The bill would bar those from Iraq, Syria, Iran and the Sudan, or those who have visited those countries in the last five years, from traveling to the United States without a visa.
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The bill had bipartisan support, and passed through the house by a vote of 407 to 19.
All 38 countries would be required to issue their citizens new fraud-resistant “e-passports” that contain information like fingerprints. The scheme began in 1986 to boost tourism and over 20 million people visit the US under the program.
The US Senate is working on similar legislation limiting the visa waiver program.
According to a CNBC report, the legislation also threatens countries with expulsion from the visa waiver programme if there is no desired progress in sharing counter-terrorism information with the US.
A statement released Wednesday by the The National Iranian American Council said they are “deeply Concerned by House Passage Discriminatory Visa Waiver Program Bill”.
At Wednesday’s roundtable, senators met with top Homeland Security and State Department officials to assess the impact of changes to the Visa Waiver Program. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., and Jeff Flake, R-Ariz., which has not yet been scheduled for a vote. “While my colleagues and I are doing what we can to protect our country from terrorists, the recent terrorist attack in San Bernardino, California, should be an alarming wakeup call that the president must stop putting his personal political agenda before the nation’s safety and immediately implement a strategy to defeat ISIS”.
“This legislation will make it easier for law enforcement to vet those visitors coming from visa waiver countries, such as in Europe, to ensure that we’re not admitting those who have traveled to places like Iraq or Syria (to) link up with (the Islamic State)”. “Some folks focused on refugees that’s not really where the problem may be”, Casey said.
On the House proposal, Burr has said he wants to hear from immigration agencies about the practicality of requiring participating foreign countries to include biometric information in their passports.
The 38 countries in the visa waiver programme are Andorra, Australia, Austria, Belgium, Britain, Brunei, Chile, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Latvia, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Monaco, Malta, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Portugal, San Marino, Singapore, Slovakia, Slovenia, South Korea, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and Taiwan.
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Some conservatives floated the idea of a six-week extension of current federal spending levels in order to give negotiators more time to work out an agreement, but most Republicans said they would like to see a much shorter extension.
