[Senate Hearing 106-813]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
S. Hrg. 106-813
INS REFORM AND BORDER SECURITY ACT OF 1999
=======================================================================
HEARING
before the
SUBCOMMITTEE ON IMMIGRATION
of the
COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY
UNITED STATES SENATE
ONE HUNDRED SIXTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSIONS
on
S. 1563
A BILL TO ESTABLISH THE IMMIGRATION AFFAIRS AGENCY WITHIN THE
DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE, AND FOR OTHER PURPOSES
__________
SEPTEMBER 23, 1999
__________
Serial No. J-106-51
__________
Printed for the use of the Committee on the Judiciary
__________
U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE
68-415 WASHINGTON : 2001
SENATE COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY
ORRIN G. HATCH, Utah, Chairman
STROM THURMOND, South Carolina PATRICK J. LEAHY, Vermont
CHARLES E. GRASSLEY, Iowa EDWARD M. KENNEDY, Massachusetts
ARLEN SPECTER, Pennsylvania JOSEPH R. BIDEN, Jr., Delaware
JON KYL, Arizona HERBERT KOHL, Wisconsin
MIKE DeWINE, Ohio DIANNE FEINSTEIN, California
JOHN ASHCROFT, Missouri RUSSELL D. FEINGOLD, Wisconsin
SPENCER ABRAHAM, Michigan ROBERT G. TORRICELLI, New Jersey
JEFF SESSIONS, Alabama CHARLES E. SCHUMER, New York
BOB SMITH, New Hampshire
Manus Cooney, Chief Counsel and Staff Director
Bruce A. Cohen, Minority Chief Counsel
______
Subcommittee on Immigration
SPENCER ABRAHAM, Michigan, Chairman
ARLEN SPECTER, Pennsylvania EDWARD M. KENNEDY, Massachusetts
CHARLES E. GRASSLEY, Iowa DIANNE FEINSTEIN, California
JON KYL, Arizona CHARLES E. SCHUMER, New York
Lee Liberman Otis, Chief Counsel
Melody Barnes, Minority Chief Counsel
(ii)
C O N T E N T S
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STATEMENTS OF COMMITTEE MEMBERS
Page
Abraham, Hon. Spencer, U.S. Senator from the State of Michigan... 1
Feinstein, Hon. Dianne, U.S. Senator from the State of California 4
Leahy, Hon. Patrick J., U.S. Senator from the State of Vermont... 7
CHRONOLOGICAL LIST OF WITNESSES
Statement of Hon. Doris Meissner, Commissioner, Immigration and
Naturalization Service, U.S. Department of Justice, Washington,
DC............................................................. 9
Panel consisting of Paul M. Berg, chief, Del Rio Sector, U.S.
Border Patrol, and chief, Chief Patrol Agents Association, Del
Rio, TX; Warren R. Leiden, Berry, Appleman and Leiden, San
Francisco, CA, on behalf of the American Immigration Lawyers
Association; Rachel S. Yoskowitz, director, Immigration and
Citizenship Services, Jewish Family Service Metro Detroit,
Detroit, MI; T.J. Bonner, president, National Border Patrol
Council, Campo, CA; and Richard J. Gallo, national president,
Federal Law Enforcement Officers Association, Northport, NY.... 27
ALPHABETICAL LIST AND MATERIAL SUBMITTED
Berg, Paul M.:
Testimony.................................................... 27
Prepared statement........................................... 30
Bonner, T.J.:
Testimony.................................................... 44
Prepared statement of T.J. Bonner, president, National Border
Patrol Council, and Charles J. Murphy, president, National
Immigration and Naturalization Service Council............. 46
Gallo, Richard J.:
Testimony.................................................... 48
Prepared statement........................................... 50
Leiden, Warren R.:
Testimony.................................................... 35
Prepared statement........................................... 36
Meissner, Doris:
Testimony.................................................... 9
Prepared statement........................................... 20
Yoskowitz, Rachel S.:
Testimony.................................................... 40
Prepared statement........................................... 42
INS REFORM AND BORDER SECURITY ACT OF 1999
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THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 23, 1999
U.S. Senate,
Subcommittee on Immigration,
Committee on the Judiciary,
Washington, DC.
The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 2:14 p.m., in
room SD-226, Dirksen Senate Office Building, Hon. Spencer
Abraham (chairman of the subcommittee) presiding.
Also present: Senators Kyl and Feinstein.
OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. SPENCER ABRAHAM, A U.S. SENATOR FROM
THE STATE OF MICHIGAN
Senator Abraham. The Subcommittee on Immigration will come
to order. I want to thank everybody who is here in attendance
and apologize for our slightly late start today, but we have
had a number of activities going on and constituents that have
kept us a bit late.
I want to welcome Commissioner Meissner. We will hear from
her soon. I thank Senator Feinstein for being with us. I know
she is very interested in this area and we look forward to
working together on developing some of these topics today and
in the days ahead in further detail.
I am going to make a brief, or maybe not so brief, opening
statement here today and will turn to Senator Feinstein, and if
Senator Kennedy or any of the other members are here and wish
to make opening statements, we will have an opportunity before
we start the panels and then sort of play it by ear a little
bit once we do.
Today, our subcommittee is here to examine the INS Reform
and Border Security Act, a bill which I introduced just before
the end of the session in August along with Senators Kennedy
and Hagel.
There is widespread agreement today, I think, that there
are serious problems as to how the Immigration and
Naturalization Service handles its service and enforcement
functions. We understand that no structure is going to result
in perfect enforcement or perfect service. However, the current
problems are too large to ignore and I believe that fundamental
structural changes should be made.
It should not be the case, whether it is in Michigan or
Mississippi or Texas, that individuals who are arrested for
flouting our laws are let go because of a lack of adequate
detention space or because of a breakdown in detention policy.
It should not be the case that in places like Arizona and
California, ranchers and other residents are endangered by
people streaming across their property and are unable to obtain
any real Federal response.
It should not be the case that an individual such as serial
killer Resendez Ramirez, who had been deported by the INS three
times on account of prior crimes, could be apprehended at the
border eight times since January 1998 but allowed to go free.
This happened once after the Houston police had alerted INS
that Ramirez was a murder suspect. Had he instead been detained
and prosecuted that eighth time, two people who were killed
would likely still be alive today.
Simply put, on the enforcement side, illegal immigration is
too high and the INS is not adequately structured, in my
judgment, to be able to be equipped to handle this serious
problem. I believe that genuine INS reform can help reduce
illegal immigration and substantially strengthen our
enforcement capacity.
On the service side, the situation is equally troubling. It
should not be the case that individuals who play by the rules
have to wait, in some cases years, to become citizens or lawful
permanent residents. It should not be the case that individuals
cannot receive updates on the status of their cases because too
often their files have been lost or misplaced or the computer
has no record of their applications.
It should not be the case that a Department of Justice
Inspector General audit concludes that, year in and year out,
the INS has not established effective internal controls to
ensure that accounting records and other relevant financial
information are adequately maintained to ensure that taxpayer
money is not being wasted. Such waste causes both service and
enforcement needs to go unmet.
I just might add that each of the contexts which I have
referenced here are situations which our office has heard about
from constituents, and I know we are not the only Senatorial
office to hear that.
The legislation we are discussing deals with important
structural issues that are, I believe, at the root of many of
the problems we see today. While structural changes alone may
not solve all of the problems, I am convinced that it will help
with many.
As I said 2\1/2\ years ago when I first became chairman of
the subcommittee, the INS has been charged with performing dual
missions, neither of which will be performed well until these
missions are separated. We cannot expect the INS to be the good
service provider by day and the tough cop by night.
I believe that a broad consensus on this fundamental point
has been reached across party lines over the last 2\1/2\ years.
Permitting the INS to move forward with its current structure
and organization only ensures an endless recurrence of the same
problems we have seen.
These problems exist not only at the national level, but at
the local level, as well. District offices around the country
combine service and enforcement functions. These offices are
run by district directors, who are not required to have law
enforcement backgrounds, with the result that enforcement often
suffers. However, if a district director has exclusively a law
enforcement background, it is possible that we will see service
suffer.
Some say we should reorganize INS from within rather than
engage in fundamental reform, but I believe that approach will
not enjoy the confidence of Congress, law enforcement,
immigrant advocates, or the general public. It will be widely
viewed as trying to maintain the status quo, and in my
judgment, seems unlikely to do enough to bring about the
fundamental attitudinal changes at all levels that I think are
needed.
The INS Reform and Border Security Act, which we will be
hearing about today, represents fundamental change. The
legislation replaces the INS with a new Immigration Affairs
Agency within the Department of Justice, led by a high-ranking
official, that will contain two separate bureaus, the Bureau of
Immigration Service and Adjudication and the Bureau of
Enforcement and Border Affairs. This will allow for
concentrated effort and personnel devoted to improving the
respective service and enforcement functions. Inspections,
which is a combined service and enforcement function, will be a
separate entity within the Immigration Affairs Agency.
The legislation also increases accountability by creating
three Senate-confirmed positions, including the Director of the
Service Bureau and the Director of the Enforcement Bureau. The
bill also establishes the position of Chief Financial Officer
in both the service and the enforcement bureaus, creating
additional fiscal accountability.
Accountability will become a two-way street. When the heads
of separate service and enforcement bureaus are confirmed, then
Members of Congress themselves will become more accountable
because they will have played a hand in the approval of those
individuals and participated in setting the benchmarks of
success or failure for the heads of these new bureaus.
This new structure should result in both enforcement and
service improvements while allowing for the overall setting and
coordinating of immigration policy. Separate chains of command
within distinct bureaus will establish clear career paths and
attract individuals most interested in one or the other bureau.
Most importantly, it will increase accountability, particularly
for senior-level personnel.
Separating out enforcement will help ensure that
enforcement is sufficiently supported and that individuals
overseeing enforcement functions possess a law enforcement
background. Moreover, the bill would move the enforcement
bureau toward the best practices of law enforcement entities
that are considered more effective. Finally, the bill would
require the addition of 1,000 more Border Patrol in fiscal
years 2002, 2003, and 2004.
We should also see important service improvements.
Separating service and enforcement will help ensure that those
individuals working in the service side understand their jobs,
to include the delivery of fair, equitable, accurate, and
courteous service. In fact, the legislation requires that all
employee evaluations include the fair and equitable treatment
of immigrants as a top priority.
The legislation also creates the Office of the Ombudsman,
which will assist individuals in resolving service or case
problems and identify and propose changes in the service bureau
to improve service. The ombudsman can appoint local
representatives to resolve serious service breakdowns. In
addition, the legislation models the service bureau's
organization on the Social Security Administration by creating
regional commissioners and area directors charged with service
implementation.
To improve the culture of employees, the bill includes a
series of measures, including employee buyouts and the ability
to bring in outside management executives, that are modeled on
those passed by Congress in the 1998 IRS reform bill.
The legislation has already achieved support from those
interested in different aspects of the execution of our
immigration laws, having been endorsed by the Chief Patrol
Agents Association, the Federal Law Enforcement Officers
Association, and the American Immigration Lawyers Association.
I look forward to today's hearing and to receive comments
and feedback from the various parties who will participate, and
I do want to finish with a comment for Commissioner Meissner.
I want to stress something I have said at other hearings,
right from the inception when I became chairman. These problems
with the Immigration and Naturalization Service are not simply
the problems of today. They have been problems that have
existed for a long period of time, and the purpose of the
legislation which we are offering, that we have introduced, is
not to single out for particular criticism any one commissioner
or any one group of people working at INS. I believe that these
problems are longstanding and I believe that, as opposed to
allowing them to continue, we have an obligation to examine the
various ways that we can address them, both from the standpoint
of resources, which we frequently do, but also from the
standpoint of structure and significant policy reform the way
we are hopefully going to be able to do during this process.
I just want to make sure that we convey those sentiments,
because the goal here is truly to address the problems. I think
that Commissioner Meissner in previous testimony has
acknowledged a number of these and has sought, I think in good
faith, internally to address them. But we need to, I believe,
examine them now from a broader perspective and I look forward
to today's hearing and its aftermath as part of that process.
At this point, I will finally finish and turn to Senator
Feinstein for any opening statement she may wish to make, and
then we will go to Senator Kyl. Thank you all for being here.
STATEMENT OF HON. DIANNE FEINSTEIN, A U.S. SENATOR FROM THE
STATE OF CALIFORNIA
Senator Feinstein. Thanks very much, Mr. Chairman. Let me
just say, I think your bill is a major step forward and I look
forward to working with you in a couple of areas.
Commissioner Meissner assumed the helm of the agency in
1993 in the midst of great turmoil. I at that time was new to
this committee. And in 1996, Congress passed the most
comprehensive illegal immigration reform measure, which
dramatically increased the INS's enforcement and service
responsibilities.
Funding for the INS has more than quadrupled in the last
decade, from $884 million in fiscal year 1989 to $4 billion in
fiscal year 2000, and in that time the demands on INS have
outpaced its capacity to manage them. As a result, the agency,
I believe, despite the strongest of efforts, has been unable to
keep up with its increasing size and complexity of mission.
In light of these trying circumstances, I would like to
acknowledge the great strides that Commissioner Meissner has
made in taking INS to a new level of professionalism,
developing a strategic plan and taking the initial steps toward
fundamental reform within the agency. I truly do not believe
anyone could have done better.
However, even with these best efforts, it has become very
clear that the problem lies not solely with the organization's
management, but also with the agency's structure. The U.S.
Commission on Immigration Reform studied the issue and found
that, despite increases in funding and authority, the current
Federal immigration structure leads to ``mission overload,''
resulting in ineffective management of the four core functions
of the system, border and interior enforcement, enforcement of
immigration-related employment standards, adjudication of
immigration and naturalization applications, and consolidation
of administrative appeals.
According to the Commission at the time, mission overload
results from the fact that the agency charged with implementing
our immigration laws have so many responsibilities that they
are unable to manage them all effectively and efficiently, and
with an immigration landscape that is growing in complexity and
size, no one agency could have the capacity to effectively
manage every aspect of immigration policy.
So finding a solution to these challenges is critical,
given that we currently have an estimated five million illegal
aliens in this country and over 300,000 newly-arriving illegal
aliens settling in the U.S. every year. Fifty percent of
whatever the number, if it is 300,000 or 400,000 or 500,000, 50
percent settle in California. One-point-seven million lawful
permanent residents are languishing in backlogs waiting to
become American citizens. More than 650,000 are waiting in
California alone.
More than one million people are in a second less-noticed
INS backlog, who have had to wait sometimes as long as 39
months for the INS to process their green card applications,
and this situation will only get worse as 900,000 applications
for new green cards are pending, in addition to the 185,000 set
for renewal.
Finally, countless numbers of spouses and minor children of
legal immigrants, whose precise numbers are not available from
the INS, who followed the law and played by the rules, have
been waiting to reunite with their immediate family for up to
10 years.
In the meantime, the enforcement arm of the agency is
confronting problems of its own. According to a recent article
in the San Diego Union Tribune, progress in containing illegal
migration through the San Diego border may be breaking down--
may be breaking down. The article cites an INS internal memo
stating that people with fraudulent documents are now getting
caught repeatedly and returned to Mexico without facing legal
sanctions. I had the opportunity to discuss this with the
Commissioner earlier today.
Moreover, I think many of us are aware of the recent story
of the alleged mass murderer, Rafael Resendez Ramirez, who
repeatedly eluded law enforcement officials. Records show that
he had been deported at least four times and arrested at least
ten times. Much of his record is still unclear, given that the
FBI's Ten Most Wanted List included 30 aliases and numerous
Social Security numbers for him.
This case demonstrates a weakness. Now, we thought it was
in the IDENT system. The Commissioner earlier today said that
the Ten Most Wanted List had not been entered into the IDENT
system, and I asked her the question, well, what about other
lists? We still need to respond to that.
I mean, this is a serial killer who came back and forth
across the border. Although he was arrested or stopped, nobody
knew apparently who he was or what alias he was using and the
Most Wanted List had not been entered in the computer system.
That, to me, is a major oversight.
Under these circumstances, any legislation that would
correct this type of recurring situation, I think is deserving
of our attention. But, Mr. Chairman, I want to say that you
have taken, I think, a major step in a very positive direction.
I believe this bill sets the stage for curing a number of
maladies in the system. It would make immigration a higher
priority within the Justice Department by elevating the new
Immigration Affairs Agency into a higher position within the
Department. That is good, in my view. It would create two
separate bureaus, one for enforcement and one for service,
thereby streamlining the two missions and responsibilities into
manageable workloads.
One of the criticisms I had of our Customs Department was
that prior to this new Customs Commissioner Ray Kelly, it had a
mixed mission. It was to promote trade and also enforce the law
at the border, and that mixed mission, I think, is very
difficult for any organization to carry out. The separateness
of the services under a common head would enforce
accountability, enable better communication and cooperation
between national headquarters and the field offices, and, I
believe, instill a clearer sense of purpose and direction
within the field offices. I mean, you would know whether you
were service or enforcement.
It would enable Congress to exercise more effective
oversight by requiring that the two bureau chiefs, as well as
the director, be Presidential appointments subject to Senate
confirmation. I have talked a little bit to the Commissioner
about this. I understand her reservations. From the position of
someone who sits as part of an oversight body and has for some
time, I think some autonomy is actually healthy, provided there
is cooperation and supervision at the top. But I think that is
something that I am certainly willing to discuss further.
And your legislation would create internal checks and
controls to better ensure the quality of both service delivery
and enforcement activities. It would also authorize an
additional 1,000 Border Patrol agents over the next several
fiscal years.
I think now is the time, Mr. Chairman, to finish what was
started in the 1996 immigration reform by creating an
implementation structure that will give the immigration laws
full force in curbing illegal immigration and improving
services to legal immigrants, and I think your bill goes a long
way to doing that.
I want to just mention publicly something that I mentioned
to you privately, and that is that as efforts like Operation
Gatekeeper and others become more effective in deterring
illegal immigration in their immediate area, they also not only
push it to other areas, such as Douglas, AZ, but they also put
intense pressure on ports of entry. In California, we have, I
believe, problems in our ports of entry, and that is not only
on the border, that is coming in from the water, as well. We
have this problem particularly with drugs. So I think the
ability to provide inspections at those ports of entry is
really important if we are going to have enforcement be given
the tools that it needs.
I look forward to the Commissioner's testimony and working
with you, Mr. Chairman, to remedy some of these things.
Senator Abraham. Senator Feinstein, thank you, and we look
forward to working together with you, as well, and anybody else
with interest in this.
Senator Feinstein. May I ask your consent to enter the
ranking member's statement into the record, please?
Senator Abraham. Thank you. We will do that.
[The prepared statement of Senator Leahy follows:]
Prepared Statement of Hon. Patrick J. Leahy, a U.S. Senator From the
State of Vermont
I am attending this hearing to demonstrate the importance of INS
reorganization to me and to the people of Vermont, as well as to take
advantage of the opportunity to express some of my concerns about the
INS generally to Commissioner Meissner.
I Would also like to welcome the other panelists who have traveled
here today to offer their thoughts on the INS Reform and Border
Security Act. I appreciate the work that Mr. Berg, Mr. Bonner, and Mr.
Gallo do to further our law enforcement objectives. And I am a great
admirer of the work done by advocates such as Mr. Leiden and Ms.
Yoskowitz, who labor so diligently to ensure that the American dream
remains attainable for those who emigrate to the United States.
As many of you know, I have a great number of constituents who
work, for the INS, and I believe that the quality of their work is
unsurpassed. On too many occasions in the past, their effectiveness and
dedication were overlooked here in Washington, and plans were made that
would have put their careers in jeopardy. Faced with that prospect, I
have worked with Commissioner Meissner to ensure that my constituents
were treated fairly. As I sit here today, I am hopeful that the latest
talk of reorganization will proceed without overlooking the great
efficiency of the Eastern Regional Office, Law Enforcement Support
Center and Debt Management Center in South Burlington, the Vermont
Service Center and Sub-Office in St. Albans, the Swanton Border Patrol
Sector, and our border crossing personnel.
That being said, I am very interested to hear the Commissioner's
thoughts on the restructuring bill that my distinguished colleagues
have introduced. I value her opinion quite highly, and believe that she
has done a wonderful job in a very difficult position. I think that the
Commissioner and all of us would agree that there is room for
improvement at the INS, and I am open to persuasion that this
restructuring bill could be the proper vehicle.
I would also like to ask the Commissioner today about her views
concerning two bills that I will be sponsoring to revise portions of
the 1996 immigration legislation, as well as about the INS' recent
handling of asylum cases involving domestic violence.
First, I have introduced the Fairness to Immigrant Veterans Act,
which would restore to U.S. veterans the right to go before an
immigration judge for a meaningful hearing before being deported, and
also to have a Federal court review any deportation decision. As you
know, those rights were taken away by the legislation the Congress
passed in 1996. I am happy to say that my bill has received the support
of numerous veterans' groups, and I am sending a letter to my
colleagues that some of those groups have written on behalf of the
legislation, as well as a letter from the American Legion demonstrating
its support for this bill. I hope that my colleagues will join with me
to recognize that at the very least, we owe our veterans the chance top
explain themselves before we remove them from our country for a past
misdeed.
Second, I am planning to introduce in the very near future a bill
that will revise our procedures for expedited removal. During the next
week, I will be sending a letter to colleagues from both sides of the
aisle asking for their support and sponsorship of this bill, which
would limit the use of expedited removal to times of immigration
emergencies. The faults of our current expedited removal system were on
display once again earlier this year, when it became clear that at
least two Kosovar refugees had been summarily excluded from the United
States even after unrest in Kosovo was on display on the nightly news.
Our current system entrusts too much power to lower-level INS officers
who, as conscientious and hard-working as they may be, are simply not
experienced enough to make what is often a life-and-death decision to
immediately remove a foreign national who may be seeking refuge on our
shores.
Third, I have serious concerns about the INS' handling of the
asylum claims of two victims of severe domestic violence, Rodi Alvarado
Pena, a Guatemalan woman, and a young woman from Mexico whose identity
has been protected. Ms. Pena escaped from a husband who savagely beat
her in Guatemala, and he has said he will kill her if she returns
there, The young Mexican woman was severely abused by her father, in
part because she attempted to stop him from beating her mother. In both
cases, administrative judges granted the asylum requests of these
abused applicants. And in both cases, the INS appealed those grants of
asylum to the Board of Immigration Appeals, which reversed the
administrative judges. I question why the INS found it necessary to
appeal the eminently reasonable decisions to allow these abused women
to remain in the United States. If prosecutorial discretion was not
appropriate here, when would it be appropriate? In particular, I would
like to know why these cases were treated differently from previous
decisions granting asylum to the victims of domestic violence, which
the INS did not appeal. (See In re A and Z (IJ (Arlington) Dec. 20,
1994); In re M and K, (IJ (Arlington) Aug. 9, 1995).) Finally, I would
like to know what role, if any, the INS' 1995 asylum guidelines
recognizing gender-based persecution and the 1998 guidelines on the
persecution of children played in the INS' handling of these asylum
cases.
Senator Abraham. I am sure Senator Kennedy will also have a
statement, whether or not he is able to make the hearing today,
and we will enter any statements that members would like to be
part of the record.
I turn now to our Senator from Arizona, Senator Kyl. Thank
you for being here.
Senator Kyl. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I will just make a
brief comment. I think that both you and Senator Feinstein have
well summarized the frustration that we have experienced, the
hope that some kind of legislation like this for reorganization
will make a big difference. Certainly, Commissioner Meissner
and I have discussed a lot of the problems that we think might
be aided by reorganization, which frequently is not the answer
to problems, but in this case, as Senator Feinstein pointed
out, there has been such a growth in the problem and the
resources put against the problem on both the service side and
the law enforcement side.
You have a different situation today than you did in the
past, and that does suggest that some reorganization could be
very, very helpful here, and I suspect that the three of us and
Commissioner Meissner are in relative agreement on the kinds of
things that would be useful. So we are looking forward to her
testimony.
The only other thing I want to say, Mr. Chairman, is that I
think Senator Feinstein just made a very important point, and
that is we should recognize that the pressures here for illegal
immigration and legal immigration are immense, and whatever we
do in one area will result in reactions in another area. The
law of physics almost applies here. There is an equal and
opposite reaction when you apply pressure.
So, indeed, when we helped to close down the border near
San Diego, they came over to Arizona, and we are trying to deal
with them now. We have about a half-a-million apprehensions a
year just in this one segment, and you mentioned Douglas, AZ.
That is the Tucson sector, where Douglas is. Arizona is second
only to McAllen, TX, in the amount of marijuana seized, as
well, about a quarter-of-a-million pounds per year.
One of the things that I have stressed is the need for INS
to do its very best to adhere to the law that we passed, that
the President signed, that calls for certain actions, such as
the training and deployment of 1,000 agents per year, net, for
a period of 5 years. We know what works. It has been
tremendously beneficial to get those agents on the ground. I
think we can accept nothing less than our best effort and full
compliance with the statute.
I think sometimes it appears to me that INS is satisfied
with less than full compliance, but my constituents are clearly
not. I would hope that as we proceed here, that we continue to
focus on the requirements of the immigration law and use our
very best efforts to get the agents on the ground, and as
Senator Feinstein pointed out, to understand that we will need
technology, we will need inspectors, as well as Border Patrol
agents to solve this problem. We, again, know what works. We
can solve the problem if we make the commitment, and I hope
that the hearings that you will be conducting, Mr. Chairman,
and this legislation will help us focus on the problem so that
we can produce that necessary commitment.
Senator Abraham. Senator Kyl, thank you.
At this time, we will turn to Commissioner Meissner. We
welcome you. We are happy to have you here and look forward to
your testimony today. Commissioner.
STATEMENT OF HON. DORIS MEISSNER, COMMISSIONER, IMMIGRATION AND
NATURALIZATION SERVICE, U.S. DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE, WASHINGTON,
DC
Ms. Meissner. Thank you. Thank you very much. Mr. Chairman,
members of the subcommittee, I am very pleased to be here today
to discuss the critical issue of how the Nation best
administers its immigration policy and system as we prepare to
enter the next century.
In April 1998, this administration sent you a framework for
change through restructuring. Last summer, we sent you
legislation to endorse that change. And this July, we gave you
a detailed restructuring proposal for how that change could
work. I want to fundamentally change this agency and I want
your approval to move forward as soon as possible with the kind
of change that will lead to improved performance.
Realistically, restructuring would not become effective
until the next administration arrives. You, as members of the
subcommittee, are likely to be here at that time. I, of course,
will not. The reason I care about the issue is because I
believe, based on more than 20 years' experience in the
immigration arena, that we must have an immigration system that
is well positioned both to enforce our immigration laws
effectively and to continue our tradition of welcoming
immigrants in the years ahead.
Today's global society is challenging this Nation's
immigration system as never before, from unforeseen world
events, such as Hurricane Mitch in Central America, to
increasingly sophisticated human smuggling operations, to
dramatic changes in our immigration laws, and we can expect
more complex challenges ahead.
We have met these new challenges and goals head on and have
achieved significant successes, from gaining control of key
areas along the Southwest border, to fixing an asylum system
that was badly broken, to dismantling the largest, most complex
alien smuggling ring ever encountered by Federal authorities,
to removing a record number of criminal aliens for the fifth
straight year. And, from 1993 to 1998, 5.6 million immigrants,
more than the total in the previous 30 years combined, have
applied for citizenship. We have been able to congratulate 3.3
million of them as new U.S. citizens.
At the same time, I am all too aware of the problems that
we have. Despite real progress, I know that consistent,
courteous, and timely customer service is not uniformly
provided. Mission conflict at the local operational level can
impede accountability and the current bureaucratic chain of
command often leads to confusion in roles and hampers
efficiency.
Mr. Chairman, I believe that you and the committee know
that I have been working to solve these and many other
problems, but the next logical step is fundamental structural
change that will allow for a fuller transformation from a
strained structure designed for a different era to a modernized
structure equipped to meet the challenges of today and
tomorrow. We need Congressional action to accomplish it.
Mr. Chairman, the administration's proposal and the
legislation that you have introduced seek to address the
problems in very similar ways. Both represent bold, far-
reaching changes designed to provide for better customer
service and improved law enforcement. Both call for a clear
split between enforcement and services to provide better
results, improve accountability, and strengthen the management
of each of these important functions. And, both advocate
organizing these two distinct functions into separate chains of
command within the Department of Justice.
Most importantly, both provide for a single policy and
management official to be responsible for a new immigration
agency within which these interrelated missions are integrated.
This integration lies at the heart of any meaningful
restructuring and we strongly support a national integrated
structure.
While we share many ideas about the solutions, we also must
be wary of going too far with detail in legislation so that we
preserve some flexibility in the immigration system to meet
unforeseen challenges that are ahead.
I have included the administration's full proposal as part
of the record. It represents more than a year's work of
planning how a separation of enforcement and services would
actually work. Let me outline just a few of the key features.
The administration's proposal calls for fundamental change
by eliminating the current INS regional and district offices
where enforcement and service functions today are commingled
and creating two new mission-centered organizations that
replace them, one for immigration services, one for law
enforcement. Each would be headed by a senior-level executive
responsible for a distinct chain of command who would report to
a full-time presidentially-appointed official with
responsibility to manage immigration matters as one coherent
immigration system.
The proposed structure for one of the new chains of
command, immigration services, leverages the work that INS has
already begun in reengineering the naturalization program and
by establishing a newly-streamlined immigration services
division, along with a national customer service center, which
is expanding just this month. A new services structure would
establish a senior-level customer service advocate who would be
responsible for customer service training and problem
resolution.
Consolidate all remote operations, such as our telephone
service and card centers with newer efforts, such as the
availability of forms and other information on the Internet and
direct mail, so that our customers can get ready access to the
information that they need.
We would consolidate our asylum program with our overseas
refugee and humanitarian affairs programs and maintain the
current domestic asylum offices.
And we would expand upon the more than 120 new community-
based fingerprinting sites that we opened last year so that we
can provide our most customer-focused activities directly in
the communities that they serve.
With respect to our enforcement mission, the new structure
would integrate all enforcement operations, including
inspections, and consolidate domestic and international
enforcement programs within one chain of command so as to have
seamless enforcement between the border and interior locations
and more effectively coordinate such actions as the large
antismuggling operations we are seeing.
We would create community advisory panels at the national
and area levels to provide community input regarding
enforcement matters, and we would centralize the detention
program at the national level to support our enforcement
operations and to ensure uniform standards are followed and
consistent practices are utilized.
Because our approach to inspections differs from that in S.
1563, let me say a word about inspections. As our border
enforcement efforts become increasingly successful and the
smuggling of illegal aliens becomes more sophisticated, the
importance of immigration inspectors in our enforcement efforts
grows. Immigration inspectors, by virtue of their training,
duties, and responsibilities, and the hazards to which they are
exposed, are much more closely aligned with law enforcement
officers than with other types of government inspectors.
Inspectors conduct more than 500 million inspections every
year. The vast majority involve law-abiding individuals. At the
same time, our inspectors are increasingly at risk in
performing their functions. Because of our border enforcement
successes between the ports of entry, we are witnessing
increasing activity and sophistication of criminal
organizations that profit by the smuggling of people, drugs,
and other contraband, and are turning to vehicular inspections
lanes at the ports of entry, commercial airports, private
aircraft landing fields, and ship dockyards.
When an inspector is viewed as an enforcement official
charged with enforcing our Nation's immigration laws, it does
not mean that that individual loses the ability to treat others
with respect, nor loses the ability to apply the law fairly,
based on proper training. We ask for an analogous form of
balance from police officers on our streets, who are charged
with enforcing laws while exercising appropriate discretion in
carrying out their duties and serving the community with
respect, courtesy, and professionalism.
So while inspectors have various roles, including welcoming
visitors to the United States, facilitating commerce through
timely processing, and adjudicating immigrant claims, they all
compliment a core border enforcement role that inspectors
perform.
The integrated enforcement structure that we have proposed
is designed to meet the needs of a modern professional law
enforcement agency that can deal with the complexities of
immigration law and handle crimes that often extend far beyond
our boundaries, while also upholding the civil rights and the
courtesy due to all individuals with whom we come into contact.
Separate and apart from the integrating and coordinating
structure at the top of a new agency, our proposal would
provide for unified support operations that would handle
support needs such as records and a national file center,
training in human resource functions, automation, data support
and technology, and administrative support. The importance of a
unified, responsive support operations structure cannot be
overstated.
While immigration enforcement and services are separate
functions, they are inextricably linked and need to be managed
as part of an integrated structure under the leadership of one
full-time appointed official. This individual should be the
focal point of accountability and the policy voice for
immigration by being directly responsible and accountable for
both services and enforcement operations. In this way, the
Government can maintain the crucial balance between enforcement
and services that is needed for a coherent national immigration
policy and system and effective application of our immigration
laws.
We live in an era of large-scale immigration and increasing
international migration pressures. We need greater, not less,
cohesion and stronger consolidation and interaction among
functions in order to serve the broad public policy needs of
our time.
As you mentioned, how to organize immigration governance
has been debated for more than 100 years as a response to
problems in the immigration bureaucracy that transcend
particular administrations or historical periods. The
administration's proposal represents fundamental reform that
will strengthen the immigration system. We should not let the
frustrations we share lead us to weakening our institutions or
our ability to carry out our responsibilities that are mutually
reinforcing instead of being fundamentally incompatible.
Mr. Chairman, I am committed to change and I look forward
to working with you and other members of the Congress in moving
forward to restructure INS and reform our system in a manner
that best serves the Nation. Thank you, and I am very happy to
take your questions.
Senator Abraham. Commissioner, thank you very much. I just
would like to indicate that members of my staff and I
appreciate the working relationship that we have had and the
cooperation we have had with your office. As I said at the
outset, our goal here is to begin moving as constructively and
in a coordinated way with all parties to try to find solutions
to these problems.
We will begin the questioning with Senator Feinstein.
Senator Feinstein.
Senator Feinstein. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
Commissioner Meissner, let me ask you a question not quite
related to this bill but one that I have not been able to get
an answer to. Recently, I was visited by the former defense
minister of Colombia. He is the former commander of the
Colombian armed forces. What he said is that 40 percent of
Colombia is essentially now under the control of
narcoterrorists. He said that 300,000 people have fled the
country, 60,000 to the United States, and urged that they be
given refugee status when they come here because they faced
reprisal going back. He said that the narcoterrorists had
kidnapped 1,500 civilians, 250 soldiers, and 250 police
officer, and that it was a very serious situation in Colombia.
We tried then to verify that, that there were 60,000
refugees from Colombia, and nobody can give us an answer. Can
you?
Ms. Meissner. I would have to check the statistics on our
asylum application caseload. I am unaware that we have seen any
substantial spurts or increases in the filings of asylum
applications from Colombia. We, of course, have been very aware
of the precarious circumstances in that country and watch these
matters across the board, not only from Colombia, but other
countries. Certainly, we have----
Senator Feinstein. May I get an answer so that I----
Ms. Meissner. We will provide that to you. I think that
what generally happens in cases like this is that when there is
trouble like this in a country, often, people who have
multiple-entry visas to the United States or who have tourist
or business visas exercise that visa prerogative and wait to
see how the situation is developing.
So it would not be surprising that, on the one hand, there
has not been a substantial increase in the asylum caseload, but
on the other hand, there may be more Colombians here as
visitors than would typically be the case because they are
people that already had visas of one sort or another or
legitimately can obtain a visa to come to visit the United
States. So I would suspect that his use of the word ``refugee''
was very generic, as compared with the legal term that we would
use.
Senator Feinstein. This was that they fled for their lives.
He was making a plea that they be able to remain here because
he felt they would be killed if they went back. I am just
trying to find out to verify that.
Ms. Meissner. Right. We will----
Senator Feinstein. It seems to me that INS ought to be able
to verify it.
Ms. Meissner. Oh, yes. We have those figures. I just do not
have them with me.
Senator Feinstein. Could you provide them?
Ms. Meissner. Absolutely.
Senator Feinstein. Thank you very much. In recent years,
there has been a shortfall of funding for the adjudications
functions of INS, which include the adjudication of visa,
naturalization, and adjustment applications. At the same time,
the examinations fee account has been used for functions which
are not related to the processing of applications, such as
detention, enforcement activities, audits, and infrastructure
costs.
The current Senate version of the C-J-S appropriations bill
would transfer $49 million from the examinations fee account to
the Executive Office of Immigration and Review. Unlike the
House bill, S. 1563 attempts to deal with this issue by
providing a firewall to ensure that fees paid by applicants for
visa, adjustment, and naturalization services be spent on
services and not diverted to other uses.
Can you discuss the degree to which fees paid to the
examinations fee account are currently being used for purposes
other than providing services to applicants?
Ms. Meissner. Thank you, Senator. That is a very important
area. Let me first say that we strongly support the idea in S.
1563 of a firewall and of fees that are paid by applicants
going solely to processing of applications. That is what we
believe fees should be used for and that is a situation where
we are not able entirely in the current circumstances to
control how fees are used.
The Congress has assigned fee money to other than
processing purposes from time to time. Several years ago, the
Congress, indeed, assigned some of the penalty money for the
adjustment of status applications that a provision existed in
the law and assigned it for detention purposes. At the present
time, some of the fee money pays for the international affairs
program and for the asylum program, which are programs that do
not generate fees.
So the situation in which we find ourselves as an agency is
in having a shortage of the required funding to process
immigration applications because the entire fee receipts are
not devoted to processing. That funding should be protected and
some provision along the lines of S. 1563 would achieve that
purpose.
Senator Feinstein. And you believe the firewall currently
in the draft of S. 1563 is adequate, then?
Ms. Meissner. I believe that it is attempting to do what is
required. We can work on refining it, if need be. But it is
very important to protect those funds, and in addition to that,
I believe that it is important to allow for appropriated
funding of some kind for handling immigration applications.
There is both a private purpose for people that are applying
that is legitimate fee-based, but there is also a broader
public purpose served in timely adjudication of immigration
applications. So appropriations are valid here and we need to
be making capital investments that improve the system and that
should not entirely come from the fees.
Senator Feinstein. My time is up. Can I ask just one more
question?
Senator Abraham. Yes.
Senator Feinstein. S. 1563 contains a number of provisions
that would require the Attorney General to provide a process
for reviewing and acting upon various categories of
nonimmigrant and other petitions within specified time limits.
These include 30-day deadlines for some nonimmigrant petitions
and a 90-day processing deadline for adjustment of status
applications and immigrant visa petitions.
While it is questionable whether such statutory processing
deadlines are well-advised, it is important to note that there
are no such deadlines for processing naturalization
applications included in the bill. What do you think would be
the consequences if we included statutory deadlines for
processing these visas, naturalizations?
Ms. Meissner. I would not favor writing processing times
into legislation. I think that is an area where there needs to
be some flexibility and legislation is not the best way to
achieve the improvements that we all want in processing times.
Were we to be implementing the way it is written at the
present time, we would have to vastly increase the fees to
those applicants in order to meet that 30-day processing time
and we would be forced to apply our efforts to those
applications that are mentioned and not in other areas, such as
naturalization--actually, I cannot recall whether
naturalization is mentioned or not.
But I do think that we can achieve the same purpose or the
same objective that S. 1563 is trying to achieve by having the
Immigration Service's structure that is outlined in the bill,
that is very similar to what it is that the administration has
advocated, because it will allow for a total management focus
and expertise and efficiencies much greater than we have been
able to achieve to date, although I think we are showing that
we know how to do it by the work that we have done on
naturalization this year, and I believe that we need to have
clear customer service standards that establish accountability
for the agency and for others who are expecting their work to
be done by us and we are developing those customer service
standards.
With naturalization, for instance, the standard is 6 months
from filing to oath. We were there once a few years ago. Right
now, we are not. We have cut the time in half for processing
just in the last year. We are down to about 13 months----
Senator Feinstein. Can I stop you on just that one point,
because I would like the chairman and Senator Kyl to know that
we were having a little dust-up on this point earlier in my
office and you mentioned the Los Angeles office, where the
waits have been so long, has in the last year cut the waiting
time in half. I would just like to extend my commendation to
the regional director there and thank him for his good work in
that regard.
Ms. Meissner. He will be very happy to hear that, but it is
not just Los Angeles. We have cut the waiting time in half
across the country, and----
Senator Feinstein. In every office?
Ms. Meissner. In every office, we are running now an
average of 13 months, and a year from now, we will be back to
the 6 months. So that is an example of a standard, of a
customer service standard where we need to manage against the
standard and resource against the standard so that there is
consistency across the country. We are not where we want to be,
but it is our commitment to be there.
Senator Feinstein. I think that is real progress from where
we were. I just want to say thank you to everybody that made it
possible.
Ms. Meissner. Thank you.
Senator Abraham. Thanks. Senator Kyl.
Senator Kyl. Thank you. I have one question about the
legislation, which I will ask at the end, but first, let me
reiterate. I think none of us believe that reorganization is a
panacea. Much of it depends upon the commitment that I spoke of
earlier.
Two facts, and then three quick questions. No. 1, this
year, this fiscal year 1999, INS trained only one-half,
roughly, of the necessary agents, or the agents authorized
under the 1996 Act.
Fact No. 2, the administration asked for no funds to train
1,000 agents for fiscal year 2000.
The first question, will you submit a request for full
funding to train 1,000 agents in fiscal year 2000, when through
the regular budget process your requests are elicited from the
Department of Justice and OMB?
Ms. Meissner. The answer to that question is yes. That
process is already underway.
Senator Kyl. Thank you. Second, will you assure us that you
will do your best to recruit 1,000 agents next year with the
money that will be appropriated this year for that purpose?
Ms. Meissner. The answer is absolutely yes. We are doing
everything that we possibly can, including entirely redesigning
our recruitment system, and I would want to say that we have
more than doubled the size of the Border Patrol in 5 years with
strong support from the Congress. We have met our hiring and
training goals every single year in order to achieve that. This
year has been the anomaly because we have run up against a
very, very tight labor market and we are readjusting in an
effort to overcome those problems.
Senator Kyl. Part of that readjustment is to provide better
benefits, particularly for the line agents, the GSA Level 9
people who some of us have recommended should go to Level 11.
Would it be your intention to include sufficient funding for
that increase in salary for the bulk of those line personnel in
the fiscal year 1998 budget request?
Ms. Meissner. That is my objective.
Senator Kyl. And as I understand it, that is about a $50
million per year cost, more or less?
Ms. Meissner. It is in that neighborhood.
Senator Kyl. OK; one of the things that the legislation
does not do, but you have talked to me personally about, as I
understand it, in its current version, is to include the
inspector function under the enforcement responsibilities. It
is my understanding that you believe that it would be better
put in the enforcement side rather than the service side of the
equation. If that is correct, could you explain your reasons
for that?
Ms. Meissner. That is correct. It is the fact that
inspections represent, as much as anything in the Service, the
mixture of our responsibilities that have to do both with
enforcement and with granting of benefits. However, inspections
is more, we believe today, like an enforcement function than
ever before. It is a critical piece of our border efforts.
Everything that we have done, and you and Senator Feinstein
are particular witnesses to this on the Southwest border,
everything that we have done to improve the effectiveness of
the Border Patrol has been done in coordination with the ports
of entry. We actually have increased our inspections staffing
at the Southwest border more steeply than our Border Patrol
staffing.
That is an underknown fact, but there has been more than a
100-percent increase of inspectors at the Southwest border over
the course of the last 4 to 5 years in this buildup and that is
because we recognized from the very outset that the two, as you
said, action-reaction. One action creates a reaction. Whatever
you do to tighten and improve between the ports has an effect
of increased pressures at the ports. So that effort at
connection and coordination is extremely important.
In addition to that, over the longer term, technology will
be increasingly helpful to us where legal crosses are
concerned, technology in terms of identity cards, advance
passenger lists that we now get from the airlines which we can
check against our databases before the airplanes even land at
JFK, so we know as the people get off the plane who is lawful
and who we need to pull aside. Advances in that arena lead us
to believe that, increasingly, our inspectors will be focusing
their efforts and their expertise on problems, on criminals and
other kinds of threats at our ports of entry, and they will be
able to facilitate the legal flows through a variety of other
means.
So we do think that although inspectors will always carry
out both enforcement and service functions, they need to be
handled from a management and occupational standpoint as part
of an enforcement chain of command.
Senator Kyl. Mr. Chairman, that is my predilection on this
issue, as well. It is difficult, because you have both service
and enforcement responsibilities. One of the things that all
three of us, I know, have focused on is the desire to make it
easier for proper access to the United States through ports of
entry, to reduce the long delays that are occasioned at the
ports of entry. We need to work with Customs in this regard, as
well. But it seems to me that, for the reasons that the
Commissioner pointed out, we might want to at least look at
that section of the legislation with her comments in mind.
Thank you for your testimony, Commissioner Meissner. Thank
you, Mr. Chairman.
Senator Abraham. Thanks, Senator Kyl.
In that we have had both the chance yesterday to talk at
some length and because your statement was very comprehensive,
I am going to have only a limited number of things to add,
really, to our previous discussions.
One of the things I did want to talk about, though, is on
the delays issue. My experience in the last couple of years has
been that for everybody who is in a line delayed somewhere are
ten friends and relatives who somehow have our phone number.
They have your phone number, too, I suspect. It is probably,
more than almost anything, what we in Congress certainly get
feedback about.
Lately, there has been an increased level of concern
focused on reports both in my State as well as elsewhere in the
country that in some service centers, delays for green card
processing are backing up dramatically, sometimes in excess of
a year and a half, which seems like an extremely long period of
time. I am wondering if we have the same sort of physics factor
involved here that Senator Kyl referred to and that you have
referred to. And that we have moved in the direction of
naturalization, and achieved perhaps some reductions in the
lines for that, in some service areas. Is that what is going on
here and prompting increases in waits in other types of areas?
Ms. Meissner. The issue with green cards is not actually a
question of producing the green card. We actually have a
wonderful technology that is working very well for the actual
production of the cards, but it is the adjustment of status
application that leads to the eligibility for the green card,
and the backlogs there have risen well beyond what we believe
is acceptable.
It is the case that in focusing on naturalization in the
way that we have over the last year, we have focused more
resources on the naturalization caseload than we had previously
and that has brought about some serious reductions in service
in other areas. It was a judgment that I felt needed to be made
and there was strong support in the Congress and elsewhere for
making that judgment, because even with the caseloads in other
application categories, the naturalization caseload was so
very, very large that it required that level of effort.
However, there is light in the tunnel. We are on track to
meeting and probably exceeding our naturalization production
goals this year. We have, as I said, cut the time in half. We
are well on our way to being able to get it back to the 6
months in another year and we will, therefore, next year,
although we will still be working very heavily on
naturalization, we will this coming fiscal year be able to
apply some additional resources to adjustment of status and to
some of these other case categories and begin to tame them, as
well.
Senator Abraham. I hope we can, and the purpose of today's
hearing is not to set the priority list in such a fashion that
we want to argue which line should be the shortest. I think all
of us clearly feel that somebody who is entitled to citizenship
ought to have the chance to be sworn in as soon as possible.
At the same time, I think it reflects the problem that you
confront, and I guess I want to just make a point. In trying to
set some kinds of parameters in legislation for reasonable
lengths of delay, perhaps we are reflecting, or at least we
have tried to reflect, what we are hearing, or at least what
this Senator is hearing and others who were involved in the
preparation of the legislation, from home, as well as in this
position I have from other parts of the country to some extent,
too.
The point is this. I think we, certainly as we move
forward, will determine or debate back and forth as we talked
yesterday whether or not some of these kinds of deadlines are
appropriate for legislation, but I hope we can move, and not
just under your leadership but I would hope in the future, as
well, after 2000 and after 2004 and so on, that we would have a
relationship with this agency, whatever it is called and
whatever its structure, that if the issue is trying to come up
with a service-friendly approach, that we debate what are the
resource requirements to get the job done.
I think Congress has the responsibility on the one hand to
try to set in motion a process that gets done in a reasonably
brief period of time, and if the agency, whatever it is called,
says, look, this is only feasible if there are either fee
increases or if there is another form of appropriated support,
we need to know that, too, and we need to work together.
We are trying here to tell people through this legislation
that the signal needs to be stronger that we are going to deal
with it. For instance, it is my understanding that in terms of
employment-based immigration petitions, that there are wide
variances between various service centers, that in the Vermont
and the Texas areas, those centers, the timeframe is in the
range of 2 months. But we are hearing in my State that the
Nebraska center is somewhere in the vicinity of 10 months. I do
not know, again, what accounts for those differences. I would
be happy to hear anything you might want to add on that.
But that is another part of it, that goes to the variances
between the areas, and the reason that we felt and feel some
need to put some kind of common standard out there so that
somebody who has got a 10-month track record and thinks that is
good enough maybe realizes it is not if there is legislation
that specifies that is not good enough.
Could you comment on those distinctions, because we are
curious in our area because we are hearing a lot of concerns.
Ms. Meissner. I think those are very fair points. I think
that the most important thing that this legislation can do to
address those points is to provide the machinery for a stable
funding base for the immigration services organization. The
funding base has to be protected, and this idea of firewalls
and the idea of fees along with some capability for
appropriated funding so that capital improvements in the
ability of the infrastructure of the agency to be able to do
this work in the most efficient way is very, very important.
Beyond that, things like the service centers where there
may be a 2-month or a 10-month delay, that is unacceptable.
That should not be the case. There should be a similar or same
level of service whether you live in Peoria or whether you live
in Miami.
So the customer service standards are the kinds of things
that should regulate that. There obviously has to be the
funding, but the management of it is important, too, and that
is why we have asked for these service centers and our national
resources to all be organized under one manager as part of that
immigration services organization rather than reporting
differentially, because those are our factories. Those are our
main production resources and that work needs to be calibrated
and made consistent and resources moved around among them, if
need be. You are always going to have some anomalies for maybe
a month or two if there is a spurt of applications, but there
does need to be that overall management that calls for
consistency.
The other thing that I do not know--I cannot recall whether
it is in your legislation or not, but the other thing that
would be very important in services with fees coming in is that
there be some reprogramming authority, some percentage of
reprogramming authority that the agency could do itself when
additional fees come in without requiring Congressional
approval at every point. That is to say, I mean, for instance,
we just have a new requirement, temporary protective status,
that was decided after Hurricane Mitch. We have fees that we
have received to do those applications, but that increased
funding level that we have has not yet been approved
Congressionally and so we cannot spend those funds.
So a little bit of flexibility where expenditure is
concerned--5 percent, 10 percent has been recommended by the
National Association for Public Administration, for instance,
the National Academy--something like that in the legislation
would be very helpful.
Senator Abraham. Commissioner, thank you for that
suggestion, those comments, and for your participation. I want
to just, as I said at the outset, thank you for trying to
participate with us in a constructive way. There is obviously a
lot of work that needs to be done before legislation passes. I
am actually quite pleased that what I began talking about a
couple of years ago now seems to be, in one form or another,
maybe not in identical form, to be a subject on which there is
a sense of consensus developing, that the need to separate
functions is an important component in making things better.
We will look forward to working with you and maybe other
members. I will leave the record open, if other members have
questions they might want to submit in writing. But we do look
forward to working with you and your team as we move forward
with the legislative efforts on this side of the Capitol and
thank you very much for being with us today. We appreciate it.
Ms. Meissner. Thank you. We very much appreciate the
chance. Good bye.
Senator Abraham. Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Ms. Meissner follows:]
Prepared Statement of Doris Meissner
introduction
Thank you Mr. Chairman, Senator Kennedy and Members of the
Subcommittee. I am pleased to be here today to discuss the critical
issue of how best to reform our current immigration structure to
address current and future immigration challenges facing the nation.
In April 1998, this Administration sent you a framework for change
through restructuring, last summer we sent you legislation to endorse
that change, and this July, we gave you a detailed restructuring
proposal for how that change could work.
I want to fundamentally change this agency, and I want your
approval to move forward as soon as possible with the kind of change
that will lead to improved performance.
Some have asked me why I care about this issue and am working so
hard on it, since, realistically, restructuring would not become
effective until the next Administration arrives. Members of the
Subcommittee, you are likely to still be here in 2001--I will not. My
only stake in the restructuring debate--based on more than 20 years'
experience in the immigration arena--is to try to achieve an
immigration system that is best positioned both to enforce our
immigration laws effectively and to continue our tradition of welcoming
immigrants in the years ahead.
Today's global society is challenging this nation's immigration
system as never before--from unforeseen world events such as Hurricane
Mitch in Central America to increasingly sophisticated human smuggling
operations to dramatic changes in our immigration laws. And we can
expect more complex challenges ahead.
We have met these new challenges and goals head on and have
achieved success in many areas. Let me mention just a few.
INS has had the greatest success in enforcement, particularly at
the border, where we have used new resources to address longstanding
enforcement challenges.
A prime example is our Southwest border enforcement strategy where
we have achieved more in the past five years than has been done in
decades. Five years ago, we developed a comprehensive multi-year
Southwest border strategy with a clearly defined goal of deterring
illegal migration, drug trafficking and alien smuggling, while
facilitating legal migration and commerce.
To help us meet our goal, Congress provided funding for
unparalleled growth in personnel and resources. We have doubled the
number of Border Patrol agents, which stands at more than 8,000 today,
and have supported them with state-of-the-art force-multiplying
equipment and technology. And we have seen results.
Today, we have achieved considerable success in restoring integrity
and safety to much of the Southwest border, thereby improving the
quality of life in border communities. Operation Rio Grande is just one
recent example of how successful deterrence works. After a concentrated
effort to gain control of the border in South Texas and New Mexico was
initiated in August 1997, apprehensions in Brownsville declined by 35
percent in fiscal year 1998. This mirrors the decline in criminal
activities that have accompanied INS border operations in other areas
such as in Nogales and Laredo, and in San Diego, where the success of
Operation Gatekeeper resulted in an 18-year low in apprehensions in
fiscal year 1998. And, as the Southwest border strategy takes hold in
high traffic areas and leads to increased border activity in new
locations, such as the areas of Arizona recently affected, we will
respond with the same comprehensive enforcement operations to achieve
similar success.
To complement the work along the border between the ports of entry,
we have worked closely with other federal agencies to enhance our
enforcement efforts at the ports while at the same time facilitating
legal migration and commerce. Our target has been to achieve a less
than 20 minute wait in our port of entry traffic lanes at least 80
percent of the time. From October 1998 to May 1999, we met this goal 96
percent of the time and we continue to build on this success at all
ports of entry.
Complementing this enhanced border management is an effective
approach to combating illegal immigration in the nation's interior. We
have now developed and begun to implement a new interior enforcement
strategy focused on the investigation of human smuggling, human rights
abuses, and other criminal violations. Last November, we announced the
dismantling of the largest, most complex smuggling ring ever
encountered by federal authorities. It smuggled more than 10,000 people
into the United States, with organizers grossing nearly $200 million.
We have also been successful at keeping pace with record numbers of
criminal and illegal aliens coming through the system. For the fifth
consecutive year, INS removed a record number of criminal and other
aliens in fiscal year (fiscal year) 1998, reflecting the agency's
continuing commitment to ensuring that illegal immigrants are not only
caught, but also removed from the country.
From fiscal year 1993 to fiscal year 1998, criminal alien removals
increased by 98 percent, from 27,825 to 55,211. Such record removals
and increased resources have helped INS deal with the fastest growing
detention population within the Department of Justice. In fiscal year
1998, alone, INS expanded its detention capacity by 33 percent, or
4,000 beds for an end of year total of 16,000 beds, which supported the
detention of more than 160,000 individuals who spent some time in INS
custody.
Success has not been limited to our enforcement function. We are
also beginning to see improvement in the provision of immigrant
services as a result of recent funding and our reengineering efforts.
Our top priority in the provision of these services has been
revitalizing the nation's citizenship program in its entirety. In
fiscal year 1998, we opened more than 120 new fingerprinting sites in
immigrant communities across the country, implemented additional
quality assurance procedures to ensure integrity which repeated outside
audits have validated, and expanded access of our customers to
information that they need.
During this comprehensive effort to overhaul the entire
naturalization process, we have maintained as our number one focus the
reduction of the backlog of pending naturalization applications. With
the new staff that we have brought aboard and the continued
improvements in our conversion to automated processes, we have moved
ahead in meeting the very ambitious goals that we have set in
naturalization for this year. During fiscal year 1999 through July, INS
completed more than 942,910 naturalization applications, a 102 percent
increase over the same period in fiscal year 1998. We have also reduced
the time required to process a naturalization application from 28
months at the beginning of fiscal year 1999 to an expected 12 months by
the end of September.
Indeed, from 1993-1998, 5.6 million immigrants--more than the total
in the previous 30 years combined--applied for citizenship. We have
been able to congratulate 3.3 million of them as new United States
citizens.
The significant progress that we have made on these and other
longstanding problems demonstrate that we can achieve results given the
proper resources and a truly coordinated approach.
However, I am all too aware of the problems that we have at INS.
Consistent, courteous and timely customer service is not uniformly
provided. Mission conflict at the local operational level often impedes
accountability, and the current bureaucratic chain of command hampers
efficiency.
I assure you that I am and have been working to solve these and
other problems, but I cannot fully succeed without the necessary
structural changes that will result in a true and meaningful
transformation--from a strained structure designed to deal with the
smaller and more manageable workload of yesterday to a modem system
equipped to meet the challenges of today and tomorrow.
Restructuring alone will not solve all of our problems but it will
better position us to solve many by providing the core framework for
administering the nation's--immigration policy in the most effective
manner possible. Restructuring will provide us with the tools necessary
to achieve comprehensive change across the board, from our operational
structure to the culture of our organization. It is the next step in
our ongoing institutional reform.
I am committed to fundamental change that will bring about true,
meaningful reform as quickly as possible, and I want to work with
Congress to achieve these reforms.
The INS must change and will change. Therefore, the question before
us is how to change the current immigration system to ensure that this
change will improve the immigration system so as to meet tomorrow's
challenges and not undermine the significant progress we have made.
And the time could not be better. We have a new workforce eager and
ready to embrace the structural change that will allow them to perform
more effectively and foster the new culture of customer-oriented
professional service.
Fortunately, I believe we share most core restructuring principles
and structural solutions. This is critical, for we must work together
to lay the foundation of the immigration system that will last far
beyond this Administration and this Congress into the next century.
I know that we cannot succeed without your help and support and I
look forward to reaching a final plan together.
Before discussing the Administration's proposal, let me briefly
share with you the extensive research and work we have done to bring us
to where we are today.
administration process
As you may know, two years ago, Congress asked the Attorney General
and I to report back on the 1997 proposal that the Commission on
Immigration Reform (CIR) prepared calling for structured changes in the
nation's immigration system. The Administration's review of the CIR
recommendations led to a proposal for a new framework for improving INS
which I shared with you last spring.
As you may recall, the Administration's Framework for Change set
forth a high level structure that fundamentally changes our immigration
system to the core. It preserves one coherent immigration system while
building a strengthened law enforcement operation and a new service-
oriented organization by splitting enforcement and services functions
into two distinct chains of command.
Since April 1998, INS has worked on providing the detail that
illustrates how the INS' organizational structure would look and
operate beneath the framework. In September 1998, INS formed a
restructuring team in the Commissioner's Office, and hired a nationally
renowned consulting firm, PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC), to provide
design support and best practices from other public and private
organizations.
The Restructuring team's internal planning has been extensive and
has drawn upon input from both field and headquarters staff.
Through a PwC stakeholder advisory board as well as through
specific briefings, the Restructuring team also engaged in extensive
consultations with INS external stakeholders, ranging from community-
based organizations to trade and international business organizations
to other government and law enforcement agencies. Regular meetings with
staff from the Department of Justice, the Office of Management and
Budget (OMB), the White House, and Congress have been ongoing to gain
input and ideas.
To apply successful lessons from structures of relevant
organizations for benchmarking purposes, the team extensively
researched other federal law enforcement and service providing
agencies, including selected state agencies and private corporations.
INS senior management and Administration reviews of this work have
led to the detailed proposal, which I would now like to discuss with
you.
administration proposal
Let me begin by saying that the Administration's proposal and the
legislation you recently introduced Senator Abraham, S. 1563, seek to
address the same longstanding problems and share very similar
structural solutions.
Both the Administration's proposal and S. 1563 represent bold, far-
reaching, non-status quo reform geared toward providing better customer
service and improved law enforcement.
Both call for a clear split between enforcement and services to
provide better results, improve accountability, and strengthen
management of each function. And both advocate putting these two,
distinct functions into separate chains of command, keeping them within
the Department of Justice.
Most importantly, both provide for an integrated structure to
coordinate these interrelated missions. The integration of these
missions lies at the heart of any restructuring and we strongly support
a national coordinating structure.
While we share many structural solutions, we must also be wary of
going too far with detail in legislation so that we preserve the
flexibility of the immigration system to meet the unforeseen challenges
ahead.
The Administration's proposal achieves each of the four primary
goals that we identified at the beginning of our effort.
First, the proposal strengthens accountability by providing clear,
separate chains of command for immigration services and enforcement
from the top of the agency to each local manager so that these managers
can be held accountable for performance and results in their area of
expertise.
Second, the proposal helps achieve a culture change in customer
service by providing for structural features such as remote servicing
offices and for full-time positions devoted solely to ensuring
consistent, courteous, accurate and timely service.
Third, the proposal builds a seamless enforcement structure that
supports all enforcement activities at and between ports of entry and
in the nation's interior.
Finally, and most importantly, the proposal ensures a coherent
immigration system for the nation that enforces the laws at the border
and in the interior as well as serves the immigrant community.
The Administration's proposed new immigration structure represents
fundamental reform. In the current organization, managers and employees
are frequently required to reconcile conflicting priorities at the
expense of one or the other of the agency's immigration services and
law enforcement missions. This proposal calls for radically
transforming the current structure by creating two new mission-centered
organizations--one for immigration services and one for law
enforcement--each with a distinct chain-of-command but within one
coherent immigration system.
The three INS regional and thirty-three district offices that have
increasingly struggled with dual mission responsibilities would be
eliminated and replaced with area and local offices organized in
networks focused around either immigration service delivery or law
enforcement.
immigration services
The proposed structure for Immigration Services (IS) builds upon
the work that INS has already begun in its comprehensive overhaul of
its benefit-granting mission in providing new customer service as
reflected in the streamlined Immigration Services Division and the
National Customer Service Center. The new structure is designed to
achieve a culture change that will make Immigration Services a model of
customer service.
Specifically, the new structure would establish a senior executive
manager for Immigration Services who would be the head of the new
Immigration Services chain of command and skilled in service delivery.
Working with an integrated program staff organized according to
specific services--family, business and trade, resident and status, and
citizenship--this executive would be responsible for INS' immigration
services mission and would be held solely accountable for results.
Much like the Ombudsman position proposed in S. 1563, the proposal
establishes a senior level Customer Service Advocate who reports
directly to the head of Immigration Services to promote customer
service throughout the agency. The Advocate would have the
responsibility of ensuring that customers are treated fairly and
courteously in a timely manner in local offices throughout the country.
We would reinforce this newly institutionalized culture of customer
service by having a national point for customer service training, the
conducting of annual customer satisfaction surveys, and problem
resolution.
The proposal eliminates a layer of management and creates
geographic operational areas headed by directors who would report
directly to the head of Immigration Services. We have ensured that the
new areas are based on such factors as the location of immigrant
communities to better reach and serve our customers. In addition, each
of the new geographic areas contains one of the metropolitan areas that
are among those with the largest volume of applications so as to better
manage the workload for more timely and accurate processing. These Area
directors would oversee all local immigration services offices within
their area and ensure quality, timely management of adjudications
workloads as well as consistent decision-making. With clear single
mission demands, the Area directors can be held directly accountable
for achieving timely performance and customer service standards within
their areas. We believe that this is a more sound approach and will
achieve the results we all seek rather than specifically setting out in
legislation deadlines for processing.
To maximize direct service for our customers, the proposal would
build upon existing offices that locate the most customer focused
activities--fingerprinting, information, problem resolution, testing,
adjudication services--directly in the communities to eventually
establish additional local immigration offices that would report,
through Area directors, to the head of Immigration Services.
In addition, the proposal would build upon the gains we have made
in using economies of scale to improve service such as in the provision
of remote services to our customers. The proposal would consolidate all
remote operations--telephone, service, and card centers--under one
director that would report to the Immigration Services executive. This
director would be held accountable for these operations critical to a
modem customer service organization.
Finally, we recognize the importance of adequate funding for
services. We want to work with the Committee to ensure that fees are
applied to processing applications which generated the fees, and to
create a source of support for major immigration services projects and
investments so as to lessen the need to rely on fee revenue exclusively
for major expenditures.
enforcement
To effectively enforce the nation's immigration laws, the new
structure integrates all existing enforcement functions under one new
chain of command. This chain is divided into geographic enforcement
areas across the country based on workload and enforcement priorities
such as anti-smuggling routes, and headed by law enforcement
professionals responsible for monitoring performance and ensuring
compliance with standard agency-wide policies and procedures. The
proposal removes a layer of middle management so that the area heads
report directly to the head of enforcement. This direct chain of
command and full integration will allow enforcement area directors to
allocate resources in response to rapid changes in criminal and illegal
activities.
This full integration under one enforcement head will help address
many difficulties we presently encounter in our enforcement efforts and
will facilitate seamless law enforcement from the nation's borders to
its interior. With one person in charge of enforcement, the structure
will enhance coordination with other law enforcement agencies on
comprehensive border control strategies and strengthen the ability to
pursue illegal activities that cross geographic boundaries. And, with
the enhanced coordination between and among ports, and with other INS
enforcement entities, the ability to identify and break large-scale
criminal enterprises will increase.
As our border enforcement efforts become even more successful and
the smuggling of illegal aliens become more sophisticated, we cannot
overlook the importance of immigration inspectors in our enforcement
efforts. One of the places where we differ with S. 1563 is with the
placement of the inspections function. The Administration believes that
inspectors are an integral part of INS enforcement mission, and while
acknowledging the multi-faceted role they serve, we believe there are
compelling reasons for keeping inspectors in the enforcement chain of
command.
Immigration inspectors, by virtue of their training, duties and
responsibilities, and the hazards to which they are exposed, are much
more closely aligned with law enforcement officers than with other
types of Government inspectors. While inspectors perform crucial
adjudicative functions as well, the primary reason for placing
inspectors at ports of entry is to serve both as a deterrent and to
enforce U.S. immigration laws which have increasingly involved criminal
sanctions. In carrying out these apprehensions and detentions,
inspectors use authorities given them by Congress which are
characteristic of law enforcement officers.
Inspectors facilitate the entry of over 500 million people to the
United States every year. In fiscal year 1997 alone, inspectors
apprehended more than 184,000 criminal aliens and originated 24,445
criminal prosecution cases. Additionally, they detained approximately
500,000 applicants who subsequently were not admitted to the United
States.
And these inspectors are increasingly at risk in performing this
law enforcement function. As a result of our border enforcement
successes in between the ports-of-entry, we are witnessing increasing
activity and sophistication of criminal organizations that profit by
smuggling people, drugs, and other contraband through vehicular
inspections lanes at the ports-of-entry, commercial airports, private
aircraft landing fields, and ship dockyards. The competition to funnel
illegal aliens, drugs and contraband through these traditional entry
points has resulted in increased violence as well. As part of their
daily routine, inspectors must subdue belligerent applicants, persons
resisting arrest, and persons attempting to flee when they realize they
have become suspects during an interrogation at a port-of-entry.
When an inspector is charged with enforcing our nation's
immigration laws, it does not mean that that individual loses the
ability to treat others with respect nor loses the ability to apply
immigration law fairly based on their extensive training. We ask for
the same type of balance in charging police officers on the street with
enforcing the laws while at the same time exercising appropriate
discretion in carrying out their duties and serving the community with
the proper respect, courtesy, and professionalism. While different in
their duties, both are charged with more than just an expanded
enforcement mission.
In short, while inspectors have various roles--whether welcoming
visitors to the U.S., facilitating commerce through timely processing,
or adjudicating immigrant claims--these all complement the fundamental
enforcement role they serve.
Recognizing the exponential increase in the demand for detention
space, the Administration's proposal would centralize the detention
program at the national level to provide for better management of
limited detention bed space. The proposal also recognizes our increased
dependence upon the use of contracted beds to meet our detention
responsibilities. As a result, the proposal provides for a national
structure that ensures that uniform standards are followed, consistent
practices are utilized, and INS and contracted facilities are monitored
to ensure that every INS detainee is afforded the same protections and
rights guaranteed by law.
Of special concern are those individuals who are detained while
seeking asylum. Clearly, it is not in our interest to detain asylum
seekers whose eligibility for asylum can be clearly established in the
course of a credible fear interview. The Administration proposal will
build on current INS efforts to address the unique situation of such
asylum seekers. Structurally, the Administration proposal would
maintain the current domestic asylum offices and consolidate the
asylum, refugee, and humanitarian affairs programs in immigration
services. Detention would be treated as a separate entity in the
enforcement chain.
The proposal also creates Community Advisory Panels at the national
and area levels to provide community input regarding enforcement
operations, to institutionalize a forum for public involvement, and to
foster better community relationships and cooperation. This will ensure
that senior management directly hear from the community as they make
operational decisions, and will better educate our personnel in the
field of the concerns unique to a particular community as they carry
out an enforcement mission.
In short, the proposed integrated enforcement structure is designed
to meet the needs of a modern, professional law enforcement agency that
can manage the complexities of immigration law and crimes that often
extend far beyond our boundaries while upholding the civil rights of
all individuals.
support structure
Separate and apart from the coordinating structure at the top, the
Administration's proposal, like S. 1563, provides for a unified support
operations structure that would handle support needs such as a records
and national file center, training and human resource functions,
automation, data support and technology, and administrative support.
The importance of a unified, responsive support operations
structure cannot be overstated.
Just taking into account the millions of records alone that we
handle, we do not believe our daily business can be done without a
support structure dedicated solely to meeting the needs of both
enforcement and services chains of command. Currently, we maintain more
than 25 million immigrant files. Each contains the documentation
required to ascertain an individual's immigration history with the
United States, including both enforcement and benefit matters. These
files must be complete and must be readily available whether to an
adjudicator in Immigration Services or an investigator in Enforcement
Operations.
The Service's chronic problems surrounding ``lost'' files are
finally being addressed with the opening of an automated, centralized
National File Center in November. A new structure needs to strengthen
these long overdue improvements and I believe our proposal does just
that.
coordination
Most significantly, both the Administration's proposal and S. 1563
recognize the need for an overall integrating structure managed by one
full-time, senior appointed official who will be the policy voice for
immigration and directly responsible and accountable for both
immigration services and enforcement operations. This would allow the
government to maintain the crucial balance between the inextricably
linked immigration enforcement and immigration services that is needed
for a coherent national immigration policy and system and effective
application of immigration law.
For instance, the nation's immigration laws determine the legal
status of all non-citizens in the United States. The laws outline how
those who are here unlawfully can obtain legal status and how those
here legally can lose that status. Because these processes are
intertwined in statute and practice, assigning them to separate
entities with no coordination would fragment and weaken the
government's ability to fairly and effectively administer immigration
laws.
And, in this day of rapidly changing events that can play out
before the world in real time, a single voice for United States
immigration policy that can respond-quickly and decisively on
immigration matters is critical.
That is why we would establish a structure with one person
reporting to the Attorney General and the Deputy Attorney General with
a number of functions at the national level in such critical areas as
legal representation, policy, financial management, professional
responsibility and review, and Public Affairs and Congressional
Relations, yet still provides for complete separation of enforcement
and services from national offices down to the field offices. And, to
ensure accountability and policy consistency, we believe this official
should be the only Senate-confirmed appointee in the immigration
system.
The need for broad-level overarching coordination is also important
in ensuring that what would be a relatively small Immigration Services
organization receives the priority and resources necessary to do its
job within the larger law enforcement missions of the Department of
Justice. We believe that one chief financial officer will best help
facilitate proper resource coordination.
Separate and apart from high-level integration, operational
coordination is also key and must be accounted for in separating the
two missions into two chains of command. Let me use just one key
example.
And, as I alluded to earlier, as INS has increased its enforcement
effectiveness in its border control, interior enforcement and criminal
alien removals, there has been a corresponding increase in the number
of individuals resorting to fraudulent means to enter and remain in the
United States. Stopping benefit fraud requires close coordination
between enforcement and services.
On a daily basis, INS adjudicators in service centers and local
offices review thousands of applications and other supporting
documents. In the course of their adjudication work, they often detect
suspected fraudulent documents and suspect applications. The service
centers and local offices refer suspect applications and petitions to
the appropriate district office for analysis and consideration for
investigation. Immigration Services employees also develop general
intelligence information about patterns of fraud and possible groups or
individuals involved.
INS Special-Agents working with the service center or local office
review the information referred by immigration services employees. Once
an investigation is initiated, special agents complete all necessary
fieldwork on the case through prosecution if necessary, and report the
results to the appropriate immigration services office for completion
of the adjudication action. Special agents and intelligence analysts
also compile intelligence information from various service centers and
local offices into plans containing strategies and tactics to maximize
future investigations of benefit fraud.
Benefit fraud investigations and resulting fraud reduction efforts
would suffer from constant challenges and competing priorities if the
two interrelated missions were completely split.
In short, the Administration proposal carefully balances the need
to eliminate potential mission conflict at the day-to-day operational
level while recognizing that the missions are complementary and both
must be considered where immigration policy and the national interest
are involved. I urge the Subcommittee to ensure that final
restructuring legislation includes this vital integrating structure.
conclusion
We live in an era of large-scale immigration and increasing
international migration pressures. We need greater, not less, cohesion
and stronger consolidation and interaction among functions, in order to
serve the broad public policy needs of our time.
How to organize immigration governance has been debated for more
than 100 years as a response to problems in the immigration bureaucracy
that transcend particular administrations or historical periods. This
Administration's proposal represents fundamental reform that will
strengthen the immigration system. We should not let the frustration we
share lead us to weaken our institutions and our ability to carry out
responsibilities in both enforcement and benefit-granting that are
mutually reinforcing, not fundamentally incompatible.
Mr. Chairman, I look forward to working with you and other members
of Congress in moving forward to restructure INS to bring much needed
reform to our immigration system in a manner that best serves the
nation. Thank you.
Senator Abraham. We will now invite our second panel to
come forward to join us. Our second panel will consist of Chief
Paul Berg, who is the chief of the Chief Patrol Agents
Association and chief of the Del Rio Sector of the U.S. Border
Patrol; Mr. Warren Leiden, who is a partner with the law firm
of Berry, Appleman and Leiden, who will be testifying on behalf
of the American Immigration Lawyers Association; Mrs. Rachel
Yoskowitz, Director of Immigration and Citizenship Services
with Jewish Family Service of Detroit, MI; and we will also
hear from T.J. Bonner, who is president of the National Border
Control Council; and finally, from Mr. Richard Gallo, who is
the national president of the Federal Law Enforcement Officers
Association.
We welcome all of you. We have, obviously, a fairly busy
panel or large panel here today, so I am going to have the
clock more rigidly enforced on this go-around. For those of you
unfamiliar with it, it is basically a 5-minute clock which
alerts the witnesses at the 4-minute point with the orange
light and at the 5-minute point with the red light. We are
usually pretty flexible about letting folks finish thoughts
that are in progress at that point, but we will, of course,
include everybody's complete statement for the record if it
would be longer than that.
Thank you all for being here. We will start with you, Mr.
Berg. Thank you for being here.
PANEL CONSISTING OF PAUL M. BERG, CHIEF, DEL RIO SECTOR, U.S.
BORDER PATROL, AND CHIEF, CHIEF PATROL AGENTS ASSOCIATION, DEL
RIO, TX; WARREN R. LEIDEN, BERRY, APPLEMAN AND LEIDEN, SAN
FRANCISCO, CA, ON BEHALF OF THE AMERICAN IMMIGRATION LAWYERS
ASSOCIATION; RACHEL S. YOSKOWITZ, DIRECTOR, IMMIGRATION AND
CITIZENSHIP SERVICES, JEWISH FAMILY SERVICE METRO DETROIT,
DETROIT, MI; T.J. BONNER, PRESIDENT, NATIONAL BORDER PATROL
COUNCIL, CAMPO, CA; AND RICHARD J. GALLO, NATIONAL PRESIDENT,
FEDERAL LAW ENFORCEMENT OFFICERS ASSOCIATION, NORTHPORT, NY
STATEMENT OF PAUL M. BERG
Mr. Berg. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Chairman Abraham,
Senator Kennedy, and members of the subcommittee, I am pleased
to have the opportunity to talk to you today about the impact
of the proposed INS Reform and Border Security Act of 1999.
The Chief Patrol Agents Association, which consists of over
190 top field managers, firmly believes that both immigration
enforcement and immigration services are critically important
to our Nation's sovereignty and those to whom we provide
service.
The problems with the existing system have been caused by
the complexity and diversity of the two competing missions of
the Immigration and Naturalization Service. On one hand, you
have an agency responsible for adjudicating the various
immigration benefits, applications for those seeking to legally
immigrate to the United States, and most importantly, the
vesting of U.S. citizenship to those eligible and deserving of
such. Divergently, enforcement elements deal with people who
try to circumvent the legal immigration system or violate their
status after admission.
The largest of these enforcement elements is the U.S.
Border Patrol, which is tasked with protecting our borders.
Last fiscal year, the Border Patrol apprehended 1.5 million
illegal entrants and seized nearly $1.9 billion worth of
narcotics. Those figures will probably be equaled this fiscal
year.
The other enforcement element, consisting of intelligence,
investigations, and detention/deportation, are essential to
immediate border control, as well as an effective interior
enforcement strategy. There is also a vital immigration
inspection force that ensures those entering the United States
through the ports of entry have the proper documentation and
have the legal authority to be here. The management of such
diverse activities by one person leads to an adverse
competition for resources.
Historically, budget allocations for the enforcement
element serve as a funding mechanism for the support services
and benefits programs. When there are shortages in those areas,
funds for enforcement, equipment, and enhancements, including
personnel, often are redirected.
Congress fully intended to improve the efficiency of the
INS, as evidenced by the record budgets over the past 5 fiscal
years. Yet, the agency has fallen short in accomplishing the
objectives mandated by Congress. Shortages of personnel and
technology continue to exist.
As you can see from my prepared statement, the priorities
of a law enforcement agency are drastically different from a
benefits-providing agency. What we presently have is similar to
expecting one manager to oversee the operations of the Federal
Bureau of Investigation and the Social Security system at the
same time.
The chain of command for the enforcement side of INS is
extremely dysfunctional. As chief patrol agent for the Del Rio
Sector, my immediate operational supervisor is not within the
Border Patrol but is the central regional director. The chief
of the Border Patrol at INS headquarters is not even in the
chain of command.
In reviewing all the enforcement divisions within the
Department of Justice, we are the only agency organized in this
nonfunctional management structure. For optimum efficiency, the
functions and management of the enforcement elements must be
structured similar to a large metropolitan police department.
The proposed legislation will allow the directors of the
two bureaus to concentrate their efforts on making a system
that is efficient, to remain focused on very complex missions,
and they will be independently accountable. At the same time,
the Associate Attorney General for Immigration Affairs can
ensure coordination between the two immigration bureaus and
directly oversee immigration inspections at the port of entry.
We must stop illegal entry into the United States and
remove those who have slipped through, remain, and work here
illegally. We must eliminate the incentive for people who risk
their lives at the hands of unscrupulous smugglers. The new
enforcement agency should be managed by career enforcement
officers with the expertise to enforce immigration law, much
like the FBI structure. A well-managed border will enhance our
national security and safeguard our immigration heritage, while
restoring our Nation's confidence in the integrity of its
sovereign border.
This cohesive strategy is essential to eliminate the
negative impact of unimpeded illegal immigration on communities
not only in Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, and California, but in
places such as Detroit, Boston, and other East Coast
destinations that draw illegal entrants not only from the
Southern border but from the Northern border, as well.
The Chief Patrol Agents Association believes the INS Reform
and Border Security Act of 1999, properly implemented, will
create an immigration enforcement bureau capable of properly
managing our borders and at the same time provide a coordinated
interior enforcement strategy. We would like to thank Chairman
Abraham and Senator Kennedy and Senator Hagel for introducing
this very important legislation.
Mr. Chairman, ranking member, and members of this
subcommittee, speaking now on behalf of all officers of INS and
especially for the agents of the U.S. Border Patrol, we are
proud to be serving our country and take pride in carrying out
the intent of the immigration laws passed by Congress. I thank
you for allowing me the opportunity to appear before you today
on behalf of the members of the Chief Patrol Agents Association
and I would be happy to answer any questions that you might
have.
Senator Abraham. Chief Berg, thank you very much. We all
appreciate your service. Again, we have a tendency here when we
focus on problems to perhaps convey the impression that there
is not a lot of respect and appreciation and admiration for the
folks who are on the front lines here. That is not certainly
our intention. I know Senator Kyl would like to comment on
that, too, before he leaves.
Senator Kyl. Mr. Chairman, I have a 3:30 appointment and I
have got to leave, but Paul Berg is already making a big impact
and we really appreciate all your help and the communication we
have had with you. Keep up the great work, and I apologize to
the rest of the panel. Thank you.
Senator Abraham. Thanks, Senator Kyl.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Berg follows:]
Prepared Statement of Paul M. Berg
Chairman Abraham, Senator Kennedy, and Members of the Committee, I
am pleased to have the opportunity to talk to you today about the
impact of the proposed ``INS Reform and Border Security Act of 1999''
on immigration enforcement operations.
The Chief Patrol Agents' Association, which consists of over 190
top field managers, firmly believes that both immigration enforcement
and immigration services are critically important to our nation's
sovereignty and those to whom we provide service. Each area requires
equal dedication and continuous management oversight.
The problems with the existing system have been caused by the
complexity and diversity of the two competing missions of the
Immigration and Naturalization Service--providing services to legal
immigrants and preventing the entry of individuals who attempt to enter
the United States illegally.
On one hand, you have an agency responsible for adjudicating the
various immigration benefit applications for those seeking to legally
immigrate to the United States. The immigration services functions
primarily deal with the paperwork and meticulous details that are
required to provide benefits within the immigration and nationality
laws passed by Congress.
The public is entitled to efficient and timely handling of
applications and issuance of immigrant and non-immigrant visas, and
most importantly the vesting of U.S. Citizenship to those eligible and
deserving of such.
Divergently, you have enforcement elements who deal with people who
try to circumvent the legal immigration system or who violate their
status after admission. The largest of these enforcement elements is
the U.S. Border Patrol.
The Border Patrol is the uniformed law enforcement element tasked
with protecting the border of our nation 24-hours-a-day, 7-days a week,
52-weeks a year. Last fiscal year, the Border Patrol apprehended 1.5
million people attempting to enter the country illegally; and seized
nearly 1.9 BILLION dollars of narcotics. Those figures will be equaled
this fiscal year. (See attached apprehension statistics.)
Supporting these enforcement elements are the offices of
intelligence, investigations, and detention and deportation. All the
aforementioned are essential to immediate border control as well as an
effective interior enforcement strategy.
We also have immigration inspectors at the ports of entry. The
inspectors have the dual function of facilitating the free flow of
commerce and persons through our land, sea and airport ports of entry,
as well as detecting malafide applicants for admission and interdicting
illegal contraband.
As you can see the management of such diverse activities by one
person leads to an adverse competition for resources. Historically,
budget allocations for the enforcement elements served as a funding
mechanism for the support services and benefits programs, when there
are shortages in those areas. Funds for enforcement equipment and
enhancements are redirected, when temporary increases in adjudicators
are needed.
Congress has initiated a commitment to improving the efficiency of
the Immigration and Naturalization Service as is evidenced by the
record budgets allocated to the agency over the past five fiscal years.
Yet the Agency has fallen short in accomplishing the objectives
mandated by Congress.
Naturalization application backlogs, unacceptable inspection
waiting times at ports of entry, poor investigation of fraudulent
applications for benefits, overstay of non-immigrants, as well as
shortages of personnel and technology continue to exist.
As you are aware, the operation of a law enforcement agency is
drastically different from the operation of a benefits providing
agency. What we presently have is similar to expecting one manager to
oversee the operations of the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the
Social Security System at the same time. While smaller in size, the
current INS requires the same diversity.
Additionally, the current system provides for a very disjointed
operation. The chain of command for the enforcement side of INS is
extremely dysfunctional. As Chief Patrol Agent for the Del Rio Sector,
my immediate operational supervisor is not the Regional Director for
Border Patrol, but, is the Central Region Director. The Regional
Director then reports to the Office of Field Operations at INS
Headquarters on all operational matters. The Chief of the Border Patrol
at INS Headquarters is not even in the chain of command.
In reviewing all the enforcement divisions within the Department of
Justice--FBI, DEA, Bureau of Prisons, U.S. Marshals Service and the
INS--we are the only agency organized in this non-functional management
structure.
To have an effective immigration law enforcement element, there is
a need for a very precise chain of command, with as few layers of
management as possible, and, with trained law enforcement people in
management functions.
For optimum efficiency, the functions and management of the
enforcement elements must be structured similar to a large metropolitan
police department, with adjustments for the national scale of the
immigration enforcement elements.
The proposed legislation--the ``INS Reform and Border Security Act
of 1999''--will provide the potential for effective management of the
Immigration Services and Immigration Enforcement activities. At the
same time it will place the immigration inspectors directly under the
Associate General for Immigration Affairs, and independent of the
immigration enforcement or services elements. This will place the
inspectors on the same level at the other agency inspectors at the
Ports of Entry.
The creation of two bureaus will allow the directors and the
Associate Attorney General to concentrate their efforts on making a
system that is efficient, to remain focused on the very complex
missions facing them, and they will be independently accountable.
The latter is something I know this committee is very concerned
with, and is important to our employers, the taxpayers. When tax-
dollars are allocated to hire 1,000 new employees, or to purchase
technology enhancements, it is important that the purchases be made for
these specific purposes, and the funds not be diverted to other
activities based on one person's conflicting mission priorities.
From the standpoint of the proposal for the Bureau of Enforcement
and Border Affairs, we believe the creation of the bureau will provide
a framework to properly enforce the immigration laws of this nation, at
the same time creating a separate bureau to better serve those wishing
to immigrate legally or seek benefits under immigration law.
As I have said previously, we must not only stop illegal entry into
the United States, but, we must remove those who have slipped through,
remain and work here illegally. We must ensure employers stop hiring
people who can not legally work in this country. We must remove the
incentive for people to risk their lives at the hands of smugglers who
are paid not only by those who are being smuggled, but also by
employers in search of cheap labor. We must be able to detect,
identify, and remove those who are threats to our society through
modern technology and the human resources required to effect the
removals.
This will require an enforcement agency structured much like the
FBI, with professional law enforcement officers in charge of each area
who know how to enforce immigration laws, as you have suggested in the
proposed legislation.
The Bureau of Enforcement and Border Affairs must be an agency with
the majority of its officers in the field where the enforcement takes
place, and with a very limited amount of management overhead. It must
take advantage of the latest technology to ensure the most efficient
use of its resources.
The proposed legislation would provide the framework for this
country to more effectively manage its borders, while improving the
services required to eligible persons. The Bill would bring the
National Border Patrol Strategic Plan, developed in 1994, nearer to
closure. The establishment of a Bureau of Enforcement would serve as
the bridge required to integrate a successful border control policy
with an effective interior enforcement strategy.
This cohesive strategy is essential to eliminate the negative
impact of unimpeded illegal immigration on communities not only in
Texas, New Mexico, Arizona and California, but, in places such as
Detroit, Boston and other east coast destinations, that draw illegal
entrants not only from the Southern Border but from the Northern Border
as well.
A well-managed border will enhance our national security and
safeguard our immigration heritage, while restoring our nation's
confidence in the integrity of its sovereign border.
The Chief Patrol Agent's Association believes the INS Reform and
Border Security Act of 1999, properly implemented, will create an
Immigration Enforcement Bureau capable of properly managing our
borders. We thank Chairman Abraham, Ranking Member Senator Kennedy and
Senator Hagel for introducing this very important legislation.
As stated, this Bill provides the framework. A detailed
implementation plan would be developed in a collaborative effort with
those impacted by this plan, internal and external customers,
community-based organizations, advocacy groups, other government and
law enforcement agencies, the Department of Justice and with the
members of Congress.
Mr. Chairman, and Members of this subcommittee, speaking on behalf
of all the employees and officers of the Immigration and Naturalization
Service, and especially the Agents of the U.S. Border Patrol, we are
proud to be serving our country and take pride in carrying out the
intent of the immigration laws passed by Congress.
I thank you for allowing me the opportunity to appear before you
today on behalf of the members of the Chief Patrol Agents' Association.
I now would be happy to answer any questions you might have.
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[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T8415.002
Senator Abraham. Mr. Leiden, welcome back. It is good to
have you again before one of our hearings. We appreciate it and
turn to you at this time.
STATEMENT OF WARREN R. LEIDEN
Mr. Leiden. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you to the
members of the committee for this opportunity to speak on
behalf of the American Immigration Lawyers Association. Our
nearly 6,000 members represent tens of thousands of U.S.
families and American businesses petitioning for immigrants, as
well as refugees and others seeking asylum. As you know, I was
a member of the Commission on Immigration Reform and I feel
like I have been studying the INS organization and
reorganization issue for over a decade.
Our association strongly supports S. 1563, the INS Reform
and Border Security Act, because the Immigration Service is no
longer succeeding at its dual mission of both enforcement and
adjudications. In particular, I would like to focus on the
adjudications function, which is suffering tremendously in the
last 2 years and is imposing both personal hardship on families
and economic hardship on businesses.
As has been mentioned, in the immigrant petitions, we see
adjudications taking longer than 10 months in both California
and Michigan and those two regions. Naturalization petitions
have almost come down to a year, but only very recently, and in
some areas are taking well longer than a year. Adjustment
applications are really not being adjudicated now. The few that
are trickling out are 18 months or longer, but adjustment and
other applications and requests for a service actions are
essentially halted right now and there is no real planned time
for adjudications to resume.
There are several reasons for this failure. First, I think
it is widely acknowledged that it just does not work any longer
to combine the conflicting missions of enforcement and
adjudications. They really have different missions, they
require different skills, and their professionals should have
different career paths.
Second, the development of the Immigration Service
management simply has not kept pace with the vast changes in
the law the last decade and the tremendous growth in the size
of the Immigration Service. Too many senior managers are
without expertise in leading large service operations, and for
many senior managers, their career path has zigzagged back and
forth between service functions and adjudications functions. I
do not mean to be critical, because I think that there are few
government agencies with as dedicated and hardworking members
as the Immigration Service, but it is precisely because of its
structure that they are having a hard time succeeding today.
Adjudications suffers from a shortage of resources, and not
just a shortage of resources, but also the timing of the
resources provision. As was mentioned previously, in many
cases, there has been an increase in revenues because of an
increase in applications in the first quarter of the year, but
those funds are not released for expenditure until the last
quarter of the year, and in some cases until the first quarter
of the next year.
Finally, there has been an ongoing series of mandates for
special projects--special investigations, special audits,
multiple outside management studies, most of which have been
paid for from the exams or other user fee accounts.
In contrast, S. 1563 lays a foundation, an important
foundation, for change. First, it separates the enforcement and
adjudications functions into two separate bureaus.
Second, it establishes the Associate Attorney General for
Immigration Affairs, who will provide unified leadership on
policy matters to both agencies.
Third, it provides coordination between the two bureaus
through the Associate Attorney General by providing policy and
planning coordination, as well as administration of shared
support resources.
Finally, S. 1563 calls attention to the need to limit user
fee funds to services for which they are intended and for which
they were provided.
In closing, I would like to focus on three additional
points. First is that the reorganization of the Immigration
Service is a means to an end. The goal has to be for all of us
that both enforcement and adjudications are done effectively,
efficiently, and fairly, and that is both in the interest of
immigrants, new Americans, and all Americans.
Second, the Congress can help make the reorganization of
the Immigration Service a success through continued attention
and oversight through the implementation of reorganization
after enactment.
And finally, on the funding issue, additional attention by
the committee is warranted to the sources of funding, how they
are utilized, and when they are made available.
I want to thank you again for this opportunity to testify.
Our association has been close working partners with the
Immigration Service since our association was founded in 1946
and we want to continue to work with your committee, as well,
to go forward on this important mission.
Senator Abraham. Thank you very much.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Leiden follows:]
Prepared Statement of Warren R. Leiden
Mr. Chairman and distinguished Members of the Subcommittee, I am
honored to be here today representing the American Immigration Lawyers
Association (AILA). AILA strongly supports S. 1563, the INS Reform and
Border Security Act of 1999, recently introduced by Senators Abraham,
Kennedy and Hagel. S. 1563 will go a long way toward resolving the many
complicated issues that must be addressed before reorganizing a federal
agency that affects the lives of so many people and should lay the
foundation for important improvements in both the enforcement and
service functions.
By way of introduction, AILA is the national bar association for
immigration attorneys in the US, with nearly 6,000 attorney members,
and is an affiliated organization of the American Bar Association. AILA
takes a comprehensive view of immigration matters. AILA Members provide
representation in virtually all types of immigration cases: individuals
and families who have applied for permanent residence; thousands of
U.S. businesses that sponsor both temporary and permanent workers; and
foreign students, entertainers, athletes, and asylum seekers, often on
a pro bono basis. AILA appreciates this opportunity to express its
views on the issue of the restructuring of the Immigration and
Naturalization Service (INS).
overview of the restructuring issue
As the federal agency responsible for enforcing U.S. immigration
law, guarding the borders of our nation, inspecting those who seek
admission, and adjudicating applications for naturalization, asylum,
and family and business immigration, the INS needs to function
efficiently, effectively, and fairly. Unfortunately, it is currently
failing to do so, despite the dedicated efforts of so many of the men
and women who staff the agency.
There are many reasons for this failure, and the Administration and
Congress must share some of the responsibility.
First, the agency has the important combined mission of immigration
enforcement and adjudications, two functions that need to be both
better differentiated but also better coordinated and lead.
Second, in the past decade there have been vast changes in
immigration law and unprecedented growth in the INS' size and
responsibilities. Yet, the development of the INS leadership and
management team has not kept pace, often resulting in ineffective
management and uncertain direction. Individuals who are effective in
law enforcement are promoted to senior roles in service management and
vice versa, with many career paths zigzagging between law enforcement
and adjudications.
Third, the continued shortage of, and failure to timely provide,
adequate resources to the adjudications side must be addressed by
Congress if its efforts on restructuring are to bear fruit. The
processing time delays, halts in adjudications, and regional
disparities have reached a breaking point. U.S. families and employers
suffer personal and economic hardship, INS personnel become
demoralized, and the public loses faith when the immigration laws are
not enforced or adjudicated consistently, professionally, and humanely.
Finally, these existing problems have been exacerbated by an
ongoing series of unfunded, complicated and often conflicting mandates
imposed by the Administration and Congress. To our knowledge, most of
the investigations, audits, and outside management reports have had to
be paid for from the already limited funds of the user fee accounts,
deepening the funding shortage.
AILA is on record urging the creation of a new, independent
cabinet-level department or agency combining all current immigration
functions of the INS and the Departments of Justice, State, and Labor.
Such an agency could separate the immigration services and enforcement
functions. If a new, independent agency is not feasible, AILA urges the
creation within the Department of Justice of two separate entities--one
for service and one for enforcement--overseen and led by an Associate
Attorney General for Immigration Matters, who reports directly to the
Attorney General.
Unified leadership at the top is essential to success of all
subsequent reforms of the immigration function. It would improve
accountability by fully integrating policy making with policy
implementation, ensure direct access to high-level officials within the
executive branch, attract top managerial talent, and coordinate the
distinct efforts of the two bureaus.
In other words, AILA believes that Congress needs to separate the
adjudications and enforcement functions but keep them in the Department
of Justice. There must be single authority to whom both functions are
accountable to ensure strategic coordination and to lead both an
integrated national enforcement strategy and an effective immigration
services function.
As you know, as a member of the U.S. Commission on Immigration
Reform, I was able to study at length the operations and structure of
the INS, and wrote in my statement in the final report to Congress in
1997:
Separation of functions would permit the establishment of
unified, focused chains of command and operations at every
level. Separation of enforcement from adjudications would allow
each function to have a clear mission and to set clear goals on
which performance could be judged and accountability enforced.
Separate functions would benefit greatly from the ability to
gear hiring, training, promotions, and discipline to a clear
mission.I66* * * * *
The two main functions of the INS--enforcement and
adjudications--should be separated into two different agencies
within the Department of Justice, with separate leadership.
This would also permit the insertion of a senior level office
in the Department of Justice to coordinate and lead the
separate functional agencies.
principles of ins re-organization
AILA has worked with and studied the INS since the Association's
founding in 1946. As a result of the collective experience of our
members across the United States, AILA has adopted four principles that
we believe should guide any INS reform.
(1) Separation of the enforcement and adjudications functions
Separation of these two functions will lead to more clarity of
mission and greater accountability, which will lay the necessary
foundation for more efficient adjudications and more accountable,
consistent, and professional enforcement.
S. 1563 meets this principle. It would create two separate Bureaus
within a newly created Immigration Affairs Agency in the Department of
Justice: The Immigration Services and Adjudications Bureau and the
Immigration Enforcement and Border Affairs Bureau. Most importantly, S.
1563 provides for coordination between the two Bureaus, so that the
benefits of communication and information-sharing can continue. S. 1563
also establishes immigration Inspections, which combines service and
enforcement functions, as a separate entity within the Immigration
Affairs Agency. While AILA believes that Inspections is almost entirely
an adjudications function (and thus most properly belongs in the
Immigration Services and Adjudications Bureau), we do not oppose this
function as a separate entity within the Immigration Affairs Agency.
H.R. 2528, introduced by Representatives Rogers (R-KY), Smith (R-
TX) and Reyes (D-TX), would divorce the INS' enforcement and
adjudications functions. However, there is no adequate provision for
coordination between the two entities, not to mention the uncertainty
of leadership over them. This appears to be a case of going from one
extreme to the other.
In addition, H.R. 2528 would house immigration inspections in the
enforcement bureau, which we find to be inappropriate. AILA strongly
opposes the inclusion of Inspections in the enforcement bureau.
Immigration Inspectors have quasi-judicial authority, and they are
called upon daily to both acquire facts and to render a decision on
those facts. Placing them in an enforcement bureau (with a pure
enforcement mission) would provide no checks or balances to ensure that
inspectors continue their quasi-judicial role and do not deport
legitimate asylum seekers, refugees or immigrants. In addition, H.R.
2528 would authorize a plan that would require that people applying for
asylum and others be detained by the Bureau of Prisons. AILA cannot
support a policy of locking up non-criminal refugees and immigrants
with convicted criminals. In our opinion this would violate
international treaties to which the U.S. government is a signatory.
(2) Accountability and leadership at the top
Appoint a high level, full-time person at the top, in charge of
supervising both functions, who will be able to integrate policy making
with policy implementation, as well as to coordinate the separate
service and enforcement chains of command.
There needs to be one full-time, high level person in charge of our
nation's immigration functions. The adjudications and enforcement
functions are distinct, with different missions, different goals,
different organizational cultures, and different career paths. However,
they also need to be coordinated at the top, and there needs to be
strong authority to which each function reports that will hold them
accountable for their accomplishments and their short-comings.
S. 1563 fulfills that principle by creating the Associate Attorney
General for Immigration Affairs. The Associate Attorney General for
Immigration Affairs can provide full-time oversight, supervision, and
coordination to the two functions without having direct operational
responsibility. As the source of policy and planning formulation on
immigration matters, the Associate Attorney General's office would set
goals and review progress toward the goals of both functions. The
Associate Attorney General would have authority at a very senior level
in the Justice Department and would be expected to have direct access
to high-level officials within the executive branch.
In contrast, H.R. 2528 provides for no full-time coordinating
entity of the adjudications and enforcement functions, relying instead
on the part-time divided attention of the Deputy Attorney General, to
whom both functions would report. Based on past experience, we conclude
that this type of coordination is inadequate, even when the functions
are part of a unified whole. With the functions separated, we fear that
such part-time oversight would make it virtually impossible to
articulate or implement a coherent, unified immigration policy.
(3) Split the functions, but establish coordination between enforcement
and adjudications
S. 1653 recognizes the need for the two bureaus to be closely
coordinated. The bill achieves this coordination by establishing the
Office of the Associate Attorney General for Immigration Affairs with
authority over the two bureaus. Most fundamentally, the planning and
policy making of the Associate Attorney General will necessarily result
in unified goals and coordinated policies between the two bureaus.
Built into the proposed structure is the understanding of the need to
share records and information between the two bureaus, albeit for
different purposes. The Office of the Associate Attorney General will
be responsible for all records and information, and the technology and
management needed, for the two bureaus. Moreover, it will be the source
of legal counsel and administrative infrastructure, including personnel
and training.
In contrast, H.R. 2528 would make such coordination difficult.
There does not appear to be provision for the hammering out of unified
policies. As a result, we fear that, under H.R. 2528, the two bureaus
would end up working at cross-purposes, with their leaders sending
conflicting messages on policy matters and interpretation of our
complex laws.
Without a structural linkage between the two agencies to access
records and information, routine requests for records checks could
become a Kafkaesque nightmare. Congressional staff handling requests
for information and assistance on immigration matters also would have
to deal with two separate agencies, making their jobs much more
difficult and time-consuming.
(4) Adequate resources: Provide adequate resources for the
adjudications function. Ensure that direct Congressional
appropriations are available to supplement user fees
As Congress considers reforming the INS, we urge you to also review
the funding of immigration functions. Currently, enforcement functions
are supported by Congressional appropriations, while adjudications are
almost entirely funded by user fees.
In theory, the filing fees paid by employer and family petitioners
and applicants for immigration benefits should be used for adjudicating
their petitions and applications. In practice, however, large portions
of the user fees are diverted to support other functions. During fiscal
year 1998 and fiscal year 1999, for example, Congress mandated the
diversion of about $300 million (including Sec. 245(i) revenue) to pay
for Justice Department oversight, Inspector General investigations, and
infrastructure costs that appear to not be related to directly
supporting immigration benefits.
Immigrant applicants and their petitioners, who already are
experiencing lengthy delays and unacceptable levels of service, should
not be forced to ``pick up the check'' for programs unrelated to the
processing of their applications. In fact, user fees should not be
viewed as general tax revenue. The responsibility for agency oversight
and for programs that do not generate fees should be shared among all
taxpayers--not just those who happen to be petitioning or applying for
immigration benefits.
AILA supported the establishment of the Examinations Fee Account
when it was first created as a solution to the adjudications problems
of the day. Unfortunately, despite some improvements in the intervening
years, adjudications delays and nonperformance are now worse than ever
for almost all types of cases. The hundreds of millions of dollars paid
into the Examinations Fee Account are just not being used
proportionately for adjudication of petitions and application. Given
its history and the current situation, the Examinations Fee Account
cannot be seen as the sole support for the Adjudications function. It
is now our view that Congress should supplement user fees with
Congressional appropriations to ensure that an appropriate level of
service is achieved. In addition, we urge Congress to reject the
diversion of funds from the user fee accounts to pay for important but
indirect and unrelated initiatives. Congress needs to find sources of
funding, other than from user fees, to pay for these efforts.
S. 1563 recognizes this problem, and provides financing reforms.
Specifically it would require that fees collected for an adjudication
or naturalization service be used only to fund those services or the
costs of other similar adjudications. This is an important first step
in the right direction.
In contrast, H.R. 2528's stunning silence on funding leaves one to
wonder whether the Adjudications funding crisis is acknowledged or
understood. Failure to begin to address Adjudications funding issues
will further postpone badly needed improvements to customer service and
a solution to the nearly three year backlog faced by legal immigrants
waiting for green cards or citizenship.
conclusion
In closing, let me reiterate that AILA strongly supports S. 1563
because it adheres to the four principles noted above. It also is
important to remember that:
Restructuring is but the first step in a long process, the
end result of which is effective, efficient, and fair
adjudications and enforcement. Both Congress and the
immigration agency need to be mindful of the end result.
Congress must continue to pay attention to the INS's needs and
the demands it faces, while the agency needs to deliver on its
promises.
Congress has the opportunity to make reorganization a
success: Congress must be ever mindful about its important role
in creating and maintaining a vital and successful federal
immigration function. Conflicting, complicated and unfunded
mandates will threaten the agency's ability to fulfill its
mission and bring us right back to where we are today.
Any meaningful restructuring of the immigration function
needs to include financing proposals. Restructuring would be
incomplete without also reviewing the sources of funding for
this function. Especially given the diversion of funds in the
adjudications function noted above, any successful
restructuring plan must respond to the funding demands of the
adjudications function. Both enforcement and adjudications are
in the national interest and should be adequately funded.
AILA is dedicated to working with Congress and the INS to ensure
that reorganization succeeds. S. 1653 is a huge step towards that end.
We appreciate the opportunity this hearing has given us to explore this
important issue. Thank you.
Senator Abraham. We will now turn to Mrs. Yoskowitz. I want
to say, before you start, as a constituent, I want to thank you
for the dedication and hard work that you and the other members
of our Detroit Area Coalition for Responsible Immigration
Policy have been doing. I think it really makes a difference,
and even though it does not necessarily always get a lot in the
limelight, I think the work of the coalition has been terrific.
We appreciate it and welcome you here today. Thanks for coming.
STATEMENT OF RACHEL S. YOSKOWITZ
Mrs. Yoskowitz. Thank you. Thank you, Senator. It is a
pleasure to be here. In fact, it is a privilege and a
responsibility to be here as a representative of the Jewish
Family Service of Metropolitan Detroit and our coalition
partners. We have been resettling refugees at JFS since 1937,
and in December 1996, we began assisting people with
citizenship. We have assisted over 4,000 people from 42 nations
in this short time period, and I will be discussing their
issues at this time.
We can categorize them into issues of delays, denials, and
dissonance, and we find these issues not only within the
Detroit District INS, but Detroit is but a microcosm of the
entire country and I like to think that our district is better
than most because of you, Senator, and in defence to you and
your commitment.
I in no way want to cast aspersions on individual INS
officers. In individual encounters, INS representatives
demonstrate concern for the immigrant cohort, knowledge of the
laws, but they are overburdened by inadequate resources and
inadequate training with which to address the overwhelming
backlog of cases.
Why, in this technologically sophisticated age, when the
click of a mouse enables us to access more information than we
ever need, are cases, files, lost by INS? A native of the
former Soviet Union who entered this country in New York and
resides in Detroit has an INS file in the District of Columbia.
A native of Southeast Asia in Detroit has a file in L.A. N-400
applications are processed in Lincoln, NE. Fingerprints are
processed in Pennsylvania. With each geographic location, we
increase the opportunity for lost files. This is highly
inefficient of time, increases the risk of loss, and
compromises consumer confidentiality.
In terms of issues with green cards, that has been
addressed by others, and I will be happy to address them more
specifically in Q and A if you would like.
Because INS lacks the capacity to meet the stated need for
service, it has prioritized naturalization applications and
adjudication in this area. And though their target is 6 months
for processing N-400's, the reality is that this timeframe is
double or triple in Detroit, with a 12- to 18-month time lag.
Nationally, we are hearing that it is 18 to 24 months.
Individuals in Michigan are now fingerprinted at applicant
support centers, which is much more efficient because there is
not as much of a timeframe for them to wait to be printed.
However, we do not have a digital print scanner. People are
still printed the old fashioned way, and their prints are often
rejected and they must be repeatedly reprinted. It breaks my
heart to see seniors with their hands bent by arthritis,
swollen with fluid, the skin surfaces worn smooth by hard
physical labor have to be reprinted three and four times, in
spite of policy capping fingerprints at two unsuccessful
attempts.
It is crucial that the culture of INS be converted to one
of service. Regardless of the infrastructure changes which you
are so wisely recommending, there must be an attitudinal change
in INS staff. Any restructuring of INS must also address
mandatory training functions with adequate appropriations to
assure INS officers will be customer service oriented in all
jurisdictions, including overseas processing centers, and it is
my hope that a product of the restructuring of INS will be
implementation of a quality structure to address the problems
of overseas processing.
National policies need to be clearly presented to all
district and local offices so all officers at all levels are
familiar with national policy. Oversight of INS policy
implementation must be a major component of national office
responsibility, and it is imperative that there be a single
central strong leader vested with authority to represent all
INS jurisdictions.
Sitting here is the granddaughter of a lumber merchant from
Zhitomer, Ukraine, and a soldier who went AWOL from the czar's
army to come to America, men who naturalized and loved this
country with all their hearts. I fully realize our sacred trust
to assure the same opportunity for others.
The first image we present to those stepping foot on our
soil is often the image of INS. I trust that your deliberations
and those of the full Congress and subsequent reform of INS
will assure that every immigrant coming to our country will be
welcomed in dignity, treated fairly, and his issues will be
adjudicated quickly.
Senator Abraham, I want to conclude my remarks by thanking
you again for giving me this opportunity today, and on behalf
of all of our community-based organization partners in the
immigrant service community, we thank you from the bottom of
our hearts for your interest. Under your guidance, your
district staff and the staff of this committee are consistently
approachable, professional, and responsive. Thank you for your
leadership.
Senator Abraham. I thank you. I am very flattered that you
had those feelings and we appreciate the working relationship
we have had with your organization and the others. It is great.
[The prepared statement of Mrs. Yoskowitz follows:]
Prepared Statement of Rachel S. Yoskowitz
Mr. Chairman, members of the sub-committee, ladies and gentlemen:
Thank you for the commitment, thoroughness and seriousness of purpose
with which you have approached your task of reforming the Immigration
and Naturalization Service. It is my privilege and responsibility to be
here today participating in this aspect of our democratic process. As a
representative of many others, I will try to faithfully represent those
for whom I speak. Though a partner in multiple ethnic and faith based
coalitions, as detailed in the written testimony before you, today, I
will not speak for the coalitions but rather for the many thousands of
foreign born whom we serve. These individuals who are legally residing
in the United States have been voiceless and powerless in impacting the
workings of our INS.
The infrastructure and process issues which I am addressing today
while occurring within the jurisdiction of the Detroit District INS are
not unique to that jurisdiction. Detroit is but a microcosm of the rest
of the country and may, in fact, be a little better than most districts
in deference to the priorities of the Senator from Michigan who chairs
this sub-committee.
The issues before us are service issues. These issues can be
categorized as delays, denials, dissonance. In no way do I want to cast
aspersions on individual INS officers. In individual encounters, each
officer has demonstrated concern for the immigrant cohort and knowledge
of the laws which INS must uphold. However, these well-intentioned
individuals are over burdened by lack of material and human resources
as well as adequate training with which to address the overwhelming
backlog of cases with which they are confronted. Currently, in the USA,
there is a backlog of 45,000 refugees; 37,000 asylees; and thousands of
others awaiting adjustment of status. These numbers convert to a delay
of 34 months from application to adjudication for green card and of 18-
24 months from application to naturalization adjudication for 1.75
million future citizens for a green card--Why?
Why indeed? Why in this technologically sophisticated age when the
click of a mouse enables us to access more information than we ever
want or a need--are INS files lost?
A native of the Former Soviet Union, who entered this country in
N.Y. and resides in Detroit has an INS rile in D.C.; a native of
Southeast Asia living in Detroit has a file in L.A.; naturalization
applications (the N-400) are processed in Lincoln, Nebraska;
fingerprints are processed in Pennsylvania. With each geographic
location requesting a hard copy file and transfer of riles, is it any
wonder that riles can't be located? Even locally--riles are
transferred. A file coming into Detroit District main office will be
transferred to the airport for an adjustment of status interview--then
back to District then back to D.C. This is highly inefficient of time,
increases the risk of loss and compromises client (consumer)
confidentiality.
In our technological age, it is incomprehensible that a piece of
equipment which prepares ``Green Cards'' for LPRs does not work. Yes,
there is 1 Center in Nebraska for preparing all Green Cards and the
machine which does this task is faulty. Consequently, the individuals'
names are misspelled, the Dates of Birth are incorrect or the Dates of
Entry to the USA are incorrect. Every second green card prepared in
Nebraska is inaccurate. Imagine that, a 50 percent failure or success
rate. That's not acceptable. Individuals who applied to adjust status
in 1997 and 1998 are only now receiving their green cards which are
erroneous and must, therefore be returned to Nebraska for correction.
How long will it take for a correct card to be issued? In the
interim, employment, college admission, financial aid applications for
universities are all on hold for the consumer. Life is in limbo because
the one piece of equipment to process all requests for Green Cards,
doesn't work.
The backlog of applications for adjustment of status is very
substantial. Since July 1998 with the Nebraska Service Center became
the single point of contact for adjustment of status requests not a
single new individual has been interviewed for a green card.
The INS lacks the capacity to meet the stated need for service, and
has therefore, prioritized Naturalization applicants. All others are on
hold. Even with prioritization of naturalization applications, there is
not an efficient process for review and adjudication in this category.
Within our district, although there is a target of 6 months for
processing N-400s the reality is double or triple that with a lag of
12-18 months from application to adjudication. With the implementation
of the off site Applicant Support Centers--the fingerprint process is
more efficient. Individuals are printed by appointment and seen within
an hour of the scheduled time. Yet, Detroit--a community of XXX
L.P.Rs still does not have the digital print scanner and to our
knowledge, the district is not on the scheduled list of communities to
receive scanners. Our district still prints the old fashioned way.
Consequently, many individuals have their prints rejected and must
be reprinted repeatedly. How it breaks my heart to see immigrants in
their seventies with hands bent by arthritis, swollen with fluid and
skin ridges worn smooth by age and years of hard physical labor
reprinted 3 and 4 times--in spite of the regulation capping
fingerprints at two unsuccessful attempts. (Refer to case specific data
attached) Each fingerprint rejection extends the delay in the
individual naturalization process--Why is the full implementation
process of the technologically efficient ASC being delayed?
Similarly--all N-400s are mailed to a central processing site in
Lincoln, Nebraska there is one direct mail address. There is also one
phone number for the service center to which CBOs working on behalf of
consumers must address all inquiries. One number which is most often,
inaccessible, continuously busy. BIA accredited representatives leave
voice messages on an answering machine to inquire about the status of
cases. Voice messages that are never returned. It is crucial that the
culture of INS be converted to one of Service. Regardless of the
changes in infrastructure which you are so wisely recommending, there
must be an attitudinal change for all INS staff--so they can treat all
immigrant clients with respect, courtesy and cultural sensitivity--i.e.
A Moslem woman with a head cover who avoids eye contact with the male
INS officer is not a liar, she is modest and acting according to her
belief system. An elderly ``stutterer'' who can not respond quickly
enough to a question, is not a liar, he is slow of speech; a senior
citizen who was a member of the Communist party in Kiev or Moscow or
Leningrad as a condition of his employment twenty years ago, is not a
threat to the United States today. Let me share the case of Tamara, an
elderly Russian refugee who entered the USA under the provisions of the
Lautenberg Amendment. She has advanced ms, her hands shake with
uncontrolled tremors, she is confined to a wheelchair. Tamara's 648
(medical waiver) was denied and she was called for an INS interview to
naturalize. At the interview, her caregiver was not permitted to be
with her. The INS officer again refused to consider her waiver and
proceeded to test her ability to write English. She placed a pen in
Tamara's shaking hands and began to dictate. She was unable to hold the
pen or to write. The INS officer said, ``I'll steady your hand'' and
proceeded to ``assist'' her. Tamara fainted. The officer told her ``you
did well''. She has heard nothing further. Her fingerprints have not
cleared. This is not a kinder, gentler INS.
Any restructuring of INS must address mandatory training functions
with adequate appropriation to assure that INS officers will be
customer service oriented, culturally sensitive and knowledgeable in
applying federal statute equitably to all immigrants in all
jurisdictions.
All jurisdictions are inclusive of INS overseas processing
locations. Please note that not only are there issues with INS process
locally, district and nationally, but there are international
implications of INS inefficiency, poor training and process failure in
the overseas offices located in US Embassies and run by INS officers.
These officers are truly the gatekeepers to the refugee and parolee
programs. They must apply the law equally.
It is my hope that a by product of the INS restructuring will be
the implementation of a quality structure to address the problems of
overseas processing.
There must be consistency in the implementation of policy in all
INS offices.
National policies need to be clearly presented to all District and
local offices so that all officers are familiar with national policies.
All INS staff and interviewing officers must have access to the most
recent regulations and directives from Washington. Oversight of the
implementation of INS policy must be a major component of national
office responsibility. Local offices must be able to appeal to
appropriate staff at headquarters for specified concerns if problems
are not adequately addressed by the regional/district office.
In addition, structures for better day-to-day supervision and
quality assurance also need to be in place. The waiting period for
those in the naturalization process or for any other services provided
by the INS local office should be uniform regardless of domicile.
Accordingly, the INS should deploy resources to ensure a more even
waiting period and that the location of INS office and ASC sites are
easily accessible to consumers public transportation.
Within whatever service structure is reengineered or reorganized,
there needs to be an easily accessible appeals process for those who
believe the decision on their application was in error, and a
``complaint office'' where those who feel they have been unfairly or
inappropriately treated can go to redress their grievance. Appeals must
be completed within a reasonable time frame. Such information should be
available to the not for profit organization working with the
individuals having business with the INS and available to consumers in
multiple languages.
All fees collected from consumers by INS should be utilized on
service delivery and improvement. None of these funds should be
available to the enforcement structures. A national fee waiver policy
must be in place to assure that everyone who is eligible for a service
can receive it regardless of their ability to pay the fee. This policy
must be implemented consistently in all offices.
Individuals required to reapply to a service because of an INS
error [e.q. list file] should not be required to pay another
application fee. Appropriations for enforcement must be totally
separate and apart from any federal funds for service provision.
Attached to this testimony is a list of cases which remain
unresolved. I am distraught that there are cases outstanding which have
been pending for years. In testimony--these cases for reasons of
protecting their privacy are cited only by initials. With the
permission of this sub-committee, I would like to present this list of
cases and full names and alien registration number to staff for further
inquiry. These are only some of the cases requiring special attention.
Most individuals who must navigate the INS system do not know to whom
they can turn for assistance. Representatives of the CBOs see only a
small portion of those who need assistance. The establishment of an
independent Ombudsman's office may address this issue assuming that
this function will be well funded, highly visible and readily
accessible to the immigrant cohort. This access must be geographic and
linguistic so that immigrants can adequately articulate their needs.
Each jurisdiction's ombudsman office will have different language needs
determined by the cohort of immigrants in that region, but translators
are a basic necessity to make the office of the Ombudsman an effective
component of the INS restructuring as proposed by the S.B. 1563--The
INS Reform and Border Security Act of 1999.
Sitting here as the granddaughter of the lumber merchant from
Zhitomer, Ukraine and of the soldier who went AWOL from the Czar's army
to come to America, naturalized and loved this country with all their
hearts, I realize our sacred trust to assure the same opportunity to
others. The first image we present to those stepping foot on U.S. soil
is often the image of INS. It is our obligation to assure that image
will be one which conveys all of the positive attributes which make our
country the magnificent land of freedom which we so love. I trust that
the deliberations of this sub-committee and the subsequent reform of
the INS will assure that every immigrant coming to our country will be
welcomed in dignity and treated fairly.
Mr. Chairman, let me conclude my remarks by again thanking you for
inviting me to be here today and share the concerns of our immigrants
with you. I am also most appreciative of your on going commitment to
and concern for the immigrant population. Your staff and the staff of
this committee are consistently approachable and responsive to the
immigrant concerns. Thank you for your leadership in this area.
Senator Abraham. Mr. Bonner, we welcome you. Thanks very
much for being part of today's hearing, and we will turn to you
for your testimony at this time.
STATEMENT OF T.J. BONNER
Mr. Bonner. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. On behalf of the
23,000 INS employees represented by the National Border Patrol
Council and National Immigration and Naturalization Service
Council, I would like to express our thanks to you and to the
other distinguished members of the subcommittee for the
invitation to present our views concerning this important
legislation, as well as your leadership in this and other
immigration issues.
The debate has shifted from whether the INS should be
reorganized to how it should be reorganized. Thanks to the
leadership of this subcommittee, many facets of the INS Reform
and Border Security Act of 1999 contain essential elements of a
successful reorganization. Most importantly, it has a strict
delineation between enforcement and service.
Perhaps equally importantly, it establishes the Office of
the Associate Attorney General for Immigration Affairs to
provide key leadership to ensure that the enforcement and
service bureaus coordinate their efforts in a cooperative
fashion. Separate chief financial officers for the enforcement
and service bureaus will ensure that funding earmarked for a
given program is not diverted to a different program. The
shared resources concept is a practical solution to balance the
desire for totally separate support structures with the need to
provide support within realistic means. The three-year
extension of annual increases of 1,000 Border Patrol agents
will provide critical reinforcements and is greatly
appreciated.
Many employees are concerned by the broad personnel
flexibility granted to the Attorney General under the
legislation. While it is clear that a certain amount of
flexibility is necessary and some administrative and senior-
level management positions will be eliminated, the flexibility
should be limited to those positions. In order to avoid
disruptive morale problems, front-line employees should be
assured that their position, duties, pay, and geographic
location will not change as a result of the reorganization.
otherwise, it will be extremely difficult to convince them that
a reorganization is in their best interest and obtain their
needed support.
The establishment of a new agency also creates the
potential for disrupting the relationship between management
and labor that has existed for 35 years by exposing employees
in the new law enforcement agency to the specious claim that
they are exempt from the protections they currently enjoy
because they are engaged in national security work. If these
employees somehow lost those protections, Congress and the
public would lose the single most valuable source of candid
information and feedback about the efficiency and effectiveness
of the new agencies.
The councils, therefore, strongly urge that this disruptive
scenario be avoided by inclusion of language in the legislation
that makes it clear that the employees of the new bureaus
remain entitled to the protections of the Civil Service Reform
Act.
Similarly, language preserving the existing bargaining
units and collective bargaining agreements would eliminate the
potential for disruption from successorship issues that could
arise from the creation of a new agency.
Replacement of the inspections program under the
Immigration Affairs Agency instead of the enforcement bureau is
problematic because it fails to recognize that these employees
perform essential law enforcement functions in addition to
facilitating the legal entry of millions of people into the
country. In this respect, they are no different than police
officers engaged in traffic enforcement. While one of their
functions is to facilitate the movement of traffic, an equally
important function is to issue citations and arrest criminals.
During 1998, immigration inspectors arrested more than
25,000 criminal aliens, initiated 23,000 prosecutions,
apprehended 3,900 drug smugglers, made over 3,100 drug
seizures, intercepted 126 terrorists, prevented the illegal
entry of 735,000 inadmissible aliens, seized nearly 100,000
fraudulent documents, and were assaulted 42 times in the line
of duty.
The proposal to grant both investigative responsibility and
disciplinary power to the Office of Professional Responsibility
would create several serious problems. Aside from the obvious
conflict of interest, lack of impartiality, and denial of due
process that would result, taking disciplinary power away from
those with supervisory responsibility would seriously undermine
their ability to maintain order in the workforce.
The provision requiring the new agency to use the fair and
equitable treatment of aliens by employees as one of the
standards for evaluating employee performance has a potential
problem. It is troubling to the extent that it would discourage
law enforcement employees from asserting their legal authority
out of fear that it would negatively impact their performance
evaluation. This could result in decreased enforcement of
immigration laws, as well as increased assault against
employees. Accordingly, the councils recommend that the
standard be defined differently for law enforcement personnel
than for service employees.
In conclusion, the councils strongly endorse the concept of
separating the enforcement and service functions of the INS and
believe that this legislation contains many of the elements
necessary for a successful reorganization and are confident
that the other elements will be added or improved as the
legislation advances.
Mr. Chairman, we again commend you for your leadership on
this issue and thank you for considering our concerns.
Senator Abraham. Thank you, and thanks for being here to
share them with us. We appreciate it and will continue,
obviously, to work with the association.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Bonner follows:]
Prepared Statement of T.J. Bonner, President, National Border Patrol
Council and Charles J. Murphy, President, National Immigration and
Naturalization Service Council
Immigration issues have been at the forefront of public debate for
the past several years. As a result, the Immigration and Naturalization
Service has received unprecedented increases in personnel and funding.
Despite this, it remains unable to slow, much less stop, the tide of
illegal immigration, or to efficiently process the immigration benefits
under its jurisdiction. Examples of such inefficiencies and
mismanagement surface almost daily. Many of the most compelling and
shocking accounts are relayed through the employee unions on behalf of
frustrated employees who want to do a good job but are stymied by an
inept bureaucracy.
One of the reasons for these problems is the current structure of
the I&NS, which places the responsibility for handling both the
enforcement and service functions under the same offices, causing both
functions to suffer. There is no longer any legitimate reason to debate
whether or not these functions should be separated. The debate should
now be focused on how to best accomplish this necessary division. The
National Border Patrol Council and National Immigration and
Naturalization Service Council, representing over 23,000 employees,
would like to share some thoughts regarding the elements they believe
are necessary for a successful structure, as well as their concerns
regarding certain aspects of various approaches that have been
advocated.
Close coordination and cooperation between the enforcement and
service functions is crucial to the success of any reorganization
effort, especially since a sizeable number of benefit applications are
fraudulent. The Office of the Associate Attorney General for
Immigration Affairs created by the INS Reform and Border Security Act
of 1999 would provide this key leadership.
A clear separation of funding and the creation of separate offices
to handle the financial affairs of each function are also essential to
a successful reorganization. The present system has resulted in far too
many instances of funding being diverted for purposes other than those
for which it was intended. Assuming that the Chief Financial Officer
for the Immigration Affairs Agency would not have the ability to
transfer funds between the service and enforcement bureaus, the
structure proposed in S. 1563 would ensure this separation.
Another essential element required for a successful reorganization
is adequate support for the two core functions. The recognition in the
legislation that certain economies can be realized by sharing some
support services is a practical solution to balance the desire for
totally separate support structures with the need to provide support
within realistic means.
The Councils greatly appreciate the commitment of the Chairman and
Subcommittee to provide necessary increases to the Border Patrol agent
workforce by extending by three years the coverage of Section 101(a) of
the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of
1996, which provides for an annual supplement of 1,000 agents. The
Councils recommend that Section 101(b), which provides for a
corresponding annual increase of 300 support positions, also be
extended for the same period.
It is clear that a certain amount of personnel flexibility is
necessary to effectuate a reorganization of the magnitude envisioned,
as some administrative and senior-level management positions will be
eliminated. The broad language of the legislation, however, would
extend this flexibility to all positions, not just those that would be
eliminated by the reorganization. Although the legislation is not
intended to effectuate wholesale personnel changes unrelated to the
reorganization, the proposed language would empower bureaucrats with a
different vision to circumvent that intent. In order to avoid
disruptive morale problems, front-line employees should be assured that
their position, duties, pay and geographic location will not change as
a result of the reorganization. Otherwise, it will be extremely
difficult to convince them that a reorganization is in their best
interest and obtain their needed support.
The creation of new agencies also creates the potential for
disrupting the relationship between management and labor that has
existed within the MNS for approximately thirty-five years. The
Councils are concerned by reliable reports that certain senior-level
managers intend to attempt to eliminate labor organizations within the
newly created enforcement bureau by claiming that all such employees
are exempt from the protections they currently enjoy because they are
engaged in national security work. While this claim is specious at
best, the ensuing conflict would be extremely disruptive and damaging
to the relationship of the parties. Moreover, if such protections were
somehow lost, Congress and the public would lose the single most
valuable source of candid information and feedback about the efficiency
and effectiveness of the new agency. The Councils strongly urge
Congress to avoid this disruptive scenario by including language in the
legislation that makes it clear that the employees of the new bureaus
remain entitled to the protections of the Civil Service Reform Act.
Similarly, the creation of separate agencies or even a single new
agency would create the potential requirement for new labor
organization election processes and a corresponding need to negotiate
new collective bargaining agreements. This would also be extremely
disruptive to the relationship between labor and management. It could
easily be avoided by incorporating language into the legislation that
preserves the existing bargaining units and collective bargaining
agreements, and the Councils urge that this be done.
The placement of the Inspections program under the Immigration
Affairs Agency instead of the enforcement bureau is problematic because
it fails to recognize that these employees perform essential law
enforcement functions in addition to facilitating the legal entry of
millions of people into the country. In this respect, they are no
different than police officers engaged in traffic enforcement: While
one of their functions is to facilitate the movement of traffic, an
equally important function is to issue citations and arrest criminals.
During 1998, Immigration Inspectors arrested more than 25,000 criminal
aliens, initiated 23,000 prosecutions, apprehended 3,900 drug
smugglers, made over 3,100 drug seizures, intercepted 126 terrorists,
prevented the illegal entry of 735,000 inadmissible aliens, seized
nearly 100,000 fraudulent documents, and were assaulted 42 times in the
line of duty. While placement in the umbrella agency would be
preferable to placement in the service bureau, it would subject the
program to some of the same problems that all I&NS programs currently
experience: The emphasis of the program shifts according to the
inclination of the director. Under a director who is enforcement-
oriented, the program emphasizes enforcement, and under a director who
is service-oriented, the program emphasizes service.
The proposal to grant both investigative responsibility and
disciplinary power to the Office of Professional Responsibility would
create several serious problems. Aside from the obvious conflict of
interest, lack of impartiality, and denial of due process that would
result, taking disciplinary power away from those with supervisory
responsibility would seriously undermine their ability to maintain
order in the workforce.
The provision requiring the new agency to use the fair and
equitable treatment of aliens by employees as one of the standards for
evaluating employee performance is troubling to the extent that it
would discourage law enforcement employees from asserting their legal
authority out of fear that it would negatively impact their performance
evaluation. This could result in decreased enforcement of immigration
laws as well as increased assaults against employees. Accordingly, the
Councils recommend that such standard be defined differently for law
enforcement personnel than for service employees.
Finally, it needs to be recognized that reorganizing is not the
sole answer to many of the troubles that plague the Immigration and
Naturalization Service. A fundamental cultural change must occur at all
levels in order to transform it into an organization that is capable of
fulfilling its mission efficiently and effectively. Although MNS
employees receive some of the most comprehensive and finest training
available, they are rarely empowered to exercise independent judgement.
In conclusion, the Councils strongly endorse the concept of
separating the enforcement and service functions of the Immigration and
Naturalization Service, and believe that this legislation contains many
of the elements necessary for a successful reorganization, and are
confident that the other elements will be added or improved as the
legislation advances.
Senator Abraham. I turn to Mr. Gallo. It is good to have
you back.
STATEMENT OF RICHARD J. GALLO
Mr. Gallo. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. My name is Rich Gallo
and it is a pleasure to be before you today. I serve as the
president of the Federal Law Enforcement Officers Association,
FLEOA, which is a voluntary nonpartisan professional
association representing more than 16,000 Federal special
agents and law enforcement officers in America. We represent
the Feds FLEOA. It is my pleasure to be here today to deliver a
summary of FLEOA's position on the reform, restructure, and
revitalization of the Immigration and Naturalization Service.
As National President of FLEOA, I represent many of the
outstanding men and women who enforce our Nation's immigration
laws.
The divisions, the investigation division, Border Patrol,
and detention and deportation, of which we get our membership
from within INS, make up the enforcement components of INS,
along with the inspections and intelligence divisions. The men
and women of these components risk their lives every day in an
ever-increasingly dangerous line of work.
In July 1998, two Border Patrol agents were killed. The
first female agent was killed, along with a male trainee, while
attempting to arrest a deranged murderer in San Benito, TX.
Ironically, the INS has yet to implement the provision of the
Immigration Act of 1990--this Act was passed by Congress in
1990--that provided general arrest authority extending
protection against legal liability to INS officers in such
situations. I offer this as one example of many of the
inefficiencies of the bureaucracy of INS.
In brief, the work has changed, Congress has changed the
laws and increased the funding, yet INS remains stuck in the
1980's. Congressman Hal Rogers captures the essence of the
problem in stating, ``The mission and jobs they are charged
with are too big and too important to be botched, and that is
what they have done, botched their jobs.''
Mr. Chairman, I read two of your statements that FLEOA
totally agrees with. One, ``It makes little sense to have a
single agency, the INS, responsible for keeping out illegal
immigrants and at the same time letting in legal immigrants and
refugees.'' And, two, another quote of yours, ``We should
consider splitting the INS up into one law enforcement agency
and one legal immigration agency to increase the efficiency of
both.'' Clearly, we cannot agree any more with you, Mr.
Chairman, and we commend you and this subcommittee and your
staffers for your determined efforts in this important
endeavor.
It is apparent that there is a broad bipartisan consensus
in Washington for the separation of immigration law enforcement
from benefit disbursement, but a wide spectrum of thought on
how best to attack this problem. Sentiment runs from the
Commission on Immigration Reform endorsement of piecemealing
out different functions to the State and Labor Departments to
the other end, a recommendation by Booz-Allen to give INS more
time to get its house in order with an internal separation.
FLEOA feels very, very strongly the solution lies in the
middle. I have to say, though, the country cannot wait any
longer, and no more further delays in rectifying this problem.
As I travel to numerous FLEOA chapters throughout the country,
and last night, I was in Cleveland, the INS special agents
continually cite the urgent need for a substantive and dynamic
reorganization of INS by separating the law enforcement
branches from the benefits branches, with an increase in the
staffing of special agents assigned to interior enforcement.
INS has to be professionalized and depoliticized. Two
separate bureaus, both within the Justice Department, one for
immigration law enforcement, the other for benefit
disbursement, will relieve INS's mission overload.
Current INS district directors face severe pressures to
provide services for aliens, sometimes with inadequate
resources. When faced with such situations, the district
directors, and just recently the directors in Chicago and
Boston have done this, they frequently use enforcement agents
as a labor pool to perform nonenforcement duties. This practice
has continued for over 20 years and shows no signs of
diminishing.
I will give one example from the past. In Baltimore, the
district director used all of the special agents in the
district as ushers at a naturalization ceremony, including
those special agents working undercover assignments, both long-
term and short-term undercover assignments. They were called in
to act as ushers at a naturalization ceremony. It is unheard of
in a law enforcement chain of command for that to happen. This
is just one example of the ongoing nationwide problem within
INS's management structure.
In closing, Mr. Chairman, FLEOA respectfully submits that
legislation providing for a substantive and complete
reorganization of the INS be passed. Your legislation will
greatly increase the morale in the enforcement branches of INS.
With the legislation pending before the House and the Senate,
FLEOA believes that the separation issue will be fully
resolved. Thank you.
Senator Abraham. Thank you very much.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Gallo follows:]
Prepared Statement of Richard J. Gallo
Good afternoon, Mr. Chairman and distinguished Members of the
Subcommittee. I am honored to submit this written statement in support
of my oral testimony for such an important and vital hearing. The
Federal Law Enforcement Officers Association (FLEOA), is a voluntary,
non-partisan professional association.
FLEOA currently represents over 16,000 federal law enforcement
officers and is the largest association for federal officers of its
kind. Several years ago, FLEOA joined with all of the major state and
local police national associations to form the Law Enforcement Steering
Committee. The Law Enforcement Steering Committee also includes the
following prominent and important organizations: Fraternal Order of
Police, National Troopers Coalition, Major Cities Chiefs of Police,
Police Executive Research Foundation, National Association of Police
Organizations, National Organization of Blacks in Law Enforcement,
International Brotherhood of Police Organizations and the Police
Foundation. In becoming a part of this group, federal agents were able
to add our voices to those of the over half a million state and local
officers already commenting on the issues that our Association
considers to be of greatest importance. I tell you today, as I have
told my membership for the past three years that the continuing
revitalization of immigration law enforcement is one of our highest
priorities. That revitalization will be accomplished through passage of
the recently introduced Reyes-Rogers-Smith Bill, H.R. 2528 in the House
as well as the Abraham-Kennedy Bill S. 1563, with reconciliation of
relatively minor distinctions in conference. FLEOA pledges to do
everything possible to ensure swift and successful Congressional
action.
As National President of FLEOA, I represent many of the outstanding
men and women who enforce our Nation's immigration laws. These men and
women risk their lives every day in an ever-increasingly dangerous line
of work. In fact, in July of 1998, the first female Border Patrol agent
was slain along with a male trainee Patrol agent while attempting to
arrest a deranged murderer in San Benito, Texas. Ironically, the INS
has yet to implement a key provision of the Immigration Act of 1990
(IMMACT) that would provide general arrest authority to extend
protection against legal liability to INS officers in such very
situations. That is correct, I said 1990! This tragic anecdote is not a
mere criticism of the status quo but rather an indictment. I offer this
by way of example of the total inefficiencies of that current
bureaucracy. In essence, the work environment for immigration law
enforcement has changed drastically; the statutory mandates as well as
funding for immigration law enforcement have similarly undergone
dramatic changes but yet the INS remains stagnant, at best and highly
resistant to those very changes. The INS representation in FLEOA
derives primarily from three organizational divisions: Investigations,
Detention & Deportation, and the Border Patrol. These three, along with
the Inspections and Intelligence Divisions, represent the enforcement
components of the INS. I would ask that you keep them, and the complex
bureaucratic framework in which they operate, at the forefront of your
thoughts because I believe this is the essence of both the present
problem and its potential solution.
I read, with interest, your statements Mr. Chairman in The New York
Times on January 17, 1997. At that time, you outlined your priorities
for the Senate Immigration Subcommittee when addressing the Cypress
Semiconductor Corporation in San Jose, California. I could not agree
more that it makes ``little sense to have a single agency, the
Immigration and Naturalization Service, responsible for keeping out
illegal immigrants and, at the same time letting in legal immigrants
and refugees''. Furthermore, you then suggested splitting the INS into
two agencies. In August of 1997, The New York Times again quoted you as
saying ``We should consider splitting the INS up into one law
enforcement agency and one legal immigration agency to increase the
efficiency of both''. Clearly, you have been on the cutting edge of
this issue and we commend you, Mr. Chairman for your tenacious and
determined actions in this most important effort.
On March 31, 1998, the Honorable Harold Rogers questioned INS
Commissioner Meissner regarding the current recommendations for
restructuring by Booz-Allen, the INS Contractor, and stated, ``Did you
look at two different agencies within Justice to achieve on one hand,
enforcement; on the other hand, service matters?'' Mr. Rogers went on
to point out the systemic formula for failure that even the Booz-Allen
study would perpetuate when he stated, ``There is an inherent conflict
with having this all in one agency * * * Even though you may have two
separate chains of command, it eventually winds up on your desk Mr.
Rogers echoed the concerns of both the Republican and Democratic
leadership in concluding that the INS had collapsed under the weight of
its dual conflicting missions: service and enforcement. Immigrants who
apply to become citizens wait up to two years in large cities. The INS
deports 112,000 illegal immigrants a year, fewer than half the 275,000
who enter illegally each year or stay after their visas expire.
Representative Rogers captured the essence of the problem in
stating ``The missions and jobs they're charged with are too big and
too important to be botched, and that's what they've done, botched
their job''.
It is apparent that there is a broad, bipartisan consensus in
Washington for the clear separation of immigration law enforcement from
benefit disbursement. There has also been a wide spectrum of thought on
how best to attack this extremely important problem. Sentiment runs the
gamut from the Commission on Immigration Reform (CIR) endorsement of
piece-mealing out different functions to State and Labor to affording
INS more time to get its house in order with the internal separation
recommended by Booz-Allen. I would submit to this Body today that the
citizens and the country cannot afford any further delay in rectifying
this problem.
FLEOA feels strongly that the solution lies in the middle of that
spectrum. As I travel to the numerous FLEOA chapters throughout the
country, the topic most on the minds of the more than 600 beleaguered
INS special agents who currently belong to FLEOA is the urgent need for
a substantive and dynamic reorganization of the immigration law
enforcement mission. Immigration law enforcement must be both
professionalized and depoliticized. Two separate bureaus within Justice
for immigration enforcement and benefit disbursement will provide the
essential specialization to resolve ``mission overload''. At the same
time, enforcement and service will have the requisite communication and
coordination through oversight by the Justice Department. This will
avoid a constant budget battle between the totally different, but
equally important, missions of enforcement and service. In addition,
law enforcement management officials will not be in a position of
influencing benefit decisions and vice-versa, thereby eliminating the
possibility of a ``tilt'' in emphasis by a single administrator or top
agency management toward, or against either function.
what should immigration enforcement do well
A 1991 General Accounting Office (GAO) General Management Report
entitled Immigration management: Strong Leadership and Management
Reforms Needed to Address Serious Problems, identified changes in the
evolving INS enforcement mission. The report noted, ``During this
period INS saw its enforcement mission evolve from one aimed primarily
at interdicting aliens at or near the border to one with increased
emphasis on investigative work and drug interdiction.'' GAO recommended
the consolidation of all field enforcement functions, including Border
Patrol and District enforcement functions under a single official
within a geographic area.''
The consolidation of enforcement functions will not only alleviate
the problem of overlapping enforcement programs, but will enhance the
ability to maintain consistent service and enforcement postures
throughout the United States. The variances in District Office policies
relating to service functions should be greatly reduced when District
Directors are relieved of the responsibility of carrying out
simultaneous enforcement efforts.
Enforcement efforts will be more uniform in application, and the
overlapping functions of the Border Patrol and Investigations can be
substantially reduced or eliminated altogether. This can be
accomplished through development of Enforcement Sectors and the
integration of enforcement components within that structure.
enforcement sector components
The establishment of integrated sub-units at the field level would
ensure an appropriate level of specialization while maintaining
flexibility, and would facilitate a cooperative and balanced approach.
Frankly, the establishment of a Chief Enforcement Officer who
supervises all enforcement components in a particular field enforcement
sector and reports to the Bureau of Immigration Enforcement
Headquarters Director, is an idea whose time has come. This concept
begs for congressional attention. It is needed to overcome the
inefficient and incredibly confusing status quo or even the halfsteps
that are envisioned under an internal benefits-versus-enforcement split
within INS.
borderpatrol
The Border Patrol is the largest enforcement component within INS,
with considerable growth in the recent past to approximately 8,000
agents on duty. The INS is now the largest federal agent force at
12,403 total immigration officers, with more armed agents than either
the Bureau of Prisons or the FBI. The Border Patrol has accounted for
roughly two-thirds of that fiscal growth.
The traditional responsibility of the Border Patrol is patrolling
the border between ports of entry. In recent years, the span of Border
Patrol activities has extended to include drug interdiction and
tactical operations. Under the new immigration law enforcement bureau
concept, a Deputy Chief for Border Patrol Operations would report to
the Chief within a respective Enforcement Sector.
investigations
The Investigations Division is the general and criminal
investigative arm of the ``Enforcement Sector,'' and should be
responsible for all complex, protracted investigative activities. It is
FLEOA's recommendation that the Investigations component operate in a
manner similar to that of most major federal investigative agencies and
detective bureaus. Investigative activities should place more emphasis
on proactive criminal investigations in the following functional areas:
anti-smuggling, benefit application fraud, document fraud, ``sensible''
worksite enforcement, and participation in multi-agency task forces
including OCDETF, Joint Terrorism Task Forces, Violent Gang Task
Forces, and INS-led Community Based Criminal Alien Task Forces. This
division would be overseen by a Deputy Chief for Investigative
operations, reporting to the Chief of the Enforcement Sector.
The Investigations Division employs approximately 2,000 special
agents today for the entire interior of the United States. The
Administration, itself, estimates that for every one alien apprehended
by the Patrol, two get through and that approximately 42 percent of the
current 6,000,000 illegal alien population entered the country with a
valid visa and simply overstayed that visa. Budget increases for the
Division under the Administration's priority emphasis on immigration
have been modest by anyone's standards. While the aforementioned
increase in INS Border Patrol positions was appropriated and paid for
by the Congress--the same was not true for increases for the
Investigations Division. The addition of 1,200 special agents under the
Illegal Immigration and Immigrant Responsibility Act (IIRAIRA) of 1996,
(300 visa overstayer Special Agents/investigators in fiscal year 1997--
300 anti-smuggling and employer sanctions Special Agents/investigators
in fiscal year 1997, fiscal year 1998 and fiscal year 1999) was
authorized but not appropriated for by the Congress. In short, no
agents at all.
Congress must begin to strike a balance between enforcement on our
borders and enforcement in the interior. A total focus on the first
line of defense will lead to only a hollow victory with word of mouth
rapidly traveling back to the source countries that one must merely
make it across the border in order to attain this new form of
unsanctioned amnesty.
Prompted by a then current estimate of 5,000,000 illegal aliens in
the country, The Wall Street Journal wrote that ``immigration is
becoming an issue deep in America's heartland as legal and illegal
immigrants are pulled well beyond the border areas in search of
employment.'' The article illustrated one of the most frequently
traveled routes used by alien smugglers--1-80 from the California coast
through the Mid-West and on to Chicago. An analysis of that route
reveals the shortage of INS criminal investigators in the interior
states through which that route passes:
Nevada--eleven special agents
Utah--six special agents
Wyoming--one special agent
Nebraska--fourteen special agents
Indiana--four special agents
While it is true that California and Illinois have relatively large
contingents of INS Special Agents, even those numbers are insufficient
to cope with a problem of this magnitude. The latest Census Bureau
figures list 1,875,000 illegals in California or 4,630 per agent. In
order to be effective, it is necessary that immigration law enforcement
be comprehensive and balanced.
Pursuant to a directive by the Subcommittee on Commerce, Justice,
State and Judiciary of the House Appropriations Committee, the INS has
been developing a long overdue comprehensive, mission-oriented
integrated interior enforcement strategy that together with its border
control strategy, would effectively determine the application of
enforcement priorities and resources throughout the United States. The
required report was due on April 1, 1998 but was never received until
March 30, 1999, after repeated promptings. This strategy would focus
around an integrated effort to deter and remove unlawful presence and
unlawful activities in the United States. The mission would be achieved
by prioritizing operational activities. For example, ``sensible''
worksite enforcement should and would be tied into the current anti-
smuggling strategy that targets notorious and/or abusive employers who
contract for smuggling loads with identified criminal syndicates. This
is a common sense approach to create a deterrent effect through
successful criminal prosecutions of the most egregious violators. In
the weighing contest with the current extremely limited interior
resources, it is evident that those resources should be utilized first
and foremost against criminal aliens and other criminal violators of
the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA).
detention/deportation
The Detention/Deportation component is responsible for the care and
custody of the alien population detained by the Enforcement Sector; it
is responsible for managing the alien docket and bond control, and for
arranging removal of aliens from the United States. FLEOA believes that
this component should also be responsible for the processing and
removal of all foreign nationals incarcerated in federal, state, and
local correctional institutions or jails. The Deputy Chief for
Detention and Deportation Operations would oversee this unit, and would
report to the Chief Enforcement Officer.
inspections
The Inspections component is responsible for the inspection of
applicants seeking admission to the United States at air, land and sea
ports of entry. The Inspections Division facilitates an integrated
approach to border management and promotes cooperation with other
inspectional agencies such as the Customs and Public Health Services.
As with the others, the Deputy Chief for Inspections Operations would
report to the CEO.
intelligence
The Intelligence component within the Enforcement Sector should
play an integral role in support of the other enforcement components.
Intelligence officers should be integrated into each field enforcement
component unit. The Deputy Chief for Intelligence and staff would be
responsible for the collection of information, analysis of information,
and reporting of intelligence product upward through the organization
and outward to other components. The Deputy Chief would also serve as a
primary liaison point with the Directors of Adjudications Service
Centers, Directors of Asylum Offices, and any enforcement units
remotely posted to the field benefits offices, adjudications service
centers or asylum offices, to assist in their anti-fraud efforts. The
Deputy Chief for Intelligence Operations would report to the CEO.
Mr. Chairman, I would respectfully submit that upon creation of the
standalone enforcement bureau, it is not necessary to reinvent the
wheel but merely adopt tried and true successful practices of modern
day law enforcement entities. For example, virtually all municipal,
county and state law enforcement organizations of significant size are
composed of distinct investigative and patrol divisions--the Los
Angeles County Sheriffs Office provides an excellent example of a well
respected law enforcement organization that centralizes command and
control over the divergent functions of patrol, investigations and
detention. Even the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP), although
operating in a different national and enforcement environment, is
structured similarly at the national and field level.
Implementation of Enforcement Sectors would facilitate a
cooperative and balanced approach to enforcement of our nation's
immigration laws. In turn, you will then begin to see the
accountability and productivity that our citizens not only deserve but
are demanding of immigration enforcement.
For many years, the INS was derisively referred to as a stepchild
within the Department of Justice. In the 1980s, a Main Justice official
told The Washington Post that the Department had ``no idea what they do
over there''--a reference to the physical distance between the Main
Justice Building and the INS Headquarters in Washington, D.C. More
importantly, this aside expressed the apathy and perhaps disdain with
which many prior Administrations regarded the immigration issue. All
that has changed and the Main Justice bureaucracy must change at the
same time that the independent immigration enforcement bureau is
created through legislation. Specifically, there is no office at the
Justice Department exclusively charged with immigration policy
development. That must be rectified under the oversight of a new
Associate Attorney General who would coordinate and facilitate
communication between the various Justice components involved in this
issue. The Department of Justice clearly has the clout to serve as a
major forum for immigration policy making, but it rarely exercises such
authority. The immigration issue is based upon law and should not be
dictated by the politics of the moment. FLEOA would stress that the
Director of the new Enforcement Bureau must be guaranteed freedom from
political interference.
Mr. Chairman, FLEOA strongly urges Congress, through the
appropriate Subcommittees, to adopt into legislation the already
carefully considered recommendations of both chambers for a substantive
and complete reorganization of the INS. INS District Directors face
severe pressure to provide services for aliens, and when confronted
with inadequate resources, have frequently used enforcement agents as a
labor pool to perform non-enforcement duties. This practice has
continued for over twenty years and shows no signs today of
diminishing. We believe that diversion damages the professional image
of immigration law enforcement officers, it diminishes their capacity
to provide assistance to other federal, state and local law enforcement
agencies and the communities they serve, and it fails to provide
protection for our society at large.
INS, as did the IRS until very recently, struggles under an
obsolete and confused organizational structure. Without the creation of
a distinct bureau for immigration law enforcement with the requisite
federal law enforcement chain of command, it is unlikely that the
legislative innovations passed by the 104th Congress in 1996 will ever
be used to their full potential. Only through streamlining the
bureaucracy, overcoming institutional inertia, and establishing balance
through a separation of functions, can modern day immigration law
enforcement be successful.
The separation of immigration benefit disbursement from law
enforcement would allow immigration agents in the interior and on the
border to focus solely on enforcement activities, in accordance with a
standard federal law enforcement chain of command. Repeated headlines
in newspapers throughout the country on alien smuggling, foreign
narcotics trafficking and international terrorism demonstrate that our
nation cannot afford anything less. I ask this Subcommittee to do
everything within its power to effect this change for the good of our
nation and the preservation of the world's most generous system of
legal immigration. The creation of a new Bureau of Immigration
Enforcement will allow this to pass.
On behalf of FLEOA, and the many dedicated men and women who risk
their lives enforcing our immigration laws, I appreciate your time and
attention, and the opportunity to share our views. Thank you.
Senator Abraham. Let me just ask, obviously, we have heard
some very powerful statements from each of you and we will
probably have additional questions we may submit in writing. I
have a couple of things I wanted to ask you to all comment on.
There are some disagreements we heard expressed here today
with respect to a few of the issues that are dealt with in the
bill, and I know that among the panel here, that you are not
all necessarily in agreement on each of these points. I do not
want to start a ``Crossfire'' type setting here like the TV
show, but what I would like is to ask each of you to, if you
have a position on this issue or if your organization does, to
express it and give maybe a very brief statement of the basis
for it, just to sort of flesh out the record on some of these
things.
Let me start with a question about inspections, because
there is some debate as to whether that should be something
that is a central sort of part of the operation under the
person, the Associate Attorney General, the individual who
would be at the top of the operation, or whether or not it
should be fully located within the enforcement division. We
heard disagreement expressed by a couple of the members here
about that today.
I know, as I said, several of you have different views on
this, and if you have those views, I would like to hear what
they are and why, either yes or no and why. We will start with
you, Chief.
Mr. Berg. Well, Mr. Chairman, we do have different views on
inspections. Inspections has always been a problem, even in the
current structure, and the main reason is because inspectors
are not 6(c) law enforcement-covered. So if they are placed
within the new Bureau of Enforcement, which in the language of
the bill should be in the best practices of the FBI and DEA,
you are looking at a Bureau of Enforcement that is a pure law
enforcement bureau.
So if the inspections program is not given, legislatively,
I suspect, 6(c) or law enforcement coverage, what operationally
will happen within that bureau, then, is there will have to be
two training academies maintained and the career paths within
the Bureau of Enforcement will become extremely bifurcated. I
mean, I do not know how they are going to cross each one. So
operationally, it will cause great problems.
The other thing is, if they are given 6(c) coverage and
placed within the bureau, those things can be overcome, but
then at your ports of entry, you are going to have part of your
force with 6(c) coverage and part of your Customs inspector
force not 6(c) covered. So there are some real problems with
what to do with inspections.
Of course, the third thing is, most of their duties, are
they enforcement duties or are they expediting commerce and
people?
Senator Abraham. I appreciate that.
Mr. Berg. We have some real operational problems with
placing them within that bureau without 6(c) law enforcement
coverage.
Senator Abraham. As I said, I am going to ask each of you
who cares to to comment today. You do not have to if it is not
within your realm of focus, but also to follow up, maybe with
perhaps an expanded basis and so on. Mr. Leiden, do you want to
comment?
Mr. Leiden. Yes. This is an issue that we have addressed,
as well, and I think that arguments can be made on both sides
because it is a function with responsibilities. But we come
down on the side of thinking that it is appropriate for
inspections to be in the Associate Attorney General's office
and not in enforcement. We see the vast majority of the
activity of inspectors is, in fact, adjudicating entries, that
is, making findings of fact and conclusions of law, to be
profound about it, but that is really what they are doing, is
they are making judgments.
To me, the metaphor is they are the Department of Motor
Vehicles and they are very different than the traffic cops who
are chasing down law breakers. They are issuing licenses, they
are issuing registrations, and renewing them.
We are also concerned, and I think this is what tips the
balance for us, is there is a quasi-judicial aspect of this
position, and particularly in the case of people seeking refuge
and asylum seekers, where a decision has to be made on the
spot. Is this someone you are going to put back on the plane or
is this someone who is fleeing persecution and death and needs
to really get the haven of the United States' asylum laws?
I think that we want our law enforcement officers to really
be looking for law violations and to be pursuing them and
prosecuting them and causing deterrent, and this role, I think,
is a somewhat judicial role. Therefore, we think it is
appropriate that it be seen as an adjudications function
primarily with some enforcement aspect.
And then finally, I think that inspections, from our point
of view, is just in the chain of adjudication. The petition is
filed, the petition is approved. The visa is issued, the visa
is used at the border. I can see in a career path, you see the
fruition of your work at a service center, at a district
office, coming back at the port of entry when someone applies
for admission. Thank you.
Senator Abraham. Mrs. Yoskowitz.
Mrs. Yoskowitz. This is beyond my realm and I prefer not to
comment at this time. Thank you.
Senator Abraham. That is fine. That is fine. Mr. Bonner.
Mr. Bonner. As you can probably understand, I have strong
feelings on this issue. We feel that----
Senator Abraham. We wanted to give everybody a chance to
comment.
Mr. Bonner. Right. We feel that if it looks like a duck,
walks like a duck, quacks like a duck, it is a duck. These
people enforce laws. They get assaulted in the line of duty.
Some have given their lives in the line of duty. They make
numerous arrests, seizures. They are law enforcement officers.
Putting them under the umbrella agency of the Officer of
the Associate Attorney General, we feel perpetuates the problem
that exists now for all of the INS programs in that if you have
a person who is enforcement-minded, then they emphasize
enforcement. If you have someone who is service-minded, they
emphasize service. So they blow with the political wind.
We feel that the cut should be made, put them in
enforcement, treat them like law enforcement officers. Yes, it
will cost a little more money to compensate them. I think that
overcomes Chief Berg's objection that they would be in
enforcement but would not have the same standards. I think they
should be treated like law enforcement officers in all
respects.
Senator Abraham. Mr. Gallo.
Mr. Gallo. Just briefly, Mr. Chairman. Basically, the
inspection division is the closest to the middle ground, on one
hand, the adjudication of people coming in, and on the other
hand, being almost the front line for the investigations branch
to work further investigations.
It is a quandary that they are in, and your legislation
kind of deals with it by leaving them in the middle with
reporting to the Associate Attorney General, which, unless
further looked at, is probably going to be the way to go, but
you are going to have to look at their--they are very important
to the enforcement side, as well as they are also very
important to the benefits side. They are definitely in that
middle gray area.
Senator Abraham. It is obviously one of the harder calls
that we made in the process of drafting the legislation, but I
think it is important for the record here to demonstrate that
there are varied opinions and the rationale for each of them.
I am going to ask just one more of these sorts of questions
and then I think, in light of the time, we will bring the
hearing officially to an end, although, as I said, we will have
the record open.
There has been some comment, or I think there is a certain
school of thought, perhaps, that suggests that the Associate
Attorney General level leadership position, as to the extent of
responsibility that would be housed in that post as opposed to
the two, as we contemplate them, at least, the two branches of
enforcement and service.
I guess I have, and we tried to draft the legislation in a
fashion that would give a lot of strength to the two individual
areas because we think they really need strength and they need
to have a person in charge that is widely known to the Members
of Congress who, at least in the Senate, they were confirmed.
Right now, if we were to ask our colleagues who held the
responsibility for the service operations of the INS, I will
bet no one could answer that question, and the same is probably
true in the House of Representatives. There are darn few
members. It seems to me we need somebody in that job, as well
as the enforcement side, who has the kind of familiarity to the
Congress, as well as the accountability that is required.
The question is, does the person who would be, under at
least our legislation, superior to those individuals, what
would be their duty? Are they merely to be sort of supervisory
or coordinating or are they to give direction and leadership?
I believe the draft that we have of our legislation is in
the latter category, where they would be the ultimately
responsible individual brought before Congress on immigration
issues. But some have said that that, perhaps, should be a
less-strong position and that we should, maybe for purposes of
moving forward, that we should, in effect, put the real
strength in the two branches.
I am curious as to how you all see it. I believe, at least,
Mrs. Yoskowitz addressed that, at least in part, in her
comments, so we know your thoughts, and I am wondering if any
of the other members here would like to make a comment. We will
start with you, Chief.
Mr. Berg. I think you have to put the strength in the
directors of each bureau and hold them accountable because they
are going to have separate focused missions that they need to
do and they need to be held accountable. I would envision that
the Associate Attorney General would have more of an oversight
role of both of them.
One of the things that we were very concerned with was
putting too much shared services, management support functions
in the Associate Attorney General level and the fear would be
that you would create a status quo INS agency one level above
the directors. It is essential that each one of those directors
have control over their personnel, procurement, training, and
other issues like that. Otherwise, how can we hold them
accountable to get the mission completed?
Senator Abraham. Mr. Leiden.
Mr. Leiden. This is an issue that we have thought a lot
about, as well. I certainly agree that there needs to be a
strong leader of each bureau who can be accountable for goals
that are set for accomplishment by that bureau, and the
question is, where are the goals set? I think that the setting
of the goals, the setting of policy, it makes sense that that
be done at the Associate Attorney General or some superior
officer level so that there can be coordination.
There have been times in the past when enforcement actions
and adjudication service programs could have been seen in
conflict but for a coordination of what national priorities are
and what national policies are, and I think it is important
that the buck stops someplace in the Justice Department and
that it stops with someone who gives full-time attention to
both bureaus and someone who can give full-time attention to
assessing how progress is made towards achieving this goal.
Senator Abraham. Mr. Bonner, do you want to comment?
Mr. Bonner. I think you need someone at the top who speaks
with one voice on these issues. The natural tendency of law
enforcement folks is to emphasize law enforcement and the
natural tendency of the folks who would be in the service
branch would be to emphasize the service, and that is
understandable and I think it is entirely appropriate. But
where you have these feuds that would erupt, you need somebody
to step in and say, this is the way it is going to be.
Senator Abraham. Mr. Gallo.
Mr. Gallo. You need someone who is strong, independent, and
probably appointed for a set term, looking at the Director of
the FBI, appointed for a 10-year term. There is a bill pending
now before the Senate to appoint the Customs Commission to a 5-
year term. You need a strong and independent leader. We do not
have attorneys general and deputy attorneys general who are shy
and introverted people. If they need to settle a dispute
between the Director of the FBI and the Administrator of DEA,
you have to feel comfortable with your oversight of the Justice
Department to have that strong leader, the ultimate leader
being the Attorney General and then the President. But as far
as the bureau directors, you need a strong, trained career law
enforcement or career benefits person in charge.
Senator Abraham. We appreciate all of you being here today.
As I said, we will keep the record open for additional
questions that might come along, either from our office or
others who were not able to participate or the other two
Senators.
I think that, just to put this in context, there is
certainly action going on in this arena in the House. We want
to make sure that the Senate moves forward, as well, and we
will work to that end. We will talk, certainly, with our
colleagues on the other side of the Capitol as we move forward.
But we really appreciate your input because that has been a
helpful part of the process for me today, and appreciate our
audience participation here today, as well. It was nice to have
a good level of interest demonstrated in these topics.
With that, the hearing is adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 4:01 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.]