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However, only if the asylum officer believes that the

person being interviewed does have a credible fear of perse-

cution will that person be permitted to present a claim for

asylum.  He or she will probably be in detention until

asylum is granted.

Those procedures are also being used to bar ordinary

business travelers and tourists with valid visas from enter-

ing the country.  For example, if an immigration officer

suspects that someone intends to enter the United States for

reasons other than what he or she had explained to the U.S.

Embassy abroad when applying for the visa, the officer can

order the person removed.  The officer need not prove to any

judge or other tribunal that suspicions are well founded;

the decision is the officer's, subject to a cursory paper

review by the supervisor.  Finally, the person who is re-

moved, even an executive business traveler who is on a

legitimate buying trip and has a valid multiuse visa, will

be returned to his or her home country and barred from

reentering the United States for five years.31

Problems with the New Law

At first glance, the amendments to the Immigration and

Nationality Act may seem reasonable.  Filing deadlines, for

example, apply to many areas of the law, so why not to

asylum applications?  Furthermore, why should the United

States not closely scrutinize people arriving at her door

with no documents or with false documents?  When the United

States finds people here without permission, why not quickly

ask them what they want and, if they cannot explain them-

selves, turn them away as the legislation demands?

The answer is threefold.  First, the one-year filing

deadline and expedited removal procedures will impede the

progress made by the INS regulatory reforms.  Indeed, the

expedited removal provisions have already proved wasteful.

In some regions of the United States, asylum officers, who

customarily complete three affirmative asylum interviews and

the accompanying paperwork in one day, can complete only one

interview a day when they must travel to distant detention

centers to conduct credible fear interviews.32  Similarly,

once the deadline becomes effective, the INS will have to

divert resources from adjudicating the merits of asylum

claims to adjudicating the timeliness of filing.  That is

why Doris Meissner, commissioner of the INS, vehemently

opposed the imposition of a deadline, saying that it would