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The Enhanced Border
Security and Visa Entry Reform Act of 2001
Summary
The Enhanced Border Security and Visa Entry Reform
Act of 2001 will strengthen the security of our
borders, secure our visa entry system, and enhance
our ability to deter potential terrorists.
Improving the resources, training, and technology
available to our border personnel is a critical
component of our efforts to improve border security.
This legislation waives the limitation on the
hiring of full-time personnel, giving greater
control to decision makers at the border; increases
the number of border personnel; raises the pay
of INS border personnel; and provides customs
agents, border patrol, and INS inspectors with
essential training and cross-training. Funds are
authorized to the Department of State to improve
the screening of visa applicants, strengthen coordination
of international intelligence information. Funds
are also authorized to enhance technology available
to the INS and Customs Service to improve technology,
expand the use of technology, and facilitate the
flow of commerce at ports of entry. To offset
the costs of such improvements, the Attorney General
is authorized to increase land border fees, and
the DOS is permitted to raise fees from the use
of machine-readable visas. In addition, the Attorney
General is required to use authorized funds to
being installing biometric data readers and scanners
at U.S. ports of entry.
We must also improve coordination and information-sharing
by the State Department, the Immigration and Naturalization
Service, and law enforcement and intelligence
agencies. Building on the progress made by the
anti-terrorism bill to provide the INS and State
Department with access to FBI information, this
legislation directs the President to devise and
implement a comprehensive report and plan to provide
the State Department and the INS with greater
access to intelligence and law enforcement information.
This plan will be developed and implemented in
consultation with the appropriate congressional
committees, and will provide information critical
to the State Department and the INS in their efforts
to identify and intercept terrorists. The President
must also develop and implement an interoperable
electronic data system - with specific name recognition
capabilities - to provide appropriate foreign
service officers and federal agents with immediate
access to relevant law enforcement and intelligence
database information. Until these plans are put
in place, U.S. law enforcement agencies and the
intelligence community are required to share relevant
information with the DOS and INS.
We must also improve our ability to monitor foreign
nationals in the United States. Consular officers
who issue visas will be required to transmit electronic
versions of visa files to the INS so that critical
information is available to immigration inspectors
at U.S. ports of entry before an alien’s arrival.
This legislation also gives greater direction
to the integrated entry and exit system established
by the 1996 law IIRIRA, including: using a specific
technology standard and technologies that facilitate
cross border movement, creating a database for
compiling arrival and departure data, and making
all security databases involved in determining
the admissibility of aliens interoperable. Biometric
technology can significantly enhance our ability
to monitor foreign nationals. This legislation
requires the Attorney General and the Secretary
of State to begin issuing machine-readable, tamper
resistant, travel documents with biometric identifiers,
and to require that countries participating in
the Visa Waiver Program issue passports with those
qualities.
In an effort to improve the ability of our foreign
consulates to identify potential terrorists, this
legislation establishes terrorist lookout committees
at each U.S. mission abroad. These lookout committees
will ensure that names of suspected terrorists
are included in the appropriate lookout databases
and that those names are transmitted to the appropriate
person in the consulate. Additionally, the legislation
prohibits visas from being issued to an alien
from a country designated as a state-sponsor of
terrorism, unless the Secretary of State, after
consultation with the Attorney General and other
officials, determines that the alien poses no
safety or security threat to the United States.
The legislation reforms the current Visa Waiver
Program by only allowing a country to be designated
as a participant in the program if the Secretary
of State and Attorney General determine that the
country transmits reports of blank passport thefts
to the U.S. government in a timely manner. The
legislation also requires that the Attorney General
enter stolen passport information into the interoperable
data system quickly.
By enhancing our efforts to screen passengers
to the U.S. at their ports of departure, we can
also improve the security of our North American
perimeter. To achieve this goal, a comprehensive
study is required to determine how best to screen
travelers to the United States, Canada, and Mexico.
This study must examine the possibility of instituting
preclearance and preinspection procedures. Our
screening capacity will also be enhanced by requiring
all commercial flights and vessels coming into
or leaving from the U.S. to provide manifest information
about each passenger, crew member, and other occupants
prior to arrival into, or departure from, the
U.S. Lastly, when planes land at our airports,
inspectors are now under excessive time constraints
to clear the planes and ensure the safety of all
departing passengers. The legislation removes
the existing 45 minute deadline, and provides
inspectors with additional time to clear and secure
aircraft.
The anti-terrorism bill improved the monitoring
of foreign students and exchange visitors, but
gaps still exist. This legislation requires that
the student monitoring program collect additional
information on the status of foreign students
in the U.S.; it expands the monitoring program
to include flight schools, language training programs,
and vocational schools; and it also improves the
reporting requirements placed on the INS, the
State Department and educational institutions.
In addition, it requires the INS, in consultation
with the Department of Education, to periodically
review institutions enrolling foreign students
and receiving exchange visitors, to ensure that
they adhere to the mandated reporting and record-keeping
requirements. If an institution fails to comply,
their authorization to accept foreign students
may be revoked. The legislation also puts in place
a temporary system until this program is implemented.
INS currently has difficulty retaining well-qualified
inspectors at our borders. By giving the same
retirement benefits to these individuals as other
law enforcement personnel, this legislation provides
an incentive that will help INS keep trained personnel.
Currently, there is no system in place to locate
nonimmigrant aliens in the United States. The
legislation directs the General Accounting Office
to conduct a study to determine the feasibility
of requiring every nonimmigrant alien in the U.S.
to provide the INS with current contact information.
Our efforts to improve border security must include
greater coordination with our allies. Toward that
end, the Secretary of State and INS Commissioner
are required to study the possibility of requiring
countries that participate in the visa waiver
program to develop an intergovernmental network
of interoperable electronic data systems.
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