from Immigration News Briefs (INB)

In addition to measures concerning intelligence information- sharing and reorganization, the 245-page bill includes provisions for increasing the number of full-time border patrol agents by 10,000 over five years and the number of full-time Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) investigators by 4,000 over five years. It also orders an increase in the number of beds available for immigration detainees by 40,000 in the same time period, and establishes minimum federal standards for birth certificates and driver licenses. [Govexec.com Daily Briefing 12/9/04]

Other measures in the bill will loosen standards for Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) surveillance warrants, allow the Justice Department to more easily detain suspects without bail and expand the criteria that constitute "material support" to terrorist groups. The bill does include one measure sought by civil liberties advocates: a Privacy and Civil Liberties Board, designed to safeguard individuals' rights. [WP 12/8/04, 12/10/04; NIF Update 12/8/04]

After prior versions of the bill were passed by the Senate on Oct. 6 and the House on Oct. 8 [see INB 10/16/04], a conference committee spent two months fighting mostly over anti-immigrant provisions included in the House version. Most of the representatives who opposed the final bill did so because they objected to the removal of the anti-immigrant provisions; they were outvoted after President George W. Bush promised, in a Dec. 7 letter, that he would consider border security provisions in 2005. "I look forward to working with the Congress early in the next session to address these issues, including improving our asylum laws and standards for issuing driver's licenses," Bush wrote. In a closed Republican meeting on Dec. 7, House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert (R-IL) apparently also promised to include the immigration provisions in a "must-pass" legislative package early next year--most likely attached to a bill seeking $70 billion for military and "reconstruction" spending in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Rep. James Sensenbrenner (R-WI), who led the fight to keep the anti-immigrant measures in the bill, has vowed to introduce a new bill on Jan. 4--the first day of the new Congress--which will include a national ban on issuing state driver licenses to undocumented immigrants, a higher standard of proof for asylum- seekers and closure of a three-mile gap in a fence along the California-Mexico border. Sensenbrenner said his proposal will not include a Bush-supported "guest worker" plan for immigrants. [HC 12/9/04; NIF Update 12/8/04; WT 12/8/04; WP 12/8/04]