US immigration can't trace overstayers
October 12 2009 by Liam Clifford
Calls by congress to introduce an electronic entry and exit system.
Some eight years after the attacks of Sept. 11th and despite repeated attempts by Congress, US immigration is yet to establish a system to verify that foreign visitors have in fact left the country.
The subject was under renewed focus today as it came to light that Hosam Maher Husein Smadi, a 19-year old Jordanian, had not left when meant to and overstayed his US tourist visa, he was in court accused of plotting to blow up an unnamed Dallas skyscraper.
Last year, over 2.9 million visitors on temporary US tourist visas, such as Smadi’s came through US immigration and into America, but never officially left. Officials say they can neither confirm nor refute the information, but they suspect several hundred thousand people overstayed their US tourist visas last year.
Over all officials have said that just under half of the estimated 11 million illegal immigrants in the US have come into the country on legal visas and just simply overstayed.
Smadi’s case brought renewed pleas from both sides in Congress for the Department of Homeland Security to complete and put into place an electronic exit monitoring system.
Texas Representative Lamar Smith, the only senior Republican in the House Judiciary Committee, has said that the Smadi case needs to be addressed by US immigration and “leads to serious questions being asked about the real need for an entry and exit system.”
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