From Politico and AP News Myway comes basically the same story that the Bush Administration is preparing to finally get serious about the borders of our country and the illegal immigrant problem.

Since Politico has more information I’ll quote from it:

The administration is unveiling a series of tough border control and employer enforcement measures designed to make up for security provisions that failed when Congress rejected a broad rewrite of the nation’s immigration laws in June. The plans are scheduled to be announced at 10:30 a.m. by Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff and Commerce Secretary Carlos M. Gutierrez.

Details were provided to Capitol Hill on Thursday. As part of the new measures, the secretary of Homeland Security will deliver regular “State of the Border” reports beginning this fall.

In one of the most interesting revelations, the plans call for the administration to “train growing numbers of state and local law enforcement officers to identify and detain immigration offenders whom they encounter in the course of daily law enforcement,” according to a summary provided to The Politico by a congressional source.

…

As part of the package, Bush is planning to increase muscle at the Mexican border, as conservatives have long pleaded. “The administration will add more border personnel and infrastructure, going beyond previously announced targets,” according to the summary. “The Departments of State and Homeland Security will expand the list of international gangs whose members are automatically denied admission to the U.S.”

…

“The Department of Homeland Security will raise the civil fines imposed on employers who knowingly hire illegal immigrants by approximately 25 percent,” the summary continues. “The administration will continue its aggressive expansion of criminal investigations against employers who knowingly hire large numbers of illegal aliens.”

The administration is promising to reduce processing times for immigration background checks by adding agents and converting paper documentation to electronic forms. And the Department of Homeland Security and the Social Security Administration say they will study and report on the technical and recordkeeping changes necessary to deny credit in our Social Security system for illegal work.

Under the tougher menu, the administration vows to fund additional beds for people caught breaching the border, ensuring that illegal entrants are returned to Mexico rather than being let go because there’s no space for them, as often occurred in the past.

“The administration will implement an exit requirement at airports and seaports by the end of 2008, and will launch a pilot land-border exit system for guest workers,” the summary says. “By the end of 2008, the administration will require most arrivals at our ports-of-entry to use passports or similarly secure documents.”

It sounds like they are finally going to enforce existing law, which is what we’ve been asking for all along.