This year’s congressional defense spending bill would further entrench the military’s role at the US border and, for the first time, allow the Department of Defense to outsource border security work to private contractors.

The $893 billion defense policy bill that passed the House of Representatives last week would grant the Department of Defense unprecedented new authority to deploy private military contractors to the United States’ southern border.

A provision in the legislation, tacked on in a July amendment, for the first time gives the Defense Secretary authority to outsource the agency’s work at the border, a proposal that critics warn could prove a bonanza for the shadowy mercenary and private security firms that work with the Pentagon, often with little public transparency.

The

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