The sign at the edge of Brackettville, Texas reads Population: 1,719 though nobody in town is quite sure that number is still accurate. For three years, this small ranching community has been at the epicenter of debates that consume Washington but feel, from here, almost entirely disconnected from the realities on the ground.

We are not a symbol. We are just people trying to run a county with the same budget we had in 2018.
Kinney County Sheriff Brad Coe

The debate over border security has consumed three consecutive election cycles, but the consequences fall most heavily on a handful of border counties that lack the resources to manage the volume of crossings.