Friends Group · Terlingua, TX
Big Bend Conservancy
Named for Big Bend
2 staff + 21 volunteers74¢ to the workFounded 1996
Stand · Find your defenders
Who’s defending Big Bend?
1 group likely to care, a guess from mission and footprint
National park in Texas, 801,163 acres, managed by the National Park Service, designated in 1944.
Likely to care
Groups likely to care about Big Bend
This group is a guess from each group's stated mission and where it works, not a record of work on this fight. Give directly; nothing routes through us.
1 more work nearby but is not tied to Big Bend on the record
The situation
What’s happening to Big Bend
The Rio Grande bends through ancient limestone canyons, and the Chisos Mountains rise from the Chihuahuan Desert like a fortress. In August 2026 bulldozers rolled into the park itself, clearing pristine desert for border barrier infrastructure, patrol roads and surveillance towers with environmental review waived. Local officials, businesses and park lovers across the political spectrum pushed back hard enough that the administration paused the work within a week, but the project is not dead, only under review. Big Bend’s remoteness has always been both its greatest asset and its deepest vulnerability. Out of sight is how a bulldozer gets into a national park.
- 1944Established as national park
- 2026Administration pauses construction for a CBP on-the-ground evaluation
Bulldozers begin clearing parkland for border barrier work
Source: NPR · August 12, 2026
Remote park disproportionately hit by budget cuts
Source: Center for American Progress
No public comment window is open on Big Bend right now. A call script is ready on the Public Lands Action Network, and the groups above are how the fight gets funded and argued in the meantime.
Our reporting
What we’ve published on Big Bend
Your move
How to stand for Big Bend
GiveGive to Big Bend Conservancy
Straight to their own donation page. Your dollar never passes through us.
Their donation page ↗SpeakCall your representativesA ready call script on Big Bend, plus any comment window as it opens.
Public Lands Action NetworkFollowWatch the mapEvery threatened place in the country, tracked, with who stands for each.
Threatened Lands MapBuild my lineup around Big Bend: the leading group here opens it, and the other seats fill from this record.
Big Bend has defenders. It needs more.
1 more likely to care, Big Bend Conservancy with 2 staff + 21 volunteers. Find your way in.