Government Reform chairman calls for visa office move

House Government Reform Committee Chairman Dan Burton, R-Ind., has thrown his weight behind shifting authority to issue visas to the proposed Homeland Security Department and out of its historic home in the State Department.

Burton's stand is a departure from President Bush's proposal, which would keep the visa office at the State Department but allow the new agency to offer guidelines.

Burton's panel marks up its portion of the homeland security legislation Thursday. The legislation goes before the International Relations and Judiciary committees today.

In a stinging letter to House Majority Leader Dick Armey, R-Texas, Tuesday night, Burton cited an NBC report alleging a U.S. embassy employee in Doha, Qatar, had sold 70 visas to Jordanian nationals for $10,000 apiece.

One of the Jordanians apparently was the roommate of two of the Sept. 11 hijackers. The State Department was planning to respond to the charge Wednesday.

Burton raised two other cases of what he called mishandling of visa matters by its officers and cover-up by the State Department, arguing in the letter that the visa function must be removed from the State Department's control altogether.

Burton thus joins forces with Rep. Dave Weldon, R-Fla., in calling for moving the visa office in the Bureau of Consular Affairs to the new department. A spokesman for the Government Reform Committee said both legislators are working to get the full committee to back the change.

"We are trying to preserve the framework the president has set and strengthen the department," said the spokesman.

The question of whether to move the visa office then would pass to Armey, who set Friday as the deadline for House committees to turn in markups of the president's proposal to his own ad hoc committee, which will decide on a final House version.

"There may be enough momentum in Government Reform to move it [the visa office] over" in the House version of the bill, said Paul Light, a senior fellow in governance studies at the Brookings Institution.

Light has testified in favor of the change, and said under section 403 of the president's bill, the new secretary of Homeland Security could issue regulations governing visa issuance through the Secretary of State.

"In practice this arrangement could be untenable--one Cabinet officer telling another Cabinet officer what to do. What Weldon is saying is: Why not just move the whole thing?" Light asked.

But Light noted that a lengthier visa issuance procedure would reverse the push in recent years to get the office to issue visas faster, because it was seen as slow and bureaucratic.

Although Light favors the change "from an organizational standpoint," he predicts the State Department will continue to resist.

The State Department "considers consular affairs [to be] core to its mission," Light observed. It believes the current director, Mary Ryan, assistant secretary of State for consular affairs, "is popular" for having improved its operation. So the department will argue "she should stay and improve it further."

Light predicted that no matter what the House does, "the Senate is more likely to defer to the wishes of the State Department." It remains to be seen if revelations of new problems in its visa system will shake the Senate's faith.