President signs bill to build border fence

    President Bush signed a bill yesterday authorizing 700 miles of new fencing along the U.S.-Mexico border, hoping to give Republican candidates a pre-election platform for asserting they're tough on illegal immigration.

    The centerpiece of Bush's immigration policy, a guest-worker program, remains stalled in Congress.

    Its cost is not known, although a homeland-security spending measure the president signed earlier this month makes a $1.2 billion down payment on the project.

    The money also can be used for access roads, vehicle barriers, lighting, high-tech equipment and other tools to secure the border.

    Mexican officials have criticized the fence. Outgoing Mexican President Vicente Fox, who has spent much of his six years in office lobbying for a new guest-worker program and a chance at citizenship for the millions of Mexicans working illegally in America, calls the fence "shameful" and compares it to the Berlin Wall.


Actually, the Berlin Wall was to keep citizens in. This is supposed to keep illegals out.