President George W. Bush signed the National Intelligence Reform Act on Dec. 17 into law — sans controversial provisions that had civil rights groups up in arms.

The proposed legislation’s primary intent, based on recommendations from the 9-11 Commission, was to overhaul U.S. intelligence systems after the failures leading up to the September 11 terrorist attacks. But House Republicans wanted to include provisions addressing immigrant issues into the final bill, insisting that it was “not an immigration issue. … It is a terrorist issue,” as House Speaker Dennis Hastert said.

One such clause would have allowed immigration officers to “order immigrants arriving in the U.S. or who have not been physically present in the U.S. continuously for the previous five-year period to be removed without further hearing or review.” But this would have given police justification for racial profiling, opponents said.

The House Republican-proposed law was a “cover for some of the worst anti-immigration provisions in the last decade,” said the American Civil Liberties Union.
The Bush administration “strongly” opposed these terms, and advised that Congress drop the more excessive provisos against immigrants and immigration.

After negotiations in a House-Senate conference committee, the final bill was worked out shortly before the 108th Congress came to a close.

“While the White House, House and Senate are to be praised for getting the overall intelligence reform legislation passed and enacted, we have only scratched the surface when it comes to addressing our broken immigration system,” said Douglas G. Rivlin, spokesman for the National Immigration Forum.