Statements on Introduced Bills and Joint Resolutions

Floor Speech

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Ms. COLLINS. Mr. President, I rise to introduce the SAFE Port Reauthorization Act of 2010. This bill extends important programs that protect our nation's critical shipping lanes and seaports from attack and sabotage.

The SAFE Port Reauthorization Act of 2010 is co-sponsored by my colleague, Senator MURRAY. Senator MURRAY and I drafted the original SAFE Port Act in 2005, leading to its enactment in 2006. I am pleased that she has again joined me to extend and strengthen this important law. Several stakeholders have expressed their support for our efforts, including the American Association of Port Authorities, the National Retail Federation, and the National Association of State Boating Law Administrators.

The scope of what we need to protect is broad. America has 361 seaports--each vital links in our Nation's transportation network. Our seaports move more than 95 percent of overseas trade. In 2009, U.S. ports logged 68,000 ports-of-call by foreign-flagged vessels, bringing 9.8 million shipping containers to our shores.

The largest 21 ports handle 98 percent of the shipping container traffic. Indeed, nearly 60 percent of all container-ship calls are made in just three States--California, New York, and Georgia--but this container traffic arrives at many points across the United States, from Maine to Hawaii.

Coming from a State with three international cargo ports--including
Portland, the largest port by tonnage in New England--I am keenly aware of the importance of seaports to our national economy and to the communities in which they are located.

Because seaports are flourishing, our harbors operate as vital centers of economic activity; they also represent vulnerable targets. Shipping containers are a special source of concern.

A single obscure container, hidden among a ship's cargo of several hundred containers, could be used to hide a squad of terrorists or a dirty bomb. In other words, a container could be turned into a 21st-Century Trojan horse.

The shipping container's security vulnerabilities are so well known that it has also been called ``the poor man's missile,'' because for only a few thousand dollars, a terrorist could ship one across the Atlantic or the Pacific to a U.S. port.

The contents of such a container don't have to be something as complex as a nuclear or biological weapon. As former Customs and Border Protection Commissioner Robert Bonner told The New York Times, a single container packed with readily available ammonium sulfate fertilizer and a detonation system could produce ten times the blast that destroyed the Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City.

Whatever the type of weapon, an attack on one or more U.S. ports could cause great loss of life and large numbers of injuries; it could damage our energy supplies and infrastructure; it could cripple retailers and manufacturers dependent on incoming inventory; and it could hamper our ability to move and supply American military forces fighting against the forces of terrorism.

I have had the opportunity to visit seaports across the country and, as one looks at some of the nation's busiest harbors, one sees what a terrorist might call ``high-value targets.'' Ferries move thousands of people daily. Large and sprawling urban populations are situated around the ports. At some locations, there are large sports stadiums nearby as well.

Add up those factors and one realizes immediately the death and destruction that a ship carrying a container hiding a weapon of mass destruction could inflict at a single port.

Of course, a port can be a conduit for an attack as well as a target. A container with dangerous cargo could be loaded on a truck or rail car, or have its contents unpacked at the port and distributed to support attacks elsewhere. In 2008, we saw that the port in Mumbai, India, offered the means for a gang of terrorists to launch an attack on a section of the city's downtown. That attack killed more than 170 people and wounded hundreds more.

To address these security threats, our bill would reauthorize the SAFE Port Act cargo security programs that have proven to be successful: the Automated Targeting System that identifies high-risk cargo; the Container Security Initiative that ensures high-risk cargo containers are inspected at ports overseas before they travel to the United States; and the Customs-Trade Partnership Against Terrorism, or C-TPAT, that provides incentives to importers to enhance the security of their cargo from point of origin to destination.

The bill would also strengthen the C-TPAT program by providing new benefits, including voluntary security training to industry participants and providing participants an information sharing mechanism on maritime and port security threats, and by authorizing Customs and Border Protection to conduct unannounced inspections to ensure that security practices are robust. The cooperation of private industry is vital to protecting supply chains, and C-TPAT is a necessary tool for securing their active cooperation in supply chain security efforts.

The bill also would extend the competitive, risk-based, port security grants that have provided $1.5 billion to improve the security of our ports. An authorization for the next 5 years at $400 million per year is a continued major commitment of resources, but it is fully proportional to what is at stake, and a priority that we cannot ignore.

In addition to continuing and strengthening critical programs, the bill also would expand the America's Waterway Watch Program to promote voluntary reporting of suspected terrorist activity or suspicious behavior against a vessel, facility, port, or waterway. While the program has proven valuable in ports throughout the country, the legislation would broaden its scope and increase public awareness through boating education and industry stakeholder meetings coordinated by the Coast Guard and its Reserve and Auxiliary components. The America's Waterway Watch Program has received strong endorsements from numerous professional boating associations for the enhanced situational awareness it will bring to our nation's ports and waterways.

Our bill would protect citizens from frivolous lawsuits when they report, in good faith, suspicious behavior that may indicate terrorist activity against the United States. It builds on a provision from the 2007 homeland security law that encourages people to report potential terrorist threats directed against transportation systems by protecting people from those who would misuse our legal system in an attempt to chill the willingness of citizens to come forward and report possible dangers.

In addition, this legislation enhances the research and development efforts to improve maritime cargo security. The demonstration project authorized by this law would study the feasibility of using composite materials in cargo containers to improve container integrity and deploy next generation sensors.

This legislation also addresses the difficulties in administering the mandate of x-raying and scanning for radiation all cargo containers overseas that are destined for the United States by July 2012. Until x-ray scanning technology is proven effective at detecting radiological material and not disruptive of trade, requiring the x-raying of all U.S. bound cargo, regardless of its risk, at every foreign port, is misguided and provides a false sense of security. It would also impose onerous restrictions on the flow of commerce, costing billions with little additional security benefit.

Under the original provisions of the SAFE Port Act, all cargo designated as high-risk at foreign ports is already scanned for radiation and x-rayed. In addition, cargo entering the U.S. at all major seaports is scanned for radiation. These security measures currently in place are part of a layered, risk-based method to ensure cargo entering the U.S. is safe.

This legislation would eliminate the deadline for 100 percent x-raying of containers if the Secretary of Homeland Security certifies the effectiveness of individual security measures of that layered security approach. This is a more reasonable method to secure our cargo until a new method of x-raying containers is proven effective.

The SAFE Port Reauthorization Act of 2010 will help us to continue an effective, layered, coordinated security system that extends from point of origin to point of destination, and that covers the people, the vessels, the cargo, and the facilities involved in our maritime commerce. It will continue to address a major vulnerability in our homeland security critical infrastructure while preserving the flow of goods on which our economy depends.

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