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Why President Trump's 'newly built walls' on US-Mexico border aren't new walls

The White House may have redefined the meaning of 'new wall.' But Trump's fallen far short of his pledge for a wall across the border.

A few hours before his Oval Office free-for-all Tuesday over paying for a border wall, President Trump unleashed a tweet storm in praise of his wall:  

"People have not been able to get through our newly built Walls, makeshift Walls & Fences."

"We have already built large new sections & fully renovated others, making them like new."

"People do not yet realize how much of the Wall, including really effective renovation, has already been built."

We've been hearing about Donald Trump's new, multibillion-dollar wall across the Mexico border for three years. We verified whether the president has built any of that wall. 

Back in April, Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen redefined "new wall."

"To us, it's all new wall," Nielsen said at a White House news conference. "If there was a wall before that's being replaced, it's being replaced by a new wall. So this is the Trump border wall."

We verified there are several projects either underway or in the works on the Trump border wall. They all beef up existing barriers. 

According to reports by U.S. Customs and Border Protection, there are replacement walls in San Diego and Calexico, Calif.; Santa Teresa, N.M.; El Paso and the Rio Grande Valley, in Texas; and near Yuma and Lukeville, in Arizona. 

That's a combined 80 miles of replacement walls in the existing 650 miles of barriers along the 2,000-mile border with Mexico.

Even by Nielsen's definition, we verified the president has fallen short of building "large new sections" of a wall along the Mexico border.

Those replacement walls are being paid for by American taxpayers. 

Congressional funding allows only for the replacement of old fencing.

It's been a long time since President Trump claimed in public that Mexico was going to pay for a wall. 

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