California cities are ratcheting up their efforts to blacklist businesses involved in the border wall President Trump wants to build. Last week, the majority Democratic San Diego City Council voted 3-1 for city officials to draft an ordinance requiring contractors competing for city projects to reveal any work or bids they have submitted for the border wall.
Council President Pro Tem Barbara Bry, a Democrat, stated, “Trump’s border wall does nothing to promote San Diego’s robust economy and our positive international ties with Mexico. Our region is stronger because of our cross-border exchange with our neighbors to the south,” as reported by The Washington Free Beacon.
Councilman Chris Cate, the Republican who voted against the action, said an ordinance would set a “bad precedent,” adding, “These folks rely on jobs to provide for their families.”
San Diego joins other cities punishing businesses for their work or bids on the prospective wall. Last December, Berkeley voted for the city to refuse to do business with companies helping to build the wall. Mayor Jesse Arreguín said, “We as a community do not stand for building walls, but breaking down walls. We’re not going to stand for what I think are racist and xenophobic policies that marginalize our immigrant population.”
The same month Berkeley voted, Oakland voted for an ordinance that stated the city would:
Refrain from entering into (formally bid/solicited or informally bid/solicited) all new or amended contracts to purchase all goods/commodities and services (i.e., professional, technical, scientific or financial services, goods, construction labor and materials or other services, or supplies) from businesses that enter into contracts to provide such services, goods, materials or supplies to build the U.S.-Mexico border wall.
In April, Los Angeles forced contractors to reveal whether they are helping to design, construct, operate, or maintain a “federally funded wall, fence or other barrier along the border between the United States and Mexico.”
In March 2017, three California legislators introduced Assembly Bill 946, which would have required California’s pension funds to divest from any company involved in building the wall along the U.S.-Mexico border. Assemblymen Phil Ting (D-San Francisco) asserted, “Californians build bridges not walls. This is a wall of shame and we don’t want any part of it.”