Opinion: Limiting visas

A rule change proposed by the Immigration and Naturalization Service to limit the number of days visitors to the United States may stay is meeting with some harsh criticism and deservedly so.

The pending regulation would limit non-immigrant visitor visas to a maximum of six months, down from one year. It would also give local immigration officials at airports and other ports of entry the discretion to place a much shorter cap on the number of days a visitor can remain in the United States -- even limiting the visit to a matter of days. Current INS rules grant visitors a minimum six months stay. According to an INS spokesman, the current system is way too generous. Statistics, he says, demonstrate that most tourists are able to accomplish their purpose within 30 days. And under the new rules, it is expected that most visitor visas will be granted for about that time period.

The new strictures are intended to heighten security at our borders, giving the INS greater control over the amount of time an alien can remain here. But as U.S. Sen. Bob Graham, D-Fla., writes in a letter to INS Commissioner James Ziglar: "A bona-fide winter resident of Florida will not be a security threat by staying in our state for five months. A bona-fide terrorist has the potential to be a security threat by staying in our state for even a few hours."

Offering access to American soil for weeks rather than months isn't likely to deter someone bent on harming Americans. Obviously, we learned a painful lesson from Sept. 11. -- not everyone who comes here does so to enjoy our sights and society. Our Swiss cheese system of immigration controls is woefully inadequate to address these new threats and we clearly have to enhance border security. But the answer isn't to create a new bureaucratic mess at America's ports of entry, where low-level INS employees would have the authority to make snap judgments about the validity of a visitor's stated purpose for his or her trip and the amount of time it is expected to take. Careful screening before visas are issued is the best way to protect American shores.

Graham is worried that busy immigration officials called on to make on-the-spot determinations on visitors will inevitably lead to a default to a 30-day maximum for nearly all visitors. He calls this "an unworkable and chaotic proposal," and one that will lead to the INS being called to process "thousands of requests for extensions," diverting the agency from more important duties.

By the end of the public comment period on May 13, the INS had received more than 10,000 comments on the new rule. The agency will now review these over the next month or two, issuing a final rule by the middle of July. Ziglar should take the concerns of Graham to heart. The changes proposed offer only speculative increases in national security and could just as easily prove counterproductive. At the same time, Florida's international visitors, snowbirds and those traveling on business could be dissuaded from making the journey. Who would want to invest the time and money to make an overseas trip when there is always the possibility that some INS worker at the airport will cut one's visit short?

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