EL PASO, Texas — Elected officials in El Paso are asking President-elect Barack Obama to scuttle federal plans to build hundreds of miles of fencing along the U.S. border with Mexico. In a three-page letter to Obama dated Wednesday, officials from El Paso argue that the fence, a project approved by Congress in 2006, was ill-conceived and is an irresponsible expense while the country is in the midst of a recession.
State Sen. Eliot Shapleigh, who has long opposed the project, said he believed existing fencing, including several miles of decades old barriers in El Paso, Nogales, Ariz., and San Diego, should also be removed.
"We want a message of friendship and a message of hope," Shapleigh said. He said the fence should not be used as a replacement for comprehensive immigration reform.
Shapleigh, who was joined Wednesday at a news conference by officials from the city and county of El Paso and a representative for U.S. Rep. Silvestre Reyes, D-El Paso, said the letter would also be sent to Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, Obama's nominee for Secretary of State, Arizona Gov. Janet Napolitano, nominee for Secretary of Homeland Security, and others.
Both Obama and Clinton voted for the Secure Border Act, which authorized fence construction. Napolitano has been skeptical of the plan, suggesting that a border fence would likely only create a cottage industry for ladders.
Local officials along the Texas border with Mexico have been vocal opponents to the fence plan. In the Rio Grande Valley, officials near McAllen struck a compromise with Michael Chertoff, whom Napolitano would succeed if confirmed by the Senate, to build a levee-fence that would bolster existing Rio Grande levees while meeting security concerns raised by the Department of Homeland Security.
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