The United States shares a 5,525 mile border with Canada and a 1,989 mile border with Mexico. Our maritime border includes 95,000 miles of shoreline and navigable waterways as well as a 3.4 million square mile exclusive economic zone. All people and goods legally entering into the United States must be processed through an air, land, or sea port of entry. Many international airports are dispersed throughout the United States. Each year, more than 500 million people legally enter our country. Some 330 million are non-citizens; more than 85 percent enter via land borders, often as daily commuters. An enormous volume of trade also crosses our borders every day-some $1.35 trillion in imports and $1 trillion in exports were processed in 2001.
America historically has relied heavily on two vast oceans and two friendly neighbors for border security, and on the private sector for most forms of domestic transportation security. The increasing mobility and destructive potential of modern terrorism has required the United States to rethink and rearrange fundamentally its systems for border and transportation security. Indeed, we must now begin to conceive of border security and transportation security as fully integrated requirements because our domestic transportation systems are intertwined inextricably with the global transport infrastructure. Virtually every community in America is connected to the global transportation network by the seaports, airports, highways, pipelines, railroads, and waterways that move people and goods into, within, and out of the Nation. We therefore must promote the efficient and reliable flow of people, goods, and services across borders, while preventing terrorists from using transportation conveyances or systems to deliver implements of destruction.
Major Initiatives
Ensure accountability in border and transportation security. The President has proposed to Congress that the principal border and transportation security agencies-the Immigration and Naturalization Service, U.S. Customs Service, U.S. Coast Guard, Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service, and Transportation Security Agency-be transferred to the new Department of Homeland Security. The new Department also would control the issuance of visas to foreigners through the Department of State and would coordinate the border-control activities of all federal agencies that are not incorporated within the new Department.
Create "smart borders." Our future border management system will be radically different from today's which focuses on linear borders. It will create a "border of the future" that will be a continuum framed by land, sea, and air dimensions, where a layered management system enables greater visibility of vehicles, people, and goods coming to and departing from our country. This border of the future will provide greater security through better intelligence, coordinated national efforts, and unprecedented international cooperation against the threats posed by terrorists, the implements of terrorism, international organized crime, illegal drugs, illegal migrants, cyber crime, and the destruction or theft of natural resources. At the same time, the border of the future will be increasingly transparent to the efficient flow of people, goods, and conveyances engaged in legitimate economic and social activities. The federal government will allocate resources in a balanced way to manage risk in our border and transportation security systems while ensuring the expedient flow of goods, services, and people.
Internationally, the United States will seek to screen and verify the security of goods and identities of people before they can harm to the international transportation system and well before they reach our shores or land borders. The Department of Homeland Security would improve information provided to consular officers so that individual applicants can be checked in comprehensive databases and would require visa-issuance procedures to reflect threat assessments. The United States will require visitors to present travel documentation that includes biometric identifiers. The United States will also work with international organizations and the private sector to improve the security of people, goods, conveyances traveling internationally, and the ports that they use. The United States will work with other countries and international organizations to improve the quality of travel documents and their issuance to minimize their misuse by smugglers and terrorist organizations. We will also assist other countries, as appropriate, to improve their border controls and their coordination with us. Finally, we will work closely with Canada and Mexico to increase the security of our shared borders while facilitating commerce within the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) area.
At our borders, the Department of Homeland Security would verify and process the entry of people in order to prevent the entrance of contraband, unauthorized aliens, and potential terrorists. The Department would increase the information available on inbound goods and passengers so that border management agencies can apply risk-based management tools. The Department would develop and deploy the statutorily required entry-exit system to record the arrival and departure of foreign visitors and guests. It would develop and deploy non-intrusive inspection technologies to ensure rapid and more thorough screening of goods and conveyances. And it would monitor all our borders in order to detect illegal intrusions and intercept and apprehend smuggled goods and people attempting to enter illegally.
The Department of Homeland Security proposed by the President will also build an immigration services organization that administers immigration laws in an efficient, expeditious, fair, and humane manner. The Department would ensure that foreign visitors comply with entry conditions. The Department, in cooperation with colleges and universities, would track and monitor international students and exchange visitors. The Department would enter into national law enforcement databases the names of high-risk aliens who remain in the United States longer than authorized and, when warranted, deport illegal aliens.
Increase the security of international shipping containers. Containers are an indispensable but vulnerable link in the chain of global trade; approximately 90 percent of the world's cargo moves by container. Each year, nearly 50 percent of the value of all U.S. imports arrives via 16 million containers. The core elements of this initiative are to establish security criteria to identify high-risk containers; pre-screen containers before they arrive at U.S. ports; use technology to inspect high-risk containers; and develop and use smart and secure containers. The United States will place inspectors at foreign seaports to screen U.S.-bound sea containers before they are shipped to America, initially focusing on the top 20 "mega" ports (including Rotterdam, Antwerp, and Le Havre), because roughly 68 percent of the 5.7 million sea containers entering the United States annually arrive from these seaports.
Implement the Aviation and Transportation Security Act of 2001. On November 19, 2001, the President signed into law the Aviation and Transportation Security Act of 2001. The act established a series of challenging but important milestones toward achieving a secure air travel system. More broadly, however, the act fundamentally changed the way transportation security will be performed and managed in the United States. The continued growth of the world economy-and, in particular, commercial transportation and tourism-depends upon effective transportation security measures being efficiently applied. The act recognized the importance of security for all forms of transportation and related infrastructure elements. This cannot be accomplished by the federal government in isolation and requires strengthened partnerships among federal, state, and local government officials and the private sector to reduce vulnerabilities and adopt the best practices available today. Protection of critical transportation assets such as ports, pipelines, rail, and highway bridges, and more than 10,000 FAA facilities is another key requirement established by the act. Additionally, the Transportation Security Administration will coordinate federal efforts to secure the national airspace-an essential medium for travel, commerce, and recreation.
The federal government will work with the private sector to upgrade security in all modes of transportation. Areas of emphasis will include: commercial aviation and other mass transportation systems; intermodal transportation; hazardous and explosive materials; national airspace; shipping container security; traffic-management systems; critical infrastructure; surety of transportation operators and workers; linkages with international transportation systems; and information sharing. We will utilize existing modal relationships and systems to implement unified, national standards for transportation security.
Recapitalize the U.S. Coast Guard. The Budget for Fiscal Year 2003 requested the largest increase in the history of the U.S. Coast Guard. The Budget for Fiscal Year 2004 will continue to support the recapitalization of the U.S. Coast Guard's aging fleet, as well as targeted improvements in the areas of maritime domain awareness, command and control systems, and shore-side facilities. The United States asks much of its U.S. Coast Guard and we will ensure the service has the resources needed to accomplish its multiple missions. We saw the dedication and the versatility of the U.S. Coast Guard in the aftermath of September 11, a performance that vividly demonstrated the U.S. Coast Guard's vital contribution to homeland security. Nevertheless, the U.S. Coast Guard is also responsible for national defense, maritime safety, maritime mobility, and protection of natural resources, and would continue to fulfill these functions in the Department of Homeland Security.
Reform immigration services. The Administration will complete reform of the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS), separating the agency's enforcement and service functions within, as the President has proposed, the new Department of Homeland Security. This reform aims to ensure full enforcement of the laws that regulate the admission of aliens to the United States and to improve greatly the administration of immigration benefits to more than 7 million annual applicants. Americans have long cherished our identity as a nation of immigrants. This reform will ensure that every applicant's case is reviewed in a timely and courteous way. Finally, the Department of Homeland Security would implement the Enhanced Border Security and Visa Entry Reform Act, including the requirement that foreign visitors possess travel documents with biometric information.
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