The Daily BS • Bo Snerdley Cuts Through It!
The Daily BS • Bo Snerdley Cuts Through It!

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ICE unloads on CBS for the sympathetic coverage of Texas contractor who built his own wall to keep ICE out

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THE DAILY BS: HOW MUCH CAN YOU HANDLE?

SPARE ME THE BS (I’ve got things to do).

  • Texas contractor Benny Melendez, who voted for Donald Trump in 2024, has installed fences around construction sites to discourage ICE agents from entering and arresting his immigrant workers.
  • Melendez told CBS News that home construction projects that once took four months now take a year because of labor shortages, and he regrets voting for both Trump and Biden.
  • ICE responded by blasting CBS for failing to seek its comment, while X users seized on the irony of a businessman building his own wall to keep federal immigration agents out.

LAY IT ON ME (I’ve got time).

Well, well, well. Apparently, walls DO work.

Just ask Texas construction contractor Benny Melendez, who has discovered a whole new application for America’s favorite immigration-security device.

He’s building fences to keep ICE out.

And here’s the part that makes the story particularly interesting: Melendez voted for Donald Trump in 2024.

CBS News traveled to McAllen, Texas, where the construction company owner explained that he has installed fencing around job sites to protect his immigrant workforce from federal immigration agents.

“If I don’t install fences, ICE is going to come into my property and take my workers away,” Melendez told CBS immigration correspondent Camilo Montoya-Galvez.

Now there’s a twist.

For years, America’s immigration debate has revolved around keeping people from coming across a border fence. Melendez has found himself building fences to keep immigration authorities from coming onto his property.

Same basic building material. Rather different mission statement.

According to Melendez, the barriers are designed to keep agents from entering his construction sites without judicial warrants. He says the immigration crackdown has devastated his ability to find workers.

A home that previously took his company approximately four months to build now takes about a year, he told CBS. At one construction site, Melendez was grateful to have even a couple of employees working.

“We’re blessed that we have two workers today,” he said.

But the contractor wasn’t merely criticizing ICE. He had some political regrets to share as well. Melendez supported Joe Biden in 2020 before switching to Trump in 2024. Now he says neither party has delivered.

“I regret my vote for Biden. Now I regret my vote for Trump,” he told CBS.

He added that he doesn’t believe either political party is working for people like him.

CBS presented his frustration as part of a larger story about Latino voters reconsidering their support for Trump amid intensified immigration enforcement in South Texas. But the segment soon attracted a decidedly different kind of attention.

First, there was the obvious wall irony. Then came a rather pointed response from ICE itself.

The agency’s official X account accused CBS of publishing a sympathetic report about people attempting to avoid immigration enforcement without bothering to obtain the agency’s perspective.

“Imagine calling yourselves a legitimate journalistic operation,” ICE wrote in its response.

The agency accused the network of refusing to ask ICE for comment and characterized the coverage as an attempt to protect people unlawfully present in the United States.

It also pledged to continue enforcing federal immigration law.

That response gave the controversy a second life online.

One X user, EducatëdHillbilly, questioned why a business owner would spend money erecting a security barrier specifically to keep law enforcement away.

Another account, decoy, raised questions about wages and working conditions, suggesting that employers who rely on unauthorized workers might be avoiding a discussion about what they’re paying.

The wage question is an interesting one, particularly in an industry where contractors regularly complain about rising costs and labor shortages.

Melendez did not disclose his workers’ pay rates in the CBS report, nor did the network establish the immigration status of each employee. But the businessman was quite open about his reason for installing the fences.

He doesn’t want ICE agents coming in and taking workers away.

The broader labor shortage is real enough. Construction companies across South Texas have reported losing employees to immigration arrests or seeing workers stay home because they fear being detained.

An October 21 investigation by The Guardian separately documented contractors erecting temporary fences around construction projects in the Rio Grande Valley. One contractor estimated spending $30,000 on fencing at a development of 16 duplexes.

The newspaper also described a concealed space beneath a staircase where workers could hide if immigration agents appeared.

It’s a remarkable development in the construction business: Builders are now spending substantial money on barriers before they can get back to building the homes they were hired to construct.

And for Melendez, the political consequences may be just as significant.

McAllen’s Republican mayor, Javier Villalobos, told CBS that immigration enforcement has become a major concern in his community. He said voters who supported securing the border and deporting violent criminals are increasingly troubled by operations affecting workers and families.

The Trump administration, meanwhile, maintains that it is carrying out the immigration enforcement agenda voters elected the president to pursue.

Washington has spent years fighting over a wall at the southern border.

Now a Texas construction boss is building one of his own — and CBS News has found itself in the middle of the argument.

DBS WIRE SOURCES (I’ve got all day).

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