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The Taking

How the border fence cut through one Brownsville neighborhood (video)

An investigation by The Texas Tribune and ProPublica revealed that landowners were paid unevenly for similar plots of land when the federal government began taking property to build a border fence in the Rio Grande Valley. Hear the stories of a few of those landowners.

By Todd Wiseman, The Texas Tribune, and T. Christian Miller, ProPublica
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Credit: Martin Do Nascimento

The Taking

Inside the federal government's haphazard, decade-long process of seizing private land for a border fence.

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More than a decade ago, the federal government began taking private property to build a border fence in Texas’ Rio Grande Valley. An investigation by ProPublica and The Texas Tribune revealed that landowners were paid unevenly – different amounts of money for similar plots of land. Nowhere was that disparity more evident than on Oklahoma Avenue, a two-lane farm road in Brownsville where the fence ends. 

This video is part of The Taking, a project looking at how the federal government abused its power to seize property for a border fence.

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Todd Wiseman’s staff photo

T. Christian Miller

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