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S. HRG. 108–910

BIOMETRIC PASSPORTS

HEARING

BEFORE THE

COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY 

UNITED STATES SENATE

ONE HUNDRED EIGHTH CONGRESS

SECOND SESSION

JUNE 15, 2004

Serial No. J–108–82

Printed for the use of the Committee on the Judiciary

(

(II)

COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY 

ORRIN G. HATCH, Utah, Chairman 

CHARLES E. GRASSLEY, Iowa 

ARLEN SPECTER, Pennsylvania 

JON KYL, Arizona 

MIKE DEWINE, Ohio 

JEFF SESSIONS, Alabama 

LINDSEY O. GRAHAM, South Carolina 

LARRY E. CRAIG, Idaho 

SAXBY CHAMBLISS, Georgia 

JOHN CORNYN, Texas 

PATRICK J. LEAHY, Vermont 

EDWARD M. KENNEDY, Massachusetts 

JOSEPH R. BIDEN, JR., Delaware 

HERBERT KOHL, Wisconsin 

DIANNE FEINSTEIN, California 

RUSSELL D. FEINGOLD, Wisconsin 

CHARLES E. SCHUMER, New York 

RICHARD J. DURBIN, Illinois 

JOHN EDWARDS, North Carolina 

BRUCE ARTIM, Chief Counsel and Staff Director 

BRUCE A. COHEN, Democratic Chief Counsel and Staff Director 

(III)

C O N T E N T S 

STATEMENTS OF COMMITTEE MEMBERS 

Page

Feinstein, Hon. Dianne, a U.S. Senator from the State of California ................. 18

Hatch, Hon. Orrin G., a U.S. Senator from the State of Utah ............................ 1

prepared statement .......................................................................................... 73

Leahy, Hon. Patrick J., a U.S. Senator from the State of Vermont, prepared 

statement .............................................................................................................. 84

WITNESSES 

Cantwell, Hon. Maria, a U.S. Senator from the State of Washington ................ 2

Harty, Maura, Assistant Secretary for Consular Affairs, Department of State, 

Washington, D.C. ................................................................................................. 7

Hutchinson, Asa, Under Secretary, Border and Transportation Security, Department of Homeland Security, Washington, D.C. .......................................... 5

QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS 

Responses of Maura Harty to questions submitted by Senators Kyl and 

Chambliss (Senator Chambliss submitted a question on behalf of Senator 

Sununu) ................................................................................................................ 24

Responses of Asa Hutchinson to questions submitted by Senators Kyl, Leahy, 

and Chambliss (Senator Chambliss submitted a question on behalf of Senator Sununu) ........................................................................................................ 58

SUBMISSIONS FOR THE RECORD 

Cantwell, Hon. Maria, a U.S. Senator from the State of Washington, prepared 

statement .............................................................................................................. 66

Harty, Maura, Assistant Secretary for Consular Affairs, Department of State, 

Washington, D.C., prepared statement .............................................................. 68

Hutchinson, Asa, Under Secretary, Border and Transportation Security, Department of Homeland Security, Washington, D.C., prepared statement ....... 75

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BIOMETRIC PASSPORTS 

TUESDAY, JUNE 15, 2004 

UNITED STATES SENATE, COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY, Washington, DC. 

The Committee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:07 a.m., in Room 

SD–226, Dirksen Senate Office Building, Hon. Orrin G. Hatch, 

Chairman of the Committee, presiding. 

Present: Senators Hatch, Kyl, Sessions, Chambliss, and Feinstein. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. ORRIN G. HATCH, A U.S. 

SENATOR FROM THE STATE OF UTAH 

Chairman HATCH. Good morning and welcome to the hearing on 

biometric passports. Since last fall, this Committee has held eight 

oversight hearings that substantially focus on our Nation’s efforts 

to prevent and respond to terrorism on American soil. The purpose 

of these hearings is to make sure that the United States government is taking every possible step to protect this country and its 

citizens from the evil intentions of terrorists and that every available resource is focused toward that end. Implementation of the biometric passport program will be an important resource in our 

fight against terrorism and we should be vigilant in our efforts to 

fully implement this program. 

Today, we focus our attention on the biometric passport requirement set out in the Enhanced Border Security and Visa Entry Reform Act. This legislation provided crucial tools to tighten immigration procedures and close loopholes in our border security which 

were, in my view, of paramount importance after the catastrophic 

attacks this Nation suffered on September 11, 2001. I was proud 

to be an original cosponsor of this legislation and am disappointed 

that more than 2 years after its enactment, we are faced with the 

reality that the biometric passport deadline of October 26, 2004, 

will not be met. 

Now, I understand that when we called for the development and 

inclusion of biometric passports, the fundamental technologies were 

not yet mature. Nonetheless, many of us believed that we needed 

cutting-edge technology in order to thwart the increasingly sophisticated terrorists. This mandate has presented difficult challenges 

for the many capable scientists and technicians who have dedicated 

themselves to this particular effort. 

But we can and must demand that the countries who participate 

in the Visa Waiver Program begin producing and distributing these 

passports. Every day that biometric identifiers are not utilized, our 

2

country and its citizens are more vulnerable to terrorist attack. So 

I strongly urge the Department of State and Department of Homeland Security to work with these participating countries in the upcoming months to establish an interoperable system for biometric 

passports. 

I have spoken to Secretary of State Powell concerning the importance of the biometric passport issue, and during his testimony before this Committee last week, Secretary Ridge also emphasized 

the importance of this issue. Both of these men, whom I highly respect, have requested a 2-year extension to the current biometric 

passport deadline of October 26, 2004. However, I am concerned 

with the national security implications that such a lengthy extension may cause. Frankly, I would like to require why a 1-year extension is not feasible for implementation of the biometric passport 

program. 

As this deadline extension has implications on our National security, I hope that our witnesses today can fully explain to this Committee the reasons for extending the current biometric passport 

deadline. I will be interested in those reasons, and, of course, I understand Chairman Sensenbrenner in the House feels somewhat 

strongly on this issue. On the other hand, I want to accommodate 

our public leaders who have these difficult jobs and do what I can 

to always be of assistance to them, and I am sure Chairman Sensenbrenner feels the same way. 

Today, the Committee will hear from two panels of witness testimony. The first panel consists of testimony by Hon. Maria Cantwell, Senator from the State of Washington. I would like to welcome Senator Cantwell, who was a cosponsor of the Enhanced Border Security and Visa Entry Reform Act. I know that she feels 

strongly about this issue and I want to thank her for taking time 

to appear before the Committee. 

I might mention that over the weekend, I did see your former 

boss, Rob Glaser of Real Networks and he said to say hello to you. 

Senator CANTWELL. Thank you. 

Chairman HATCH. The second panel consists of testimony by 

Hon. Asa Hutchinson—Secretary Hutchinson, we are really honored to have you here—Under Secretary for Border and Transportation Security at the Department of Homeland Security. And, of 

course, we have Hon. Maura Harty, the Assistant Secretary for 

Consular Affairs at the Department of State. We equally welcome 

Ms. Harty. I welcome both of you good people to our Committee 

and appreciate your testimony on this very, very important issue 

at this very, very important time. 

With that, I will insert the ranking member’s statement into the 

record and we will interrupt when he comes, but we will turn to 

Senator Cantwell until then. 

[The prepared statements of Senators Leahy and Hatch appear 

as submissions for the record.] 

STATEMENT OF HON. MARIA CANTWELL, A U.S. SENATOR 

FROM THE STATE OF WASHINGTON 

Senator CANTWELL. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you 

for the opportunity to appear before the Committee. As a former 

member of the Judiciary Committee, I miss my time being here on 

3

the Committee and the lively and spirited and intelligent debate 

that this Committee provides, so— 

Chairman HATCH. That is an interesting comment for somebody 

who has the experience you have. We miss you on this Committee, 

too. We wish you were back. 

Senator CANTWELL. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate the 

opportunity to testify this morning because the need for greater 

border security became a glaringly evident issue in the Northwest 

in 1998 when Ahmed Ressam, a terrorist trained at one of the 

Osama bin Laden training camps in Afghanistan, was arrested 

shortly after crossing the Canadian border at Port Angeles, Washington. Explosives and other bomb materials were found in the 

trunk of Ressam’s car. Ressam’s plan was to head to Los Angeles 

and blow up LAX airport. But thanks to the hard work of Diana 

Dean, the U.S. Customs Inspector, the terrorist was apprehended. 

This frightening incident made it clear, the vulnerabilities we 

face along the porous Northern border and the vulnerabilities that 

became even more concerning after the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. But the Ressam case raised important questions 

about our international standards. 

Ressam began his journey on a French visa, leaving Algeria and 

landing in Versailles. Ressam came to the United States after creating a trail of fraudulent documents on his journey from Algiers 

to the United States, first obtaining a French passport on the basis 

of a fake French birth certificate. He then entered Canada under 

his own name, seeking refugee status. While living in Canada, he 

used a false baptismal certificate to obtain a Canadian passport 

under an alias. 

An international biometric standard for visas would have identified Ressam the first time he tried to enter France. The identification would have become traceable when he entered Canada and 

then the United States and could have been more easily stopped. 

Obviously, we can’t always count on the good work of our Border 

Patrol to stop every individual, so this information is paramount. 

That is why I worked with you, Senator Hatch, and Senator 

Leahy, in the Patriot Act to establish the technology standard for 

the U.S. visa program. Those provisions, Section 403(c) of the Patriot Act, called for a technology standard to facilitate a comprehensive screening of visa applications at our overseas consulates and 

to access the necessary law enforcement, watch list, and intelligence information at our consular offices and at border crossings, 

and the verification of identifying persons crossing our borders 

being the same people who obtained the travel documents. 

In the Enhanced Border Security and Visa Entry Reform Act of 

2002, I also worked with this Committee and Senators Kennedy, 

Feinstein, Brownback, and Kyl to include in Section 603 a requirement that the Department of Homeland Security coordinate with 

this same technology requirement in the Patriot Act to work with 

Canada, Mexico, and the 27 visa waiver countries. This would implement standards for visa programs that could be compatible with 

those adopted in the United States. 

More simply said, we must recognize that we need international 

cooperation to be successful with our visa technology standard. It 

must be compatible with our own. This would enable us to catch 

4

the Ressams of the world at a sooner place in time, before they got 

to the United States. 

The problem begins in the United States. The requirement of the 

visa technology standard, like the passport standards, have not 

been met and that is the subject of this hearing. Congress required 

that the visa standard be set by 2003. In a report issued in November of 2002, the National Institute for Standards and Technology, 

the standards body for creating the standard, recommended a dual 

biometric for visas, fingerprints and facial recognition. 

With the U.S. VISIT program, the Department of Homeland Security has begun to implement a national biometric program using 

dual biometrics, but the biometrics chosen do not allow for searching FBI or Interpol databases, and perhaps that can be commented 

on later, but that is my understanding. More analysis should be 

done on what is the appropriate standard to maximize international cooperation and international information. 

The Department of State and Department of Homeland Security 

must make it a priority to establish U.S. standards and to work 

with the international standards setting organization. This ISO, 

which is a network of national standard institutes from 148 countries and the International Civil Aviation Organization, can work 

to help us implement these standards. 

We need to stop terrorists before they are at our borders. In fact, 

we should be working first, which I believe the State Department 

will testify, in those seven states that the Department has listed 

as terrorist states in establishing these visa technology standards. 

Then we must set a priority in working with the 27 waiver countries, that they also adopt these standards so that they again can 

make sure that people, as in Ressam’s case, starting in a country, 

then entering one of those 27 waiver countries and then coming to 

the United States, are stopped at an earlier point in time. 

The 19 hijackers that perpetrated the attack on the United 

States on September 11 had submitted 24 visa applications, receiving 22 tourist visas and one student visa. The 19 entered the 

United States a total of 33 times before flying airplanes into the 

Twin Towers and the Pentagon. We need to do a better job at getting the technology and securing our visa process with these international countries. 

I am glad that the Committee is taking a closer look at this 

issue. I look forward to hearing the testimony of both the agencies 

that are presenting today and hoping that this visa standard can 

be met in the near future. There are obviously significant challenges to meeting that standard and there are concerns about this 

delay. I am suggesting just one issue that the Committee might 

consider, and that is that we continue to have a six-month update 

by this Committee until we actually get the standard in place and 

encourage the Committee to continue to work on the oversight as 

it relates to setting an international standard that hopefully can 

maximize the use of the Interpol data so we can catch these people, 

as I said, before they reach our borders. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

[The prepared statement of Senator Cantwell appear as a submission for the record.] 

5

Chairman HATCH. Thank you. I appreciate your testimony. I 

know you are an expert in this area and it means a lot to us that 

you would take time to come see us. 

Any questions from anybody? 

[No response.] 

Chairman HATCH. With that, we are glad to have had you here. 

Senator CANTWELL. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Senator SESSIONS. Senator, I thank you very much for coming. 

You indicated that—I don’t know if you want to talk about it now—

it is important, your comment that FBI and Interpol databases 

may not be accessible under some of the proposals that are out 

there. I think that is real important. Do you agree? 

Senator CANTWELL. Yes, I do, and I think that there is more 

progress being made by companies working on an international 

standard with that ISO organization, and the question becomes, do 

we have a standard that we set in the United States that is compatible in accessing all that information. While today we might 

only want to access, say, our FBI files, it would be an interesting 

question whether Mr. Ressam, starting in Algiers, would have been 

in the Interpol database already on something else. Obviously 

wanting to stop people at point of origin as opposed to the point 

of entry into the United States would be a better process, so getting 

that standard. 

Chairman HATCH. Thank you, Senator Cantwell. 

Senator CANTWELL. Thank you. 

Chairman HATCH. We really appreciate your taking time from 

what we know is a busy schedule. 

Senator CANTWELL. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman HATCH. Thank you. If we could have our good friend 

Asa Hutchinson, Under Secretary for Border and Transportation 

Security, Department of Homeland Defense, and Hon. Maura 

Harty, who is the Assistant Secretary for Consular Affairs in the 

Department of State, come to the table. We appreciate having both 

of you here, and again, I would like to welcome both of you. 

Secretary Hutchinson is a former member of Congress with distinguished service on the House Intelligence and Judiciary Committees. I also understand that Secretary Hutchinson, at the age 

of 31, was appointed U.S. Attorney for the Western District of Arkansas. At that time, if I recall it correctly, you were the youngest 

U.S. Attorney in the country. 

We also welcome Secretary Harty, who has honorably served our 

country for over 20 years in the Foreign Service and was a former 

U.S. Ambassador to the Republic of Paraguay. We admire your 

dedication, Ms. Harty, and your service to our country and look forward to your testimony here today. 

Under Secretary Hutchinson, you can proceed with your opening 

statement. 

STATEMENT OF ASA HUTCHINSON, UNDER SECRETARY, BORDER AND TRANSPORTATION SECURITY, DEPARTMENT OF 

HOMELAND SECURITY, WASHINGTON, D.C. 

Mr. HUTCHINSON. Thank you, Chairman Hatch, distinguished 

members of the Committee. It is a pleasure to appear before you 

to discuss the Department’s commitment to enhance the security of 

6

our citizens, our international visitors, and our Nation through the 

use of biometric technology. It is a pleasure to appear with Maura 

Harty, my good friend and partner in this endeavor from the Department of State. 

I would emphasize that it is important that we work through our 

partnership in the international community to integrate the biometric technology into passports and travel documents in accordance with international standards, best practices, and our own 

statutory requirements. The involvement and cooperation of the 27 

countries that comprise the visa waiver program are critical to establishing an effective system for managing the entry and exit of 

millions of travelers each year. 

The use of biometrics, including digital finger scans and photographs, is consistent, in my judgment, with the values and character of our Nation and our commitment to enhance security while 

facilitating legitimate trade and travel, respecting individual rights 

and privacy, and maintaining positive relations with our allies. 

Also, it helps us to effectively use our taxpayer dollars. 

For that reason, I would like to reiterate the administration’s request for a 2-year extension of the deadline for the visa waiver program countries to issue machine-readable passports. As you known, 

the program enables citizens of certain countries to travel to the 

United States for 90 days or less without obtaining a visa. And 

while visa-less travel encourages travel and trade with our allies, 

it also makes the program attractive to those who wish to avoid 

visa security checks conducted at our consular offices and even 

would be an invite for terrorists. 

Congress has addressed this security vulnerability by requiring 

visa waiver program countries to issue tamper-resistant machinereadable passports, including biometric identifiers, in accordance 

with international standards. While most countries have initiated 

programs to meet the current deadline, very few, if any, countries 

will be in a position to issue passports in that time frame, and this 

is due in most cases not to a lack of will or commitment to enhanced security, but a result of technical or scientific challenges. 

The Department of Homeland Security must also implement a 

system to process those passports by the October 26 deadline. We 

will not be in a position to biometrically compare and authenticate 

those travel documents due to immense technical challenges, including the need to test and develop a system that will rely upon 

a single type of machine reader to process passports from 27 countries. We prefer not to develop a reader or multiple types of readers 

for different passports that are issued by the 27 different countries. 

Based upon information provided by these countries as well as 

the Department of State’s experience, we believe that all countries 

can be compliant by November 30, 2006, and it should be a hard 

and fast deadline. Extending this date will also give the Department enough time to rigorously test the equipment and technology, 

and it is important, I believe, for us to get this process right the 

first time and not to spend additional time and resources to correct 

mistakes that might have been avoided. 

During this time, we do need to enhance security, and for that 

reason, we are expanding our U.S. VISIT enrollment to include 

visitors under the visa waiver program beginning in September. As 

7

you know, the U.S. VISIT system, for the first time in our country’s 

history, allows us to biometrically confirm the identity of foreign 

visa travelers at our ports of entry. We believe processing these 

visitors under U.S. VISIT enhances our security, and by expanding 

it to visa waiver countries gives us some additional security capabilities. 

It allows us to, through the biometric check, to check their identity against lookout databases that we have available. It also allows us to freeze the identity of the traveler and tie that identity 

to the travel document. It allows us to determine whether the traveler complied with the terms of his or her admission, previous admission, and in using that identity. We can collect arrival and departure information of travelers and update their records and their 

immigration status while they are in the U.S. We can determine 

if they have overstayed their visas. And obviously, we can give 

checks of their biometrics and biographic information against additional security databases that we have to assure that they are not 

a threat to the United States. 

Since we implemented this on January 5, we processed over five 

million visitors. We have matched over 579 persons against criminal databases and prevented more than 196 known or suspected 

criminals from entering the country. Adding the visa waiver program countries will add an additional 13 million visitors to the system. I believe that we can do that successfully. We have that in 

plan by September 30. We believe the 2-year extension will be 

helpful for us to meet our mutual objectives of security, cooperation 

with our allies, and an appropriate use of the taxpayers’ dollars. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman HATCH. Thank you, Secretary. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Hutchinson appears as a submission for the record.] 

Chairman HATCH. Ms. Harty, we will take your testimony. 

STATEMENT OF MAURA HARTY, ASSISTANT SECRETARY FOR 

CONSULAR AFFAIRS, DEPARTMENT OF STATE, WASHINGTON, D.C. 

Ms. HARTY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for the opportunity to testify today on the administration’s request for a 2-year extension of 

the 10/26/04 deadline for inclusion of biometric features in passports issued by countries which participate in the visa waiver program. I also would like to report on State Department’s progress 

in developing our own biometric passport. 

The inclusion of biometrics in international travel documents to 

verify the identities of prospective travelers to our country is a critical step in improving our border security and as part of our collective effort to combat terrorism. Naturally, the inclusion of biometrics in our passport is not the only step we are taking to enhance the security of our borders. We are working hand-in-hand 

with our friends and colleagues at the Department of Homeland 

Security to improve a multi-layered and interlocking system of border security through greater information sharing among agencies 

and with the VWP governments, through enhanced passenger 

screening and pre-clearance measures, and through DHS’s recent 

8

decision to expand the U.S.–VISIT program to include visa waiver 

country travelers. 

State and DHS are currently in the middle of a Congressionally 

mandated biennial review of the VWP countries, assessing their 

compliance with the terms of the program and the criteria established by Congress. At all visa adjudicating posts overseas, consular officers have pushed our borders out beyond physical limits 

as a nation. They are seeing people well before they ever begin 

their travel, and through our Visa Viper programs overseas, every 

element of an embassy contributes to reporting on anyone who 

might be in a position to do this country harm. 

As you know, the Enhanced Border Security Act (EBSVERA) established 10/26/04 as the deadline by which travelers entering the 

U.S. under the Visa Waiver Program must present passports that 

incorporate biometric identifiers that comply with the ICAO standards. In May of 2003, ICAO decided to make facial recognition 

encrypted on contactless chips the globally interoperable, standard 

passport biometric. Thus, visa waiver program countries had 17 

months from that date to bring a biometric passport from design 

to production. 

EBSVERA does not provide a waiver of that provision, and few, 

if any, of those countries will be able to meet this legislatively mandated deadline. Although the countries are committed to deploying 

biometric passports, they are encountering the same technical difficulties and scientific issues that we have encountered. 

The challenge given the international community by the Congressional mandate is a daunting one. There are complex issues 

with which we are well familiar, including the security of the passport data on the contactless chip and the international interoperability of readers and biometric passports, which we and our VWP 

partners have continued to work through together. 

In May of 2004, ICAO established the technical standards for the 

interoperability of contactless chips and passport readers at ports 

of entry and the technical specifications for protecting passport 

data from unauthorized use. As a result, manufacturers can now 

begin producing passport readers that will be able to read multiple 

chips. Each country can now begin to do their program and put 

their passports together and test them in real world scenarios. 

Now that the questions of global standards and interoperability 

have been laid to rest, we and the VWP countries can begin full 

development and deployment of our respective programs. Given the 

time that it has taken to resolve these technical complex issues, as 

I have said, few of the visa waiver countries, if any, will meet the 

deadline. In fact, it is not a question of ill will. It is very much a 

question of difficult science. 

Although the legislative requirements do not pertain to the U.S. 

passport, we recognize that in our roll as leaders, we would or 

should do the very same thing and lead the way and demonstrate 

that this passport technology that is being required of them would 

be something that we would also engage in, and as I have mentioned earlier, we have run into the same problems that they have. 

In regard to our own progress, we expect to be able to produce 

the first operational biometric passport this December. It won’t be 

en masse, but we will have one by Christmas here in Washington. 

9

We will then expand our program to official and diplomatic passports so that we have a sizeable number of passports to use as we 

sort of work through the program and make sure that our technology is intact and functional. We will then expand it more broadly in February of 2005 to our Los Angeles passport agency and we 

will work with Australia and the travelers themselves to make sure 

that these passports are, in fact, interoperable in every way. 

Given our own experiences with respect to building a biometric 

passport program, sir, we believe that there are compelling reasons 

to extend the deadline to November 30, 2006, as the administration 

has requested. Failure to extend the deadline will have some serious consequences for the country as well as the Department of 

State, and we can certainly go into those, sir, as you so desire. 

I would like to add to what Under Secretary Hutchinson has already said and to encourage the Committee to please consider the 

2-year deadline that we have previously requested. I thank you for 

your time. 

Chairman HATCH. Thank you so much. 

[The prepared statement of Ms. Harty appears as a submission 

for the record.] 

Chairman HATCH. Mr. Secretary, it is my understanding that the 

chosen biometric for this program is facial recognition, whereby a 

biometric photo is stored in a chip. The chip is then embedded in 

the individual passport. Now, I understand that this biometric 

standard was adopted by the International Civil Aviation Organization. I want to ask you just two questions. 

Number one is, how reliable is this facial recognition biometric? 

And number two, does the chip have the ability to take on other 

biometric recognition features, such as fingerprints or any other, 

should the visa waiver countries choose to implement additional 

features for more enhanced security in the future? 

Mr. HUTCHINSON. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. You are correct 

that ICAO, the International Civil Aviation Authority, did meet in 

May and set the standard, where we are grateful that they acted 

quickly after some international pressure to move in this direction. 

You asked about the reliability of the current standards and the 

chip technology. First of all, the facial technology is not fully developed. It is sufficient for one-to-one matches so that you can use it 

to confirm identity, which is the overarching purpose of this initiative. It is not sufficient in accuracy to do a one-to-many match 

which gives you the capability through facial recognition to check 

databases. We are hopeful that that technology will improve as 

time goes on. 

In addition, the chips have a lifespan currently of three to 5 

years. As you know, in many instances, the passports are issued 

for six to 10 years. So right now, you will be adding a chip on there 

that has a shorter life span than the life of the passport itself, and 

this is again an area that we hope that industry will be able to improve their technology in reference to. 

So we believe that we have standards that are well set, but we 

thought we had the standards well set a year or so ago and we recognize after testing that they were not sufficient. They came back 

and redefined those. We hope that the testing this time will show 

that everything is appropriate and ready to move forward. 

10

Chairman HATCH. I know you are aware that just yesterday, the 

House passed a 1-year extension for the full implementation—full 

implementation of the full biometric program, or passport program. 

Now, you both have requested that this should really be 2 years. 

The Secretary of State made that case to me, as well, because of 

the technological challenges which you are outlining here today. 

Are both of you saying that it is impossible to fully implement 

the program within the 1-year time limit that the House has set? 

Maybe, Secretary Harty, you would want to comment on that. 

Ms. HARTY. I appreciate the question, sir. While I regret having 

to say that something is impossible, we have been told by almost 

all of the countries that they cannot get it done within a year. As 

I have already admitted, in our own program, we will get a passport done, a small number of passports done by the end of the year. 

But to go into mass production simply isn’t possible in a 1-year 

time frame. 

One of the things that we are very concerned about is that we 

truly would like to measure twice and cut once, that we would 

truly like to also be good stewards of our programs and our shared 

responsibilities for border security, but also taxpayer dollars. We 

would like to get it right and we have heard this over and over 

again from our VWP partners. We would not like to rush into getting it wrong. 

Chairman HATCH. I know you have tried hard, really hard, to 

put this together, but how receptive are the visa waiver countries 

to our efforts to implement this program in an expedient manner? 

Are there any countries that have given you resistance to accomplishing this? 

Ms. HARTY. No, sir. I don’t think there is resistance at all. There 

is a tremendous ‘‘can do’’ spirit. We have seen it at ICAO. We have 

seen it at G–8. We have seen it in multiple international fora. We 

bring the visa waiver country embassies into the State Department 

all the time and talk through this. There is a tremendous desire 

to do it, and I think that the events in Spain of March 11 only 

punctuated the need to do just exactly this kind of thing. 

And it is not restricted to the visa waiver countries, sir. We are 

very, very regularly approached by other countries who do not yet 

have machine-readable passports who also want to increase and 

enhance the validity and safety and security of their own documents. This is a tidal wave of good will. But the science has proven 

more difficult than we realized, as Under Secretary Hutchinson 

said. 

Chairman HATCH. My time is up, but Secretary Hutchinson, you 

indicated you wanted to talk about that? 

Mr. HUTCHINSON. Mr. Chairman, I think that Ms. Harty is correct that the countries are willing to proceed down this path, and 

some with great enthusiasm. Others, as we have gone through the 

assessments of who should be renewed for the visa waiver country 

program and where they are in the level of compliance, we look at 

how developed their program is in this regard and some of them, 

yes, we have a program which is primarily a plan to move forward 

when the standards are set. So there are varying levels. 

I think the leadership of the United States has been essential in 

this arena and the Congress of the United States, and I think your 

11

original question was whether anybody could—is it possible to do 

it within a year. Australia has taken the lead on that and really 

been aggressive in this arena and we are entering into testing with 

them, with Australia, New Zealand, Japan, and Germany. But the 

testing pattern is, like, next June. So that is a very short time 

frame for procurement after a June couple-month test. Even the 

most aggressive would have a difficult time doing it within 1 year. 

Chairman HATCH. Thank you. I am going to turn to Senator 

Chambliss, and I am going to ask Senator Chambliss if you will 

continue to chair the hearing and follow up with the rest of the 

Senators here. You might want to take this chair here. 

Thank you. I appreciate both of you coming. 

Senator CHAMBLISS. [Presiding.] Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for 

calling this hearing on an issue that is critically important, not just 

to the United States but to 27 other countries, as well. Both you 

Secretaries, we appreciate your diligent work on this issue. 

Secretary Hutchinson, as you know, myself along with several 

other Senators on this Committee have introduced legislation to extend the time frame for the implementation of these new biometric 

visas by 2 years. I know there are some valid reasons why, from 

a homeland security standpoint, that you have requested it—you, 

as a part of the administration, have requested that. Let me ask 

you two questions in that regard. 

First of all, can you explain the various security measures, such 

as machine-readable passports, the passenger manifest agreement, 

and the lost and stolen passports database, that will essentially fill 

the gap as biometric passports are being implemented. 

And secondly, I know you are aware of the Inspector General’s 

report that has recently come out and has been somewhat critical 

of this process. Would you tell us what steps you have taken to ensure the overall security program since the Inspector General’s report came out, please. 

Mr. HUTCHINSON. Thank you, Senator Chambliss. In reference to 

the Inspector General’s report that was on the visa waiver program 

and the capability, really, of the Department of Homeland Security 

to conduct the assessments, really, at the time that report was 

issued, it was really outdated because many steps had been taken 

in the interim and it was not very timely. 

We have submitted to the Inspector General, I presume with a 

copy to the Senators that have inquired, our responses in detail to 

the recommendations that were made. One of the recommendations, for example, was that there be a responsible program office 

in the Department. That has been established within my directorate. 

Secondly, they recommended that visa waiver countries be a part 

and enrolled in U.S. VISIT, our biometric check. That has been 

done. It is being done by September 30. 

And so I believe those have been addressed. We have a very vigorous program. Our goal is to have all the assessments done by 

September 30. We are on target to do that. We have completed, I 

believe, well over half of the site assessments, working with the 

Department of State. So that review is in place. 

In addition, of course, we are continuing to enhance our security 

capabilities overall, from the manifest checks on the flights. We 

12

have an initiative with Interpol and our European colleagues on 

lost and stolen passports and utilizing Interpol as a database for 

exchange of information on lost and stolen passports. We have 

those also bilaterally with the different countries so that we have 

access to that information. 

So we are continuing to enhance security even through our visa 

waiver country programs while we are continuing the assessment 

as to whether they should continue in that program. 

Senator CHAMBLISS. Ms. Harty, do you have any additional comments along those lines? 

Ms. HARTY. Thank you, sir. I agree with everything that Under 

Secretary Hutchinson just said. The advance passenger screening, 

machine-readable passports, which will all be required by this October, PNR, sharing of lost and stolen passport data are all things 

that add to what we are aiming for, which is a depth of security. 

This is like an onion that we are building rather than peeling, and 

as many ways as we can add layers of that onion and increase the 

degree of scrutiny which as a Government we apply to travelers, 

as well as the degree of difficulty to a maleficent traveler, is what 

we are working on every day together. 

I would also like to add that in regular conversations with our 

VWP allies, they agree with those aims and goals. And so as we 

scrutinize our systems, so are they doing the same thing as they 

look at how they issue passports to their own nationals, visas and 

those kinds of things. 

Senator CHAMBLISS. Have you given the 27 countries benchmarks to which they must comply by a certain date, and if so, how 

are they progressing on those benchmarks? 

Ms. HARTY. We have a series of benchmarks, sir, that we have 

developed. It is a rather lengthy list, but we haven’t put times to 

it. We haven’t put specific dates to it. But we would go back to 

them quarterly to make sure that they know what the benchmarks 

are and so that we could see progress therein, yes, sir. 

Senator CHAMBLISS. Okay. If we extend this by a year versus the 

2 years, is the likelihood that we are going to be back here pretty 

high, Senator Hutchinson? 

Ms. HARTY. We wouldn’t want to be doing that, sir. As we talked 

last year, 1 year ago, about the machine-readable passport issue, 

which did have an attendant ability by the Secretary of State to 

extend, we said last year that we would go back to the countries 

once with respect to the machine-readable passport requirement 

and we would not come back to the Senate and ask for another extension. We did not. We will not, even though there may be one 

country that has a problem with that. We were clear. We set a 

benchmark, and we would not back down from that. I would assume that we would be doing the same thing with this, sir. 

I think that we can see, not only through the benchmarks and 

the process that we will go through over the next, I hope, 2 years 

to get everybody on board on the program, that there won’t be any 

surprises, that countries will communicate with us as we will with 

them and we will know every step of the way. We will also be able 

to make better judgment on where to expend our resources with respect to any country that might not be able to, despite the inVerDate 0ct 09 2002 14:42 Jul 19, 2006 Jkt 028598 PO 00000 Frm 00016 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 S:\GPO\HEARINGS\28598.TXT SJUD4 PsN: CMORC
13

creased 2-year deadline, make it. They will just need visas after 

that, sir. 

Mr. HUTCHINSON. Mr. Chairman? 

Senator CHAMBLISS. Yes? 

Mr. HUTCHINSON. Could I quickly respond on that, as well? I 

think if there was a 1-year extension, where we would be in a year 

is that we would be back here reporting that some countries have 

moved forward quickly in compliance. They will all have a program, but they will not be issuing the biometric passports. We will 

have just completed the testing phase. 

Probably the greatest concern would be that some countries 

might move forward because of that deadline with technology that 

has not been sufficiently tested, that would not be in line with the 

international protocols, that would wind up having something out 

of sync which would have to be redone and would also put a question mark for our ports of entry, that we might have to develop 

readers for someone that developed their biometric passports early 

without sufficient testing and there is a potential for some waste 

of money in that process, in getting it wrong. 

Senator CHAMBLISS. Thank you. Senator Sessions? 

Senator SESSIONS. Thank you, Senator Chambliss. 

I am concerned about the ability to access the databases, particularly with regard to the visa waiver countries and ICAO, the International Civil Aeronautics Organization’s regulations about their 

adoption of a facial standard. First, let me ask you, Secretary 

Harty, ICAO is basically a private organization of people involved 

in aviation that we have— 

Ms. HARTY. It is an international organization, sir, and while 

there may be some private representatives there, every government 

sends a—every member sends an official government— 

Senator SESSIONS. And we pressured them, as I understand it, 

to come forward with a biometric and they said, okay, facial. But 

the problem is, facial is not scientifically achievable at this moment 

and facial is unconnected to this tremendous worldwide databank 

we have of fingerprints. So we have created a facial identifier that 

is valid for the purpose of determining whether or not the entering 

person is the same person holding the passport, but we haven’t 

dealt with any ability to identify those who have records internationally or in the United States of criminal activities. 

This is a huge expense. If everybody in the world is going to rush 

off into this facial idea that may not prove to be practical, it may 

not prove to be scientifically achievable. As a matter of fact, one 

major CEO that was in my office and somehow we talked about 

this subject and he said to me, we chose not to bid on it because 

we are not sure, this world-class high-tech company, he said, we 

are not sure we can achieve it. We don’t want to end up having 

false positives and people complaining at us that your system fails. 

And so we just didn’t even bid. 

So I guess, Mr. Hutchinson, on the law enforcement side, can’t 

we go back and challenge and urge ICAO to adopt a fingerprint 

standard that is already in existence worldwide, that we have the 

proven technology to make it work, and wouldn’t that give us a 

protection that this facial system would not? 

Ms. HARTY. Sir, may I answer it, as well? 

14

Senator SESSIONS. Yes. 

Ms. HARTY. Thank you. ICAO took quite a bit of time to come 

up with the facial recognition standard. It was a difficult bar for 

them to get over. A number of issues came up. The first of those, 

or one of many, I should say, was the question of what the biometric would be. Lots of people thought, let us look at fingerprints, let 

us look at hand geometry, let us look at iris scans. 

The reason that they went first with facial recognition was they 

have—every member country has experience collecting photographs 

because they do that already for passports. The facial recognition 

technology, as Under Secretary Hutchinson already mentioned, is, 

in fact, pretty good on one-to-one, which is matching me with my 

passport, the traveler with the traveler’s document. The traveler, 

of course, goes through immigration and customs in many places, 

border control, before they leave their own country, entry controls 

in another country. At each of those border points, there is, of 

course, access to Interpol information, another layer of that onion, 

if you will. 

But ICAO was also concerned that some countries might want to 

do more and so they have also acknowledged that other countries 

might want to collect fingerprints, other countries might want to 

engage in further studying of iris scans. With respect to fingerprints— 

Senator SESSIONS. My time is about up— 

Ms. HARTY. I am sorry. 

Senator SESSIONS. Let me ask this. I understand ICAO took this 

option, but it is a no-deal option. 

Ms. HARTY. Well— 

Senator SESSIONS. You are not going to really help us identify 

whether or not the person coming in that airport is a fugitive from 

the United States that fled the country or was deported after having been convicted of a felony. It won’t pick that up because our 

database is not facial. Our database is fingerprint. As the former 

prosecutor knows, every policeman in America can access anybody 

and put their fingerprints in a system and on a short notice determine whether or not a warrant is out for his arrest. You can’t do 

that with a face. 

And these countries, it seems to me, have an interest, Mr. Secretary. They don’t want criminals coming into their country. They 

don’t want fugitives fleeing their country. Aren’t we making a big 

mistake not to push real hard right now to just make this a fingerprint standard? 

Mr. HUTCHINSON. Senator, we agree that, first of all, fingerprints 

should be a significant part of the international criteria for security. We have implemented finger scans through U.S. VISIT. So we 

have that protection in the United States. But it would also be 

helpful, as other countries issue passports and travel documents, 

that they put facial recognition in there, but also another biometric 

of finger scans or iris scans. Finger scans, obviously, because you 

have got databases of that collected of criminals around the world. 

ICAO did allow that as a secondary. We would like to move the 

international community to make that mandatory, as well, in the 

future. Obviously, we don’t have a consensus in the international 

15

community to do that at this time, but there certainly would be the 

law enforcement benefit to do that. 

Senator SESSIONS. The FBI Director, Mr. Mueller, said there has 

got to be interoperability and expansion of the system ourselves, 

working with the Department of Homeland Security, to be on the 

cutting edge of the use of fingerprints in all of its manifestations. 

I asked him about that—that is in response to my question—and 

he was firm that fingerprints had to be the critical part of the system, in his view. 

Mr. HUTCHINSON. We are in agreement on that. The chip standard that is set by ICAO has a sufficient capability to add additional 

biometrics as those standards are more refined. So, I mean, first 

of all, Congress set ICAO as the standard to follow. 

Senator SESSIONS. That was a Congressional act? 

Mr. HUTCHINSON. Yes, that was a Congressional act, to tie this 

to ICAO. 

Ms. HARTY. Yes. 

Mr. HUTCHINSON. And so ICAO— 

Senator SESSIONS. I am not surprised. 

[Laughter.] 

Mr. HUTCHINSON. —couldn’t do it unilaterally. We have got to do 

it together. 

Senator SESSIONS. Maybe we need to undo that. I mean, it is 

great to get their opinions and their feedback, but ultimately, it is 

our borders that we are monitoring. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I went over. 

Senator CHAMBLISS. Let me just, before we leave that and go to 

Senator Kyl, U.S. VISIT does require fingerprinting, correct? 

Mr. HUTCHINSON. Absolutely. 

Senator CHAMBLISS. And in that particular instance, we use 

those fingerprints to track potential criminals or somebody who has 

a criminal record and may be trying to get back in here. How does 

that correlate to the use of the visa waiver program? 

Mr. HUTCHINSON. Under U.S. VISIT, right now, all visa travelers, as they come into our ports of entry, our airports, will give 

their travel document. We will also check their biometric, their two 

finger scans to make sure it is the same person that the State Department, the consular office has issued the visa to, because they 

took the same biometric and we have it online transferred to our 

port of entry. So we have got a one-to-one check. In addition, we 

will check it against the databases for criminals, visa overstays, 

immigration violators, and terrorists. 

When we add the visa waiver countries on September 30, that 

same security fix will be in there. The only difference is that we 

do not have their identity frozen, or their identity verified by the 

issuance of visas at the consular offices. We check it and it is enrolled the first time and it is frozen whenever they come into our 

port of entry. 

So we use the fingerprints very effectively in U.S. VISIT. I think 

the only difference, what we are talking about, is if it was an international standard that if it was a French passport, for example, we 

would have the identity, the biometric, the fingerprint embedded in 

that French passport. That way, it is an additional security check 

that would be in place as they came in. That way, we can check 

16

the fingerprint of the person who is coming into that port of entry 

against the one who the passport was issued to, and that is a huge 

security benefit. 

So we have built the first layer. There are probably additional 

layers we can build in the future. 

Senator CHAMBLISS. Senator Kyl? 

Senator KYL. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Let me just pursue this 

same line of questioning. In the briefing to staff, I was informed 

the Department of State did not even raise at the ICAO meetings 

the use of the fingerprint as the biometric identifier. Is that correct? 

Ms. HARTY. Over five years ago ICAO, in its New Technologies 

Working Group (NTWG), began looking at biometrics for use in 

tying a person irrevocably to their document. The events of September 11, 2001 and the subsequent U.S. legislation for VWP countries to incorporate biometrics into their passports motivated increased activity in developing biometric studies and programs. In 

June of 2002, the ICAO NTWG endorsed unanimously the use of 

facial recognition as the globally interoperable biometric for machine-assisted identity confirmation with machine-readable documents. the BTWG also recognized that some ICAO member states 

might elect to use fingerprint and/or iris recognition as additional 

biometrics. Fingerprints were not favored as the primary biometric 

since many believed the technology raised social and privacy concerns. Furthermore, fingerprints are not currently collected as part 

of the passport application process; to collect fingerprints would require a new enrollment structure that would be expensive and 

would require in-person enrollment. The NTWG recognized that facial recognition could meet the business needs of most States in 

terms of verifying that the person carrying the passport is the person to whom the government issued the passport. In reaching these 

decisions, ICAO observed: •Photographs of the face do not disclose information that the 

person does not routinely disclose to the public. 

•The photograph is socially and culturally accepted internationally. 

•The public is aware of its use for identity verification purposes. 

• It is non-intrusive. 

•Many member States have a legacy database of facial images 

captured as part of the digitized production of passport photos, 

which can be encoded into facial templates and used for identity comparison. 

In May 2003 ICAO adopted a global, harmonized blueprint for 

the integration of facial recognition into passports. In May 2004, 

ICAO adopted refined standards for incorporating facial images 

into the chips to be included into the documents. 

Section 303 of the Enhanced Border Security Act of 2002 which 

required VWP countries to produce biometric passports relied on 

the ICAO standard; VWP countries have already invested considerable time and money in biometric passport programs based on the 

U.S. legal requirement and ongoing ICAO discussions of the issue. 

Inclusion of fingerprinting as a mandatory ICAO standard at this 

point would further delay the introduction of biometric passports 

17

and would also lead to a reciprocal requirement for U.S. citizens to 

provide fingerprints. 

Senator KYL. All right, because clearly, it is something that we 

would have wanted to pursue, it seems to me, for the reason that 

the Secretary just pointed out. What percentage, roughly, of the 

people coming into the United States today and the people leaving 

today are covered by U.S. VISIT? 

Mr. HUTCHINSON. Well, to give you an idea of the numbers, we 

have, I think it is 23 million visa travelers. We are adding 13 million visa waiver travelers just to our airports and seaports. That 

is 36 million. We have a couple hundred million that come in each 

year. Those are through our land ports of entry, which we will be 

having U.S. VISIT apply to by the end of this year at the 50 busiest ports. So we are gradually building on the land side. But right 

now, it is probably, all total, up to 25 percent would be my rough 

estimate. I would be glad to get you more specifics. 

Senator KYL. I realize it is a very rough estimate. The point I 

was trying to make is just in a notional way that maybe a quarter 

of the people are being checked today and it is going to take quite 

a long time for it to expand to the full number of people that we 

would like to have the U.S. VISIT program apply to, both entry 

and then exit. 

Any estimate with respect to how we are coming along on that, 

assuming you get the appropriations you need from Congress, how 

long it will take to get to 100 percent coverage? 

Mr. HUTCHINSON. Well, our deadline is the end of this year, 50 

land ports of entry, and then a comprehensive system by the end 

of 2005. That is going to be a very difficult, challenging deadline 

to meet. We are committed to doing that. And that will not give 

us necessarily a biometric check of every person who comes across 

the land borders. You can imagine the complexities there. But it 

will give us, hopefully, the capability of checking in, checking out 

every international visitor, which is a huge step forward in terms 

of determining visa overstays. 

Senator KYL. The key point that I would like to make to both of 

you is that there are questions about whether or not we have tried 

hard enough to get our friends in other countries to meet the compliance date. We understand that it is impossible to meet the date. 

We need more time. You have in place a series of checks, milestones to meet. I think it is critical that you supply that information to us on an ongoing basis so we know how it is going. Some 

members want to suspend the visa waiver for any country until it 

actually complies. I mean, that is the kind of thing you are facing 

here. So I think you have got to figure out a way to keep us informed of how well you are doing with both the carrot and the 

stick. 

I also want to ask you a question with regard to one country of 

particular concern. Ms. Harty, you were kind enough to respond 

yesterday to a letter that I had sent on May 5 regarding statistics 

for those who want to visit from Saudi Arabia, the statistics on the 

applications there, and it appears to me, based upon these statistics, that there is about an 85 percent visa grant rate at the 

present time. If that is incorrect, tell me. 

18

I don’t know how that compares to the rates in some other countries and I would like to ask you to give me some information in 

that regard. My understanding is that refusal rates, for example, 

for Egypt and Yemen before September 11 were about 40 percent, 

and if we are granting 85 percent of Saudi nationals at this point, 

that seems to me to be a very interesting statistic. Could you shed 

some light on that for me? 

Ms. HARTY. Sure. I would be happy to, sir. If you look at fiscal 

year 2001 of those statistics I gave you, the number of non-immigrant visas issued in fiscal year 2001, we issued 45,411 visas to 

Saudi nationals. In fiscal year 2003, which is the most recent, obviously, complete year that I have, we issued 9,862. You have seen 

such a precipitous drop-off in the number of Saudi travelers to this 

country. What you have seen, I think, in the largest measure is 

people who used to come here, as I have heard all over the country, 

sir, people who used to come here as students, people who used to 

come here for medical treatment, people who used to come for tourism. 

I will have to check it and dig down a little bit, sir, but my hunch 

here is that that less than 10,000 that we issued in fiscal year 2003 

represents people who are coming here in official capacities. We 

have, until fairly recently, done quite a bit of training of Saudi 

military officials in this country— 

Senator KYL. Excuse me for interrupting, but because of the 

time, really, my question, if I could, Mr. Chairman, if you would 

indulge me, with regard to these statistics, first of all, you have to 

add the two columns, issued and refusals overcome in order to get 

the total number granted, right? 

Ms. HARTY. Yes. I just couldn’t do the math quickly enough. 

Senator KYL. Right. And secondly, what I am focusing on is not 

how many Saudis want to come here and are granted a visa but 

how many refusals there are. 

Ms. HARTY. Right. No, no, I understand that. What I was getting 

at, the last point I would have made there, sir, is that these represent, I believe in large measure, folks that we had a U.S. Government interest in having in the country, the people we were bringing here to train and people on sort of official sponsorship of one 

kind or another. An awful lot of personal preference travel from 

Saudi Arabia is just gone. We are just not seeing it. But I can dig 

down for you, sir, and we will get you a little more. 

Senator KYL. Excuse me, Mr. Chairman. If I have additional 

questions—and I appreciate the information— 

Ms. HARTY. Of course. 

Senator KYL. I will give those to you in writing and you can respond. Thank you very much. 

Ms. HARTY. Okay. Thank you, sir. 

Senator CHAMBLISS. Senator Feinstein? 

STATEMENT OF HON. DIANNE FEINSTEIN, A U.S. SENATOR 

FROM THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA 

Senator FEINSTEIN. Thank you very much, and I am sorry I 

couldn’t be here. I had an amendment on the floor, Mr. Chairman, 

but I want to welcome Mr. Hutchinson and Ms. Harty to the Committee and use my time really to indicate to you, because you have 

19

been listening in the past and I very much appreciate that, I think 

the visa waiver program is the soft underbelly of our Nation’s 

guard against terrorism efforts. 

We know that slightly below 200 people who are criminals have 

used the program to come into the country. We know that among 

them were a number of terrorists, from Ramzi Yousef to Mr. 

Moussaoui. And we know that about 13 million people from 27 

countries come in. 

As a member of the Intelligence Committee, I happened 1 day to 

run across a classified FBI memo which discussed stolen travel documents from a visa waiver country, and I believe you know to what 

I am referring. Well, then right after that, shortly thereafter, I 

read the Office of Inspector General, the OIG report on the visa 

waiver program, which pointed out its weak management, its sloppy organization, really the inability to even know whether people 

leave the country. 

As I began to talk about it, of course, I began to get calls. Oh, 

you can’t do anything about it, you know. This will hurt our business. At the same time, those things that this Committee talked 

about, and I have been on the Immigration Subcommittee and the 

Judiciary Committee for 12 years, was the biometric passport, and 

I remember the discussions. We asked the Department, how long 

will it take, and they gave us a time and then we even built into 

that an extra period of time. 

Well, that time went by. We have extended it 1 year. Now we 

have another request to extend it another 2 years. I am really worried because of the specific nature and numbers of stolen travel 

documents, and particularly when they are counterfeit-proof, what 

is going to happen. So I am concerned about continuing a program 

where we can’t really, except by manual means, even intercept 

those fraudulent passports, according to the OIG report, and then 

very often when we do and it is a counterfeit passport, it is given 

back to the individual and the reason is so they can get back in 

their country. 

Well, it seems to me if you are using a stolen passport, there 

ought to be a penalty for that. I, for one, am not concerned about 

facilitating the user back to his or her country. It seems to me that 

person ought to be taken into custody, and if the laws need to 

change to do that, we ought to do it. But as long as we have a laissez-faire system with respect to the use of stolen passports, and I 

don’t believe for a minute that a user of a stolen passport doesn’t 

know that it is stolen. 

So I have been thinking, now should I stir the pot by introducing 

legislation to put a moratorium on the program until the management reforms called for by the OIG are in effect, until we know we 

have got the passport stipulations of the legislation in place, and 

until we can say to the people of America, we can account for everybody that comes into this country and we know they leave and 

we know they are legal and bona fide. If you would like to answer 

that, I would be happy to hear the answer to it. 

Mr. HUTCHINSON. Senator, I would be grateful for the opportunity. We share your concerns on security. Our response has been 

a very aggressive and, hopefully, thorough approach to enhancing 

the security in terms of our visa waiver country travelers, both by 

20

enrolling in U.S. VISIT effective September 30, and you did point 

up very appropriately the comments of the Inspector General. We 

take that report very seriously. I signed off on a response to each 

of the recommendations on May 27. 

Many of the criticisms that were leveled have been addressed. 

For example, the oversight, the visa program office has been established within my directorate. We are aggressively pursuing the site 

visits with the Department of State. We have completed 12 site visits of the visa waiver countries. Two are in progress. The rest are 

scheduled and will be completed by July 15. We are on target to 

complete the assessment, which will be the first assessment by the 

Department, by September 30. 

In terms of the passports, again, you are absolutely correct. That 

is a serious concern. That is one of the requirements to be a visa 

waiver country, they have good reporting capability for stolen passports. We have that information. When it is provided to us, it is 

given to our inspectors at the ports of entry. We certainly, if somebody travels here, I think there is a little bit of a misperception 

that we actually physically give it back to the traveler to return 

home. It is delivered separately to the law enforcement officials on 

the other end, is my understanding of it, and we certainly should 

not be giving it back to them. 

Senator FEINSTEIN. I think you ought to check that out, because 

Secretary Ridge was before us and he said that was the reason that 

the passports were given back to the individual. 

Also, just in this report, it indicates that even when the stolen 

serial numbers are known, unless it is manually picked up—and 

this report is just a month old—unless it is manually picked up, 

it goes by the by. 

Mr. HUTCHINSON. Correct, Senator. That needs to be improved. 

We are working on a data sharing arrangement with Interpol and 

our European colleagues. So there will be a database that will electronically transfer the stolen passport information. We do have, as 

they reported, it is put into our system. We do need to enhance 

that. That is one of the arrangements that we hope to have with 

our European colleagues in reference to Interpol. 

So again, I would simply agree with many of the security concerns that you expressed. I think you have to answer a fundamental question: Should you cancel a program or whether you 

should enhance the security to make it effective. Until Congress directs otherwise, we are working very hard to make it more secure. 

Senator FEINSTEIN. What should we do with someone who uses 

a forged or stolen passport? 

Mr. HUTCHINSON. I would—well, you have got a couple questions 

there. By and large, I think it should be presented for prosecution 

to the U.S. Attorney, and you certainly know, Senator, that many 

of the U.S. Attorneys have guidelines that they are not going to 

prosecute that case. And so then we are caught with the option of 

letting him go free in the United States. We are not going to do 

that, so we have to return him at that point. So prosecutorial 

guidelines are an issue. Of course, you have some circumstances 

that an asylum seeker would have a false passport. That has to be 

evaluated. So we have to make the—but from a law and order 

21

standpoint, I would love to see them prosecuted whenever they 

come in with that. 

Senator FEINSTEIN. Mr. Chairman, if you would just permit me, 

most asylum seekers aren’t necessarily from visa waiver countries. 

Visa waiver countries are really our strongest positive relationships. So it is really false use of the visa waiver passport. And 

when you have many thousand of them out on the market, you can 

be sure they are being used. Otherwise, why steal them if you are 

not going to sell them? Why steal them in lots of thousands, including other travel documents which then bolster the passport and 

make it impossible to pick that person up? That is why it is an insidious situation. 

Mr. HUTCHINSON. There is not hardly a greater tool that could 

be used by the terrorists. If they obtain stolen passports, they can 

utilize them, but they can also sell them on the market and make 

money. So they almost get a ‘‘two-fer’’ for stolen passports. That is 

one of the reasons, of course, the enrollment of the visa waiver 

country travelers in U.S. VISIT, taking their biometric when they 

come through, is an added security benefit. And as we were talking 

with Chairman Chambliss, we certainly hope that, eventually, we 

can require our visa waiver countries to actually have additional 

biometrics in their passports other than simply facial identification 

that would give us even a greater security capability. 

Senator FEINSTEIN. Would you support strengthening the law 

with respect to the use of a passport fraudulently in the visa waiver program? 

Mr. HUTCHINSON. Strengthen law on the use of a fraudulent 

passport? 

Senator FEINSTEIN. That is correct. 

Mr. HUTCHINSON. Well, I think that we could strengthen law, 

whether it is visa waiver or otherwise. I certainly believe that we 

can look at that and should look at ways to discourage and to penalize those that would intentionally use a false passport. 

Senator FEINSTEIN. Would you do that and make some recommendations to this Committee? 

Mr. HUTCHINSON. I would be happy to look at that and certainly 

work with the Department of State on that and provide a report 

to you. 

Ms. HARTY. If I could add just one line there, I would not only 

agree with Under Secretary Hutchinson, but I would like to see the 

law for the use of a U.S. passport which might be fraudulently obtained or used also strengthened with stronger prosecutorial guidelines. Some see the use of a U.S. passport obtained fraudulently as 

nothing worse than fishing without a license. That is a serious 

issue and we would love to see those prosecutorial guidelines 

strengthened, as well. 

Senator FEINSTEIN. Mr. Chairman, it is my view, and I would be 

interested in what Senator Sessions would think, since we are 

waiting for Senator Grassley, that if we are going to keep this program going, even in view of this report, and I don’t know, despite 

Mr. Hutchinson’s good management, I don’t know how effectively 

you can move in a month to solve a lot of these problems, but if 

we are going to keep it going and actually extend the deadline, it 

seems to me there ought to be a very strong penalty to use a fraudVerDate 0ct 09 2002 14:42 Jul 19, 2006 Jkt 028598 PO 00000 Frm 00025 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 S:\GPO\HEARINGS\28598.TXT SJUD4 PsN: CMORC
22

ulent passport, a fraudulent international driver’s license, a fraudulent Geneva Convention travel document, or any other document 

as part of the visa waiver program. And the individual that does 

should be picked up coming in, should be put in jail, and should 

be prosecuted, and we ought to send that message out. 

Senator CHAMBLISS. Let me say two things. First of all, before 

you got here, Secretary Hutchinson addressed the IG report and 

there have already been some corrections made, actually before, I 

think, the report came out. I know you and I had some conversations about that and I wanted you to be aware of some of those 

changes that have been made. 

Secondly, I don’t think there is any question but that anybody 

who uses a stolen or fraudulent passport seeking to come into the 

United States is coming here up to no good. Times have changed. 

It used to be that we didn’t need to be as concerned as we do now. 

We know that on September 11, we should have been more concerned about that. I think you are absolutely right that it behooves 

us to consider some strengthening of the criminal action that is 

available to prosecutors for folks who are caught using false stolen 

passports, as you say, driver’s licenses, Geneva Convention documents, whatever. 

I would be very receptive to any recommendations that either 

State or Homeland Security or the Justice Department has in that 

respect. I think it ought to come from all three of you. 

Senator SESSIONS. Mr. Chairman— 

Senator CHAMBLISS. Senator Sessions? 

Senator SESSIONS. Following up on Senator Feinstein’s suggestion, while we act like United States Attorneys get to set prosecutorial policy, they are appointed by the President of the United 

States to carry out his policies. Mr. Hutchinson was one. I served 

one 12 years. If the President says, prosecute document fraud 

cases, if the Department of Homeland Security goes to the Attorney 

General and says, we want to see some of these cases prosecuted, 

they will be prosecuted. 

Now, you go to the United States Attorney in Los Angeles and 

he thinks he is too big to prosecute a little case and he wants to 

prosecute a $100 million bank fraud. But I think that is the wrong 

way to think, because if nobody will prosecute these cases, they 

don’t get prosecuted. What are they doing every day? 

So I do think that we need some directives from the top. I think 

the way it should occur is that Secretary Ridge should talk with 

Attorney General Ashcroft, and Attorney General Ashcroft needs to 

tell some United States Attorneys to prosecute these cases, and I 

will tell you what will happen. They will start talking and then you 

will find out who made these false IDs and one person is making 

thousands normally. So it is not just one case. It can eliminate 

whole rings of fraudulent document cases and create an impression 

around the world that if you get caught in the United States with 

a false document, you are going to jail. And I think the tide can 

be turned easier than some people think. 

I will just say this. These cases don’t go to trial. It is not going 

to back up the whole court system. Most of them are going to plead 

guilty, Senator Feinstein. You have got them and the document is 

false. They obviously are not the same person. They have to plead 

23

guilty. Send them to some time in jail and move them out of the 

country. But the condition— 

Senator FEINSTEIN. Now, it is— 

Senator SESSIONS. —should be they should tell where they got 

that document so we can follow up on it. 

Senator CHAMBLISS. I think you are probably right that when 

they do catch them with them, they just don’t let them in the country and they send them back— 

Senator FEINSTEIN. Right. 

Senator CHAMBLISS. —and you are exactly right. We need to 

send a strong, clear message. If you try to come in here with a 

fraudulent, stolen passport, you are going to be prosecuted and you 

are going to jail. It is simple enough. It is much harder to enforce, 

though, I expect, Secretary. 

Does anyone else have any questions? We have got ten minutes 

left on a vote. 

[No response.] 

Senator CHAMBLISS. If not, Secretary Hutchinson, Secretary 

Harty, thank you very much for being here. We appreciate the 

work that you folks are doing down there. We know it is difficult 

and tedious, but there is no more important time in the history of 

our country for the work that you are now doing and we look forward to continuing to work with you. Thank you very much. 

The Subcommittee is adjourned. 

[Whereupon, at 12:20 p.m., the Subcommittee was adjourned.] 

[Questions and answers and submissions for the record follow.]

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