A bipartisan pair of senators on Tuesday reintroduced their bill to require the Department of Homeland Security to increase the percentages of passenger and cargo vehicles being screened by electronic inspection systems entering the U.S. at ports of entry.
However, unlike the legislation proposed in 2022, the new version of the Non-Intrusive Inspection Expansion Act (S. 1822) would give the DHS Customs and Border Protection (CBP) agency two more years to obtain the benchmark screening goals.
The bill would require CBP to scan at least 40 percent of passenger vehicles and at least 90 percent of commercial vehicles entering the U.S. at land ports of entry by the end of fiscal year 2026, which would be in September of that year. The bill introduced last summer by Sens. Gary Peters (D-Mich.) and John Cornyn (R-Texas) would have mandated CBP meet the scanning goals by the end of FY ’24.
CBP in 2021 awarded a combined $870 million in contracts for new non-intrusive inspection (NII) systems that can scan passenger and commercial vehicles in pre-primary inspection lanes as they approach a customs booth without requiring the vehicles to stop. The deployments of the NII systems have been slow, in large part to the accompanying civil works required to install the scanners, requiring the agency to delay its goal of getting to 40 percent of passenger vehicles and 70 percent of cargo-carrying vehicles scanned in pre-primary inspection lanes within the next few years.
The agency currently inspects 1 to 2 percent of passenger vehicles and about 15 percent of cargo conveyances at the border. CBP at one time hoped to get to 40 and 70 percent, respectively, this year.
CBP is acquiring low-energy drive-through portals to scan passenger vehicles from Astrophysics, Leidos [LDOS] and OSI Systems [OSIS] Rapiscan Systems division. The agency is purchasing multi-energy drive-through portals from Leidos, Rapiscan and Smiths Detection to scan trucks without requiring occupants in the cab to exit the vehicle.
The bill also requires CBP to examine the feasibility of scanning 10 percent of all outbound vehicles and meet this goal by the end of FY ’26. Traffic departing the U.S. through land ports of entry, particularly along the southern border, is used to conceal guns and money.
“Increasing the scanning rate of non-intrusive inspection systems at land ports of entry will strengthen our border security by helping these dedicated officers better identify contraband and better protect our communities from illicit drugs like fentanyl, while also enabling CBP to efficiently process legitimate commerce that keeps our economy moving,” Peters, chairman of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, said in a statement.