The building was designed by the Supervising Architect's office of the Treasury Department; construction was performed by Robert E. McKee of El Paso, Texas, who was paid $93,800.

In May 1933 the building was complete; it was quietly put into use without a formal dedication ceremony.

[3] As traffic increased at the crossing over the decades, an additional building was added north of the 1933 facility.

That new building was then replaced by much larger inspection and customs facilities to its west, completed in 1974 and still in use.

Politically, the building has played an important symbolic role in relations between Mexico and the United States at one of the busiest land border crossings in the world.