By BRADY MCCOMBS, Arizona Daily Star

The State Department isn't sweating a last-second surge of applications with only four months left before U.S. citizens will be required to have a passport to re-enter the country.

The fencing erected along the U.S.-Mexico border in the past three years by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security has cost more than expected, a government report shows.

NOGALES, Mexico -- Tourists shouldn't cancel their trips to Nogales and other parts of the Mexican state of Sonora just because of the U.S. State Department's updated travel alert, city officials from the Mexican border city said.

TUCSON, Ariz. -- Imagine an invisible laser beam homed in on the carotid artery in your neck, reading your blood pressure, pulse and respiration rate as you wait in line to cross the U.S.-Mexican border.

A barrier put up by the U.S. Border Patrol in a storm-water tunnel beneath Nogales, Ariz. that was partially in Mexico has been torn down.

TUCSON, Ariz. -- A new fence at the border between the U.S. and Mexico has become a dam, flooding towns in both countries and raising concerns that the U.S. government's speedy border enhancements are degrading the environment.

KINO SPRINGS, Ariz. -- The fencing of Arizona's international border continues at an unprecedented speed and cost.

Most illegal entrants selected for prosecution under a new zero-tolerance initiative are getting little jail time, but the program still might be producing the deterrent officials desired.

AGUA ZARCA, Sonora, Mexico -- Taut ropes hold down a blue tarp over boxes and suitcases overflowing from the bed of Jorge Tapia Espinoza's small white pickup.