The legislation would also authorize money for the Immigration and Naturalization Service to purchase machines that can read the cards.
The provisions are part of sweeping immigration legislation dubbed the Enhanced Border Security Act of 2001. Its sponsors said is intended to build on the anti-terrorism law President Bush signed last week.
"In strengthening the security of our borders, we must also safeguard the unobstructed entry of the more than 31 million persons who enter the United States legally each year as visitors, students and temporary workers," said Sen. Ted Kennedy, D-Mass., who chairs the Senate Judiciary immigration subcommittee.
Since 1996, the State Department has been reissuing border-crossing cards with electronic cards that feature fingerprints and data encrypted in magnetic strips. Congress has twice extended the deadline for Mexicans to apply for new cards, with the latest deadline passing on Oct. 1.
The new visas contain electronic features that are meant to curb fraud and forgeries. The cards permit Mexicans to enter the United States and travel within 25 miles of the border for up to 72 hours at a time.
The deadline would be extended for a year, but it was not immediately clear when the year would begin.
The bill would also:
- Extend information sharing among agencies about potential terrorists.
- Waive limits on hiring full-time border personnel and improve pay and benefits for Immigration and Naturalization Service workers.
- Eliminate a 45-minute deadline in which airport inspectors must clear arriving passengers.
- Prohibit students from countries that sponsor terrorism from obtaining visas, unless they get State Department clearance.
"The bill does not lock down our country as some would have us do," said Rep. John Conyers, D-Mich. "We have refused to impose unrealistic mandates or prohibitions on immigration that would damage our rich tradition as a nation of immigrants,"
