On Wednesday afternoon in Rio Grande City, Texas, cement trucks, construction workers and semi-trucks loaded with pieces of border wall could be seen entering a plot of land on FM 1430.

What was once a family farm is quickly becoming a main cog in Texas’ immigration fight.

The 1,402.4-acre piece of land was acquired by the Texas General Land Office and Texas Land Commissioner Dawn Buckingham on Oct. 24 from Sheerin Real Properties LLC.

At the time, the General Land Office put out a press release, saying, “Texas General Land Office (GLO) has acquired a 1,402-acre ranch along the Rio Grande at Starr County’s border with Mexico. This property’s frontage on the Rio Grande makes it a crucial location for enhanced border security and placement of a border wall.”

“For too long, the federal government has abdicated its job to secure our southern border,” Buckingham said in the release from late October. “This is why I am stepping up and acquiring this 1,402-acre property in the heart of the border crisis. (O)ur agency will take matters into our own hands and partner with the State of Texas to secure this section of Starr County by building a fortified 1.5-acre mile wall.”

According to the General Land Office, this large piece of land along the river was being used for farming row crops such as onions, canola, sunflowers, sorghum, corn, cotton and soybeans.

Originally, the plan from the General Land Office was to continue the farming operations, with the proceeds benefitting the schoolchildren of Texas through the Permanent School Fund, which funds primary and secondary public schools.

Now, that plan seems cloudy.

On Tuesday, the General Land Office offered the expensive plot of land to the incoming Trump administration to aid in its efforts to accomplish the largest mass deportation operation in the history of the country.

Buckingham wrote a letter to President-Elect Donald Trump and his team on Tuesday, saying she is “fully prepared” to assist federal agencies and “to allow a facility to be built for the processing, detention, and coordination of the largest deportation of violent criminals in the nation’s history.”

Gov. Greg Abbott went on Fox News on Tuesday evening and expressed his support for this plan, saying it is the next step in securing the border.

As of Wednesday, some things are still unclear. For starters, who owned the land is still in question. The General Land Office purchased it from Sheerin, but other documents indicate the land could have belonged to a local family.

In Buckingham’s letter to Trump, she said, “The previous owner had refused to allow the wall to be built and actively blocked law enforcement from accessing the property.”

One thing is for sure at this point — the race to secure the southern border seems to have already started before the President-Elect is sworn into office.