Air Transport Association Calls for Involvement in DHS Development of the US-VISIT Exit Program Process

WASHINGTON, June 28 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- The Air Transport Association (ATA), the trade association for the leading U.S. airlines, today testified before the U.S. House of Representatives Homeland Security Subcommittee on Border, Maritime and Global Counterterrorism on the U.S. Visitor and Immigrant Status Indicator Technology (US-VISIT) Exit -- a program to collect biometric information from non-U.S. citizens departing from the United States.

Airlines support the US-VISIT Exit program and want to assist collaboratively in its effective implementation, just as we did with the development of US-VISIT Entry. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) needs to reconsider its plan to simply reassign its responsibility to collect biometric data to the airlines.

"DHS and its counterparts are responsible for this country's national security and immigration programs, and should not unload this responsibility on private corporations because it fits their 'business plan,'" said ATA President and CEO James C. May. "Congress has made it abundantly clear -- six legislative mandates since 1996 -- that it wants the federal government to implement entry and exit control programs."

"If, as DHS proposes, passengers are required to check in at ticket counters and airlines are required to collect biometrics during the check-in process, then efficient, off-airport passenger check in will disappear, to be replaced by lines of frustrated passengers -- airlines are working to shorten and eliminate lines, not add them," May continued. "Quite frankly, the simplest solution is to collect biometrics at the TSA checkpoint."

ATA members and their affiliates transport more than 90 percent of all U.S. airline passenger and cargo traffic.