We were told by illegal immigration activists for years that walls don’t work, Oddly, however, they lobbied vigorously against a wall along our porous border with Mexico. If walls don’t work, I wondered, why are the pro-illegal immigration activists so dead set against them?

And if walls don’t work, I further wondered, why did the Berlin Wall succeed in imprisoning freedom-seekers for decades? Why are there walls around prisons? Why is there a wall around the White House?

But I’m not a wall scientist, so I figured there must be good answers to those questions but the answers were beyond my ken. I did learn from yard signs that it’s important to follow the science and that there is no such thing as an illegal human. So, I figured there must be something I was missing about wall-atology.

Former and future President Donald Trump seemed to miss it too. He built walls on portions of our border with Mexico to reduce illegal border crossings.

Border crossings did indeed go down. But of course, correlation is not proof of causation. It could well be that border crossings went down because of some other factor at work. Maybe life improved for a spell in Mexico and Venezuela and the other cesspools from which these poor immigrants ran, struggled and sometimes died in search of a better life, albeit illegally.

The next president, Joe Biden a/k/a Big Guy, went back to following the science. He announced that under his watch “not another foot” of border wall would be constructed. He sold off much of the materials for pennies on the dollar that Trump had purchased for wall construction.

We were told Biden’s policy succeeded. His Homeland Security Secretary testified to Congress under oath that “The border is secure.”

Sure, it’s a fact that illegal border crossings have hit an all-time high of hundreds of thousands a month amounting to nearly 3 million a year, drug cartels operate freely across the border, and human trafficking is appalling. But, again, correlation does not equal causation. Those facts might well be caused by something other than an insecure border. Might just be acts of God – er, sorry, I mean Gaia.

Ah, but science is ever-evolving. There’s new data out. That data includes the following.

Polls show Biden’s approval rating on border issues is in the low 20s. These polls are on an issue that voters care about, and they come barely a year before a presidential election.

Politicians of Biden’s own party in places like Illinois and New York are begging for a slowdown in the influx of illegal immigrants into their jurisdiction, an influx that is putting intolerable pressure on public services like emergency housing and food.

Never mind that these politicians pridefully announced just a few years ago that they not only tolerated illegal immigrants but as “Sanctuary Cities” they welcomed them. They were a little like me when I host a party; I put out a welcome sign only because I know that nobody will show up.

So, it turned out the science was not settled the way it is in, say, global warming. In view of this new political data, science tells us that walls do in fact work, and the previous reduction in illegal border crossings under Trump might have something to do with him making it harder to do so.

And so, Biden (via people who can speak real words and make sentences out of them) announced yesterday that he will resume construction of a border wall. His Department of Homeland Security published a notice yesterday stating: “There is presently an acute and immediate need to construct physical barriers and roads in the vicinity of the border of the United States in order to prevent unlawful entries into the United States in the project areas.”

To prevent those unlawful entries, they informed us, they were resuming construction of Trump’s border wall — the one they said didn’t work and would not be built even “another foot.”

But then today, BIden told the press that he still believes border walls don’t work. And his Secretary of Homeland Security told us that the language from his department was taken “out of context” and that in fact there was “no change in policy.”

Which apparently means “not another foot” of wall is still the policy, even as they build miles of it.

I’m in favor of the border wall, as are most Americans, so I’m glad they’re resuming construction. But I wish they would demonstate some honesty and competence in their communications on the subject. For people who “follow the science,” they sure have difficulty with the language.

Postscript: To be clear, I have no personal animus toward the illegal immigrants. I think personal animosity toward them is inappropriate and undermines our position on the subject. If I were in the circumstances of these illegal immigrants, I hope I would have the courage to do what they’re doing.

That said, we can’t allow them to do it. It’s too hard on them and on us. I’m with Elon Musk. I’m all for immigration, but it needs to be the legal kind where we vet the prospective immigrants, ensure the physical safety of them in their travels, and control our borders.

It’s a cliche, but some of my best friends are legal immigrants who went on to become citizens. To a person, they would agree with this. Glenn