The opening titles explain that American corporations are using the North American Free Trade Agreement by opening large maquiladoras right across the United States border. The maquiladora's hire mostly Mexican women to work long hours for little money in order to produce mass quantity products.

Lauren Adrian (Jennifer Lopez), an impassioned American news reporter for the "Chicago Sentinel" wants to be assigned to the Iraq front-lines to cover the war. Instead, her editor George Morgan (Martin Sheen) assigns her to investigate a series of slayings involving young maquiladora factory women in a Mexican bordertown.

Adrian runs into a young 16 year girl that had been raped and buried left for dead.  To try and find the guilty, Adrian volunteers to be a ginny pig at the factory to get her story.  She ends up getting partially attacked herself and almost killed.

She sends her story to her boss.  He refuses to print it because she accuses not only the Mexican government of covering it up, she accuses the American government of doing so too.  A new NAFTA agreement was also being put through and the 'bigwigs' didn't want any bad publicity.

Adrian ends up taking over the newspaper there in Juarez because the original, her friend, was murdered for his involvement of trying to get the story out there.

It was a violent, sad, and shocking story.  All true.

I recommend this movie to all.  NAFTA may be good for companies and governments, but it's creating slave labor and death down south.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bordertown_(2007_film)