San Francisco considers bill to bar city from doing business with companies that build border wall

A San Francisco lawmaker introduced a bill Tuesday that would prohibit the city from doing business with construction companies that bid to build President Donald Trump's border wall.

According to KTVU-TV, San Francisco Supervisor Hillary Ronen's bill would bar those construction companies from bidding on future projects with the city. Ronen said her city shouldn't do business with companies that have values different from San Francisco's.

"Stick to building bridges, not walls," she said Tuesday during a news conference.

"By introducing this legislation, we are moving beyond symbolic protest and making it clear to companies interested in doing business with San Francisco, that we expect those companies to uphold basic principles of compassion and dedication to human rights," Ronen explained.

Essentially, the purpose of the bill is to pressure construction companies from doing business with the Trump administration. Though a company stands to make millions of dollars by building Trump's border wall, the long-term sustainability of a construction company could be hurt if no municipality will do business with them for building the wall.

Ronen's news conference took place in front of international construction giant T.Y. Lin, which is based in San Francisco and is reportedly bidding for the contract to build the border wall.

During the news conference, Ronen also named construction companies — Hensel Phelps and Tutor Perini — as companies that San Francisco does business with but have expressed interest in building Trump's wall.

Currently, both companies have active construction contracts with the city, according to the San Francisco Chronicle:

Among them are two companies that have massive contracts with the city: Hensel Phelps Construction Co. in Oakland and Tutor Perini Corp. of Sylmar (Los Angeles County). Hensel recently signed a $1.1 billion contract to help build a new terminal at San Francisco International Airport. The San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency has an $860 million contract with Tutor Perini to help construct the Central Subway.

However, according to Ronen, the bill would affect only future contracts.

In San Francisco, a city that is heavily influenced by liberal and progressive policies, there isn't much pushback against the proposed legislation. According to KTVU, the bill already has support from San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee.

"That wall is such a strong symbolism of division in our country that we don't want to have anything to do with it, including contractors that want to work for the city," he told KTVU.

Nearby cities like Oakland and Berkeley have also considered similar measures. In fact, Berkeley unanimously passed a resolution last week divesting from construction companies that seek to help build the border wall.

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