People on social media are wondering why there hasn’t been any progress with a $22 million fund, begun by an Air Force veteran, to build sections of President Donald Trump’s border wall.
“I’ve been away for FIVE months,” one person tweeted last month. “When’s the groundbreaking?
Others have posted messages wondering why no videos or photos have been posted of construction or locations.
The GoFundMe effort was launched in December by Brian Kolfage, who complained that “too many illegals” were entering the U.S. He sought up to $1 billion to create a nonprofit organization to build sections of the wall on private land.
When he failed to raise the full amount, he said he was stopping the GoFundMe campaign, and vowed to refund the money and build the wall himself. But the site remains active. Kolfage continues to update the page with news about immigration, and has boasted that he has drawn a number of “brilliant Americans” to the project, including former White House chief strategist Steve Bannon.
In a March interview with American Family Radio, Kolfage said his project was going to “start breaking ground” in April. He told The New York Times in January that ground-breaking would begin within “weeks.”
The Daily Beast reported Friday that there’s “no evidence that any construction has started,” and quoted upset donors.
Kolfage slammed the article on his “We Build the Wall” and personal Facebook page — but provided no details about the project.
“Omg this is PERFECT timing by the liberal rag news site,” Kolfage wrote. “They are about to look more stupid than @hillaryclinton on election night 2016! I guaranteed we would build the wall . . . and I’ll leave it at that!”
In a Facebook post on Saturday Kolfage wrote: “There’s no update because we are remaining silent for a very good reason. You will all have the best present very soon ... it’s going to be glorious!”
Kolfage cautioned that the American Civil Liberties Union would “file a lawsuit” against the project, which is apparently his reasoning for not revealing details about the project.
Late Saturday he launched a raffle to win a trip to a “wall party at first completed section.”
After Kolfage launched his GoFundMe campaign, NBC reported that Facebook had previously shut down several Facebook pages he used to post misinformation, hoaxes and inflammatory language to drive traffic to affiliate websites.
“My personal issues have nothing to do with building the wall,” Kolfage told NBC at the time.
He was also accused of questionable fundraising practices for veterans (check out the video up top).
CORRECTION: This article previously misidentified several Twitter users as donors to the crowd-sourced wall fund. HuffPost did not establish that they are donors, and the article has been edited accordingly.