AUSTIN — Today, Texas Land Commissioner Dawn Buckingham, M.D., is proud to announce that the Texas General Land Office (GLO) has acquired a 1,402-acre ranch along the Rio Grande at Starr County's border with Mexico. This property's frontage on the Rio Grande makes it a crucial location for enhanced border security and placement of a border wall.

"For too long, the federal government has abdicated its job to secure our southern border – endangering Texans by allowing hundreds of thousands of unvetted illegal migrants to stream across our porous border. This mass negligence and refusal to enforce the law is downright sinister. As Land Commissioner, tasked with overseeing thirteen million acres of state land, I will not idly stand by and let this dereliction of duty affect the lives of hard-working Texans,” said Commissioner Buckingham. “This is why I am stepping up and acquiring this 1,402-acre property in the heart of the border crisis. The General Land Office works for the people of Texas, and our agency will take matters into our own hands and partner with the State of Texas to secure this section of Starr County by building a fortified 1.5-mile wall.”

In addition to adding a layer of security for Texans facing this massive border crisis, this ranch is currently a row crop farm that produces many industry staples, including onions, canola, sunflowers, grain sorghum, corn, cotton, and soybeans. The GLO is proud to foster acreage that provides state-grown produce for Americans and aims to acquire land constantly to generate revenue for the school children of Texas through the Permanent School Fund (PSF).

Starr County is part of the Border Patrol’s Rio Grande Valley Sector. This border sector has recorded thousands upon thousands of illegal migrant encounters and asylum-seekers crossing the Rio Grande from Mexico into South Texas since January 2021.

In 2023, Commissioner Buckingham declared Fronton Island, a 170-acre island in Starr County, state land. Since her declaration, the land has been fortified by the Texas Department of Public Safety (DPS) and the Texas Military Department (TMD) through Operation Flat Top, and crime at this border hotspot has been halted dramatically.

With the acquisition of this border property, the GLO now owns two pieces of land on the border in Starr County – encompassing more than 4,000 acres. This most recent property acquisition includes trees that have reportedly served as “rape trees,” where migrants would display various arrays of women's clothing as "trophies" after sexual abuse. The GLO is proud to step in to ensure this property can no longer be used for this kind of heinous activity.