Border Improvement and Immigration Act

The California Chamber of Commerce supported the "Border Improvement and Immigration Act of 1999," which became law as the Immigration and Naturalization Service Data Management and Improvement Act of 2000.

This measure originally would have exempted land borders and seaports from the application of Section 110 of the Illegal Immigration and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996 and would have initiated a feasibility study to evaluate all the issues surrounding the entry and exit control system, including how it could be implemented without increasing border delays and congestion; and increase resources for border control and enforcement activities.

Section 110 required the Immigration and Naturalization Service to develop a system that would document the entry and departure of "every alien" arriving and leaving the United States. Thus, people entering the leaving the United States to and from Canada and Mexico would need to be stopped by the INS in each direction to have information collected from them. The California Chamber of Commerce believed that Section 110 could cause harm to California's trade and tourism with Canada and Mexico.

Application of Section 110 on the U.S.-Canada border would have been extremely costly for Americans and Canadians alike, leading to long delays in the movement of people, vehicles and goods across our borders. In terms of U.S.-Canada two-way traffic, over 125 million people annually who were not subject to entry and exit control, would be subject to new time consuming procedures. It would have lengthened the stop required upon entry to the United States from Canada, and would have created a new requirement for every northbound vehicle to stop on the U.S. side to document the exit of each individual. The delays that would result would damage the largest trading relationship in the world, which sees billions of dollars a day in goods and services across the U.S.-Canada border.

Although Canada is not on the California border, as our state's second largest trading partner, a good deal of our $16.1 billion in annual trade would have been affected as most U.S. exports to its neighbors are shipped by truck. The $1.7 billion in California fresh produce and other agricultural products that Canadians buy every year would be especially vulnerable to damage as a result of these delays.

The implications on the Mexican border would be even more directly visible to Californians. In 2007, California's merchandise exports to Mexico reached $18.3 billion, supporting over 200,000 jobs. Each year about 4 million Mexicans visit California as tourists, staying at least one night and spending $1.3 billion. California's tourism industry benefits from the smooth flow of people across the border to shop or for entertainment.