Step 1 of the border isn't building a wall, it's fixing the god-damned legal immigration system. It is horrifically broken.
Much fewer people would enter illegally if they had any rational hope of getting in legally without an 8-year avalanche of nonsense bullshit.
But no, we squabble about a wall and deportations. And yes, the legal system being broken was the case 4 years before now, and 4 before that, and 4 before that......it's both parties shitting the bed.