http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/hea ... 88223.html

June 21, 2006, 12:28AM



IMMIGRATION
Commerce chief backs wall
Gutierrez says southern border must be protected
By JENALIA MORENO
Copyright 2006 Houston Chronicle

U.S. officials should not be apologetic for wanting to build a wall along the 2,000-mile U.S.-Mexico border, Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez told two local Hispanic organizations Tuesday.

"We have an obligation or a right to protect our border, and if it takes a wall, it takes a wall," Gutierrez said to members of the Camara de Empresarios Latinos de Houston and the Hispanic Alliance for Progress Institute, a public policy group.

Some members of the Camara de Empresarios, a chamber made up of Hispanic immigrant entrepreneurs, have watched their sales drop in the wake of the national debate over immigration reform. Some undocumented immigrants in Houston have said they are holding on to their cash in case they must leave the country or apply for citizenship and pay fines.

Gutierrez's visit was part of his four-day tour of Texas and New Mexico to drum up support for President Bush's immigration reform plan. Bush has proposed a guest-worker program that would allow immigrants to work legally in the U.S. while Congress is debating an overhaul of immigration laws.

"The more we delay it, the more complicated it will be," said Gutierrez, who kicked off his tour Monday in Albuquerque and will end it Thursday afternoon in Dallas.

Democrats criticized the political tour.

"Instead of standing up to the extremists in the Republican Party who are blocking comprehensive immigration reform, the Bush administration continues to resort to staged PR events that do nothing to address this critical issue," Luis Miranda, spokesman for the Democratic National Committee, said in a written statement.

Bush's plan includes providing biometric identification cards for immigrant workers so that employers can more easily verify the identity of workers, Gutierrez said at the Post Oak Grill, a Galleria-area restaurant owned by immigrant chef Leopoldo "Polo" Becerra.

jenalia.moreno@chron.com