West Texas

US District Judge Kathleen Cardone granted the order following more than four hours of court testimony, blocking federal contractors and the Department of Homeland Security from carrying out any further ground-disturbing activities.

The ruling halts infrastructure work across a five-hundred-mile stretch of West Texas, directly protecting Big Bend National Park, Big Bend Ranch State Park, and environmentally sensitive lands along the Rio Grande while a federal lawsuit challenging the project moves forward.

The court order stems from a federal lawsuit filed in April by the Center for Biological Diversity alongside local property owners and regional preservation advocates.

Co-plaintiffs include the Friends of the Ruidosa Church, a nonprofit dedicated to preserving historic adobe landmarks in Presidio County, and Danny William Miller, a local Rio Grande river guide and landowner.

River outfitters and agricultural landowners expressed relief at the ruling, pointing out that land condemnation procedures and heavy construction equipment had already disrupted fragile riverbanks and threatened local tourism economies dependent on the Rio Grande.

The injunction represents a major hurdle for the White House's broader forty-six billion dollar effort to line the nation's southern border with steel walls, vehicle barriers, and surveillance technology.

Big Bend is one of six ongoing legal battles surrounding wall construction in West Texas following intense debate over federal administrative authority on national park lands.

While federal authorities have not yet formally indicated whether they will seek an expedited emergency appeal with the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, Judge Cardone's injunction will remain in force throughout the duration of the trial, temporarily freezing one of the administration's flagship infrastructure initiatives.

No.

You ever been to West Texas? [laughs]

Oh, God, yes.

Ugh.

Like, not even Lubbock.

I'm talking, like, West Texas.

El Paso?

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Although there's another airport as well in, in West Texas that could be, could be an option.

Yeah.

But it's essentially a White Sands, Carlsbad Cavern, uh, National Parks in New Mexico, and then Guadalupe Mountains and Big Bend National Parks in Texas.

Unreal.

But Guadalupe Mountains looked really cool.

And then Big Bend is way down there in West Texas.

Yeah.

Really the Baja first, then the Western Mountains tomorrow.

And then it's going to get into parts of Arizona, New Mexico, Western Texas, Oklahoma, Colorado.

And along the way, it's going to be pulled into this upper level feature, just a piece of the jet stream that's going to transition what's left of Polo into this extra tropical system.

Now, As that tries to go toward the western Corn Belt, we're going to be chased out of fields in the western Corn Belt very quickly this week.

It significantly increased the size of the company's portfolio in the Delaware Basin.

That is a key oil and gas-producing sub-basin of the Permian in West Texas and Southeast New Mexico.

The deal also brought together a portfolio that now includes the Marcellus Shale, the Eagleford Powder River Basin.

That's amongst other properties that Tom's claims brings an undue level of complexity to the company and contributes to what is, in its view, a discount to its peers of at least one multiple point.

I'm putting quotes around it [laughs] 'cause you all say obtrusion, and I think that's a, a good distinction.

One of my favorite experiences was a summer camp in West Texas, basically outside of, of Fort Davis and the McDonald Observatory in Far West Texas, and you can see the stars and all the beautiful clouds of the universe.

But should cities really worry about light obtrusion, and, and what's important to consider when you're thinking about lighting in a city versus maybe lighting in, in the countryside, especially when it comes to road lights, street lights, all, everything that we're talking about today?

You know, my humble opinion is that both obtruding light anywhere, whether it's light trespass into somebody's apartment window or a garage light going on at, you know, the dead of night, but, you know, you're still awake, but light trespass or whether it's glare, as you mentioned, which hurts the eyes, that's basically the definition, light that hurts your eyes, or sky glow, which is the thing that we're talking about with the observatory and the sky.