April 10, 2024

CORREA’S BORDER TECHNOLOGY LEGISLATION PASSES KEY HOUSE PANEL WITH BIPARTISAN SUPPORT, AWAITS FLOOR VOTE

The Bipartisan Emerging Innovative Border Technologies Act Would Require DHS Detail Areas Where High-Tech Solutions Can Enhance Border Security, Deliver Report to Congress

Fact Sheet (PDF) | Text of Legislation (PDF)

WASHINGTON — Today, Representative Lou Correa (D-CA), the top Democrat on the House Border Security and Enforcement Subcommittee, announced that his Emerging Innovative Border Technologies Act successfully passed out of the House Committee on Homeland Security with bipartisan support. The legislation was introduced last week alongside Representative Morgan Luttrell (R-TX) and now awaits a full floor vote in the House of Representatives.

The bipartisan piece of legislation would enhance border security operations by requiring the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to present a plan to Congress for integrating innovative technologies, like artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning, and nanotechnology, at the border.

“Border security means keeping drug and human traffickers away from our communities—and we can do that by ensuring those working on our nation’s frontlines have access to the best and most-advanced technology available,” Correa said. “This legislation is common-sense, and will allow Congress to better-understand how our officers can stop smugglers, as well as identify and respond when migrants are crossing in remote and deadly conditions. It’s why it received bipartisan support, and why it was passed out of the Homeland Security Committee today. I’m confident that my colleagues across the aisle and across Congress will come together to get this legislation passed through the full House as soon as possible.”

The legislation was introduced after DHS’ announcement of its “Artificial Intelligence Roadmap” last month. The roadmap details DHS’s 2024 plans, including to test uses of the technologies that deliver meaningful benefits to the American public and advance homeland security, while ensuring that individuals’ privacy, civil rights, and civil liberties are protected.

Specifically, the Emerging Innovative Border Technologies Act would: 

  • Require the Secretary of Homeland Security, within 180 days, to submit a comprehensive plan to Congress to identify, integrate, and deploy new, innovative, disruptive, or other emerging technologies into border security operations. 
  • Authorize one or more CBP Innovation Teams to research and adapt commercial technologies that are new, innovative, or disruptive into border security operations to address both capability gaps and urgent mission needs and assess their potential outcomes.
  • Require each CBP Innovation Team to have both operating procedures that clarify roles and responsibilities within such team with respect to DHS and non-Federal partners as well as protocols for entering agreements to rapidly transition technologies into new or existing programs of record.

You can read Correa’s announcement of this legislation HERE. You can find a fact sheet on this legislation HERE. You can read the full text of the legislation HERE. 

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