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New contracts show Ducey’s Department of Administration has agreed to pay AshBritt Management & Logistics $57.2 million to tear down the containers in ÃÛèÖÖ±²¥ County and transport them to ÃÛèÖÖ±²¥. That is on top of the $95 million allocated to the company to put them there in the first place.

Another addition to the contract gives the firm more than $9.3 million to deconstruct the 3,820-foot ersatz wall of double high containers it put up near Yuma at a cost of $6 million.

And then there’s $9.8 million to transport containers, which were awaiting planned use in the barrier, from their current location near Sierra Vista up to ÃÛèÖÖ±²¥.

The move comes after Ducey, sued by the U.S. Justice Department for trespassing and damaging federal land, agreed earlier this month to take the containers down, despite his continued insistence the land where they were placed does not belong to the federal government.

In fact, the governor’s private attorney — hired with state tax dollars — filed legal papers in federal court less than a week ago to keep alive a separate lawsuit he filed asking a judge to declare there is no federal ownership of the land.

Incoming Gov. Katie Hobbs has told Capitol Media Services she believes Ducey’s claim is not on solid legal ground.

“It’s not our land to put things on,’’ the Democratic governor-elect said. Murphy Hebert, press aide to the incoming governor, called the Ducey-ordered barriers “a political stunt that backfired at the taxpayers’ expense.’’

Ducey press aide C.J. Karamargin acknowledged the additional cost of taking down a barrier that was just erected — and, in the case of ÃÛèÖÖ±²¥ County, was still under construction. But he insisted the project was not a waste of taxpayer funds.

“We don’t know what we stopped,’’ Karamargin said. “We know that local law enforcement officials, like the sheriffs in ÃÛèÖÖ±²¥ and Yuma County, were both appreciative of the effort because it made their job to protect their communities a little bit easier.’’

He said it was not until the containers started to go up that the Biden administration contracted to have the U.S. government fill some of the gaps left in the border wall started under former President Donald Trump. As such, Ducey’s spokesman said, the shipping containers served a valid purpose, regardless of the cost.

Biden, on his first day in office, called an immediate halt to further construction of Trump’s border wall, leaving several open areas where wall construction was originally planned.

But in July the U.S. Department of Homeland Security announced it had authorized Customs and Border Protection to seal openings near the Morelos Dam in the Yuma area.

Yet, a month later, Ducey issued an executive order directing that gaps near Yuma be filled with a line of double-high shipping containers.

Karamargin brushed aside questions about the timing, calling the federal announcement “all talk and no action.’’

And in October, Ducey announced the contract to fill a 10-mile gap along the border in ÃÛèÖÖ±²¥ County south of Sierra Vista, in Coronado National Forest.

Karamargin deflected questions of whether the money was wasted.

“Why don’t you ask a farmer whose celery field or asparagus field or lettuce field was contaminated because people were defecating in it, if the effort to stem the flow of migrants into Yuma was worth it,’’ he said.

Where Ducey is getting the money to hire AshBritt to undo its own work is unclear. Karamargin said he does not know.

Construction costs came out of a $335 million ÃÛèÖÖ±²¥ Border Security Fund approved by lawmakers earlier this year as part of a new state budget. But there are strings on use of those dollars, including requirements they be spent solely to erect a barrier.

As to the choice of AshBritt, a spokeswoman for the Department of Administration, Megan Rose, said Ducey’s emergency order allowed the state to bypass the normal process of seeking bids.

The company was chosen because it has “demonstrated turnkey rapid response solutions since 1992,’’ Rose said. She said no other firm was considered “based on the time constraints.’’

Once the containers are gone, that will leave the other ongoing expense of taxpayer money on the issue.

Ducey retained private counsel to file a lawsuit earlier this year so he could argue that the 1907 directive by President Theodore Roosevelt declaring a 60-foot strip along the border to be exclusive federal property was not legal. That means the state was not trespassing, he continues to argue.

The Biden administration responded with its own lawsuit earlier this month asking a federal judge to require ÃÛèÖÖ±²¥ to remove the containers or to allow the feds to do it and bill the state.

It took Ducey only a week to agree — and a few more days for the state to sign the $76 million in new contracts to take out the makeshift barrier AshBritt had built and was still building.

Come Jan. 2, when Hobbs is sworn in as governor, Ducey’s ongoing lawsuit will become her lawsuit against the feds. But Murphy said she can’t comment on whether Hobbs will continue the fight or dismiss the case, as the incoming administration is “reviewing all litigation.’’