Thread: Feinstein: visa waiver program a 'shambles'

Feinstein: visa waiver program a "shambles"
At a hearing on expanding the list of countries not requiring visas, she says it creates a gap in domestic security.
By DENA BUNIS
The Orange County Register


WASHINGTON Sen. Dianne Feinstein today called the program that allows foreign visitors from 27 different countries to visit the United States without a visa a "shambles" and the "Achilles' heel" of the nation's immigration system.

Feinstein, D-Calif., held an oversight hearing in her terrorism subcommittee to explore reports that the Department of Homeland Security wants to expand the program even as questions persist about the agency's ability to track the millions who come here under that program each year.

"The visa waiver program leaves open both a major gap in our domestic security and a way to exploit our immigration laws,'' Feinstein said. Last year 16 million people came to the U.S. through this program.

Of the estimated 12 million illegal immigrants living in the United States, federal officials have estimated that 40 percent of them entered the country legally and just overstayed their welcome. There's no telling how many of them came from a country that required a visa or how many were from a country whose residents could come here without one.

Most of the so-called visa waiver countries are in Europe. The list also includes Australia, Japan, and New Zealand. DHS officials are talking with 13 other countries, many in Eastern Europe as well as South Korea, Greece and Cyprus, about joining.

As part of the 9/11 Commission law Congress enacted last year, changes were made to the Visa Waiver Program designed to increase security. Among the changes the law required is that no new countries could be added until DHS could verify the departure of 97 percent of travelers leaving U.S. airports and until it had a system that got personal information about visitors coming to the U.S. without a visa before they got on an airplane to come here.

DHS official Paul Rosenzweig assured Feinstein that no countries would be added until those requirements were met.

But Feinstein, Arizona Republican Sen. Jon Kyl and Rosenzweig, who is acting assistant secretary for international affairs, got into an argument over what criteria DHS plans to use to meet the 97 percent goal.

Feinstein and Kyl said they just assumed – and that the intent of the law was – that the 97 percent figure meant that DHS would verify that 97 percent of those people who came to the United States to visit left when they were supposed to.

But Rosenzweig couldn't assure them that that's the definition DHS would use. One method – criticized by a recent congressional watchdog agency – would allow DHS to meet the criteria if it could just match 97 percent of people on airline departure lists with records they had on people entering the country at any time. They wouldn't have to verify that people had not overstayed their visas.

"It's a phony statistic,'' Feinstein said.

Congress has been after immigration enforcement officials for more than a decade to create a system to track foreign nationals coming in and out of the U.S.

Feinstein said she is particularly concerned about this program because although it has always been assumed that the people coming here from our European allies didn't usually pose a threat to the United States, the Director of National Intelligence Mike McConnell recently said that al Qaida is recruiting Europeans because they do not require a visa to come here.

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"The visa waiver program leaves open both a major gap in our domestic security and a way to exploit our immigration laws,'' Feinstein said. Last year 16 million people came to the U.S. through this program.

She has a problem with this, but it's ok that millions sneak over our southern border?

Or is it because these countries are not Mexico or Latin America? No that can't be it, because that would be racist now, wouldn't it?

Most of the so-called visa waiver countries are in Europe. The list also includes Australia, Japan, and New Zealand.

We have 20-30 million illegal invaders, with more pouring across our borders daily, many of whom commit violent crimes and fleece tax dollars, bankrupt our cities and states and this woman is concerned with a our Visa Program???

The day these morons are on the same page as the American People is the day we will have our country back. Not until then. Pelosi and Feinstein are detremental to this state as well as this country and I cannot see how they are allowed to stay in office and represent foreign countries.