Hearing of the Senate Judiciary Committee - Federal Government Counterterrorism Efforts

Federal News Service

HEADLINE: HEARING OF THE SENATE JUDICIARY COMMITTEE

SUBJECT: FEDERAL GOVERNMENT COUNTERTERRORISM EFFORTS

CHAIRED BY: SENATOR ORRIN HATCH (R-UT)

WITNESS: SECRETARY OF HOMELAND SECURITY TOM RIDGE

LOCATION: 226 DIRKSEN SENATE OFFICE BUILDING, WASHINGTON, D.C.

BODY:
SEN. JOHN CORNYN (R-TX): Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Secretary Ridge, my questions relate to the US-VISIT program and implementation, but first I want to refer to the letter that you and the secretary of State wrote with regard to the need to extend the deadline for the implementation of the biometric passports under the Visa Waiver Program. You make some persuasive points in the letter, one of which I want to highlight, though, is in addition to the security concerns, which are paramount, that there is a concern that the need to acquire individual visas might suppress demand for travel to the United States, with tremendous economic consequences in the country. The last sentence said possibly resulting in multibillion- dollar losses to our economy and reducing employment in one of our economy's most dynamic sectors.

My question with regard to the US-VISIT program is the implementation of that program along our southern borders.

SEC. RIDGE: Right.

SEN. CORNYN: And of course in Texas, as you know, we have about a 1,200-mile border with Mexico. I'm sure that Senator Feinstein, Senator Kyl perhaps have similar concerns, to make sure not only that our security-border security is established, which again is our paramount concern, and I know yours as well, but that it be done in a way that does not adversely impact the economy in South Texas, for example, along the border, which are traditionally some of the poorer counties and parts of our state. Since the advent of NAFTA about 10 year ago, fortunately we've seen huge economic growth in South Texas.

But out of all of the border or the entries into the United States-I believe INS inspects more than a half-a-billion entries into the U.S. each year, but about 80 percent of those, as you no doubt know, are land borders, and about 800,000 alone occur between the United States and Mexico. And I must tell you that I've been struck by the differences in comprehension of life along our U.S.- Mexican border, between that area which I know so well and Washington, D.C. because I think we tend to think in global sort of broad-brush terms.

But specifically, what I would like to ask for your help on, and your staff has been very attentive to these concerns, but I just want to make the point with the boss that there is a tremendous concern about the use of the laser visa, which ironically does provide the kind of biometric identifier that US-VISIT hopes to ultimately accomplish for all entries, but with limitations on the time that non- immigrant visa holders, these laser visa holders, can come into the United States to shop and conduct business, which provides a tremendous economic benefit to the border region of the United States, including south Texas.

And so I would like to ask for your continued attention and cooperation and just raise this matter to your attention, because it is a profoundly important issue to my state and particularly the south Texas border region, and it corresponds precisely with the concerns that you and Secretary Powell raised in your letter with regard to the implementation of the Visa Waiver Program.

If you have any comments --

SEC. RIDGE: I do, Senator. Thank you.

SEN. CORNYN: -- I'd appreciate it.

SEC. RIDGE: I can recall giving very specific directions within a couple of weeks after I came to Washington to initially serve as the assistant to the president for Homeland Security. When he related the facts associated with making security paramount as of September 11th, 2001, of both our Canadian and Mexican borders, we made it paramount, and we basically shut down travel and commerce. I mean, we had traffic backed up for literally miles and delays that sometimes went almost as long as a day, if not longer.

So it's pretty clear that along our land borders we have to layer in different means of identifying the people and the products that come across and to make sure they're legitimate and lawful and that people coming across are law-abiding. And we began that in the "Smart Border" accord. We're looking at different-where we've identified-pre-screened certain people, pedestrian traffic, people coming across in commercial traffic, pre-screened shipping companies and the truck drivers that bring that traffic across, looking at various kinds of technology to really apply to the border, again, as part of a layered effort to provide security so we can move literally hundreds of thousands of people across the border back and forth every day.

And one of the other things we're looking at is to extend the time and the distance that people with the laser visa can travel, which, again, is part of our effort to-we can legitimize their coming over for legitimate purposes, but if we make them go back and forth every single day when in fact they plan on staying for two, three or four days, whatever it may be, it will reduce the pressure on the borders-so that we want to layer in different levels of security at the border, and we will continue to work with you and your colleagues on the southern border, but as well the colleagues on the northern border, to effect the outcomes that we want, and that's a successful US-VISIT system by the end of this year at the land borders-at the 50 largest land borders in America.

SEN. CORNYN: Thank you, sir.

SEC. RIDGE: You're welcome.

SEN. CORNYN: Thank you.