MEXICO CITY (AP) — Political calls for more walls and policing at the U.S.-Mexico border are a “straw man” designed to defeat immigration reform, former U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano said Wednesday.

Napolitano said in an interview with The Associated Press that U.S. money would be better spent on easing border-crossing bottlenecks that affect trade rather than on adding more barriers and agents.

“When you go to some of our ports and see the backup — it’s gotten better but it’s not good enough. And it’s not keeping pace with the amount of commerce that’s growing between our countries,” she said, emphasizing that she is expressing a personal opinion now that she has left government.

“You cannot seal a border, that’s an unrealistic expectation,” she added. “And I think that unfortunately it has become a straw-man argument to prevent immigration reform from passing.”

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Read more:http://houston.cbslocal.com/2014/05/22/n...-seal-a-border/