President Trump’s executive order to build a wall on the Mexican border won’t go down as America’s finest hour. But at least the policy he’s setting out is more moderate than his campaign rhetoric and makes some concessions to immigration reality.

Mr. Trump ran and won on mass deportation of illegal immigrants and building a “great, great wall,” and he’s honoring his campaign promises. Nobody can claim he’s springing what the order calls a “secure, contiguous and impassable physical barrier” on unsuspecting voters. But Mr. Trump also often signaled in 2016 that he would “soften” these positions in office, and in some ways he has.

The symbolism of “the wall”-or double-layered fence, perhaps-is contrary to America’s best traditions. A country that prizes liberty, and that historically has welcomed and assimilated immigrants, is sending a powerful signal against newcomers who have always made America greater. The wall antagonizes a friendly neighbor, and the political backlash against the U.S. in Mexico might empower the nationalist left.

Read more at The Boulder Daily Camera.