DEL RIO, Texas — Texas ranchers are rejecting an offer from the federal government to cover property damages resulting from illegal immigration and drug smuggling, fearing the aid will come with strings attached and won’t help with the underlying problems at the border.
A Department of Agriculture initiative to pay landowners across the state for a wide array of losses they sustained due to a surge in trespassers traveling from the border north into Texas is being met with skepticism and calls for President Joe Biden to secure the border.
Under the Environmental Quality Incentive Program, the USDA’s Natural Resources Conservation Service began last week allowing farmers and ranchers to claim reimbursements for more than two dozen types of costs sustained, including fencing repairs, livestock fatalities, irrigation, and crop planting, through July 5. The service has not disclosed how much funding it will make available or how many people it expects to apply to the new program.
But at least some of the intended beneficiaries aren’t buying in to the program.
“It looks good on paper. It looks good in the media,” said rancher John Paul Schuster. “But in reality, it’s not servicing us right now.”
Six residents of Kinney and Val Verde counties in the south-central part of the Texas border spoke with the Washington Examiner this week about a myriad of concerns they have with the program. Five of the six do not plan to apply for reimbursement because they think it will be more work than it is worth, do not trust Washington, or have already paid for repairs and are ineligible for reimbursement because they took action.
DEL RIO IS NEW CENTER OF BORDER CRISIS WITH 31,000 MIGRANTS STOPPED IN JANUARY
The southern property line of John Paul Schuster and his wife Donna’s ranch is 25 miles north of the border, but their land has become a hot spot for illegal immigrants who have crossed the border and are trying to evade law enforcement by passing through the private ranches. The Schusters have made innumerable repairs to their fences, had animals escape or die, and lost long-term water supplies due to the nonstop trespasses.
Most importantly, Donna Schuster said, they have lost their peace of mind over the past 14 months that they said the border fell out of control. The Del Rio area in January saw more illegal immigrants stopped by law enforcement than any other section of the border, a first in the Border Patrol’s 98 years. While families often surrender to Border Patrol, many adults try to avoid getting caught by escaping across private property.
Nearly all trespassers are men, and some are dressed in camouflage to avoid being detected.
The Schusters are president and vice president of the Texas Farm Bureau’s Kinney County chapter. When the Schusters learned last week about the USDA initiative to pay landowners in 33 Texas counties for losses sustained amid the border crisis, they were initially optimistic that the government was taking action because it would mean the thousands of dollars they had spent on repairs over the past year would be reimbursed.
Although the program started this month, Texans would be able to expense damages that occurred before February, NRCS spokeswoman Dee Ann Littlefield wrote in an email.
But the Schusters’ hopes quickly faded after realizing that, since they had paid out of pocket to repair their fence every time it was cut in 2021, they are ineligible for reimbursement now, as the program only applies to unrepaired damages.
Page Day is a professional outfitter who makes a living hosting hunters on guided expeditions on his 20,000 acres outside Del Rio. He said he has spent up to $60,000 on repairs over the past year. Since Sunday, he has found five holes cut in fences on his property, meaning new repairs are necessary. Day plans to apply for reimbursement but is concerned that the money will be taxed or that it is a loan, not free money, though the USDA has indicated it is not a loan. Day said the details of the initiative were not laid out in detail, making him more unsure about applying.
“I don’t have high hopes we’re going to get money or that it’s going to work because of the way they’ve worded it,” Day said, adding that giving money to landowners does not get at the cause of the damage. “I almost want to say it’s a political stunt by the government to say, ‘Look, we are helping the ranchers.’”
Billy Whaley of Val Verde County said it is more complicated than that. When trespassers leave gates open, cattle escape, and once they are found, it must be quarantined in case it was exposed to tick fever, a parasite-borne illness that leads to fever in cattle and has high fatality rates.
“It’s probably going to be more trouble than it’s worth [to apply] because nothing is simple with the government. If I have to spend four or five hours filling out stuff and sending it in then have somebody come look at it, by the time they do that, we’ve already fixed another fence,” said Whaley.
Ann Hodge and her husband, Byron, have a multigenerational ranch in Del Rio. She said she was worried that there will be a catch to accepting the money.
“We don’t want anything from the government. There’s going to be strings attached,” said Hodge. “You never know when they’re going to try and say they might need that money back now and have the power to take it away from us.”
In December 2020, the Schusters installed a new net wire fence that was supposed to last 30 to 40 years but instead is constantly being repaired due to climbing and cutting from trespassers. Recently, a smuggler drove a truck off the highway and through their fence, continuing past it and into the next pasture.
Another trespasser used a rock to smash a hole in the couple’s water tank, draining 10,000 gallons of water that was meant to sustain the cattle for six weeks. Because they use a solar pump, the water cannot be recouped quickly, forcing them to buy a new tank and move the cattle to a different pasture.
Garbage left behind by trespassers may not be a type of damage itself, but it has killed some of the Schuster’s cattle, costing them thousands of dollars per animal. Donna Schuster does the daily checks around the property but will not pick up trash she sees until the following day in case someone is still around. It means the cattle have a chance to consume it.
“Those cattle eat it, and because of their digestive system and the way it’s set up, they end up getting what we call hardware disease. They can’t process their diet anymore, so they get skinny and eventually die,” John Paul Schuster said. “We found a dead cow the other day that I haven’t calved.”
Losing a middle-age cow is equivalent to losing up to $6,000, while the loss of a bull would cost up to $3,000. Heifers are worth more because they will breed a calf every year for up to 15 years. Calves are worth $700 each.
John Paul Schuster said there is no price that they could be paid to make up for the safety and comfort that they have lost. Late Wednesday evening, he told the Washington Examiner that state troopers had just called to alert him and his wife that they were chasing eight men on their property.
“DPS called me and said foot chase headed towards your house. So we turned off all the TV and one light wife had on in bedroom. She went to bed — I am sitting still in recliner with dog and pistol by my side,” he wrote.
CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER
Val Verde County Sheriff Joe Frank Martinez asked landowners in a meeting Tuesday to report all damages, break-ins, and run-ins to local law enforcement, not state troopers or Border Patrol, because the county can use the incident data at the end of the year as a reason for additional sheriff’s deputies.
