ducey's lawsuit.

While the focus of the lawsuit is the shipping containers, one of its six claims serves to test whether states can declare an invasion at the border, a legal theory GOP candidate for governor Kari Lake has made central to her bid for office.

Ducey, who has made border security a hallmark of his almost eight years in office, has not signaled any interest in making such a declaration, which would upend decades of court rulings that have maintained the federal government has the enforcement authority for immigration laws.

Asked why he hadn't pursued a declaration of invasion, Ducey said, "We've done everything possible to address the border situation."

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Nor does he intend to bus asylum seekers to cities on the East Coast other than Washington, D.C., a practice condemned by immigrants' rights groups as a political ploy, but that Ducey has said takes the border crisis to President Joe Biden's doorstep.

Arizona has sent 2,260 migrants to the nation's capital on a total of 63 bus trips since the governor quietly unveiled the transportation program in May. The trips cost about $82,000 each, according to the state's contract, resulting in the bill to the state of over $5 million so far. The taxpayer-funded trips supplement similar work already being done by nonprofits that aid migrants.

Decisions by Republican governors in Texas and Florida to move migrants to other places, like New York and Martha's Vineyard, Massachusetts, were condemned by Democratic leaders there.

Such programs have emerged as a new front in the political battle over immigration policy and border security.

Reach reporter Stacey Barchenger at stacey.barchenger@arizonarepublic.com or 480-416-5669. Follow her on Twitter @sbarchenger.

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This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: Arizona sues federal government over shipping container wall at border