The 9th district court of appeals has upheld a ban on redirecting defense department funds for wall building.
Crowdfunding a wall
The business of crowdfunding a wall from passionate people.
Reliefweb summary of the border spending bill
This bill has since past, but prior to it – here was a review from one organization of what it liked and didn’t like in the bill.
ReliefWeb Yuma expanding detention facilities
Yuma is expanding detention facilities
azcentral Apparently also plans (and push back) for similar facility near Laredo.
Starr County
Another contract for four miles of border fence in Starr County
El Paso Times DHS has waived many regulations for this construction.
Construction Dive Border patrol
Customs and border patrol (CBP) is back in the news and not in a good way. In particular, it as come to light that a group of agents and former agents had a facebook group where they mocked and made bad comments about migrants as well as some lawmakers. This is under investigation.
ProPublica 
NPR.org The group has 9500 members and sounds like some poor judgment for some of the posts. This comes at same time that poor conditions have been revealed at places like Clint, TX.
This is unfortunate and I hope CBP and the administration address the worst abuses and get ahead of this, rather than just counter-attacking those making the reports, such as this Fox article starts to do.
Fox News Reports from longer ago, also point to a poor culture.
The Intercept The border patrol is a large organization and needs support of the local communities where it operates. I expect the organization to have diversity with some inappropriate behavior – as well as folks that engage well with migrants. So I think it is both wrong to (1) tarnish the entire organization with these views and (2) have them not be addressed. We will see how this unfolds…
[unfortunately, I do see some parallels with police brutality conditions that came to light – where it became a flash point and way to rile up partisans on both extremes.]
Drownings
This article describes some of the drownings and causes. Among them, the canal can be more treacherous than expected, the canal is isolated against the fence. More water is being released now after snowmelt is known.
Letter from attorney who visit Clint
Slate Magazine Honduras
Social spending, remittances and migration. An description of how these countries could afford more on social issues, but remittances are much more profitable.
A second Honduras article describing the situation
The Conversation Some general facts related to Honduras
Pew Research Center Finally a general article describing causes from Arizona Central
azcentral Also an article suggesting climate change effects.
PBS NewsHour 
Hyperallergic