Pipeline to Mexico Through Texas Land. Is there a public use?

The 143-mile Trans-Pecos pipeline will take West Texas gas to Mexico. To get there, it has to build a pipeline through lands owned by Texans. 

Say you’re a ranch owner, and you’re asked for a 50 foot easement for a pipeline that won’t deliver its goods to the U.S. Did the Constitution contemplate a public use outside the U.S.? 

A land owner quote from a meeting in Alpine, TX: “If it were supplying people in this state with fuel, I could better understand it,” Nelson said. “Using eminent domain to [take over land] to supply another nation — I got my reservations about that.”

Al Jazeera America